How Ukraine is trying to retake Crimea, “the Russian stronghold”

This week there were impressive attacks from Ukraine to the peninsula Crimeawhich hit Russian warships and missiles.

Estimates of the damage caused run into the billions of dollars and beg the question: Is Ukraine preparing to retake Crimea, the peninsula that Russia annexed in 2014?

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Crimea is a Russian stronghold, so it’s important not to get too excited.

“The strategy has two main objectives,” says Oleksandr Musiienko, from the Kiev Center for Military and Legal Studies.

“Establish dominance of the northwestern Black Sea and weaken the logistical opportunities of the Russian defensive lines in the south, near Tokmak and Melitopol.”

In other words, The operation in Crimea goes hand in hand with the Ukrainian counter-offensive in the south.

“They depend on each other,” says Musiienko.

Let’s look at Ukraine’s recent successes in Crimea.

On Wednesday, long-range cruise missiles, supplied by the United Kingdom and France, dealt a blow to Russia’s much-vaunted Black Sea Fleet in its home port of Sevastopol.

Satellite images of the scene showed two charred vessels.

The British Ministry of Defense said two Russian ships were seriously damaged in the attack. (BLACK SKY VIA REUTERS).

On Friday, the British Ministry of Defense declared that a large amphibious landing ship, the Minsk, had been “almost certainly functionally destroyed”.

Next to it, the Rostov-on-Don, a Russian submarine used to launch cruise missiles hundreds of miles into Ukraine, “likely suffered catastrophic damage.”

And perhaps equally important, the dry docks, vital to the maintenance of the entire Black Sea Fleet, are likely to be out of service “for many months”, according to the Ministry.

Furthermore, although the fires were barely extinguished in Sevastopol, even more dramatic nighttime explosions occurred when Ukraine blew up one of Russia’s most modern air defense systems, called the S-400, about 40 miles to the north, in Yevpatoria.

It was another sophisticated operation that used a combination of drones and Ukrainian-made Neptune missiles. confuse and destroy a key component of Russian air defenses on the Crimean Peninsula.

An important fact: Russian attempts to use exactly this technique over Kiev have generally failed, largely thanks to the presence of American Patriot interceptor missiles.

Thursday marked the second time in less than a month that Ukraine destroyed an S-400 missile system on the peninsula.

On August 23, at Olenivka, on the western edge of the Tarjankut Peninsula, Ukraine managed to destroy another launcher and a nearby radar station.

It is believed that Russia had no more than six S-400 launchers in Crimea. Now he’s lost two.

But these are just some of Ukraine’s recent operations.

Others shot down Russian radar positions on offshore gas platforms and, according to Kiev, used experimental maritime drones to attack a hovercraft missile carrier at the entrance to the port of Sevastopol.

Sevastopol Governor Mikhail Razvozhaev after the missile attack on that port’s shipyard on September 13. (EPA-EFE/REX/SHUTTERSTOCK).

Why is Crimea so important?

Through its air bases, troop concentrations, training camps and the Black Sea Fleet, Crimea has been a key target since Russia’s large-scale invasion last year.

“In Crimea there are still many reserves, with artillery shells and other types of weapons”, says Musiienko. “And this is the main logistical supply line for them.”

As the months passed, Kiev’s operations became more sophisticated, from a drone attack in August 2022 that destroyed around nine Russian aircraft at Saky air base, to combined drone and missile attacks to this day.

With more advanced weapons believed to be on the way, Musiienko expects Ukraine to launch increasingly sophisticated operations.

“When we receive the ATACMS (tactical ballistic missiles) from the United States, I think we will try to use, in a single attack, ballistic missiles, cruise missiles and also drones”, he states.

“And this will be a serious problem for Russia’s air defense system,” he adds.

“Let’s try to blind them.”

Each successful attack, he says, facilitates the next. “We’re paving the way and it’s getting easier and easier.”

The latest reports from Washington suggest that the Biden administration is close to approving the ATACMS long-range missile system, following months of Ukrainian pressure.

Does this mean that Kiev is getting closer to its goal of liberating Crimea?

“It’s getting closer, but there’s still a lot to do”says retired Ukrainian Navy Captain Andriy Ryzhenko.

“We have to free the coast of the Sea of ​​Azov and cut off the land corridor,” he says, referring to the slow Ukrainian offensive in the south.

And then there is the Kerch bridge.

Ukraine has been attacking this bridge, which connects Moscow to Crimea, for almost a year, but Russian heavy equipment continues to circulate on its railway line.

In any case, although it is now much better defended, it is still in Kiev’s sights.

This photo from July shows damage apparently caused by a Ukrainian attack on the Kerch Bridge, which connects Crimea to Russia. (REUTERS).

“When we close the Crimean bridge, it will be a logistical problem for them,” says Ryzhenko.

Isolating Crimea would be catastrophic for Russia and would give a welcome boost to the Ukrainian offensive in the south.

So is all this a prelude to a Ukrainian effort to retake the peninsula?

Observers here in Kiev try not to get ahead of themselves.

“I think this could be preparation for the liberation of Crimea,” says Musiienko. “But I understand this will take time.”

“What we’re trying to do now is make our way to Crimea.”

On Saturday, Secretary of the National Security and Defense Council Oleksiy Danilov said that Ukraine used every means at its disposal to force Russia to abandon Crimea.

“It seems that if the Russians don’t abandon Crimea on their own,” he said in a radio interview, “we will have to ‘disappear’ them.”

Source: Elcomercio