WP: On May 10, the first day of the Russian offensive in the Kharkov region, the Ukrainian Armed Forces lost their Starlink terminals

At the beginning of the Russian offensive on the Kharkov region, due to electronic jamming of electronic warfare, the Starlink satellite Internet terminals, which provide basic communications for the Ukrainian military, failed.

The Washington Post tellsthat the approximately 40-kilometer section of the border between the Russian Federation and the Kharkiv region was defended by the 125th Territorial Defense Brigade, which used reconnaissance drones to daily monitor how the Russian Federation was building up forces for a possible attack.

But on the morning of May 10, the brigade lost all its video channels due to electronic jamming. Since the Russian invasion began in February 2022, this is the second time such a situation has arisen. As the commander of the drone unit told WP, ​​communication with the drones “just disappeared”:

“At a certain point we were left completely blind… That was the biggest problem, we couldn't see them moving, we only worked through the radio or through the phones where they were still working.”

On May 10, Russian troops became more active in the north of the Kharkov region, occupying a number of settlements in the “gray” zone. On May 16, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky said that the Defense Forces managed to stabilize the situation in the north of the Kharkov region. The deepest Russian troops advanced into Ukraine was 10 km. He also noted that the Russians in the Kharkov region only reached the first of three lines of fortifications.

Zelensky believes that Ukraine has prospects over time to switch to counter-offensive actions, provided that the Armed Forces are sufficiently staffed. IN AFP interviewanswering the question whether there are prospects for a new counter-offensive by Ukraine, he said:

“There are prospects. To do this, we must first stabilize the situation at the front. It is not stable, you see. I would say this: now it’s their turn. They need to be stopped, we will stop them. And then have the appropriate staffing of the brigades in order to count on the next step is counter-offensive.”

Asked whether this new counteroffensive could take place in 2025, the president said: “I can’t say. I know, but I can’t.”

Source link