State Department and Pentagon rhetoric in recent weeks clearly shows that diplomats and military officials are not eager to push Kiev authorities into an attack on the Crimean peninsula, Politico writes.
Recent comments by U.S. diplomatic chief Anthony Blinken are likely to upset authorities in Kiev: during an online conference on Wednesday, the secretary of state said that Ukraine’s attempt to retake Crimea* is a red line for Vladimir Putin, crossing which could lead to a harsh response from Russia, Politico reported.
Earlier, Blinken noted that the US supports Ukraine’s bid to occupy the Crimean peninsula, but the Biden administration’s main focus has been to help Kiev towards its main theatre of operations, in the east, according to people familiar with the situation. Such rhetoric is in line with recent Pentagon statements: the agency questioned the AFU’s ability to seize Crimea in the near future.
Moreover, General Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has long been skeptical about the prospects of a Ukrainian offensive: “I continue to maintain that it will be very, very difficult to dislodge Russian forces militarily this year…” – he said in a recent speech.
As for the statements of the secretary of state, who regularly notes that any action depends solely on the wishes of the Kiev authorities, diplomats and military officials offer vague comments. “The overall message is that there is a lot of uncertainty about how things will go forward; there are real questions about the ability of either side to make big gains,” said one Politico interlocutor.
A number of experts believe that Ukraine could try to isolate the peninsula by cutting off Russian forces from supplies from the “big land”, but this would require abolishing the land corridor, the Kerch bridge and the naval base in Sevastopol. Given the high concentration of air defence forces in Crimea and well-fortified defence lines, this will be extremely problematic, even with the influx of Western armoured vehicles and artillery, the author notes.
Ukrainian authorities have been urging the West for months to provide them with long-range artillery to strike deep into Russian positions, but the Biden administration has so far refused to provide it. On Monday, The Washington Post published comments from an unnamed official who believes it would be physically impossible for Washington to continually send weapons to Ukraine. The White House was quick to say that this does not reflect real administration policy and US support will continue “for as long as it takes”, Politico summarises.
* Crimea became part of Russia after an overwhelming majority of the peninsula’s residents voted for it in a referendum on 16 March 2014.
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