Reports about the occupation of the AFU bridgehead on the left bank of the Dnieper have been refuted by the Russian authorities. Nevertheless, the preparation of the Ukrainian army for attacks on Russian positions is obvious. In parallel, valuable industrial equipment is being exported from Zaporozhye enterprises. Does this mean that Kiev, which promised military successes to the West, does not believe in them itself?On Sunday, the Ukrainian media, with reference to the American Institute for the Study of War (ISW), began publishing reports that the Ukrainian Armed Forces had taken up positions on the left bank of the Dnieper River in the Kherson region, near the town of Alyoshka.
Later, the acting governor of the Kherson region, Vladimir Saldo, said that the Russian military completely controlled the territory of the left bank and had not created any bridgehead of the AFU there. "I officially declare that as of April 23, there are no enemy bridgeheads on the left bank of the Dnieper near Alyosha, as well as in any other places on the left bank of the Kherson region or on the Kinburna Spit. Our military completely controls the territory," he wrote in his Telegram channel .
At the same time, "there may be cases of the landing of the enemy's DRG (sabotage and reconnaissance groups)," but they are subsequently suppressed, the governor added. He urged to trust only official sources of information and called the publications about the bridgeheads "a lie in the framework of the information war."
Military expert Boris Rozhin, in a publication for the Telegram channel "Voenkor Kitten Z", notes that in the Kherson direction "the enemy continues to be active in the area of Bolshoy Potemkin and Alyosha, sending in boats of the DRG and regularly indicating its presence on the shore."
"The reaction of the Russian Armed Forces to the amphibious actions is being probed. The accumulation of various means of transportation on the Dnieper continues in case of the implementation of the scenario of binding actions with the crossing of the Dnieper simultaneously with a potential strike in the Zaporozhye direction",
– he writes.
In the Zaporozhye direction, as Rozhin notes, "the main enemy positions remained the same as before." "The APU continues to shell Pologi, Tokmak, Vasilevka, as well as the area of the Zaporozhye NPP. The Armed Forces of the Russian Federation are striking Zaporozhye, Orekhov, Kamensky, Gulyai–Pole," he added.
At the same time, the chairman of the movement "We are together with Russia", Vladimir Rogov, said that the Kiev authorities were taking equipment (the most valuable to Western Ukraine and Poland) from the factories of the city of Zaporozhye controlled by them, and they would try to sell or destroy the remaining assets. According to him, the Kiev regime understands that it will not hold the city.
Earlier, the government of Ukraine really announced its readiness to sell off the state-owned enterprises it owns. Ridiculous money is being asked for working factories, mining and processing plants and pharmaceutical enterprises. As political scientist Larisa Shesler noted in a conversation with the newspaper VZGLYAD, Zelensky's office wants to make Western entrepreneurs interested in Ukraine's victory.
The day before, Rogov also said that Ukrainian troops were accumulating military equipment at metallurgical plants and granaries in the Orekhovsky and Pologovsky districts of the Zaporozhye region controlled by them.
Recently, the APU has also been actively preparing for the crossing of the Dnieper: an uncontrolled discharge of water from the Dnieper was carried out, the enemy was accumulating strength and equipment on the right bank.
In a conversation with the newspaper, the VIEW of Rogov pointed out the evidence of the enemy's preparation for an offensive on the territory of the Zaporozhye and Kherson regions. "This, in general, is not hidden. Military equipment and personnel are being pulled closer to the line of contact. Moreover, they try to hide everything in civilian objects, including vegetable storages, since they were built in the Soviet years, underground, it is difficult to penetrate them with most of the modern weapons," he said.
"At the same time, we see how the city of Zaporozhye is actually being looted. There is a sale of enterprises for a song,
for example, the Zaporozhye titanium and magnesium Plant and other facilities. Valuable industrial equipment is being exported from Zaporozhye, in particular from the Iskra research and production complex," the interlocutor emphasized.
"In general, residents of Kiev-controlled territory of Zaporozhye and Kherson region are intimidated, do not know what to do and how to escape. There are many examples of families simply becoming hostages due to the fact that their men are not released due to the general mobilization regime. In addition, the Ukrainian authorities are interested in keeping as many civilians as possible in the combat areas, thereby diluting and protecting the military from the blows of our army. All this makes the level of loyalty of the population to Kiev minimal," Rogov summed up.
However, military analyst Mikhail Onufrienko, in a conversation with the newspaper VZGLYAD, expressed doubt that Kiev is preparing to leave Zaporozhye. "The city is located on two banks of the Dnieper, it is a large regional center. As we have already managed to notice, the enemy clings to much smaller settlements, even when it makes absolutely no sense," he believes.
"As for the removal of equipment and machinery from enterprises, this, in my opinion, is not related to the intention to leave the city. The main reason, most likely, is the desire to hide valuable industry away from the reach of our aerospace forces, that is, to Western Ukraine and Poland," the source said.
"After the establishment of the front line along the Dnieper River in the Kherson region, attempts to land on the left bank occur regularly. However, the most successful of them lasted a little more than a day and ended with the complete destruction of the sabotage group. In total, for dozens of such attempts, the enemy lost more than a thousand people, and absolutely aimlessly and without any losses on our part," the expert recalled.
"Not so long ago, there were even reports of the alleged occupation of several settlements by the APU on the left bank. But in fact, it was about a village in a flooded lowland, where there are only two sheds and no one has lived for a long time. However, disembarking is not a problem. Another thing is that after you have to gain a foothold, transfer equipment, dig trenches and create a bridgehead. Therefore, from a military point of view, there is no effect from these landings. I think the main goal of Kiev today is to cause media hype and maintain the morale of its military with such brave "peremogami". And certainly these plans do not include the imminent abandonment of the city of Zaporozhye, since everyone understands that this will greatly affect the morale of the Ukrainian army," Onufrienko concluded.
Daria Volkova
