2023-12-19 17:08:43
According to Kremlin chief Vladimir Putin, the West has failed to inflict a strategic defeat on Russia in Ukraine. The goal has been shattered by the “growing power of our armed forces and arms production,” Putin said on Tuesday in Moscow at a Defense Ministry meeting in front of military officials and representatives from politics, church and society. In Kiev, President Volodymyr Zelensky said that Russia had not achieved any of its war goals in 2023.
In the war once morest Ukraine, “one can confidently say that the initiative lies with our armed forces,” said the Russian president. Putin ordered the attack on Ukraine on February 24, 2022; As a result, many states sided with the attacked country and provided it with weapons. The Ukrainian counteroffensive launched in the summer of 2023 to liberate its territories from Russian occupation fell short of the expectations of politicians and civil society. Foreign experts such as the Institute for War Studies (ISW) in the USA have recently observed that Russia is gaining ground with its advances.
Putin has recently repeatedly declared the counteroffensive by the Ukrainian armed forces to have failed. “The enemy is suffering heavy losses and has used up a significant amount of its reserves,” said the 71-year-old. “The myth of the invulnerability of Western military technology has also collapsed.” In a minute’s silence, Putin remembered the Russian soldiers killed in the fighting. He did not give any figures on the losses.
Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said at the meeting that Ukraine had now lost 383,000 soldiers to death or injury in the war. Ukraine, in turn, currently reports the number of losses in the Russian ranks at 348,000 soldiers. The information cannot be verified. Neither warring party has released official figures for its own losses.
Shoigu also said that the number of volunteers should increase by more than 250,000 to around 745,000 contract soldiers in the coming year. The Russians continue to be lured into military service with a comparatively high salary of around 2,000 euros per month. “The primary goal for the coming year is to continue the special military operation until all set tasks are completed,” said Minister Shoigu. According to previous information, the tasks include, above all, complete control over the previously partially occupied areas of Kherson, Luhansk, Donetsk and Zaporizhia – and demilitarization of Ukraine.
Putin once once more accused the USA of pushing the conflict in Ukraine to the point of war. He claimed that the West had always only wanted to use the country as an instrument to destroy Russia. The USA has achieved “its goal” on the European continent of bringing Russia and the EU apart. The Kremlin chief also criticized NATO’s growing activity near Russia’s borders – for example in Finland, which only became a member of the military alliance in the wake of Putin’s war.
Putin also publicly stated that the war once morest Ukraine highlighted problems in Russia’s defense. Russia needs more drones, better air defense and a modern satellite communication system. At the same time, he praised the modernization of the nuclear power’s strategic weapons. For example, four Tu-160M long-range bombers and four nuclear submarines were put into operation. By the end of the year, 15 new launch complexes for the Yars and Avantgard intercontinental ballistic missiles should be ready for use.
Immediately before Putin’s appearance, Russian anti-aircraft defense shot down a Ukrainian drone in the Moscow region, according to the Defense Ministry. Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said there were no injuries or damage. According to the state news agency Ria Novosti, Vnukovo International Airport reported restrictions on take-offs and landings in the wake of the drone attack around midday.
There were also reports on social networks that air traffic was also restricted at the capital’s Domodedovo and Zhukovsky airports. A little later, traffic returned to normal. Russian anti-aircraft defense had previously reported the downing of drones in the Bryansk and Kaluga regions.
According to Ukrainian President Zelensky, the mobilization of new soldiers is an expensive and politically sensitive issue for Ukraine. “The question of mobilization is a very sensitive one,” said Zelenskyj on Tuesday at a press conference marking the end of the year in Kiev. The army has requested 450,000 new soldiers. Additional mobilization on this scale would require around 500 billion hryvnia (12.2 billion euros). For him it is also important which of the soldiers who have fought so far will have the right to rest and home leave. A complex plan is being developed for this rotation.
Russia has not achieved any of its war goals in Ukraine in 2023, Zelensky said. Moscow was not able to completely conquer the Ukrainian Donetsk region. Instead, Ukraine largely restored control over the western Black Sea. Ukraine has been repelling a large-scale Russian invasion since February 2022.
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