By Roman Burko
ATO forces continued with the active phase of offensive operations. During the night of July 23, the settlements of Kozhevnia and Chervona Zoria were liberated from illegal armed groups, and therefore the Marynivka checkpoint was taken under control as planned. Closer to midday, the Ukrainian Armed forces also took under control Marynivka and Diakovo. So the first corridor which was formed by terrorists at the end of May (Kuibyshevo-Dmytrivka-Snizhne) is now completely controlled by Ukrainian armed forces.
According to unconfirmed information, National Guard troops captured settlement Blagodarne, therefore blocking the connection between Snizhne, Amvrosiyivka, and Uspenka. In this way, terrorist groupings near Snizhne have been practically blocked. However, as a result of ATO offensive actions towards Pervomaisk, the militants have been noticed relocating towards Snizhne and Torez. It is worth mentioning that the grouping of terrorists in Snizhne can be considered as quite powerful. There is a chance of the militants breaking towards Uspenka and Kuibyshevo, aiming to get access to the territory of Russian Federation.
Today the militants have completely left Karlivka and Netailovo. This fact can be estimated as one more positive point, for in the rear of ATO forces, which moved towards Donetsk and unblocked the local airport, the group of enemy’s forces ceased to exist. The tension has been eased this way. It is most likely related to the ATO forces breaking into the Uhlehirsk region. This fact has strongly advanced the chances of Donetsk militants’ forces total defeat in the closest future. In the city itself, street fighting continues, though at the same time the outflow of armed forces was noticed in the direction of Starobishyvske.
Fighting continues in the settlement of Horlivka. So far, Horlivka remains to be the only northbound location where the enemy is still hunkering down. Even though today a motor convoy was noticed leaving via Pantyleimonivka towards Makiyivka, most likely Horlivka will be soon completely liberated and that’s going to happen tomorrow.
Closer to the morning the militants forces relocation took place in the eastbound direction. Terrorists sent their motor convoy form Sakhanovo towards Pervomaisk. Possibly the convoy was heading down to support the gangs of Stakhanov and Lysychansk, but was successfully destroyed in the Zolotiy county. Most likely that was the reserve that the militants counted on.
In the afternoon of July 23, Igor Girkin, head of pro-russian militants, at his “Kotych forum” announced the loss of connection with one of the field commanders Alexey Mozgovoy. There is a suggestion that Mozgovoy has left for Moscow to get additional instructions, as well as removing the self-appointed governor of Luhansk Valery Bolotov from his position.
Besides, it is pleasant to admit the successes of ATO forces in Lysychansk. The city has not been yet liberated, but the cleaning-up operation progresses fast and will be finished tomorrow according to our forecast, if no force majeure takes place.
The ATO forces continue their offensive movements towards Luhansk and Luhansk Station from the North, having renewed fighting towards Olkhova. At present, ATO forces have to close another supply corridor coming from the Russian Federation. As this is the direct connection between Luhansk and Russia, chances are that fighting over this region will be quite violent. Militants have also been seen grouping on the road of Luhansk-Krasnodon.
Therefore, it is reasonable to say that ATO forces have achieved substantial success over the last three days.
The last day has also been marked by success on the informational battlefield.
The Ukrainian Ministry of Internal Affairs has received irrefutable evidences of the Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu being involved in arms transfer and coordination of terrorist forces on the territory of Ukraine. Besides, today Ukrainian military forces again shot down a Russian drone Orlan-10 . A surveillance system was eliminated near Amvrosyivka village in Donetsk Oblast.
However, tragedies also took place besides victories. The tragic events over the last 24 hours included:
Two ATO SU-25 military planes being shot down. As was announced by RNBO news and analysis center speaker Andriy Lysenko, the planes were destroyed at the altitude of 5200 meters. According to the preliminary estimate of official sources, the shooting took place from the territory of Russian Federation. The fate of the pilots remains unknown.
Besides, during the battle to liberate Lysychansk, a unit commander, colonel Oleksandr Radyivskiy, died. It is reported that the colonel fell into a terrorist ambush.
Today we received an alarming call from the occupied Crimea. Militants continue to be drafted there in order to be sent to Eastern Ukraine and participate in the combat operations. It also became known that the Crimea occupation authorities have started a full-scale social assimilation policy of the peninsular population and it continues to be secretly populated by Chechen people and other representatives of the Caucus. It looks like Kremlin decided to pull through the project of assimilating Crimean Tatar-Muslims with identical Muslims, but those already loyal to the Russian Empire of oppressed nations.
There was even more alarming news from Crimea. There were reports of Russian military forces transporting nuclear warheads to the peninsular for storage at two former Ukrainian bases. We are waiting for confirmation of these reports in order to not spread panic. But taking into account that starting from mid-May and to early July the Russian Federation already held two command and staff trainings on practicing a scenario of a pin-point nuclear attack, anything can be expected. According to opinions of military experts, the extent of Russia’s preparation to scenarios of nuclear war surpasses even those carried out in soviet times. Read more here: Why is RUSSIA preparing for the nuclear war).
Besides, some groups close to Putin seriously considered (and possibly still discuss) an option of Russia preventively striking Dnipropetrovsk with low power nuclear weapons. This may sound far-fetched, but our task is to draw attention to the possibility of such a threat. We do hope that it will remain just an fiction of the diseased imagination of Kremlin elites.
[hr]Translated by Roman Vlasov, edited by Alya ShandraSource: burkonews
