For the third day in a row, Russian forces battled Ukrainian troops on Thursday after they broke through Russia’s border in the Kursk region, a daring attack on the world’s largest nuclear power that forced Moscow to call in reserves.
According to Reuters, in the early hours of August 6, around 1,000 Ukrainian soldiers drove through the Russian border with tanks and armored vehicles in one of Ukraine’s largest attacks on Russia during the two-year war. They were covered from the air by swarms of drones and artillery fire, Russian officials said.
Ukrainian forces crossed the fields and forests along the border north of the border town of Sudzha, the last active transit point for Russian natural gas entering Europe via Ukraine.
President Vladimir Putin called the attack a “major provocation.” The White House said the United States – Ukraine’s biggest backer – had no prior knowledge of the attack and would seek further details from Kyiv.
Russia’s highest-ranking general and Chief of General Staff Valery Gerasimov told Putin on Wednesday that the Ukrainian offensive in the border area had been stopped.
But several pro-Russian military bloggers reported that fighting continued until Thursday and civilians were being evacuated.
“Sudzha is basically lost to us. It is an important logistics hub,” said Yuri Podoliaka, a well-known pro-Russian military blogger of Ukrainian origin. He added that Ukrainian forces were advancing north towards Lgov.
“In general, the situation is difficult and continues to deteriorate, although the pace of the Ukrainian offensive has noticeably slowed down.”
The Ukrainian army remains silent on the Kursk offensive. Some Russian bloggers criticized the state of border defenses in the Kursk region, saying that it was far too easy for Ukrainian forces to break through them.
CRITICAL POINT
The fighting for Sudzha comes at a crucial time in the conflict, the largest land war in Europe since World War II, and Kyiv is concerned that US support could wane if Republican Donald Trump wins the presidential election in November.
Trump has declared he would end the war, and both Russia and Ukraine are eager to gain the strongest possible negotiating position on the battlefield.
Ukraine wants to hold back Russian forces that control 18 percent of its territory, but the strategic significance of the border offensive was not immediately clear.
Former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said the Ukrainian attack was an attempt to force Russia to withdraw resources from the front and show the West that Ukraine was still capable of fighting.
As a result of the attack on Kursk, Medvedev said, Russia must expand its war aims to include the capture of the whole of Ukraine.
“From this moment on, the SVO (special military operation) should take on an openly extraterritorial character,” Medvedev said, adding that Russian forces should advance to Odessa, Kharkiv, Dnipro, Mykolaiv, Kyiv “and beyond.”
“We will not stop until we deem it acceptable and profitable.”
Gas still flowed through Sudzha via the Urengoy–Pomary–Uzhhorod pipeline, which transported about 14.65 billion cubic meters of gas in 2023, about half of Russia’s gas exports to Europe.
The Russian National Guard said it had increased security measures around the Kursk nuclear power plant, located about 60 kilometers northeast of the city.