“Progress reports”
Kremlin: Putin visits leadership command for Ukraine war
November 10, 2023, 9:49 a.m
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Chief visit to Rostov-on-Don: President Putin is said to have informed the army about the progress of his war against Ukraine. According to the Kremlin, the 71-year-old heard progress reports and saw new military technology.
According to the Kremlin, Russian President Vladimir Putin once again got an idea of the combat situation in Rostov-on-Don at the command headquarters for the war against Ukraine. “The commander-in-chief was shown new models of military equipment,” it said. “The head of state heard reports on the progress of the special military operation.” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov did not provide any further details. The head of state was accompanied by Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and Chief of General Staff Valery Gerasimov.
According to official information, this was the fifth time the Kremlin chief visited the headquarters in the Southern Military District. The last visit to date was on October 20th. The Russian region of Rostov in the south with the regional capital Rostov-on-Don borders the east of Ukraine and thus the territories occupied by Russia. According to the Kremlin, the 71-year-old has also been to the war zone itself.
The images distributed by the Kremlin of the visit almost exclusively show Putin, Shoigu and Gerasimov. Sergei Rudskoi, spokesman for the command command, can be seen in one photo. No documents, plans or maps can be seen. The men sit at an empty table. Despite the windows, there is no daylight in any of the interior photos. Pictures in which Putin appears to be outdoors were apparently not taken during the day either.
Russia claims to have intercepted drones
Ukraine has been defending itself against the Russian war of aggression with Western arms support for more than 20 months. The aim of the Ukrainian armed forces is to liberate the four regions of Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson that were annexed by Russia but only partially controlled from Russian occupation and to recapture the Black Sea peninsula of Crimea, which was annexed in 2014.
According to Western experts, Ukraine fell well short of its own goals in its counteroffensive to liberate its Russian-occupied territories. The Ukrainian commander-in-chief, Valeriy Saluschnyj, recently spoke of trench warfare. Neither side is making any progress. Shortly afterwards, President Volodymyr Zelensky contradicted this and said that he did not see a stalemate situation. However, he had acknowledged massive problems caused by a lack of air support on the immediate front line and underpinned his demand for new military aid. Putin repeatedly described Ukraine’s counteroffensive as “failed.”
Meanwhile, the Russian Ministry of Defense also reported two new Ukrainian drone attacks on Crimea, which were repelled by anti-aircraft defenses. In addition, a drone was destroyed in the Russian Tula region south of Moscow. The information could not be independently verified.