The Russian Defense Ministry claimed on Tuesday that about 300 Ukrainian troops penetrated the border on a sabotage mission into Russia’s Kursk region and engaged Russian forces near the border towns of Nikolaevo-Darino and Oleshnya.
The Defense Ministry said Russian “reserves” were “heading to the Kursk direction” to join the battle, which was ongoing as of Wednesday afternoon.
The Kyiv Independent on Tuesday quoted Russian and Ukrainian information officers vigorously accusing each other of lying about whatever was happening in Kursk:
Earlier in the day, Aleksey Smirnov, the governor of Russia’s Kursk Oblast, claimed that Russian border guards “prevented a border breakthrough” in the Sudzhansky and Korenevsky districts.
Andrii Kovalenko, the head of an anti-disinformation department at the National Security and Defense Council, said that Russia “doesn’t control the border.”
“Russian military commanders lie about controlling the situation in Kursk Oblast,” he wrote in the Telegram post.
Kursk Acting Governor Alexei Smirnov on Wednesday declared a state of emergency to “eliminate the consequences of enemy forces coming into the region.”
Gen. Valery Gerasimov, the Russian military’s chief of staff, reportedly informed President Vladimir Putin by video uplink on Wednesday that up to a thousand Ukrainian soldiers “went on the offensive” in Kursk. The Ukrainians were reportedly equipped with several dozen tanks and armored personnel carriers.
Putin angrily denounced the operation as a “major provocation” by Ukraine and accused the Ukrainians of “firing indiscriminately” at civilians. Russian officials claim Ukrainian shelling has injured 24 civilians, including six children.
The Russian Defense Ministry claimed on Wednesday that further advances by the Ukrainians have been thwarted, but “the operation for the destruction of Ukrainian army units” could take a while longer to complete.
The Ukrainians countered by claiming they have seized control of the Sudzha natural gas hub in Kursk – a significant strategic target, since it is the only way for Russia to pump natural gas to customers in the European Union.
Unofficial online chatter from the region suggested the Ukrainians were faring much better than the Russian Defense Ministry claimed. Independent media sources reported heavy fighting and intensifying Russian airstrikes in the area.
Military analyst Pasi Paroinen told the New York Times on Wednesday that the Ukrainian incursion was puzzling because the small Ukrainian force could not hope to hold out indefinitely against Russian reserves, or even pose enough of a threat to divert significant resources from Russian operations in Ukraine.
“Operationally and strategically, this attack makes absolutely zero sense. This seems like a gross waste of men and resources badly needed elsewhere,” Paroinen said.
Ukraine has managed a few previous “counter-invasions” during the war, including attacks on Kursk, but those were generally brief skirmishes using Russians opposed to the Putin regime, rather than Ukrainian combat forces. The U.S. government has distanced itself from Ukraine’s use of such “paramilitary organizations.”
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in January signed a decree laying claim to parts of Russia that were “historically inhabited by Ukrainians,” effectively flipping the script on Putin for invading Ukraine to claim areas with large populations of ethnic Russians. Kursk was one of the regions mentioned in Zelensky’s decree.
COMMENTS
Please let us know if you're having issues with commenting.