The German publication Welt reports that the counteroffensive planned by Ukraine for 2024 obviously will be such as planned by the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine Valerii Zaluzhnyi for this summer.
This is reported by the portal of the German publication Welt, citing an expert from Germany in the field of security and political consultant Nico Lange.
Welt is confident that even though the Ukrainian counteroffensive is clearly deadlocked, and the West is hesitant with its support, there are signs that Kyiv is preparing a plan.
After the failure of the Ukrainian counteroffensive, pessimism spread in society. Bad news about the lack of ammunition in the Ukrainian Armed Forces, the lack of soldiers, bottlenecks in the supply of weapons systems from the West and the decline in morale of Ukrainians feed bad moods.
"Many forget that most tanks and armoured personnel carriers are still there, and that a lot of promised weaponry is still being supplied," counters German security expert and political consultant Nico Lange.
This applies, for example, to 200 German Leopard 1 tanks, of which only about 30 arrived in Ukraine.
Moreover, Ukraine still has access to more than 95% of all weapons systems supplied by the West, since they have not yet been used in the counterattack. This is the result of estimates of the Dutch open website Oryx, which analyzes data on the supply and destruction of military equipment.
The publication notes that in the South, Ukrainian naval units maintain and expand the bridgehead near Kherson on the russian-occupied bank of the Dnieper. From here, it is only 60 kilometers to the Crimean peninsula, occupied by russia. This is a weak point for the russian army since Ukraine forced the Black Sea Fleet to withdraw its troops from there and destroyed important air defense systems and other russian military objects.
"Ukraine still has big plans. This is evidenced by the list of desired weapons that Ukraine sent to the United States. These are Black Hawk and Apache attack helicopters, F-16 and F-18 fighters, long-range missile systems, Abrams tanks, a number of drones and ammunition. But "people are actually talking about F-18 fighters," Lange emphasized.
According to media reports, Commander-in-Chief Valerii Zaluzhnyi was never a supporter of the offensive without air support, and agreed to this only "for political reasons," but subsequently the "great counteroffensive" that was to lead to Melitopol and Berdiansk was eventually canceled.
Journalists add that Zaluzhnyi, deciding to attack with small units, kept his soldiers alive, secured weapons systems from the west and won an important time.
"Ukraine is probably gathering resources for a new counteroffensive next year. One of the starting points may be a bridgehead in Kherson. With the necessary fighters, combat helicopters and drones, Ukraine could provide sufficient support to advance its troops, especially since there are almost no russian fortifications in this region. This would be exactly the counteroffensive that Zaluzhnyi probably meant from the very beginning," the publication stated.
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