Russian army quits Kherson’s second city
Invaders prepare defensive positions on west bank of Dnipro as Ukrainian troops vow to push on to Crimea
‘History reminds us that Russia can be extremely cruel to its own people and if they need more cannon fodder they will find it’
RUSSIAN forces are evacuating the second largest city in the Kherson region of southern Ukraine as they prepare their defences along the left bank of the Dnipro river.
Pavel Filipchuk, the Kremlin-installed head of the city of Nova Kakhovka, said that a 10-mile evacuation zone had been imposed south of the river ahead of an expected Ukrainian attack after the Russian army quit Kherson city last week.
“This region is subject to mandatory evacuation because of the possibility of fighting and because every day there is an increased military presence,” he said. “Certain military structures and fortifications are being built in this territory.”
The evacuation of Soviet-built Nova Kakhovka is significant because it lies on the left bank of the Dnipro river to which Russian forces have retreated in order to prepare a defensive line.
The city had a pre-war population of 45,000 and is around 35 miles upstream from Kherson city, the regional capital, on the opposite bank of the river from which Russian forces were ordered to retreat on Friday after it had become too difficult to resupply them.
Ukraine’s military intelligence has confirmed the Russian defensive regrouping on the left bank of the Dnipro, saying that the Russian army was “strengthening fortification equipment”.
The withdrawal of an estimated 30,000 Russian soldiers from around Kherson city is the third major retreat by Moscow’s forces since it invaded Ukraine in February and some pro-war officials have described it as a humiliation for Vladimir Putin, the Russian president. However, influential Russian military bloggers have supported the military commanders, saying that the withdrawal made sense tactically.
“Don’t panic,” said Vladlen Tatarsky, who has more than half-a-million subscribers on his Telegram social media channel. “It has been a manoeuvre to move troops to prepared defensive lines … observers can see the ‘dragon’s teeth’ and fixed bunkers built into the left bank.” Russian media have reported that the country has sent thousands of the 300,000 men mobilised in September and October to dig trenches along the Dnipro.
Ukrainian officials have said that they intend to push on to recapture all Ukrainian territory occupied by Russia since 2014, including Crimea to the south of Kherson, but analysts have warned that this will be difficult to achieve after the Russian army has prepared its defensive line on the Dnipro.
In London, Ben Wallace, the Defence Secretary, backed up this analysis. “History reminds us that Russia can be extremely cruel to its own people and if they need more cannon fodder, they will find it,” he told reporters.
Meanwhile, Volodymyr Zelensky, the Ukrainian president, said in his nightly address yesterday that investigators had uncovered more than 400 Russian war crimes and found the bodies of both servicemen and civilians in areas of the Kherson region freed from Russian occupation. In Kherson city, residents celebrated their liberation by holding rallies in the city’s main square. They also rounded up people accused of collaborating.
A photograph emerged of civilians and soldiers staring at two men tied to poles after they were accused of being informers for the Russian army. Officials said that Ukrainian mobile phone networks in the city, replaced by Russian ones by the occupying authorities, had been switched back on.
It was also reported that retreating Russian soldiers looted the main art museum and stole 15,000 works, along with a raccoon, a llama, a wolf, a donkey and squirrels from the city zoo.
Analysts said that equipment abandoned by the Russian army suggested that it was running out of modern kit. “This is a truly ancient T-62,” James Rushton, a British security analyst based in Kyiv, commented next to a photo on Twitter of a Russian tank captured near Kherson.
“This is essentially one of the base, unmodified, 1960s versions.”