Text / fat guy eggplant
Now that the war situation in the south has eased, the Russian army will naturally intensify its air strikes against Ukraine. However, the Russian military’s drone air strikes have been frustrated one after another, and Zelensky even made a high-profile appearance with the wreckage of the Russian drone, which made Russia a little embarrassed.
According to the World Wide Web quoted Reuters on October 29, Zelensky delivered a video speech a few days ago. But this time, the scene where he spoke was not in the office, but in an open space. At his feet was apparently the wreckage of a Russian-made “Geranium” drone. At the scene, Zelensky looked serious and glared, and the lighting was warm and layered. This is also the first time since the Russian-Ukrainian conflict that the Ukrainian side has displayed the “drone combat results” in such a high-profile manner, which is tantamount to humiliation for Russia.
Zelensky said that in the past two days, the Russian army has increased the frequency of air strikes against Ukraine. More than 30 “Geranium-2” drones have been dispatched. aircraft and even cruise missiles. The Ukrainian air defense force gave a head-on attack to the Russian air attack plan, shooting down as many as 23 drones, two Ka-21 Wuzhi, one Su-25 and several cruise missiles.
Zelensky also made it clear in his speech: “We will continue to cut off the metal wings of Moscow’s drones”, “The Ukrainian people will not be destroyed by air strikes, and the Ukrainian people will not fall.” At the same time, he also thanked the civilians and officers and soldiers who contributed to Ukrainian air defense operations.
It is worth mentioning that Zelensky also accused that Russia has launched more than 8,000 air strikes on Ukraine, a large part of which came from “Iranian drones”. The United States also insisted that the drones used by the Russian military were provided by Iran, a situation that Blinken called “shocking.” However, both Russia and Iran denied the matter, and the Iraqi side also asked the Ukrainian side to provide “more convincing evidence”, otherwise the accusation should not be filed.
It is reported that this round of large-scale air strikes by the Russian army coincides with the slowdown of the Kherson war. The latest news shows that the “Kherson civilian evacuation operation” arranged by the Russian authorities has basically ended, and at least 70,000 civilians have been evacuated. After crossing the Dnieper River, head to a relatively safe settlement in the rear. In addition, due to the beginning of winter and the increasingly severe weather in the local area, the attack and deployment speed of the Ukrainian armored forces began to relatively slow down, and the intensity of the fighting between Russia and Ukraine in the local area decreased.
Some scholars believe that this gap provides Moscow with a valuable breathing window – and the large-scale air strikes are the Russian military’s attempt to extend this window. The scholar believes that at least 41,000 mobilized troops have been sent to the Ukrainian territory to reinforce the front-line troops, but due to their limited training level and insufficient equipment, the Russian army obviously cannot guarantee that it can “100% defend Kherson”. Under such circumstances, on the one hand, Russia has to take advantage of the slowdown of the Ukrainian army to deploy troops for reinforcements; Thus, to a certain extent, the actions of the Ukrainian army were contained to gain more time. However, Ivanov, a member of the Russian State Duma, warned that with a large number of recruits now gathered on the front lines, if the Ukrainian army still decides to launch an offensive, the casualties may be “unacceptable for the Kremlin”.
And Ukrainian Defense Minister Reznikov also said that although the Ukrainian army still maintains the plan to attack Kherson City, the muddy road brought by the bad weather makes the movement of heavy equipment such as tanks and armored vehicles more sluggish, which aggravates the Risk of being hit by Russian airstrikes. Some commentators believe that if the Ukrainian army wants to accumulate strength to continue the counterattack, considering the large number of minefields, defensive offensives and traps that the Russian army has laid around Kherson, then it is obviously not a very suitable time to continue the rash attack. In this case, both Russia and Ukraine seem to be facing their own difficulties, and there is a brief calm over Kherson. But for now, this lull may not last long.