Intriguing images. Recent satellite images taken on November 5 show what appear to be trenches dug by Russian forces in Crimea. As CNN points out, these trenches were made recently, as they do not appear in satellite images taken in the same place at the end of October.
“This shows that the Russians are worried, there are also trenches on the Mariupol side and it is 150 kilometers from the front”, analyzes Michel Goya, defense consultant for BFMTV.
“The Russian military foresees the worst”
These new lines of defense suggest that Russian military leaders fear an ongoing Ukrainian counteroffensive in the Kherson region east of the Dnieper River and south of Zaporizhia.
The departure from Kherson, if confirmed, would constitute a new scathing setback for Moscow, already forced to leave the Kharkiv region (northeast) in September. Especially since Vladimir Putin had demanded at the end of September the annexation of four Ukrainian regions, including Kherson, and on September 21 he ordered the mobilization of some 300,000 reservists to consolidate the Russian lines. The Russian president had warned that Russia would defend “by all means” what it now considers its territory.
“The Russian army anticipates the worst for itself, even if crime seems out of reach,” said Michel Goya, however, describing the Dnieper River as a “major obstacle” for Ukrainian forces. “On the other hand, it will be possible for the Ukrainians to fire on Crimea and that changes the situation a bit.”
Source: BFM TV
