Bakhmut, Andriivka and now Klishchiyivka. After days of assurances and denials, Ukraine announces that it will retake the areas in Donetsk, forcing Moscow to take action on the Eastern Front. According to Kiev, 52,000 Kremlin soldiers as well as 274 tanks, armored vehicles and missiles would be deployed on this route: a veritable army within an army, considering that a total of around 150,000 Russians would be in Donbass.
Even on the southern front, things don’t seem to be going well for Russia. After Kiev captured the front lines to the south, the Ukrainian military reported that Moscow was strengthening its ranks by concentrating its forces on the city of Tokmak, effectively turning it “into the second main line of defense.” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy proudly thanked his soldiers for their successes. Successes that, however, must not lead to carelessness. For United States Chief of Staff General Mark Milley, the Ukrainian counteroffensive “has not failed,” but the road to Kyiv’s final victory in the conflict is still long.
In the evening, explosions were heard in occupied Crimea near Cape Fiolent in Sevastopol. Another fortress was reported in Tokmak, a city in the Russian-controlled Zaporizhzhia region of Ukraine.
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