The Minister of Defense of Ukraine, Oleksiy Reznikov, said that the offensive of the Ukrainian military in the east went much “better than expected.”
In an interview Financial Times Reznikov noted that the Ukrainian troops were tired after the six-day counteroffensive in the Kharkiv region, but their fighting spirit was high, because this became a sign that “Russia can be defeated.”
At the same time, the minister emphasized that now the liberated territories must be protected from a possible repeated attack by Russia. According to him, Russian forces can attack stretched supply lines, and Ukrainian troops can be encircled if they advance too far.
Civilian infrastructure targeted: Russian troops hit the building of the Main Investigative Directorate in Kharkiv (photo report)
On September 12, Russian troops hit the building of the Main Investigative Department of the National Police of Ukraine in the city of Kharkiv
Reznikov also stated that the almost simultaneous counteroffensive of the Ukrainian military in the Kherson region developed more slowly, because it is an agricultural area with irrigation canals, which the invaders use as defensive trenches.
The day before, in his address, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that since the beginning of September, the Ukrainian military has liberated more than six thousand square kilometers of the territory of Ukraine in the east and south, and “the movement of Ukrainian troops continues.”
The Ministry of Defense of Russia on September 10, for the first time since the beginning of the Ukrainian offensive in the Kharkiv region, as a result of which the front was breached and dozens of settlements were liberated, indirectly confirmed the retreat of Russian troops, calling it a “regrouping”.
The next day – September 11 – the American Institute for the Study of War (ISW) stated, that Russia’s retreat in the Kharkiv region is not a regrouping of troops, as the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation claims, but a hasty escape. And restoring control over the city of Izyum, among other things, removes the threat of an attack on the Donetsk region from the northwest, according to ISW.
