While himself enthusiastic about the reported advancements by the Ukrainian military in Kharkov Region, White House National Security spokesman John Kirby on Tuesday urged reporters not to lose sight of Russia’s military potential.
“They clearly still have a military capable of inflicting great damage and casualties,” Kirby told reporters at a briefing on Tuesday afternoon. For all the problems the Russians may have faced in Ukraine, their military is “still very large and very powerful” and Russian President Vladimir Putin “still has an awful lot of military capacity left at his disposal, not just to be used in Ukraine, but potentially elsewhere.”
Ukrainian forces moved into areas north and east of Kharkov last week, with President Vladimir Zelensky claiming gains of 2,000 square kilometers. Moscow claimed the Russian troops that previously held the strategically important city of Izyum were “redeployed.”
Ukraine’s Deputy Prime Minister Olga Stefanishyna told France 24 on Tuesday that the Kharkov operation was a “turning point” not just of the fighting since February, but of “the war that started in the spring of 2014,” referring to Kiev’s efforts to suppress the independence of the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics in the aftermath of the US-backed coup.