Ukraine’s campaign against Russian logistics has left Moscow unable to effectively supply Crimea, with fuel shortages spreading and transport links into the peninsula increasingly disrupted, a senior NATO official has said.
On the sidelines of the NATO Defence Ministers’ meeting, the UK Defence Journal was told that a concerted Ukrainian effort to interdict the logistics heading into Crimea and Zaporizhzhia was now having a visible effect, with the official saying “we see that Russia can’t effectively supply Crimea now” and pointing to fuel shortages and to Russia’s increasingly “limited means for transportation” to move safely into the occupied areas.
The official said Ukrainian forces had struck bridges in northern Crimea in June, further disrupting Russian transport links, and had caused the temporary loss of rail ferries on the Kerch Strait crossing, creating fresh bottlenecks. While the Kerch bridge itself remained open, the official said its use was “almost certainly restricted” because the Russians remained deeply concerned about the prospect of the next Ukrainian strike against it.
This interdiction, the official said, was being driven by a marked improvement in Ukrainian capability, citing Ukrainian ingenuity and innovation alongside significantly improved command and control that gave Kyiv a better ability to strike along the operational depth behind the front line, much of it enabled by more effective drone technology.
A key turning point, the official said, had come once Russia could no longer make use of Starlink, after which “Russian command and control begin to degrade”, something the official assessed had amounted to a net advantage for the Ukrainians, compounding the supply problems now being felt across the occupied south.
Asked how dire the situation might become for Russian forces in Crimea, the official was cautious, saying a moment of genuine crisis was not imminent, but warned that military operations ultimately come down to logistics, and that once an occupying force cannot sustain its supply lines “you’re starting to get into some pretty big trouble”, with a degraded Russian military capability on the peninsula and growing discontent among the population there.
Private fuel sales in Crimea now banned.
Governor Sergey Aksyonov said individuals and businesses would be turned away from petrol stations, and fuel would only be sold to government agencies.
Slava Ukraini 🇺🇦
Things are not getting any better for Russia. Suggest they fill their tanks and head home.
That basically means any fuel tanker is a military one… Free game to hunt.
It’s suprising that Ukraine hasn’t fully destroyed the Kerch bridge, given how much they were targeting it early on in the war. Is it possible that they are deliberately not fully destroying it, but rather damaging it just enough to put it out of action, before waiting for Russia to bodge it back together and then hitting it again?
No, it’s just really difficult. The bridge has to be designed to withstand enormous stresses, so to ‘destroy’ it- i.e. bring about catastrophic structural failure- would require a weight of ordnance that Ukraine would still struggle to deliver- particularly to the foundation. It’s a choke point and there are other ways to render it impassable, depending on who controls the airspace.
The thought I had was, If you leave them an exit maybe they won’t resist too hard if the Ukrainians start to take Crimea back. They might decide to take the easy option of crossing the bridge, If you take that away they might resist harder. Just an idea.
the battle for the donestsk oblast is coming to a culmination, russia is finally advancing on slovyansk and kramatorsk, that’s why the western media is overwhelming us with negative propaganda about russia, even more than it’s done for the last 4 years, this war could have been ended in 2022 on much more favourable terms to ukraine, including the withdrawal of all russian forces from territory occupied since their full scale invasion, we can hardly expect russia to agree to that now after the cost of this war to them, especially given it was incited by the west in the first place given they reneged on their assurances to russia nato wouldn’t be allowed to spread eastwards
see ‘nsarchive, what gorbachev heard’
Get lost vatnik!
oh no, not the russian bot retort, nobody ever expects the russian bot retort !
have you ever had an original thought in your head, just one ?
Utter shite!
The war could never happened if Putin wasn’t a psychotic freak obsessed with former Soviet glory, and Russian society moved on from 1945 and joined the 21st century.
There was no promise from NATO not to expand eastwards, and even suggesting it in those terms shows a Russian understanding of things.
NATO doesn’t expand in any direction; countries aren’t absorbed into NATO. Countries have to apply to join, and all existing NATO members must agree.
