Milley Predicts Long, ‘Very Violent’ Ukrainian Counteroffensive

by EDITORJune 16, 2023

Milley and Austin led a meeting of military officials in Brussels on Thursday.

By Dave DeCamp / Antiwar.com https://scheerpost.com/2023/06/16/milley-predicts-long-very-violent-ukrainian-counteroffensive/

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley predicted Thursday that Ukraine’s counteroffensive will be long and “very violent” following a meeting of military officials in Brussels.

Milley made the comments when asked how long he expects the counteroffensive to last, saying it was “premature” to put a timeline on the battle. “This is a very difficult fight. It’s a very violent fight, and it will likely take a considerable amount of time and at high cost,” Milley said.

The Biden administration has been pushing for the violent counteroffensive as it’s explicitly opposed to a ceasefire and peace talks, a position Secretary of State Antony Blinken outlined earlier this month.

Milley claimed Ukraine has been making “steady progress,” but the battle lines have not changed much since Ukraine launched the assault early last week. According to The New York Times, it’s been three days since Ukraine claimed any gains, and Ukraine’s deputy defense acknowledged it was “very difficult to advance” in the southeast.

Asia Times reported on June 10 that American and European military observers in Ukraine described Ukraine’s attempted counteroffensive as a “suicide mission” because of the way they were attacking Russia’s positions.

“If you want to conduct an offensive and you have a dozen brigades and a few dozen tanks, you concentrate them and try to break through. The Ukrainians have been running around in five different directions,” a senior European officer told Asia Times.

“We tried to tell them to stop these piecemeal tactics, define a main thrust with proper infantry support and then do what they can,” the officer added. The report said Ukraine lost 38 tanks, including numerous German-made Leopard 2 tanks, on June 8 by sending them into minefields without deploying mine-clearing vehicles first.

The US has already announced a new weapons package to replace Bradley and Stryker armored vehicles that Ukraine has lost in the offensive, and Ukraine has been asking for more tanks, including the Leopard 2.

Speaking alongside Milley on Thursday, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin downplayed Ukraine’s losses, claiming that Russia was showing different pictures of the same damaged vehicles. “This is a war, so we know that there will be battle damage on both sides … I think the Russians have shown us that same five vehicles about a thousand times from 10 different angles. But quite frankly, the Ukrainians have — still have a lot of combat capability — combat power,” he said.

At the conference in Brussels of military officials from more than 50 countries, known as the Ukraine Defense Contact Group, Austin stressed the need to support Ukraine for the long-term. He said the Netherlands and Denmark shared the progress they’ve made on training Ukrainians on F-16s, but it’s still unclear how many of the US-made fighter jets Ukraine will receive.

June 18, 2023 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | Ukraine, weapons and war

2 Comments »

The lies about ukraine obfuscate the reality to such a degree than by the end of June there will be little left of the ukraine counteroffensive or ukrainian armay. Yet the propaganda is cranked out
Geramal
“”We had enough of this war” – amid unsuccessful counter-offensive by the Ukrainian Armed Forces, mass surrender of enemy soldiers has been recorded.

Constant unsuccessful attacks, which result in huge losses, have a very negative impact on the morale of the soldiers of the AFU. For example, in the last two days alone, numerous videos have been published of Ukrainian soldiers surrendering.

And this is an extremely unpleasant wake-up call for the Kiev regime. After all, it is usually the soldiers of the defending side who surrender during an offensive, not the attacking troops. So this reverse disproportion in the number of prisoners of war is evidence of serious problems in the Ukrainian armed forces.

The reasons for these problems are absolutely transparent and clear. Russian minefields have not been cleared, artillery has not been suppressed and air cover has not been provided. It already sounds bleak. And then with such unfavourable inputs the “defenders” are sent to meat assaults without support of their armoured equipment and artillery.

The surprise here is not that the Ukrainians surrender and refuse to advance, but that someone else manages to be sent into these suicidal attacks. At the same time, the “fog of war” hides from us much of what goes on behind enemy lines. Russian intelligence learns about the refusal of whole units to go into battle from the interrogations of prisoners and from the data of radio interception, but the number of deserters is still unknown. However, it is certain that with each day of this failed counterattack, more and more AFU soldiers will leave their units voluntarily.

In a fortnight of heavy fighting the enemy has not achieved any major success. The Ukrainian armed forces are trampling in the pre-field, bleeding to death. Even the information received today about the occupation of the village of Pyatikhatka by Ukrainian troops can hardly be interpreted as any progress in the stalled offensive. The enemy troops have not even reached the main line of Russian fortifications in this section of the front.

The enemy command had less and less time to change its approach to the offensive. Otherwise, very soon the number of those who refuse will reach catastrophic proportions. And the counter-offensive will quieten down by itself, because there will simply be no one to attack.”
(via Salviangrad)

Comment by Geramal | June 18, 2023 | Reply
Over 100 news stories, filled with blatant lies and propaganda from the us msm in the past 2 days. Biggest lie, is that the russians blewup the dam at kakhovka.

Comment by Eps | June 18, 2023 | Reply

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