The source said that US President Joe Biden will deliver, on Tuesday, a speech in Poland, in which he will once again confirm the condemnation of the Russian military operation in Ukraine, and will also clearly declare that the United States will support Kiev until the last moments of the conflict.
He added that US officials believe that Ukrainian forces “are about to reach a critical stage, as Russia is preparing to launch a new offensive.”
Concurrently, the Biden administration is “urgently pressing the Ukrainian president’s administration to consolidate its gains – and perhaps launch its own counterattack,” according to Politico.
And she added, quoting a number of officials, that the White House had asked Zelensky’s team “to prepare for the attack, as weapons and aid flow from Washington and Europe.”
American support for Ukraine continues to receive an almost complete bipartisan consensus, despite some voices calling for an end to “continued generous support” for Kiev.
Republican Senator Lindsey Graham said: “Biden has been good at linking our national interests to the Ukraine war, because it is good for the world that Russia does not succeed … and therefore it will be one of the defining moments of his presidency.”
Many military analysts expect a major attack that Russia could launch for “symbolic” reasons, as the anniversary of the special military operation approaches on February 24.
“We are seeing more and more Russian reserves being deployed in our direction, and we are seeing the introduction of more equipment,” Luhansk region governor Sergei Gaidai told Ukrainian television.
Will Bakhmut be the counterattack point?
- Ukrainian forces conducting weekly exercises near the small town of Seversk in the east of the country said they were preparing to defend one of the possible targets for a new Russian offensive. Seversk, which had a pre-war population of about 10,000, is located 35 km north of Bakhmut and on a direct road to another of the main towns in the Donetsk region, Sloviansk. Bakhmut is the scene of fierce fighting in recent weeks.
- The deputy commander of the Seversk Battalion, whose pseudonym was Han, said, “If they occupy Bakhmut, we will be semi-encircled because the Seversky Donets River limits us from the left and the enemy will advance from the right, and they may cut us off completely if they reach the Bakhmut highway.”
- Ukrainian forces have appealed to Kiev’s western allies to send more advanced weapons to help them defend Bakhmut, which is being attacked by Russia’s Wagner private military group. One of the soldiers defending Seversk said that the enemy’s artillery outweighed most of their artillery, which dates back to the Soviet era.
- Capturing Bakhmut would give Russian forces a springboard to advance into two larger cities to the west, Kramatorsk and Sloviansk.
- But Ukraine and its Western allies say success there would be a Pyrrhic victory for Moscow given the time it took and the scale of the losses.
Back to talking about “nuclear”
- The Russian Ministry of Defense said that Ukraine had received containers of radioactive materials from Europe, with the aim of carrying out a provocation in order to accuse the Russian forces of it.
She explained that the purpose of the provocation is to accuse the Russian armed forces of launching indiscriminate attacks on dangerous radioactive facilities in the country Ukrainewhich led to the leakage of radioactive materials and contamination of the area.
On more than one occasion, Western officials have expressed their concern that the allegations of “nuclear provocations” are merely a pre-emption of military action in which banned materials may be used.
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