If Kiev drops cluster bombs on Russian soldiers, “we reserve the right to use them as a reciprocal measure”: Russian President Vladimir Putin promises retaliation for the arrival in Ukraine of the controversial “cluster bombs”, which despite the ban by the armies of more than 120 countries are entering – now officially – the conflict. “If it hasn’t already done so, Ukraine will use cluster bombs in the next few hours and days,” assured Jake Sullivan, the US national security adviser who supplied them.
According to Kiev, these weapons are necessary to give impetus to the counter-offensive which, if it claims progress in the south, finds it difficult in the east as admitted by the Kiev defense ministry itself. While Putin declares that the Ukrainian operations “are not successful”, to then launch yet another lunge against the West: “If the US asked European leaders to hang themselves, they would do it”, is the attack by the head of the Kremlin. The supply of cluster munitions and their use by Kiev “should be considered a crime”, said the tsar in an interview for Rossiya-1, underlining that “the same US administration through its staff had given this same opinion long ago. Now Moscow’s goal is to respond in kind: «We have a sufficient reserve of various types of cluster munitions. So far we haven’t done it, we haven’t used them and we haven’t needed them».
In the usual message the Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky, reported by Ukrainska Pravda: «We have already demonstrated that there are no Russian missiles that the Ukrainians cannot shoot down. And when the Ukrainian air shield becomes strong enough, and it will be, Ukraine will provide real freedom and protection for all of Europe from Russian terror. The security of our continent starts here.” But the New York Times warns that in the first weeks of the counteroffensive, Ukrainian forces destroyed or damaged 20% of the weapons and vehicles at their disposal. This – according to the prestigious American newspaper – has prompted Kiev to rethink its strategy and slow down the pace, with the losses having dropped to 10% and with the aim of preserving more of the troops and armaments necessary for the great offensive thrust that Ukrainians claim is yet to come.
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