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| UKRAINIAN GROUND FORCES/via REUTERS |
Using weapons supplied by NATO, Kyiv targets Moscow’s weak points and supply lines
Ukrainian forces have inflicted significant losses on Russia’s larger and better-armed military—blunting advances by Moscow on several fronts—using insurgency-style tactics that take advantage of their grab bag of available weapons, say military officers from NATO countries.
In a war of ambushes and skirmishes, mobile Ukrainian units have used their knowledge of the local battlefield and sought to hit Russian forces at their weak points, striking armored columns on main roads and undermining their ability to fight by disrupting supplies, say Western observers.
But the Ukrainians’ approach is more suited to choking the invading Russians in places they overextended than to mounting a major counteroffensive against massed forces, they say. That raises questions about Kyiv’s ability to dislodge Russian forces from territory they have occupied in the country’s south and east.
Ukrainians’ greatest hope of success against larger Russian forces, Western observers say, is in crimping the flow of Russian supplies of ammunition, fuel and food, which would limit Moscow’s ability to fight or hold ground.
“The Ukrainians are fighting a smart fight with a force that is far less well equipped” than the Russians, said retired Gen. Philip Breedlove, a former supreme allied commander in Europe for the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. “They are fighting a skirmishing and rear-attack fight that is just bleeding the Russian army.”
NATO leaders, including President Biden, are set to meet in Brussels on Thursday and are expected to discuss how to boost support for Ukraine. Mr. Biden recently approved $1 billion in new military aid to Kyiv, including, for the first time, lethal drones. The U.S. has begun shipping 100 tube-launched Switchblade drones that circle in the sky and then smash into targets.
Ukrainian fighters say they need a constant flow of antitank weapons, also included in the new package, to continue to inflict losses on Russian forces. --->READ MORE HERE
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| AP |
Ukraine said it retook a strategically important suburb of Kyiv on Tuesday, as Russian forces squeezed other areas near the capital and pressed their attack on the embattled southern port of Mariupol.
Explosions and bursts of gunfire shook Kyiv, and black smoke rose from a spot in the north. Intensified artillery fire could be heard from the northwest, where Russia has sought to encircle and capture several suburban areas of the capital, a crucial target.
Residents sheltered at home or underground under a 35-hour curfew imposed by city authorities that runs to Wednesday morning.
Russian forces also continued their siege of Mariupol after the southern port city’s defenders refused demands to surrender, with fleeing civilians describing relentless bombardments and corpses lying in the streets. But the Kremlin’s ground offensive in other parts of the country advanced slowly or not at all, knocked back by lethal hit-and-run attacks by the Ukrainians.
Early Tuesday, Ukrainian troops drove Russian forces out of the Kyiv suburb of Makariv after a fierce battle, Ukraine’s Defense Ministry said. The regained territory allowed Ukrainian forces to retake control of a key highway and block Russian troops from surrounding Kyiv from the northwest. --->READ MORE HEREFollow links below to relevant/related stories:
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