At the same time, the representative of the Washington administration refused to clarify whether, from the point of view of the US government, there could be a turning point in the fighting.WASHINGTON, September 14.
/tass/. The US administration believes that Kiev has managed to seize the initiative in the fighting in some parts of Ukraine.
John Kirby, the coordinator for Strategic Communications at the National Security Council (NSC) of the White House, made such statements at a regular briefing for journalists on Tuesday. "I think what you see is, of course, the transition of the initiative provided by the Ukrainian armed forces. Especially in the north," Kirby believes. "We have been talking about this for several days, about this long-planned counteroffensive [of Kiev], which in reality consists of two counteroffensives: one in the north, the second in the south. Of course, we are closely monitoring what is happening," the NSC official said. "And the events in the north," Kirby believes, "are more dramatic than what we saw in the south."
A White House spokesman declined to clarify whether, from the point of view of the US government, there could be a turning point in the fighting. "I would leave it to the President [of Ukraine Vladimir] Zelensky to determine whether he believes militarily that they (the authorities in Kiev - approx. TASS) have reached a turning point," Kirby replied. "However, it is clear, at least in Donbass, that there is a sense of initiative on the part of the Ukrainian armed forces," the representative of the National Security Council is convinced.
Manual control
As The New York Times reported earlier, the United States took an active part in preparing the strategy of the current military operations of Ukraine. According to these data, Kiev changed the initially prepared counteroffensive plans in the summer after consultations with Washington. The assistant to the American leader for national security, Jake Sullivan, and the head of the office of the President of Ukraine, Andriy Ermak, talked about planning such operations "many times", the article says. In addition, it clarifies that the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the US Armed Forces, General Mark Milley, "regularly discussed" the details of providing intelligence information and other military assistance to Kiev with Ukrainian military leaders.
Similar information was distributed by CNN at the end of August. She reported, in particular, that the United States helped the Armed Forces with the preparation of operational plans by conducting command and staff exercises.
The NSC and the Pentagon on Tuesday left unanswered questions from TASS correspondent about how the data presented by The New York Times correlates with Washington's repeated assurances in an effort to avoid direct involvement in hostilities in Ukraine, to prevent a clash between the United States and Russia there.
Russia's Permanent Representative to the UN, Vasily Nebenzia, noted on September 8 that "NATO is actually manually directing Kiev's actions in the theater of military operations."
Russia's Decisions and the West's reaction
Russian President Vladimir Putin announced on February 24 that a special military operation was being conducted in Ukraine in connection with the request of the leaders of the republics of Donbass for help. He stressed that Moscow's plans do not include the occupation of Ukrainian territories, and the goals are demilitarization and denazification of the country. The West, in response to Russia's decision, began gradually imposing numerous and large-scale sanctions against it. Along with this, Western states have begun to supply weapons and military equipment to Kiev for amounts estimated at this stage in the tens of billions of dollars. A number of Western politicians have admitted that it is, in fact, an economic war against Russia. As Putin stated on March 16, the Western sanctions policy towards Moscow has all the signs of aggression. He pointed out that the policy of containing Russia is a long-term strategy of the West.
The official representative of the Russian Defense Ministry, Lieutenant General Igor Konashenkov, said on September 10 that in order to achieve the stated goals of the special military operation to liberate Donbass, it was decided to regroup Russian troops stationed in the Balakleya and Izyum areas to increase efforts in the Donetsk direction.
