Fighting intensified in the regions of Donetsk and Zaporizhia on Monday, but it was not the start of an expected Ukrainian counterattack, the Kyiv government said after Russia said it had rejected a major offensive in the country’s east. . Ukraine continues to give no clear indication of the start of the counter-offensive that it has been announcing for months. In a cryptic message on Twitter, Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksi Réznikov quoted the well-known Depeche Mode theme song: Enjoy the silence.
The Deputy Minister of Defense of Ukraine, Hanna Maliar, assured yesterday that their counter-offensive has not yet begun. If Russia says otherwise, it is only to distract attention from the losses it is suffering in Bakhmut, he stressed.
Russia announced that it had repulsed a major Ukrainian offensive at five points on the Donetsk front and had killed 250 of the enemy. Russia’s Defense Ministry said Ukraine had attacked on Sunday morning with six mechanized and two tank battalions south of Donetsk, where Moscow has long suspected that Ukraine wanted to open a breach into Russian-held territory. “The enemy did not achieve their tasks, they did not succeed,” he said.
He also released a video showing several Ukrainian armored vehicles falling to pieces after being attacked. According to Moscow, its forces destroyed a further 16 tanks, three infantry vehicles and 21 armored vehicles.
Several Russian military bloggers claim that one of the points attacked by Ukrainian troops was Velika Novosilka, where they would have managed to open a breach. “A tough battle is being waged (…) This time the news is much more worrying”, wrote Semión Pégov, author of the War Gonzo blog.
In Telegram, Hanna Maliar explained that Ukrainian forces were “moving to offensive actions” in some areas of the front. But he denied that it was a big operation. “Why are the Russians actively publishing information about a counteroffensive? Because they need to distract attention from the defeat in the Bakhmut area,” he wrote.
This city in Donetsk province, which the Russians call Artyomovsk, was taken in May by Russian mercenaries of the Wagner Group after eight months of fighting in the bloodiest and longest battle of this conflict. However, Ukraine has continued to attack areas in the north and south.
The creator and owner of Wagner, Yevgeny Prigozhin, said yesterday in a video broadcast by Telegram that the Ukrainians have recovered part of Berkhivka, a nearby town, which he described as “a misfortune”. This oligarch, close to the Kremlin, but facing the Russian military leadership, took the opportunity to criticize the Russian Minister of Defense, Sergei Shoigu, and the Chief of Staff, Valery Guerassimov, whom he urged to go to the front to direct personally the battle. “We’re here, you can do it! And if you can’t, you will die as heroes.” After taking the city, the Wagners surrendered their positions to the Russian regular army.
According to Hanna Maliar, Bakhmut remains today the “epicenter” of the fighting.
On the other hand, the deputy head of the Russian administration in Zaporizhia, Vladimir Rogov, reported that Ukrainian attacks are also intensifying in this region of southern Ukraine, partially controlled by Moscow. Ukrainian troops already began to attack on Sunday in the Vremevski area, but yesterday morning the actions resumed “in a more active, more organized way”. A day earlier, he assured: “The situation is alarming, but it is under control.”
In recent months, Kyiv has announced a counteroffensive, which always seemed imminent, to expel Russian forces from the territory they have occupied since Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered his army to intervene militarily in Ukraine in February 2022.
In an interview published Sunday in The Wall Street Journal, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said that preparations for the counteroffensive had been completed.
But Kyiv is silent. Its Minister of Defense, Oleksà Réznikov, reproduced on Twitter several verses of the Depeche Mode song Enjoy the silence: “Words are very unnecessary, they can only hurt.” He also posted a video of soldiers looking into the camera and putting a finger to their lips, with the following text: “The start will not be announced.” The secret remains.