The day of the war at a glance
Dozens of “sleeping” soldiers killed – Russia now hypersonic power
03/19/2022, 9:24 p.m
The extent of a Russian air raid on a barracks in southern Ukraine’s Mykolayiv with many dead becomes clear. The city, believed to be a fortress on the outskirts of Odessa, is facing a “tornado” of airstrikes. Elsewhere, Russia is establishing itself as a power with a special weapon. The 24th day of the war at a glance.
Gateway to Odessa: Mykolaiv under heavy air raids
Mykolaiv in southern Ukraine is considered the last fortress before the port city of Odessa. According to the local Ukrainian regional government, the Russian armed forces have stepped up their airstrikes on the city today. The attacks happened so quickly that no alarm could be raised, Governor Vitali Kim said in online networks. “Because by the time we announce this tornado, it’s already here.” He did not provide any information on the extent of the damage or the number of possible victims.
The devastating dimensions of an attack on a military barracks in Mykolaiv that took place yesterday only became really clear today. According to eyewitnesses, dozens of people were killed. “No fewer than 200 soldiers slept in the barracks,” said a 22-year-old soldier. “At least 50 bodies were pulled from the rubble, but we don’t know how many are still there.”
Another soldier said the attack could have killed 100 people. “We’re still counting, but given the condition of the bodies, it’s almost impossible to count,” said one of the rescuers.
Russia now hypersonic power
With another attack on an ammunition depot, Russia has also established itself as a power with hypersonic missiles. the The “Kinshal” (dagger) type rocket is probably the first of its kind ever to be used in a war. This happened on Friday in the Ivano-Frankivsk region. Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenko said the missile destroyed an underground weapons depot containing rockets and ammunition from the Ukrainian Air Force in western Ukraine.
The military expert and head of a research center in Moscow, Vasily Kashin, spoke of a “world premiere” after the announcement of the “Kinschal” mission. Hypersonic technology is state-of-the-art, but at the same time well-known. Numerous countries have been researching it for decades. Already in the “Third Reich” research was done on the “Silbervogel” hypersonic glider.
Despite this, the Russians are now arguably the first to use a modern hypersonic missile that both flies above Mach 5 and remains manoeuvrable. The first use of the “Kinzhal” takes the Russians a step further in the international race for ever better weapons, drones and destruction AI. You can read more about this in an analysis here.
Is Russia running out of generals?
But there was also reportedly a heavy loss for the Russians – and in the top ranks at that. Russia has twenty generals at the front, widely reported. Now the Ukrainian army wants to have killed another and thus the fifth. He is said to have been killed in the Ukrainian city of Chernobayevka after an artillery attack, the Ukrainian Armed Forces General Staff said on Twitter and Facebook. According to this, the dead man is Lieutenant General Andrei Mordvichev, commander of the 8th Army of the Southern Military District of the Russian Armed Forces.
Just yesterday it was reported that Russian President Putin had fired another general. The British newspaper The Telegraph reported, citing a British minister, that Putin had one of the highest-ranking military officers, General Roman Gavrilov, arrested. However, the report was denied in the Duma. Accordingly, Gavrilov resigned at his own request. There had previously been reports that Putin had recalled 8 of 20 generals at the front.
While it can be assumed that Russia has at least a high three-digit number of generals nationwide, the loss among the twenty generals deployed at the front does in fact appear very high.
Kyiv asks China, China does not give in – on the contrary
In the meantime, the war in Ukraine has developed into a diplomatic struggle for allies apart from the actual war. Often in the centre: China. The government in Kyiv appealed to Beijing to condemn Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine. “China can be an important element of the global security system if it makes the right decision to support the coalition of civilized countries and condemn Russian barbarism,” Ukrainian Presidential Advisor Mykhailo Podoliak wrote on Twitter. In particular, China is also under intense pressure from the United States and its European allies to distance itself from Moscow.
Meanwhile, Chinese Deputy Foreign Minister Le Yucheng said Western sanctions against Russia were increasingly outrageous. He echoed the Russian perspective by declaring that the western military alliance NATO should not expand further east, cornering a nuclear power like Russia.
Sea mines on the Bosphorus?
On the border between Europe and Asia, namely in the north-western Black Sea off the Ukrainian coast, the threat of sea mines is increasing as the war progresses. The Russian and Ukrainian sides blame each other for this.
The Ukrainian Navy has mined the ports of Odessa, Ochakiv, Chornomorsk and Pivdenny, the Russian domestic secret service FSB said. However, some of the more than 420 anchored sea mines were torn loose in the storm. That threatens ships on the Black Sea. In the worst case, mines could drift through the Turkish straits into the Mediterranean, the FSB statement said.
The Ukrainian portal BlackSeaNews, which specializes in shipping, also cited the Russian warning of floating sea mines. However, citing its own sources, it reported that the Russian Black Sea Fleet laid the sea mines on the route between Odessa and the Bosphorus. There was no independent confirmation of this.
Since the Russian attack on February 24, shipping in the north-western part of the Black Sea has been forced to stand still. Little traffic can be seen off the coasts of EU and NATO members Romania and Bulgaria.
More articles on the Ukraine war
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