Russia is upset that countries like Poland and the Baltics joined NATO, without ever asking themselves WHY they wanted to join – to prevent exactly what’s happening in Ukraine from happening to them! They were obviously right to do so.
have you not bothered to read the reference i posted ?
do you understand now ?
Have you not bothered to read anything not written by pro-Russian Vatniks?
What I understand is Ukraine is now winning this war and the filthy orcs infesting Crimea and the rest of Ukraine will be gone in time, fucking off back to Mordor.
Are you saying nsarchive is pro-russian, or have you left you brain in your handbag, and left that at home
the documents speak for themselves, unless your saying they’re faking it ?
Your word structure makes me think that you’re not British, or even a westerner, despite the ted name.
Or not even human but some bot.
The occasional full stop and use of capitals would help enormously.
Thanks.
and ?
maybe you can make valid points even if your not british !
do you understand now ?
And? And nothing, I suspect you have an agenda so I call you out on it.
I like how you repeat the “do you understand now” bit, you did that the last time you surfaced.
I do understand, I understand that you are free to make a point, you yourself can then understand that others will call you out on it, though it’s impossible to assume that you do not have an agenda when posting these views on a British centric defence forum which runs counter to everything accepted.
and those people who call me out on it ought to address the evidence i produce to support my point, not some brainless bot argument, even bot’s can be right if their given correct information
do you understand now ?
We understand you’re a braindead Vatnik bot.
As I suspected, you actually understand nothing then, and are presumably incapable of doing so, am I right ?
African by any chance?
does it make a difference because your bigoted ?
try dealing with the issues, i.e the evidence produced by nsarchive showing the culpability of nato
do you understand now ?
Up yours Vlad 🖕
oh no, not the russian bot retort, nobody ever expects the russian bot retort !
have you ever had an original thought in your head, just one ?
Have you? Because all I’m seeing is what your Kremlin paymasters are telling you to say.
AHH, now I understand, you prefer to live in a different world than the real one, where everybody who disagrees with you must be doing it for money
Do you know how dozy that is ?
Ted, Where is the evidence that NATO’s leadership promised to Russia that the Organisation would not expand eastwards? Its a myth propgated by Russia!
see ‘nsarchive, what gorbachev heard’
no it wasn’t, it appears to be fact, care to dispute the nsarchive analysis ?
Your reference NSarchive;
Document 29, 1991
‘…the Soviets wanted the agreement to include a provision that Czechoslovakia would not join alliances hostile to the USSR. Wolfowitz advises both Havel and Dobrovsky not to enter into such agreements and to remind the Soviets about the provisions of the Helsinki Final Act that postulate freedom to join alliances of their choice. Havel states that for Czechoslovakia in the next 10 years that means NATO and the European Union.’
That has always been the position on this matter. The Helsinki Final Act, to which the USSR was a signatory, states that every sovereign nation has the right to its own self determined foreign policy and to join international alliances as appropriate.
Ukraine is also a signatory.
‘I was in those meetings, and Gorbachev has [also] said there was no promise not to enlarge NATO,” Zoellick recalls. Soviet Foreign Minister, Eduard Shevardnadze, later president of Georgia, concurred, he says. Nor does the treaty on Germany’s unification include a limit on NATO enlargement.’
and nor does what gorbachev or shevardnadze say matter one jot, it only matters what was actually said to them, and the referenced documents clearly show these assurances where given, unless you care to challenge their authenticity of course, which NOBODY has done to date) ?
think of it like this, you can’t prove a negative, i.e. something wasn’t said, but you can prove a positive, i.e. something was said, which the referenced documents clearly do !
We know what was said to Gorbachev because he has told us:
‘The topic of “NATO expansion” was not discussed at all, and it wasn’t brought up in those years. I say this with full responsibility. Not a singe Eastern European country raised the issue, not even after the Warsaw Pact ceased to exist in 1991. Western leaders didn’t bring it up, either.’
‘Additional armed forces from the alliance would not be deployed on the territory of the then-GDR after German reunification. Baker’s statement, mentioned in your question, was made in that context. Kohl and [German Vice Chancellor Hans-Dietrich] Genscher talked about it.
