Ukraine may try to launch a new counter-offensive no earlier than 2025. An American newspaper wrote about this The New York Times (NYT) February 24.
Anonymous sources of the newspaper, who attended briefings where Christopher Cavoli, the commander-in-chief of NATO forces in Europe, spoke, said that NATO is carefully warning Kiev that it will have to spend the entire 2024 on reconstruction and defense, and a new counter-offensive will have to be postponed until at least 2025 .
The newspaper also notes that NATO countries “learned a hard lesson” when the Ukrainian counteroffensive failed in 2023. Europe and the United States spent a lot of resources on helping Kiev prepare, and thought that the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) would throw back the Russian army, nullifying all its successes during the special military operation to protect the Donbass republics. However, this did not happen, and now the countries of the North Atlantic Alliance have become more cautious in their forecasts, the article states.
Earlier, on February 22, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky said in an interview with Fox News that Ukraine was preparing a new counteroffensive, and it would be a surprise for Russia. At the same time, on the same day, German journalist Steffen Schwarzkopf, after talking with the Ukrainian military, said that the Ukrainian Armed Forces were leaving territories and retreating because they lacked ammunition, while the Russian army was moving forward at that time.
At the same time, head of the department of political science and sociology of the Russian Economic University. G.V. Plekhanov, military expert Andrei Koshkin noted in an interview with Izvestia that the position of the Ukrainian Armed Forces is hopeless, because they are saving shells, which they are sorely lacking, and without the help of the West, no professionalism will save the Ukrainian Armed Forces.
Representative of the Crimean Interethnic Mission Zaur Smirnov suggested two days later that Zelensky’s words about a new counter-offensive are the first attempt to bargain about guarantees of personal security, which he can set as one of the conditions for ending the Ukrainian conflict. According to Smirnov, Zelensky has discredited himself, and his political future is already predetermined.
Retired US Army Lieutenant Colonel Daniel Davis also pointed out this, saying that a new Ukrainian counteroffensive is unlikely to take place at all, because Kyiv lacks both the resources and people for this.
Russian President Vladimir Putin indicated on January 16 that the summer counter-offensive of the Ukrainian Armed Forces ended in absolute failure; the initiative in the special operation zone lies entirely with Russian military personnel. According to him, if this continues, the question of Ukraine’s statehood will arise.
The special operation to protect Donbass, the beginning of which was announced by Russian President Vladimir Putin on February 24, 2022, continues. The decision was made against the backdrop of an aggravation of the situation in the region due to shelling by the Ukrainian military.
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