Russia Launches Push for Eastern City as It Struggles to Regain Military Initiative; Russia’s ‘mechanical’ Tactics Making it Impossible for It to Capture Bakhmut; Ukraine’s Military Hit 10 Russian Temporary Bases Over Past Day; Ukraine Says Eastern Town of Avdiivka Could Become ‘second Bakhmut’, LIVE UPDATES and MORE
Russia Launches Push for Eastern City as It Struggles to Regain Military Initiative:
Moscow seeks to surround Avdiivka but faces heavy losses, Ukraine’s military says
Russia launched an assault on the eastern city of Avdiivka, seeking to kick-start its spring offensive that Ukraine said was on the verge of fizzling.
Avdiivka, on the outskirts of the occupied regional capital of Donetsk and known for its coke plant, has long been a target for Moscow and is already largely destroyed. A fresh Russian offensive against the city has brought incremental advances similar to those around the nearby city of Bakhmut, which Russian forces are seeking to encircle and cut off, a Ukrainian military spokesman and the U.K. Ministry of Defense said Monday.
“The enemy is constantly trying to surround Avdiivka,” Col. Oleksiy Dmytrashkivskiy, the military spokesman, said on Ukrainian television. “Avdiivka could soon become a second Bakhmut.”
However, he added that Russian forces were suffering heavy losses and were running out of reserves as they were attacking routes known to Ukraine’s military.
In Crimea, which Russia seized and occupied in 2014, Ukrainian military intelligence, known as HUR, said late Monday that Russian Kalibr cruise missiles had been destroyed in the city of Dzhankoi in the peninsula’s north while they were being transported by rail.
HUR didn’t say how many missiles were destroyed or how. Videos on social media showed a large explosion after what appeared to be a drone striking a railroad in Dzhankoi. Sergei Aksyonov, the Russia-installed head of Crimea, acknowledged that air defenses had fired in the area. The resulting wreckage damaged a house and a shop, and injured one person, he wrote on his Telegram channel.
Russia has sought to advance in a handful of directions in the east of Ukraine in recent weeks but hasn’t seized a significant Ukrainian city since last summer.
Ukrainian officials said Russian attacks elsewhere were foundering. The intensity of attacks on the town of Vuhledar, to the southwest of Donetsk, has decreased because of the huge losses Russia has suffered, said Col. Dmytrashkivskiy. That was forcing Russia to backfill severely depleted forces there with reserves from other units that were in poor condition, Ukraine’s military said. —>READ MORE HERE
Russia’s ‘mechanical’ tactics making it impossible for it to capture Bakhmut, Ukrainian military says:
Russian invasion forces are unable to complete their tactical operation to capture Bakhmut, the spokesman for the Eastern Group of the Armed Forces of Ukraine Serhiy Cherevatyi said on Ukrainian national television on March 19.
Active fighting continues around the Ukrainian town, but the invading troops continue to conduct attacks “mechanically,” Cherevatyi said.
He also said the actions of the Russian army in the area of Bakhmut could hardly be described as a “major strategic offensive operation.”
“Right now, they are actually tactically unable to complete the operation to capture the Ukrainian district center of Bakhmut,” Cherevatyi said.
“Indeed, there are very active battles there, they still continue to carry out several dozen attacks by inertia, but they suffer huge losses.” —>READ MORE HERE
Follow links below to +++++relevant+++++ and related stories:
+++++Russia-Ukraine News LATEST UPDATES: (REUTERS) (AP) (NY POST) and (WSJ)+++++
+++++Ukraine’s military says it hit 10 Russian temporary bases over past day+++++
+++++Ukraine says eastern town of Avdiivka could become ‘second Bakhmut+++++
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