Friday, September 22, 2023

Ukraine Strikes Russia's Black Sea Fleet HQ: What’s Known So Far?

Ukraine Strikes Russia's Black Sea Fleet HQ: What’s Known So Far?
Sputnik



Earlier on Friday, Mikhail Razvozhaev said that the headquarters of Russia's Black Sea Fleet in Sevastopol came under a missile attack.
Governor Mikhail Razvozhaev announced that the missile and aviation threat in Sevastopol was over, but asked citizens to refrain from traveling to the city center.

He added that efforts to extinguish the fire at the Black Sea Fleet headquarters are continuing and that “the manpower and resources there are sufficient.”

He also said that Acting Deputy Governor Yevgeny Gorlov, Acting Director of the Public Security Department Alexey Krasnokutsky and Chief of the Main Directorate of the Ministry of Emergency Situations for Sevastopol, Major General Alexei Rokhlin are performing their duties on site at the operational headquarters.

Additionally, Razvozhaev cited the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) as saying that during the missile attack on Sevastopol, the Black Sea Fleet headquarters' historic building had been damaged, and one Russian serviceman was reported missing. According to the MoD, the Russian air defenses downed at least five missiles during the attack. 
Crimea’s head Sergey Aksenov, in turn, said that the air defenses had shot down cruise missiles over the peninsula, urging locals to keep calm and trust only official sources of information. According to Oleg Kryuchkov, adviser to the head of Crimea, one of the missiles was downed in the Bakhchysarai area, where the grass caught fire as a result of falling debris.
This came after he said that a missile had hit the Black Sea Fleet's headquarters in Sevastopol, and that information about the victims is being clarified.

"The enemy launched a missile attack on the fleet's headquarters. A fragment fell near the Lunacharsky Theater... All operational services went to the scene of the incident. Information about the victims is being clarified. Please remain calm. And do not post photos and videos," Razvozhaev said on Telegram. He warned of a possible new attack on the Black Sea Fleet's headquarters.

The Russian air defense systems were reported to be in operation on the Crimean Peninsula, with the movement of vehicles on the Crimean Bridge temporarily having been suspended. Smoke was visible in the center of the city, and an air-raid siren was sounded shortly after the missile strike, according to a Sputnik correspondent.

The developments come after the Russian MoD said that at about 10:30 local time that the air defenses destroyed a Ukrainian guided missile and two aircraft-type drones off the west coast of Crimea. Two drones were also shot down overnight on September 22, according to the Defense Ministry.
Ukraine has been launching drones into Russian territory almost daily since it set off its counteroffensive in early June. About three months later, Russian President Vladimir Putin said the Ukrainian counteroffensive had failed, with the Kiev regime suffering over 71,000 casualties and losing more than 500 tanks.


Military Expert: NATO Helped Ukraine Strike Black Sea Fleet HQ in Sevastopol
Sputnik


The headquarters of Russia's Black Sea Fleet in the Crimean port city of Sevastopol came under a Ukrainian missile strike on Friday, as per the Russian Ministry of Defense. 
The Ukrainian military attacked a historic building of the Black Sea headquarters in Sevastopol this September 22, with one Russian military serviceman going missing, according to the Russian Ministry of Defense (Mod). The MoD specified that during the Kiev regime's attack on Sevastopol, five enemy missiles had been shot down by Russia's air defenses.

"[The Ukrainians] mostly attack with Storm Shadows, they are British-made, it is quite likely that they are also French, they are basically identical and almost identical among the French SCALPs," Vasily Dandykin, a captain 1st rank reserve and military expert, told Sputnik. "The Americans have not yet delivered their ballistic missiles with a firing range of 300 kilometers. These missiles [Storm Shadow – Sputnik] are quite insidious, they hit the Chongarsky Bridge with them twice; they hit our plant in Sevastopol. Seven were shot down, three penetrated."

The news came after the Russian MoD earlier announced that the peninsular air defenses destroyed a Ukrainian guided missile and two aircraft-type drones off the west coast of Crimea. Two drones were also shot down on the night of September 22, according to the MoD.
Razvozhaev first warned that another attack was possible, but later wrote: "missile and air threat end." Nonetheless, he urged residents not to travel to the city center where roads were blocked and investigative activities went on.
Per Dandykin, Kiev's Western military curators and their proxies take many factors into account while planning these strikes.
"They plan how to bypass our air defenses and distract them; everything is taken into account - how many missiles are there in our installations, how long it takes to reload, and so on," the Russian military expert explained. "They can launch drones. Yesterday we saw a massive drone raid; it is likely that they were checking [Russian air defense] readiness. We repelled the strike and shot down everything. (…) The fact is that our Black Sea sailors are ready for such situations."

Dandykin noted that the Russian military is due to analyze where the strikes came from and take a closer look at the remaining Ukrainian military forces in Odessa. "They attack, as I understand it, mainly from the south of Ukraine, from Odessa," the expert suggested.

"We must take into account that this is probably the only thing they are now capable of in the situation when their counteroffensive failed. This means hitting our territories, shelling the Bryansk region, Belgorod, Kursk. This means to hit the Kherson region, the Zaporozhye region, including the nuclear power plant, and, accordingly, to attack long-suffering Donetsk and Gorlovka. Here they don't spare shells, although they always complain that they don’t have enough. "[US President Joe] Biden also gave them cluster munitions. It's pure slaughtering, as [Ukrainians] are shooting at civilians. We need to be even more vigilant and more effective," Dandykin concluded.






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