On the ninth day of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Russian forces have the goal of encircling Odesa in the southern part of the country where they have had the most success since the multi-pronged onslaught began on Feb. 24. National Security and Defense Council Secretary Oleksiy Danilov said on Facebook that “the southern direction remains hot, where the occupier is concentrating resources for active actions to try to encircle Odesa” port city along the Black Sea coast.
He further added that Russia has exhausted 95 percent of the battalion tactical groups “it prepared” for the fuller-scale invasion “and needs an urgent increase in reserves.”
Ukraine estimates that more than 9,000 Russian military personnel have been killed or wounded since Kremlin leader Vladimir Putin ordered an all-out invasion on its neighbor beyond the Ukrainian territories of Crimea and certain parts of the Donbas, which have been occupied since 2014 in Europe’s only ongoing shooting war.
Before the invasion, U.S. and British assessments said that at least 120,000-150,000 Russian troops were deployed in and around Ukraine poised to attack.
Danilov, speaking on the ninth day of the invasion said Russia suffered “significant losses in all operational areas – Polissya, Siversky, Slobozhansky, Tavriya, and in the Joint Forces Operation area [of eastern Ukraine].”
An abandoned Russian army air defense vehicle (Photo Credit: Armed Forces of Ukraine)
He affirmed that territorial defense forces have “grasped the tactical initiative,” yet emphasized that Moscow still intends to push on and “encircle the cities of Kyiv, Kharkiv, and reach the administrative borders of Luhansk and Donetsk regions [in the east].”
He substantiated his assessment by describing Russia’s use of indiscriminate bombardment of civilian areas and infrastructure as a “weakness,” which is carried out “to gain time for redeployment.”
Danilov furthermore pointed to evidence, also seen by the Kyiv Post on verified social media accounts, of Russian forces using vehicles with Red Cross symbols “to transport weapons and ammunition.”
He continued: “Therefore, the [International Criminal Court in] The Hague is approaching faster and more inevitably for the entire Russian elite.”
