Vladimir Putin did not reveal his plans regarding Ukraine in China nor was he expected to do so, beyond insisting, during a press conference yesterday in the city of Harbin, that any negotiations with Kyiv would have to refer to the negotiations in Istanbul ( at the end of March 2022, after a month of war), in which Russia proposed the neutrality of the country it had just invaded. Immediately, the Russian president reiterated once again that the advance of his troops in the Kharkiv region during the last week is due to the need to create a buffer zone to protect the Russian city and region of Belgorod from Ukrainian cross-border attacks. . The governor of Belgorod, Viacheslav Gladkov, reported yesterday the death of two civilians – mother and son – due to a nighttime drone attack against one of the towns in the region, the Efe agency reported.
Since May 10, the Russian army has penetrated the Ukrainian border to a maximum depth of 10 kilometers, occupying a dozen towns and villages in the region, the largest advance in a year and a half. But Putin noted that “there are currently no plans to take Kharkiv,” Ukraine’s second city.
Kharkiv is a big city, and the time and human and material cost that Russian forces have paid to take small towns like Avdiivka or the village of Robotyne (a conquest announced this week) makes that idea seem extraordinarily ambitious, no matter how ambitious it is. One of the Russian lines of advance is heading towards the suburb of Liptsi, relying on the coverage of a large reservoir on its western flank and the fact that it is a highly urbanized route to Kharkiv.
The head of the Ukrainian armed forces, General Oleksandr Syrsky, said yesterday that the Russians had managed to expand the front in the Kharkiv region by 70 kilometers, which has forced the mobilization of reserve troops (but also to transfer them from the Donbass). “We believe there will be tough battles and that the enemy is prepared for it,” Syrsky said yesterday.
In the last two or three days the Russian advance would have slowed down, perhaps by ending a trial phase in which it used small military units. Apparently, the Russians would have chosen not to insist on occupying the town of Vovchansk, the easternmost town on the front. It must be remembered that this region, occupied by Russia at the beginning of the invasion, was liberated by Ukrainian forces in brilliant advances led by General Syrsky himself in the fall of 2022.
According to the head of Ukrainian military intelligence, Kyrylo Budanov, the next objective of the Russian army is Sumi, to the west and at a great distance (about 200 kilometers) from the current battle lines. Ukrainian troops would have already headed there for its defense. The Russian intention would be none other than to expand the northern front as much as possible to stretch the Ukrainian lines and drain its defenses of combatants at more interesting points for Moscow, such as the enclave of Chásiv Yar, whose conquest would constitute the door to finishing occupying the region. of the Donbass.
NATO, on the other hand, does not believe that Russia has enough troops to consider a siege on Kharkiv, which seems obvious. But that does not free the city from being at the center of the war right now. From the first year of the invasion, Moscow realized the need to equip its aviation with guided bombs, and also to protect it, given the harsh reception it received from the tiny Ukrainian air force. So the bombings that the city of Kharkiv is suffering come from the Russian skies. The objective would be, on the one hand, to exhaust the Ukrainian anti-aircraft defenses and, on the other, to cause panic in the city and its evacuation.
This is why Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has insisted on asking Washington for two Patriot anti-aircraft missile batteries. If Ukraine could also use them to neutralize the aerial threat in Russian airspace, the improvement in its defense would be considerable. Possibly the comment, this week in Kyiv, by Secretary of State Antony Blinken, in the sense that the US does not encourage Ukrainians to attack Russian territory with North American weapons but would not raise many objections, is the key to what can happen In the next weeks.
