5 MINUTES AGO! UKRAINE CUTS OFF Russian Army in CRIMEA by BLOWING UP Crimean Bridge with New F-16s!
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What’s the latest on the battle in Crimea between Ukraine and Russia?
Since the arrival of American long-range ATACMS missiles, the Ukrainian army has claimed to be decimating Russian air defenses in Crimea as part of a campaign to cut off its logistical routes.
Making Crimea a liabilty rather than an asset: This is the objective that the Ukrainian army seems to have been pursuing for several months, in accordance with directives from President Volodymyr Zelensky, who has made it the year’s strategic priority, despite the intensification of Russian pressure on the eastern and northern fronts.
A rear base, a hub, an outpost: The peninsula annexed in 2014 in defiance of international law remains an essential part of Russia’s military presence in Ukraine, and Moscow’s most precious prize. But its relative geographical isolation could also be its Achilles heel. Cutting off the narrow logistical routes linking it to Russia would make the situation untenable for troops deployed there, as well as for those holding the southern oblasts of Kherson, Zaporizhzhia and Donetsk. The Ukrainian army and special forces have been working on this since the start of the large-scale conflict.
The Kerch Bridge, a logistical route of the utmost strategic and symbolic importance at the time, has therefore been damaged twice, in October 2022 and July 2023. The headquarters of Russia’s Black Sea fleet in Sevastopol was bombed on September 22, 2023; more than a third of its ships were disabled, according to the Ukrainian navy’s count, and the rest had to retreat to the less exposed ports of Novorossiysk and Feodosia. But the situation accelerated in the spring, with the arrival of American ATACMS (Army Tactical Missile System) missiles with a range of 300 km, twice that of the version supplied until then, leaving no region of Crimea invulnerable.
Read more Subscribers only US includes long-range ATACMS missiles in arms deliveries to Ukraine
Since then, there has been an almost daily barrage of fire, particularly at Russia’s S-300 and S-400 air defense batteries, costly flagships of the Russian military-industrial complex. According to the Ukrainian army’s Center for Strategic Communication, about 15 were hit between mid-April and mid-June in Crimea.