Everything that could have been and needed to be done to solidify that political obligation was done. And fulfilled. The agreement on a final settlement with Germany said that no new military structures would be created in the eastern part of the country; no additional troops would be deployed; no weapons of mass destruction would be placed there. It has been observed all these years. So don’t portray Gorbachev and the then-Soviet authorities as naïve people who were wrapped around the West’s finger. If there was naïveté, it was later, when the issue arose. Russia at first did not object.’
Mikhail Gorbachev 16 Oct 2014
it doesn’t matter wht gorbachev says, (he was duped after all, so his reaction is quite common), it only matter what actually was said, and the nsarchive documents are persuasive evidence of that, to date, nobody has actually disputed them as an historical record, so, are you now saying their lies, and if so on what evidence ?
do you understand now ?
and i’m not disputing that right, but the right to its own self determined foreign policy and to join international alliances as appropriate isn’t a right to be allowed to join, e.g. if you wanted to join a golf club do the members/committee have to let you ?
and in this case the west had given assurances to russia they wouldn’t be allowed to as the referenced documents show, it ain’t rocket science is it !
Not only is it not rocket science, the idea that NATO has even conducted a planned eastward expansion in contravention of some unwritten agreement (there is certainly no evidence of any agreement in writing) is complete nonsense.
We know what was said to Gorbachev because he has told us:
‘The topic of “NATO expansion” was not discussed at all, and it wasn’t brought up in those years. I say this with full responsibility. Not a singe Eastern European country raised the issue, not even after the Warsaw Pact ceased to exist in 1991. Western leaders didn’t bring it up, either.’
‘Additional armed forces from the alliance would not be deployed on the territory of the then-GDR after German reunification. Baker’s statement, mentioned in your question, was made in that context. Kohl and [German Vice Chancellor Hans-Dietrich] Genscher talked about it.
Everything that could have been and needed to be done to solidify that political obligation was done. And fulfilled. The agreement on a final settlement with Germany said that no new military structures would be created in the eastern part of the country; no additional troops would be deployed; no weapons of mass destruction would be placed there. It has been observed all these years. So don’t portray Gorbachev and the then-Soviet authorities as naïve people who were wrapped around the West’s finger. If there was naïveté, it was later, when the issue arose. Russia at first did not object.’
Mikhail Gorbachev 16 Oct 2014
We even know that Putin himself considered the idea of Russia itself joining NATO.
‘Why not? Why not?” Putin said when asked by the BBC’s David Frost about Russian membership. “I do not rule out such a possibility . . . in the case that Russia’s interests will be reckoned with, if it will be an equal partner.”
“Russia is a part of European culture, and I do not consider my own country in isolation from Europe and from . . . what we often talk about as the civilized world,” Putin said. “Therefore, it is with difficulty that I imagine NATO as an enemy.”
Putin 06 March 2000
‘The narrative of a broken Western promise is a fiction, carefully cultivated by Moscow after the fact to justify its aggression in 2014 and 2022.’
Putin is conducting a so far largely unsuccessful campaign of demographic expansionism in response to Russia’s internal demographic crisis. He has attempted to justify this campaign to the Russian people by an orchestrated deluge of propaganda, all of it atmospherics; hot air.
i’ve never claimed the eastward expansion was planned, only that assurances were given, which the documents outlined bu nsarchive are compelling evidence of, nobody to date has ever disputed their veracity, so be clear, are you saying their phoney, and of so your evidence is ?
do you understand now ?
Your golf club analogy doesn’t work.
This is more like someone (Ukraine) wanting to join a golf club (NATO) but the shit rival golf club across town with a dodgy course and whose every member cheats (Russia) thinks it has a right to dictate who joins the first golf club.
the analogy does work within the concept of wanting to join a club vs right to join a club, as for the ovolvement of russia, you neglect to concede the club they want to join has already told the russian club they won’t let a certain ‘class of people become members’, so the shit club is ?
do you understand now, the only relevant discussion here is about whether the west gave those assurances or not, the nasarchive evidence is pretty compelling evidence the west did, once you accept that the conclusion is obvious, it’s the west which must pay reparations to both ukraine and russia, i accept ukraine has done nothing wrong in seeking to join nato, the fault lies in the west suggesting they might be allowed to join, of course, that is impossible for the west to accept now, the sums are too large, which is why their having to gas light their populations about their duplicity !
