Vancouver Sun ePaper

KEY BREAKTHROUGH FOR UKRAINE.

TOM BALMFORTH

KYIV • Ukrainian forces achieved their biggest breakthrough in the south of the country since the war began, bursting through the front and advancing rapidly along the Dnipro River on Monday, threatening supply lines for thousands of Russian troops.

Kyiv gave no confirmation of the gains, but Russian sources acknowledged that a Ukrainian tank offensive had advanced dozens of kilometres along the river's west bank, recapturing a number of villages along the way.

The breakthrough mirrors recent Ukrainian successes in the east that have turned the tide in the war against Russia, even as Moscow has tried to raise the stakes by annexing territory, ordering mobilization and threatening nuclear retaliation.

“The information is tense, let's put it that way, because, yes there were indeed breakthroughs,” Vladimir Saldo, the Russian-installed leader in occupied parts of Ukraine's Kherson province told Russian state television.

“There's a settlement called Dudchany, right along the Dnipro River, and right there, in that region, there was a breakthrough. There are settlements that are occupied by Ukrainian forces,” he said.

Dudchany is around 30 km south of where the front stood before the breakthrough, indicating the fastest advance of the war so far in the south, where Russian forces had been dug into heavily reinforced positions along a mainly static front line since the early weeks of the invasion.

While Kyiv maintained almost complete silence, as it has during major offensives, some officials described what they referred to as unconfirmed reports of big gains.

Anton Gerashchenko, an adviser to Ukraine's interior ministry, posted a photo of Ukrainian soldiers posing with their flag draping a golden statue of an angel. He said it was the village of Mikhailivka, around 20 km beyond the previous front.

By Monday afternoon, Ukraine's defence ministry had confirmed only the recapture of Myrolyubivka, a village close to the previous front line. Serhiy Khlan, a Kherson regional council member, also listed Osokorivka, Mykhailivka, Khreschenikvka and Zoloto Balka as villages recaptured or where Ukrainian troops had been photographed.

“It means that our armed forces are moving powerfully along the banks of the Dnipro nearer to Beryslav,” he said. “Officially, there is no such information yet, but the (Russian) social media pages which are panicking... absolutely confirm these photos.”

The advance in the south mirrors the tactics that have brought Kyiv major gains since the start of September in eastern Ukraine, where its forces swiftly seized territory to gain control of Russian supply lines, cutting off larger Russian forces and forcing them to retreat.

Just hours after a concert Friday on Moscow's Red Square, where Russian President Vladimir Putin proclaimed the provinces of Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia to be Russian territory forever, Ukraine recaptured Lyman, the main Russian bastion in the north of Donetsk province. That has opened the way for it to advance deep into Luhansk province, threatening the main supply routes to territory Moscow captured in some of the war's bloodiest battles.

In the south, Ukraine's advance targets supply lines for thousands of Russian troops — perhaps as many as 25,000 — on the west bank of the Dnipro. Ukraine has already destroyed the main bridges, forcing Russian forces to use makeshift crossings. A substantial advance down river could cut them off entirely.

“The fact we have broken through the front means that ... the Russian army has already lost the ability to attack, and today or tomorrow it could lose the ability to defend,” said Oleh Zhdanov, a Kyiv-based military analyst.

“A month of our work destroying their supplies and reducing the combat effectiveness of this group means that they are functioning on minimal rations in terms of ammunition, fuel and food.”

NP

en-ca

2022-10-04T07:00:00.0000000Z

2022-10-04T07:00:00.0000000Z

https://vancouversun.pressreader.com/article/281904482065575

Postmedia