On the morning of May 10, Russian occupation troops crossed the border with Ukraine in Kharkiv region and began what they began to call the “offensive against Kharkiv”. In the information flow, there was talk of an apocalypse and the inevitable loss of Kharkiv. But what is actually happening?
Analyst Oleksandr Kovalenko stated that the Russian operation "Imitation" is currently underway. It should be understood that the main task of the operation is not the capture of Kharkov. Not the surroundings of Kharkiv. Not even a breakthrough to Kharkov and creating a threat of encirclement and conquest. The task of the operation is to mimic all of the above in order to force Ukrainian forces to withdraw resources to defend the city from other points on the front.
The resource available to the Russian occupation troops in this area is enough to organize a border skirmish, but by no means to capture a city of a million. This is exactly what we are seeing there at the moment.
The Russians lacked both the manpower and the mechanized component to fully man their forces. In addition, logistics was lagging, Kovalenko points out. The Russians report that they have captured several villages near the border. Their big goal, however, is to create panic that the city of Kharkiv may fall, although for this purpose, huge resources in manpower will be needed, which the occupiers have not currently concentrated in this direction of the front.
Even before the start of the “offensive against Kharkiv” Russian propaganda is launching an information war whose main narrative is to create panic among the residents of the crowded city. Against the background of the intensification of attacks on Kharkiv and its immersion in blackout, dire “prophecies“ began to spread that an encirclement and capture of the city was being prepared. "But it must be understood that all these are limited opportunities of a limited contingent, which even at the initial stage and even in the gray zone could not immediately fulfill the set combat tasks," said Kovalenko, who called on Ukrainians not to panic.
Let's recall that the Russian army wanted to capture Kyiv in three days, but for more than 800 days it has never been able to enter the Ukrainian capital. Russian terrorists continue to target unarmed civilians and commit war crimes in Ukraine. But they are unable to break the spirit of the country that war criminal Vladimir Putin wants to destroy.
Ukraine urgently needs more Western air defense systems to protect its civilian population, which is Russia's main target. Western systems have already proven many times that they can easily take down even the declared "analogless" Russian missiles. However, there is still hesitancy in Western countries over providing weapons to Ukraine, which is encouraging Putin to commit more and more war crimes with impunity.