The United Kingdom has announced that it will provide long-range Storm Shadow cruise missiles to Ukraine to defend it against a Russian invasion.
Russia denied that Ukrainian forces had achieved a breakthrough in the bloody battle for Bakhmut while the United Kingdom became the first country to supply long-range cruise missiles to Ukraine.
Ukraine has requested long-range missiles from its Western allies for months but has only received short-range weapons as its supporters fear more advanced weaponry could be used to strike targets inside Russian territory and further escalate the conflict.
British Defense Secretary Ben Wallace said on Thursday that Storm Shadow cruise missiles – which have a range of more than 250 km (150 miles) compared to the US-supplied HIMARS of about 80 km (50 miles) – would be sent to Ukraine.
“We will not stand by while Russia kills civilians,” Wallace told members of parliament when announcing that Storm Shadow missiles were being offered to Kiev.
Wallace said the cruise missiles are being sent for use inside Ukrainian territory, which means he has received assurances from Kiev that they will not be used to strike targets inside Russia.
The Kremlin has previously said that the UK’s provision of such missiles would require an “appropriate response from our military”.
On Thursday, Russia’s Defense Ministry was forced to deny reports that Ukrainian forces were making progress in the months-long fight for Bakhmut.
“Individual statements on Telegram regarding a ‘breakthrough’ at several points on the front line do not correspond to reality,” the ministry said in a statement.
Pro-Moscow military bloggers have indicated that the long-awaited Ukrainian counteroffensive has begun quietly while the head of the Wagner Group, Yevgeny Prigozhin, said this week that Russian forces have withdrawn from some areas of Bakhmut and that Ukrainian forces have advanced north and south of the country. The city, while he also said it was the beginning of the attack.
In a video posted on messaging app Telegram on Tuesday, Prigozhin said Russian forces were fleeing their positions in Bakhmut due to the “stupidity” of their commanders.
“Today everything is being done so that the front line collapses,” he said.
In the statement, the Russian Defense Ministry said that the Russian forces repelled several Ukrainian attacks during the day, adding that the ongoing battle took place near Malinivka in the eastern Donetsk region and involved air force and artillery. It added that Russian forces “continue to liberate the western parts” of Bakhmut.
The Institute for the Study of War, a Washington-based think tank, said that Prigozhin and the Russian Defense Ministry’s reactions to Ukraine’s moves in Bakhmut “reflect growing panic in the Russian information space” about the long-awaited Ukrainian counteroffensive.
New: Ukrainian forces may have broken through some Russian lines in close quarters counter-attacks #Bakhmutprompting responses from # Wagner Group financier Evgeny # Prigozhin and the Russian Ministry of Defense.
latest in # Ukraine w/ @employee: https://t.co/r7NqfmK8hU pic.twitter.com/FUpQG0CsvO
– ISW (The Study of War) May 12, 2023
The deployment of low-quality Russian forces on the flanks around Bakhmut indicates that the Russian Ministry of Defense [Ministry of Defence] It largely abandoned the goal of encircling a large number of Ukrainian forces there.
Zelensky: Mentally we are ready
Amid speculation that the Ukrainian counter-offensive had already begun, President Volodymyr Zelensky was quoted as saying that Ukraine needed more time before the operation against Russia could begin.
“We are mentally ready…” Zelensky told the BBC. “In terms of equipment, not everything has arrived yet,” he said.
“with [what we have] We can go ahead and succeed. But we lose a lot of people. I think this is not acceptable. So we need to wait. “We still need more time,” he was quoted as saying on Thursday.
Patrick Bury, a senior lecturer in security at the University of Bath in the United Kingdom, said he was not surprised by Zelensky’s comments.
“If you’re Zelensky,” he said, “you do everything you can to make sure you have everything you need” before launching the attack.
“On the other hand, I wouldn’t be surprised at all if it started in the next couple of weeks, depending on the mud. …as of last week, it was still one of the wettest springs they’ve had there in years…
Ukrainian military analyst Oleksandr Musienko said Kiev’s allies need to understand that the counterattack “may not lead to a complete evacuation of Russian forces and the final defeat of Russia in all occupied areas”.
“We have to be ready for the war to continue until next year – or it could end this year,” Musienko told Ukraine’s Radio NV.
“It all depends on how the battles develop. We cannot guarantee how the counterattack will develop.”
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