After launching the first invasion of Russia since World War II, Ukraine’s objectives for its Kursk incursion are becoming apparent. Ukraine barely acknowledged the almost two-week-old campaign initially. However, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy recently laid out some of the goals his forces are trying to achieve.
According to Zelenskyy, Ukraine needs to shore up its political support. The president said it is essential that his country enters the fall with momentum. Taking Russian territory and capturing Russian soldiers is a good way for Kyiv to show its supporters it can win the war.
Zelenskyy, along with others in the international community, pointed to the incursion as the latest proof that Russia’s threats over potential border crossings are little more than bombastic bluffs.
Time and time again, Vladimir Putin and his allies in the Kremlin said Moscow would use nuclear weapons if Ukraine received certain items from the West. Some of those items include artillery, tanks, air defense systems and F-16s. Even with parts of its territory under siege and hundreds of thousands of its people displaced, which was another Russian line in the sand, Moscow is seemingly no closer to a nuclear launch today than when the war began two years ago.
Two more objectives for Ukraine during its offensive were to create dilemmas for Russia and a defensive buffer zone.
A map of the area shows the battle lines and regions of control. The dark areas are the Donbas and Crimea, which Russia illegally seized in 2014. The areas shaded in red are the other contested parts of Ukraine Russia is trying to take.
In the East, Russia is close to making significant tactical gains. Ukraine does not want that to happen.
This is where Ukraine’s incursion into Russia is taking place. The dilemma for Russia is whether or not to keep up the pressure in the Donbas, or reposition troops and equipment to expel the Ukrainians in Kursk. It can do both for now, but not forever.
That is because both campaigns will take considerable investments in resources and manpower.
As it stands right now, Ukraine has the momentum in Kursk. In the last 72 hours, Ukrainian artillery took out three bridges over the Seym River. That move essentially cut off Russian forces in the area and setting up a cauldron with little hope of escaping.
If Ukraine can build on the success it saw in Kursk and expand its area of control in Russia, that will push back Russia’s offensive capabilities, creating a buffer zone for the Ukrainian villages along the border region. This would create more dilemmas for Russia, which would then have to determine how to push Ukraine back without destroying its own towns and villages with wave after wave of artillery.
Editor’s note: In a previous version of this video, an inaccurate location was gestured to on the map. This video has since been corrected. Straight Arrow News regrets the error.
