Fear of the first anniversary of the war: is Russia preparing a major offensive against Ukraine?

Russia is preparing a major attack on Ukraine later this month. This is what the Ukrainian government assures, which is already seeing the intensification of attacks in the eastern part of the country, as well as the sending of Russian soldiers: 300,000 men, according to Moscow. “Do not underestimate the enemy,” Reznikov said at the announcement. Because from Ukraine they consider that the number is much higher. “From what is seen at the borders, estimates suggest that there are many more.” Specifically, it would amount to 500,000, half a million soldiers.

They are preparing for what they believe will be a two-axis attack, in the Donbas area and the south of the country.

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The context. “I think Russia really wants some kind of big payback. And I think it has already started,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Monday.

• By this he refers to the latest Ukrainian conquests in the city of Kherson in November and Kharkiv province in September. For this reason, they fear that from Moscow they intend to make a coup: a key date, a deployment of soldiers and a great offensive to offer their own.

• “We believe that since they (Russians) live in the symbolic, they will try something around February 24,” Reznikov told French television station BFM TV. Experts understand that “for Russia it is interesting to press as soon as possible to achieve its minimum objectives,” says Yago Rodríguez, director of ‘The Political Room’ in ‘Al Rojo Vivo’.

• A fact in which Jens Stoltenberg, NATO Secretary General, agreed, who stated that “(the Russians) are preparing for more war, that they are mobilizing more soldiers, more than 200,000 and potentially even more than that”, to journalists during a visit to South Korea this week.

• “They are actively acquiring new weapons, more ammunition, increasing their own production, but also acquiring more weapons from other authoritarian states like Iran and North Korea,” Stoltenberg said.

What can we expect? From Kyiv they insist to their partners that “it is necessary to be prepared as soon as possible.”

• That is why they are pushing for the idea of ​​increasing arms shipments to Ukraine. “Weapons are necessary to contain the enemy, since everything in war depends on initiative,” the defense minister said.

• For his part, Sergei Lavrov, Russian Foreign Minister, stressed that Russia’s intention is to move Ukrainian troops away from its border, thinking about the security of its territory. And he stresses that “the more long-range weapons the West supplies the Kyiv regime, the further it will be necessary to move them away from Russian territory.”

• Along these lines, the US has confirmed a new aid package for Ukraine, which includes a bomb with a range of 150 km for the first time. Of course, the United States has rejected Ukraine’s request for the ATACMS missile, with a range of 297 km. But from Kyiv, they insist. Reznikov, Ukraine’s defense minister, during his visit to the French government, wanted to pressure the West to send combat planes to the front.

• So far, both the United Kingdom, France and the United States have refused. “It doesn’t seem like a sound decision to us at the moment,” Ben Wallace, Britain’s Secretary of State for Defense, said on Wednesday.

And meanwhile… The representative of the Main Directorate of Military Intelligence (GUR) of Ukraine, Andriy Yuso, has assured that the war has entered its most active phase in the months of February and March.

• The first success of the Russian troops after months of stagnation in the face of the Ukrainian response has been the conquest of Soledar, in eastern Ukraine.

• The bloodiest battles continue in Donetsk. There, the mercenaries of the Wagner group have taken control of two towns close to Bakhmut. “Every day there are new groups of professional military or an increase in the number of Wagner fighters,” Zelensky said. The city of Bakhmut specifically has gone from having 70,000 to 6,500 inhabitants after these very strong attacks.

• Today there has been a new attack in Donbas, in Kramatorsk. A Russian missile hit an apartment building, leaving at least three dead and 20 injured, according to regional police. “At least eight apartment buildings were damaged. One of them was completely destroyed,” police said in a Facebook post. “People can stay under the rubble.”