Ukraine targets a key Crimean city a day after striking Russia's Black Sea Fleet headquarters
Ukraine targets a key Crimean city a day after striking Russia's Black Sea Fleet headquarters
Russia says Ukraine has launched another missile attack on Sevastopol on the occupied Crimean Peninsula. The strike on Saturday came a day after an attack on the headquarters of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet left a serviceman missing and the main building smoldering.
Ukraine on Saturday morning launched another missile attack on Sevastopol on the occupied Crimean Peninsula, a Russian-installed official said, a day after an attack on the headquarters of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet that left a serviceman missing and the main building smoldering.
Sevastopol was put under an air raid alert for about an hour after debris from intercepted missiles fell near a pier, Gov. Mikhail Razvozhayev wrote on the messaging app Telegram. He later added that another missile fragment fell in a park in northern Sevastopol, parts of which had to be cordoned off. Ferry traffic in the area was also halted and later resumed.
Loud blasts were also heard near Vilne in northern Crimea, followed by rising clouds of smoke, according to a pro-Ukraine Telegram news channel that reports on developments on the peninsula. Crimea, illegally annexed by Russia in 2014, has been a frequent target for Ukrainian forces since Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
I'm no military analyst but this whole thing seems like kind of a big deal. If Russia no longer has sufficient air defence capability to protect their assets in Crimea I would assume this opens up a whole buffet of targets.
I guess it's most likely temporary as they move more defence into the region but I also wonder if that would open up other areas to attack?
I have no idea what I'm talking about here but it's going to be interesting to see what happens.
I'm suprised Ukraine hasn't targetted Russian ships in port. It can't be to hard to get real time info on a boats location but my assumption is for as damning the Russian navys long rang attacks are, the long range Ukranian strike options are limited and destroying the black sea fleat is not the best use of their stock.
It could also play to Ukraines favor if in a negosiation Ukraine commits to allowing Russia to remove its ships safely in exchange for a relitively bloodless taking of Crimea, but that would be a while away, and would rely on a Russia thats willing to negosiate, but Ukraine can always destroy the ships on a later date.
Sevastopol was out of range for Ukrainian missiles until recently. The Ukrainian army was able to move their launchers 10-20km south only thanks to the gains made during the summer offensive. The recent attacks on Russian targets in Sevastopol/Crimea are probably precisely to draw Russian deployments from the front lines.
I’m suprised Ukraine hasn’t targetted Russian ships in port.
One reason I assume for this is that war ships are generally well protected, both by armor and their own defenses.
A flying kamikaze drone with maybe 3-5kg of explosives will not do that much damage to a steel hull unless it finds just the right spot to hit. The sea drones based on jetskies that the Ukrainians used had 150kg of explosives and an armor piercing design, IIRC.
I'm no military expert but read/watch enough stuff to make an educated rest. You are pretty much correct. Attack them further and further in occupied territory forces them to reduce cover on their front lines.
Ukraine has also been explicitly targeting Russian long-range air defense systems. Creating more and more gaps or at least reducing the overlap of Russian defenses. That coupled with fancy air-launched ground attack missiles which are designed to be hard to detect and intercept, coming fast and low from a mountainous area making it extra hard to intercept them.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
Crimea, illegally annexed by Russia in 2014, has been a frequent target for Ukrainian forces since Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
Ukraine’s intelligence chief, Kyrylo Budanov, told Voice of America on Saturday that at least nine people were killed and 16 others wounded as a result of Kyiv’s attack on the Black Sea Fleet on Friday.
Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, and other Ukrainian leaders have long pushed the U.S. and other Western allies to provide longer-distance weapons that would enable Kyiv to ramp up its strikes behind Russian lines while themselves staying out of firing range.
Elsewhere, Ukraine’s military said Saturday that Russia launched 15 Iranian-made Shahed drones at the front-line Zaporizhzhia region in the southeast, as well as Dnipropetrovsk province farther north.
Residential quarters were hit, including medical and education institutions, government-built stations that serve food and drinks, as well as critical infrastructure facilities and a penitentiary, he added.
In the eastern Donetsk region, where heavy fighting is ongoing on the outskirts of Bakhmut, Russian shelling killed one civilian and wounded another on Friday and overnight, local Gov.
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