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Zelenskyi said Ukraine has neither the time nor the strength to attack Russian territories
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Why doesn’t Ukraine attack Russian territory? BBC News Brasil summarizes the answer to this key question about the war.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Ukraine had no intention of attacking Russian territory, arguing that the country had neither the time nor the resources to do so. Ukraine’s counteroffensive is targeting areas “illegally occupied” by Russia, he said.
“We are not attacking Russian territory, we are liberating our own legitimate territory,” Zelenskyy said during a trip to Germany in May. “We have neither the time nor the strength (to attack Russia). And we don’t have any weapons left with which to do it.”
“We are preparing a counterattack on illegally occupied territories based on our constitutionally established, internationally recognized legitimate borders.”
But how does this dispute over territories progress?
Since February 2022, when Russia invaded Ukraine, the war has been marked by Russian attacks and conquests of parts of Ukrainian territory especially in the east and south of the country.
On the battlefield, Ukraine managed to retake part of the areas under Russian control and prevented the advance of Moscow troops towards the capital Kiev and the west of the country. However, there were no significant attacks by Ukraine on Russian territory. A few sporadic attacks on Russian territory have been reported, but Ukraine has consistently denied any involvement.
In May, The Washington Post reported that US intelligence documents indicated that Ukraine intended to seize areas of Russia as part of its counteroffensive. These areas would serve Ukraine as a basis for possible peace negotiations.
However, Ukraine has denied this intention.
Ukraine’s counteroffensive the special operation announced by the authorities in response to the Russian invasion is at an early stage. Currently, there are signs that Ukraine intends to defend and retake its own territory, Zelenskyy said.
“If Ukraine manages to split the territory in two and keep the ground it has regained, its offensive will have been successful,” Gardner says. “It would isolate Russian troops to the west and make supplying Crimea more difficult.”