Within a few days, the Crimean Peninsula, annexed by Russia, was shaken by a drone attack on the Black Sea Fleet and by explosions at a military base. Is Ukraine trying to take back its territory with military force?
“We rested. Nothing happened. It was quiet and peaceful. And then there was a violent blow,” says Viktor Lesnichenko in a video of the news magazine “Spiegel”. Puffs of smoke can be seen in the background.
Lesnichenko lives in Crimea, a peninsula in Ukraine annexed by Russia. He witnessed the explosions that occurred there on Tuesday first hand. “The house trembled. The windows shattered. They covered my wife. The frame of the window broke. To be honest, I didn’t understand what was happening,” he says.
Many people are probably like Lesnichenko. Who is responsible for what is happening in Crimea? How many people are dead, how many are injured? The most important questions and answers about the explosions on the Ukrainian peninsula.
Now save articles for later in “Pocket”.
On Tuesday there were several explosions at a Russian military base in south-west Crimea near the resort town of Nowofyodorovka. One person was killed, as Crimean head of administration Sergei Aksjonov said. There were also 14 injured.
As Ukrainian media reports, the runway of the military airport and an ammunition depot are affected. From the Saki base north of Sevastopol, Russian Sukhoi Su-24 fighter jets and Sukhoi Su-30 multi-role fighter aircraft recently flew many attacks on targets in southern Ukraine.
Other Russian regions in the border area with Ukraine are also reporting an extremely tense situation in the wake of alleged attacks from the neighboring country. The governors of Bryansk, Kursk and Belgorod complain of injuries and heavy destruction.
Surf tip: You can find all the news about the corona pandemic in the FOCUS Online news ticker
It cannot be independently verified who exactly carried out the attacks. When asked at a press conference whether Kyiv officially took responsibility for the blasts, Zelensky’s adviser Mikhail Podoliak said: “Of course not. What do we have to do with it?” And further: “It was an ammunition explosion.”
Moscow also denies that Ukraine was behind the explosions. The Russian Defense Ministry said a violation of fire safety rules was the cause of the recent explosions.
The New York Times, on the other hand, reported a Ukrainian attack. A weapon developed by Ukraine was used. The Ukrainian presidential adviser Oleksiy Arestovych also spoke unofficially of an attack with a new Ukrainian weapon “while our partners are not yet sending us long-range missiles”.
The Ukrainian defense industry is making progress. The focus of military experts is primarily on the new Hrim-2 short-range ballistic missiles. They were developed in Ukraine and are said to have a range of up to 500 kilometers.
Military experts from the US Institute for the Study of the War assume that the Russian leadership does not want to admit a Ukrainian attack for image reasons. Then Moscow would have to admit that its air defenses had failed, they said.
The Australian military strategist Mick Ryan, who repeatedly gives his assessment of the war in Ukraine, has also commented on the explosions in Crimea. He believes that the detonations are a Ukrainian action.
On Twitter he summarized – from his perspective – “the impact of this successful operation”. The explosions would have cost the Russians some planes. “But the reality is they have a lot more.” More serious than the loss of the planes is the loss of ammunition and fuel supplies, Ryan said. “Remember how Japan failed to move the fuel tanks at Pearl Harbor?”
In addition, the explosions could damage Russian confidence in their own defense systems. “The base was allegedly protected by S400 systems,” writes Ryan.
He sees Russia in a quandary because Ukraine is apparently succeeding in besieging Crimea. “The Black Sea Fleet, its fuel, ammunition, repair weapons and infrastructure are now at risk,” his Twitter post said.
According to Ryan, the Ukrainians either have an interest in retaking Crimea in the medium term. Or they use them in the short term to put strategic pressure on Russia.
In Ryan’s view, the explosions on the peninsula ultimately give Ukrainian soldiers, but also ordinary citizens, a “morale boost”. And: “They show western nations that Ukraine is still worth supporting, regardless of the energy costs in Europe.”
On Wednesday evening, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy recalled the explosions in Crimea in a video speech. Several Russian fighter planes were destroyed there in one fell swoop.
He also called on the residents of the Russian-occupied territories to resist. They should send information about the enemy or collaborators to the Ukrainian armed forces through secure channels, Zelenskyy said.
The head of state also expressed the expectation that the Russian occupiers would soon flee. “You already feel that the time has come to flee from Kherson and in general from the south of our country. There will come a time when they will flee the Kharkiv region, Donbass and Crimea.”
