Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy warned in an overnight address Tuesday that Russia is planning to ramp up its aggression and will “throw everything they have” in an attempt to turn the war around.
Little progress has been made by either side since the harsher winter months set in, though Russia saw major losses in Kharkiv and Kherson between September and November last year.
Ukrainian forces have also continued to push the lines further east into Donetsk, with some of the fiercest battles now taking place around the Donbas region, where Russian-back forces have been fighting since 2014.
A Ukrainian soldier fires a mortar at Russian positions in Bakhmut, in the Donetsk region of Ukraine, Nov. 10, 2022.
(AP Photo/Libkos, File)
“We have no doubt that the current masters of Russia will throw everything they have left and everyone they can muster to try to turn the tide of the war and at least postpone their defeat,” he said addressing his troops and international allies.
“We have to disrupt this Russian scenario. We are preparing for this,” he added.
Zelenskyy suggested that stopping this looming offensive will be the “final defeat” in the war against Russia, which has raged for more than 10 months.
Zelenskyy did not expand on what Kyiv suspects Russia will do in this major offensive, nor did he comment of preemptive defensive measures Ukrainian forces are gearing up for.
But the warning from the Ukrainian president comes less than two weeks after Russian President Vladimir Putin called on his defense forces to overhaul his war effort by not only reinforcing troops on the front lines in Ukraine, but by making sure they have the arms, supplies and equipment they need.
Medical waste and military clothes belonging to wounded Ukrainian soldiers outside a hospital on Dec. 26, 2022, in Bakhmut, Ukraine.
(Pierre Crom/Getty Images)
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Putin also called on Russia’s Defense Military Board to expand missile stockpiles, boost “the combat readiness of [Russia’s] nuclear triad,” and ready what he called the world’s “most powerful” warhead – the intercontinental ballistic Satan II missile – for “combat duty.”
Putin signaled last month that another mobilization will not be needed after he called up 300,000 men in September to join the war – a figure that was double the number of troops he stationed on Ukraine’s border ahead of the invasion.
Though some reporting has suggested Moscow will order another mass conscription among fighting age men to join the war and will close Russia’s borders to prevent them from evading the order.
Russian recruits stand prior to their military training at the Patriot Park outside in Moscow, Russia, Saturday, Oct. 1, 2022.
(Russian Defense Ministry Press Service via AP)
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It is unclear how many Russian soldiers are fighting in Ukraine, and death tolls have not been confirmed.
U.S. officials in November said some 100,000 Russian soldiers are estimated to have been killed or injured in the fighting, though a breakdown of the casualties was not provided.
Ukraine has claimed that nearly 109,000 Russian troops have died in the war, though these figures have not been verified.
