Following the Friday destruction of the strategic bridge in the Russian town Glushkovo, which lies in Kursk oblast, and the taking out of another bridge across the River Seym on Saturday, Ukraine has attacked and damaged a third bridge in the same region, Moscow has confirmed.
Russia’s Investigative Committee on Monday announced that yet another bridge located along the River Seym, which winds through the Kursk region, was destroyed in a Ukrainian attack.
Ukraine’s military has said that the targeted attacks are intended to disrupt Russian supply lines and make Russian troop and armory movement much more difficult.
“Minus one more bridge,” Ukrainian Air Force Commander Mykola Oleshchuk wrote on Telegram while publishing footage of the attack.
“The Air Force aviation continues to deprive the enemy of logistical capabilities with precision air strikes,” Oleshchuk said further.
In follow-up to this Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky outlined his stated aims in detail:
“It is now our primary task in defensive operations overall: to destroy as much Russian war potential as possible and conduct maximum counteroffensive actions. This includes creating a buffer zone on the aggressor’s territory,” he said in his evening address.
He also explained how the hundreds of Russian troops captured in Kursk since the brazen cross-border operation began on Aug.6 will be used to bolster the countries “exchange fund” – a reference to the ability to get Ukrainians back through prisoner swaps.
RT has noted that “Russian President Vladimir Putin stated last month that the number of POWs held by both sides is five to one in Russia’s favor,” but now “Ukraine claims to have taken dozens of Russian border guards prisoner during the first phase of its Kursk offensive.”
Ukrainian officials have of late talked about prioritizing the return of those “who defended Azovstal” in future prisoner exchanges, many of which were made of the infamous Azov Battalion, which is well-known to have neo-Nazis in its ranks.
There are widespread reports that Ukraine has utilized US-supplied munitions, including the HIMARS system (last Friday) to strike some of these bridges. The below video is from the third bridge to be blown up.
Though impossible to confirm, Ukraine is now claiming to have seized 440 square miles of Russian territory. It also says the Kursk operation has been able to divert Moscow’s attention from the front lines in Donbass, though the degree to which infantry troops have had to be pulled and relocated to Russia’s southern oblasts for defense remains uncertain.
Russia’s Defense Ministry (MoD) has meanwhile on Monday said it captured the town of Artemovo in Eastern Ukraine (known as Zalizne in the rest of Ukraine), with the MoD describing it as one of the area’s “major population centers.”