Part of the massive Kherson dam, which is under Russian control, collapsed on Tuesday morning, flooding large swathes of a war zone and threatening the lives of tens of thousands of people.
According to a Ukrainian official who spoke to ‘Sky News Arabia’ on condition of anonymity, that Kiev has prepared alternative plans for the counterattack, and that the attack is still ongoing and has been well prepared on the logistical and military plan, although flood waters limit Kiev’s options.
Kiev said several months ago that Russian forces mined the dam and said Moscow blew it up in an attempt to prevent its forces from crossing the Dnipro River, while Russia holds Ukraine responsible for this environmental and military disaster in the middle of the war.
Has the counterattack begun?
Amid conflicting Ukrainian accounts, attributed by observers to an attempt to confuse Russia and not explicitly revealing the timing of the attack in order to preserve the secrecy of military operations, Oleksiy Danilov, secretary of the National Security Council of Ukraine, said Wednesday that his country had not yet launched a counterattack to regain its land.
• The onset of the attack will be clear to everyone when it occurs.
• Russian officials were right when they believed that the Ukrainian advance in some areas of the front lines marked the start of a larger operation, according to Reuters.
• All this is not true when the attack begins, because it is our army who will decide.
About the destruction of the dam, Danilov said:
• Undoubtedly, Russia caused the destruction of the Kakhovka Dam on the Dnipro River because the area has been under occupation since the beginning of the Russian invasion. According to Hana Malyar, Ukrainian Deputy Defense Minister, on Wednesday, Ukraine has advanced in the past hours between 200 meters and 1100 meters in some areas surrounding the town of Bakhmut.
For its part, the newspaper “Washington Post” confirmed on Thursday that Ukraine had launched its counter-attack on Wednesday, which opens the door to a decisive phase of the war aimed at reconquering its lands and maintaining Western support.
The newspaper quoted several members of the Ukrainian army as saying that Kyiv had stepped up its attacks in the southeastern regions of the country and that the fighting was “violent and continuous”.
• The process is expected to take several months, according to the newspaper.
• This will be the test of the strategy led by Washington to prepare the Ukrainian forces with all the most advanced military methods.
Russia responds
Russian President Vladimir Putin described the destruction of Kakhovskaya station as “a barbaric act by Kyiv under the direction of Western conservatives”.
As for Vladimir Rogov, leader of the “We are with Russia” movement in Zaporizhzhia, he said on Thursday that the destruction of the station was part of the Ukrainian counterattack plan.
• Ukraine was preparing to destroy the station, flood the coastal areas, withdraw the forces and reserves of the Russian forces in this direction with the aim of launching an offensive in Zaporizhia.
• Ukrainian forces only managed to gain a foothold at a height near the village of Rabotino and there are continuous battles.
• The objective of Ukraine is to seize the city of Tokmak, to storm the letter of Azov, to cut off the land corridor to Crimea.
Does the bombardment of the dam prevent the attack?
Following the dam’s collapse, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy confirmed that it would not affect Kyiv’s plans to move forward with its counterattack aimed at retaking its lands from Russian forces.
But the destruction is likely to limit Kyiv’s options in its initial counterattack, according to the Financial Times.
And about the timing, she describes the matter as: “suspicious, and to a large extent it benefits Russia to thwart Kiev’s plans in the south and increase the possibility of launching an attack in the east on which Moscow can concentrate.
As for the British newspaper The Guardian, it said on Thursday that:
• The Ukrainian attack will be very expensive even if it succeeds.
Its signs have appeared during recent military operations in several sectors along the front lines.
• The collapse of the dam will not affect the attack.
• Kiev has military alternatives and plans, but no matter how increased its military and combat capabilities, it will suffer huge human casualties.
• It’s not easy because Moscow has prepared impregnable defensive lines in anticipation of Ukrainian moves.
For his part, military expert Peter Alex told Sky News Arabia that, according to Al-Mutawwal, recent Ukrainian military actions on multiple fronts were part of the counterattack:
• The Ukrainian attack is a message to the West that its massive aid has not been in vain, and a message within to boost the morale of the Ukrainian people.
• Russia takes advantage of the destruction of the Kakhovka dam to prevent any breakthrough on its front in Kherson.
• With the destruction of the dam, Kyiv’s launch of a military operation in Kherson has become unclear.
• Ukraine has alternative plans after assessing the damage caused by the collapse of the dam, and if it was a disaster, it would not stop Ukraine’s counterattack.
• Moscow may have blown up the dam to disrupt the Ukrainian advance and flood the islands downstream of the Dnipro after Ukrainian forces regained control.
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