The breakthrough, if it holds, would be a vindication for Ukraine, which has endured criticism from some of its closest partners about the way it is managing the war.
The breakthrough, if it holds, would be a vindication for Ukraine, which has endured growing criticism from some of its closest partners about the way it is managing the war.
U.S. defense officials told NBC News that while it’s true the Ukrainians had breached Russian defenses the advances are more of symbolic value than a big operational development. The breakthroughs are in a very small area and the Ukrainians have not moved personnel or vehicles through, they said. “Ukraine has breached the first Russian main defensive line, known as the Surovikin line, in the direction of Verbove,” Emil Kastehelmi wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter, adding that the village was “integrated to the Russian defenses.”NBC News has contacted the Russian Defense Ministry for comment.
“I haven’t seen evidence that Ukrainian forces were able to breach this line so far, but they are certainly trying to punch through, and close enough that we may not yet know if they did,” he said. “They’ve been gaining momentum over the past two weeks, after relatively slow advances initially, so this is certainly an important moment.”Diego Herrera Carcedo / Anadolu Agency via Getty Images file
“Everything would have come up through Crimea, the Ukrainians would be closer to Crimea and it would pose a massive problem" for the Russian forces, O’Brien added.was the natural place for Ukrainian forces to aim at, the Russian forces"were expecting them, so they have built a lot of defensive lines.
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