Zelensky claims Ukraine's counteroffensive put off by lack of munitions
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has claimed that plans for a highly anticipated counteroffensive in early spring have been postponed due to lack of sufficient munitions despite widespread reports that the war effort have miserably failed with heavy losses.
“We did have plans to start it in spring. But we didn’t, because, frankly, we had not enough munitions and armaments and not enough brigades properly trained in these weapons, still, more, that the training missions were held outside Ukraine,” he so claimed on Sunday in an interview with the US-based CNN.
The Ukrainian president added that because the counteroffensive began later, “it provided Russia with time to mine all our lands and build several lines of defense. And, definitely, they had even more time than they needed.”
Zelensky went on to say that due to the fact that Russian forces “had a lot of mines in our fields,” our counteroffensive operations had a slower pace.
“We didn’t want to lose our people, our personnel. And our servicemen didn’t want to lose equipment because of that,” he claimed.
The latest development comes almost a week after Russia described Ukraine’s counteroffensive against its forces as “unsuccessful.”
Ukraine launched a counteroffensive last month to reclaim territory under Russian control. However, Kiev acknowledged that its forces are not advancing as fast as it desired against Russian forces.
Earlier this month, Zelensky said the slow delivery of weapons promised by the West was delaying the counteroffensive, calling on the United States and other allies to provide Kiev with long-range weapons and artillery.
Zelensky has repeatedly called on its Western allies to speed up the pace of supplying weapons to his country. In May, the Ukrainian president pressed allies to send more weapons as his military geared up for the planned counteroffensive.
However, the promise of F-16 fighter jets, which Zelensky had repeatedly pressed the US and other allies for, didn’t come until days later. Those jets are set to arrive in Ukraine toward the end of the year.
Russia launched its special military operation in Ukraine in late February 2022. Ever since the beginning of the war, Western countries, led by the United States, have been pumping Ukraine full of tens of billions of dollars worth of advanced weapons.
Russia has repeatedly warned that the flow of Western arms will only escalate tensions.
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