No, the analogy doesn’t work.
The shit club (Russia) has no right to demand that a former member joins the better golf club.
And there was no such assurances, at all. You even admitted earlier that Gorbachev said no such thing was agreed, and then said that his word was irrelevant.
Gorbachev himself, a former USSR Premier, said no such agreement happened. End of.
The West doesn’t owe Russia anything. That’s absolutely laughable! Russia owes Ukraine hundreds of billions at the very least. I’d say a trillion dollars would be a good reflection of how much Russia should pay Ukraine in reparations.
The West owes it to Ukraine to keep providing aid, both military equipment and financial, but doesn’t owe anything to Russia!
This war is down to nothing more than Putin’s USSR 2.0 wet dreams.
of course it works, russia isn’t demanding ukraine joins anything, it only expects the west to respect the assurances it gave they wouldn’t allow nato to spread eastwards
you’d understand this if you could read the documents nsarchive references
Russia tried to demand Ukraine DOESN’T join NATO.
Again, the documents are shite. Gorbachev himself said that there was no such assurance made. You cling to these documents like they’re the holy grail. They’re not.
Show me a binding agreement signed, stating that NATO would not expand eastwards. Show me an actual legal document, signed by both NATO member states and the USSR as a legal agreement.
Both you and Russia have no leg to stand on. And the sooner Putin’s army of rapist orcs realises that they’ve lost this war and piss off back to Mordor, the better for everyone (including Mordor/Russia!)
and what evidence, (other than the rantings of an eejit), have you that the documents are shite, nobody has falsified them to date, and it doesn’t matter what gorbachev said, it only matters what actually was said, the documents are credible proof of that
and for your information, an international organisation, e.g. nato, cannot form a legally binding agreemnt with a sovereign country, e.g. russia, yet another example of how you’ve been gas lighted, nevertheless, the assurances were given by the west, and to that extent, the russian’s have the moral high ground
please, can you and your fellow eejits stop with the ranting and orc refernces, it only goes to show your limited intellects
Using your own logic, it doesn’t matter what Putin said. What matters is that Russia signed to secure Ukraine’s security when they gave up Soviet nuclear weapons, and since then Russia has completely shat on said agreement by invading Ukraine!
Ha! “Russia” and “moral high ground” don’t belong in the same sentence.
And we’ll stop calling Russians “Orcs” when they stop behaving like them.
Actually, scratch that; orcs never raped anyone, so Russian forces are actually worse than orcs!
I’ve wasted enough time on a pathetic Vatnik troll like you. Why don’t you go and volunteer for the Glorious Mordor Army? Brainless fool like you will fit right in!
Preston Stuart is a good source of info on the tube. Quotes many Russian sources. He almost predicts each Uke move and is pretty accurate. Next? The bridge, he disclosed Ukes have over 60 of their newish cruise missiles….lets see, and hope Ivan just withdraws.
did he predict ukraine’s kursk publicity stunt, (or anything like it), did he predict the fall of pokrovsk, has he predicted the encirclement of slavyansk and kramatorsk ?
Morning Ivan. Pillockski.
so your determined to just be a prat ?
so your determined to just be a prat ?
Da tovarich is Moscow still on fire 🔥
probably, there’s still loads of stuff to burn compared to kiev, did preston predict that pratovarich ?
💙💙
Of course there is; far more vodka in Moscow than in Kyiv – learn to spell it right!
and far more bulsh in kiev, (and western europe for that matter, only it’s called gas lighting here)
@steve R
russia signed to secure ukrainer’s future security still thinking the west would honour the assurances given to russia they wouldn’t allow nato to spread eastwards
come on chumpy, you haven’t exhausted your 57 varities of why those assurancxes done’t matter !
do you understand now ?
Oh my Lord, say what you want, freedom of expression et al, but please no more “Do you understand now? It is starting to grate.
Russian equivalent of Starship Troopers?
“Would you like to know more?”
Ah, I understand now!