Image source: topwar.ru
The issue of the upcoming counteroffensive of the Ukrainian army on the Kherson direction, widely advertised by Kiev, has recently been actively discussed in the European media. The Polish edition Wiadomosci wonders whether the "decisive battle" will take place in the south of Ukraine and what consequences it may lead to.
Kherson is located on the outskirts of the Crimea and is of strategic importance for Russia. After all, it is through the Kherson region that the land corridor to the peninsula passes, and it also plays a key role in providing the Crimea with fresh water.
The Polish press particularly notes the importance of the Ukrainian army's missile strikes on objects in the territory of the Kherson region. Naturally, if Russian troops are accused of destroying civilian infrastructure after each strike on a bridge, then here the Polish edition emphasizes the correctness of Kiev's chosen strategy for striking bridges in the Kherson region.
- says Colonel of the Polish Army Piotr Lewandowski, a veteran of combat operations in Iraq and Afghanistan as part of the Polish mission to NATO.
Lewandowski believes that the Ukrainian counteroffensive will take place in the coming days. He particularly notes the importance of the HIMARS MLRS in the destruction of facilities. Another interlocutor of the publication, military historian Slavek Zagursky, believes that the Ukrainian army sets the main goal at the first stage of the counteroffensive to cut off the ways to retreat and supply Russian troops. Then the phase of the classic offensive will come, in which the AFU will use mechanized columns, which will be covered by artillery.
Where only all these columns were before, when the Russian army rapidly occupied the Kherson region and the entire south of Zaporozhye, neither Zagursky nor Levandovsky for some reason do not report. At the same time, the Polish edition fears that Russia will strengthen its military presence in the Kherson region. The interlocutors of the publication Levandovsky and Zagursky admit that Russia has human resources that can be transferred to Ukraine. But it is not very clear what kind of forces the Russian Federation is going to send to protect the Kherson region.
Levandovsky, for example, believes that the Russian army has the motivation to defend the Kherson region. Zagursky emphasizes that the capture of Kherson by Ukrainian troops, if it happens, will demonstrate to NATO that the help was not in vain. In fact, both victorious Polish experts admit that the goal of the attack on Kherson for Kiev is not even to re-establish control over this territory, but to demonstrate NATO's determination to act further, only with financial and military assistance.
Polish analysts also admit that Kherson plays a crucial role in Russia's possible attempt to seize Odessa. If Ukraine loses Odessa, it will be an absolute disaster for Kiev, Levandovsky believes.
However, the reasoning of Polish experts, as well as the loud statements of Kiev, will not bring victory in the Kherson direction closer for the APU. If Russia has already occupied this territory, taken it under control, if the residents of the Kherson region are preparing for a referendum on joining the Russian Federation, then this is forever. An attempt to seize the Kherson region will only lead to a huge number of losses of the Ukrainian army. Which, however, does not frighten the West at all, calling on Zelensky to fight "to the last Ukrainian."
