A group of 1,500 soldiers receive training in combat tactics and handling state-of-the-art weapons in Wiltshire County in a “new phase” of British aid to Kiev
With Boris Johnson defeated by scandal in the latter part of his mandate, his will as Europe’s most belligerent leader against Russia for the invasion of Ukraine continues to be applied to the letter. The British Army’s 11th Security Assistance Brigade has received more than 1,500 Ukrainian soldiers whom it has begun instructing on weapons, combat tactics and surveillance strategies, according to the Defense Ministry. The troops are already divided into training camps where 10,000 soldiers will pass in the coming months. With this program, the governments of London and Kiev hope to increase the ground offensive capability of Ukrainian troops, which have ceded a substantial portion of Donbas to the Russian war machine in the past three weeks.
The strength that the invaders failed to show at the start of the war has now become a hard wall to break. The bombing has been incessant last dawn. In just 24 hours, Russia attacked 177 Ukrainian positions. The explosions killed at least six civilians (other sources estimate the tragedy at 10 dead and 20 injured) in the cities of Kharkiv, Bakhmout, Sloviansk and Kramatorsk. Everything indicates that the Kremlin is preparing a large-scale offensive. Local authorities have even asked the population of Donetsk’s main cities to evacuate as “major battles” are imminent.
The General Staff has confirmed British intelligence reports that the Russian army is “regrouping, or rather reconstituting” to attack areas of the region it does not yet control. Military sources see in this move the end of the “pause” that President Vladimir Putin ordered his army after the final seizure of the neighboring province of Lugantsk to “rest and recover” for the next battles.
British intelligence assures, however, that these troops will be equipped with mediocre and even outdated war material, which would point in two directions: either Moscow believes it will not face as much resistance at this stage of the invasion as it has in the last four and a half. month and has decided to reserve what remains of the most modern and expensive arsenal, or has already exhausted this equipment and has been forced to resort to other old ones. Numerous analysts agree on this line and see the brutal bombing of residential areas or the destroyed shopping center in Kremenchuk as a sign that Russian aviation is using old and inaccurate missiles.
In Ukraine, the situation of its arsenals also does not look good. Ukraine’s dependence on foreign weapons is total. The Zelensky administration has reiterated that messages should be provided to the international community. In addition to the lack of ammunition, the Kremlin has refined selective attacks on imported bombs. This morning, it confirmed that its missiles destroyed a hangar where US M-777 155-millimeter howitzers were stored in the town of Chasuv Yar and knocked out several Ukrainian batteries, killing all thirty operators.
In that sense, Kiev has welcomed with a sigh of relief the Pentagon’s announcement that new US military aid is on the way. Washington, which has invested $6.9 billion in this war, will provide the Ukrainian armed forces in the coming days with four Himars multiple rocket launcher systems and 155-millimeter missiles like those destroyed at Chasuv Yar. With them, the Ministry of Defense hopes to increase the firing capacity and, above all, the precision of its guns to attack Russian positions.
The UK is also a strong donor to the Zelensky government. In total, the British executive has allocated €2.668 million in military equipment, a package to which is now added training on British soil of the Ukrainian army. “There are already over 1,500 soldiers in the UK. They arrive every week on planes carrying between 100 and 200 people at a time. Soon they will have trained 10,000 of our soldiers,” Ukraine’s ambassador to London, Vadym Prystaiko, told the Ukrinform bureau.
The main training center is in the county of Wiltshire, in the south west of the country. The program includes learning the use of certain next-generation short-arms and especially the MLRS long-range missile launchers. These missiles have caused a strong controversy between Western governments and Moscow, as they are capable of hitting targets 50 miles away and therefore serve in an offensive on Russian territory. Kiev has promised the United States and the United Kingdom that it will only use them within Ukraine’s war zone. The British supervisors, who have been accompanied by several New Zealand commanders, have emphasized the “enthusiasm” of the Ukrainian soldiers in statements to the BBC. “They hardly rest. They work and work and work.”
Defense Secretary Ben Wallace has confirmed the training is the “new phase” of Britain’s aid to Ukraine. “Using the global experience of the British military, we will help rebuild their armed forces and increase their resilience, while defending their country’s sovereignty and their right to choose their future,” Wallace said.
Source: La Verdad
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