This photo released by acting Governor of the Kursk region Alexei Smirnov on the telegram channel shows a house damaged by shelling by the Ukrainian side in the city of Sudzha, Kursk region bordering Ukraine, Tuesday, August 6, 2024.
Governor of Kursk region telegram via AP
A state of emergency has been declared in Kursk after Russian authorities said Ukraine had carried out a rare incursion into Russia’s border region.
Acting regional governor Alexey Smirnov said the “operational situation” in the Kursk border region remained “complicated” on Wednesday, a day after Russia said Ukrainian units had launched an attack in the area.
“In order to eliminate the consequences of enemy forces entering the area, I have decided to declare a state of emergency,” Smirnov said in a Google-translated update on Telegram.and added that drone and missile attacks continued overnight.
Russia’s Defense Ministry said Tuesday that 300 Ukrainian troops crossed the border in tanks and armored vehicles, entering the country near the town of Sudzha, about 400 miles southwest of Moscow. Kursk is across the border from Ukraine’s northeastern Sumy region.
Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday accused Ukraine carried out “another large-scale provocation” on the Russian borderamid ongoing fighting between Ukrainian units and Russian forces sent to defend the area.
Russia’s Defense Ministry said on Wednesday that its forces were “destroying armed formations” with air and missile strikes, along with artillery.
Valery Gerasimov, chief of the Russian military general staff, later told Putin that Russian forces had thwarted an attack by 1,000 Ukrainian soldiers — a much higher estimate than the initial figure provided by the country’s defense ministry.
“The enemy’s advance deep into the territory in the direction of Kursk was stopped by the actions of the state border guard units together with border guards and reinforcement units, with air, missile and artillery strikes,” Gerasimov said in televised comments reported by Reuters.
In this photo of a swimming pool released by Russia’s state news agency Sputnik, Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation Valery Gerasimov is seen on screen as he remotely participates in a meeting with heads of law enforcement agencies to resolve the situation in the Kursk region on August 7, 2024.
Gavriil Grigorov | AFP | Getty Images
Ukrainian authorities have not commented publicly on the incursion. CNBC has asked the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense for more information.
US State Department spokesman Matthew Miller told reporters on Wednesday that the United States had no advance warning of the Ukrainian attack, but did not rule out the possibility that an attack had taken place.
“We do not have [ know in advance about the Kursk operation]. But it is not unusual for the Ukrainians to not inform us of their exact tactics before they carry them out. It is a war that they are waging. We provide them with equipment. We provide them with advice. But when it comes to the kind of day-to-day tactics that they carry out, the day-to-day attacks that they carry out … they have the right to make those decisions,” he said at a press conference.
Russian President Vladimir Putin enters the hall during a meeting with ministers at the Novo-Ogaryovo Presidential Palace on August 7, 2024, in Moscow, Russia. This week, Putin called on Iran to limit damage in any relations with Israel.
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Miller said the US was currently “in contact with the Ukrainians about this specific operation” but that it would be inappropriate to comment on “what type of operation they are conducting and what their objectives are. They should be talking publicly about that, not us.”
The US State Department spokesperson added that Putin’s description of the incursion as a “provocation” was “a bit of an overstatement… given that Russia has been violating Ukraine’s territorial integrity and sovereignty” by illegally occupying Ukrainian territory since 2014, beginning with the annexation of Crimea, before a full-scale invasion in February 2022.
Ukraine’s strategy, Russia’s response
The strategy and rationale for the Ukrainian border raid remain unclear, although some defense analysts have suggested the operation may be an attempt to force Russia to redeploy its forces away from eastern Ukraine, where Russia’s summer offensive is underway.
Analysts at the Institute for the Study of War estimated on Wednesday that Ukrainian forces had advanced 10 kilometers — or about six miles — into the Kursk region “amid continued mechanized offensive operations on Russian territory.”
“The current confirmed extent and location of Ukrainian advances in Kursk Oblast [region] indicates that Ukrainian forces have penetrated at least two Russian defense lines and one stronghold,” ISW said in analysis.
Screenshot from video released by the Russian Defense Ministry shows Russian forces conducting a missile attack, targeting military equipment of the Ukrainian Armed Forces in the border area of Kursk region, Russia on August 7, 2024.
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The Kremlin’s response to Ukraine’s offensive operations in Kursk “has so far been contradictory, as Russian officials are trying to balance presenting the effort as a notable Ukrainian escalation with avoiding exaggerating its potential impacts and risking domestic discontent,” ISW said.
“However, the Kremlin risks losing its credibility in some circles by appearing to deny the significance of the attack by dismissing it as merely a ‘provocation’.”
ISW noted that some Russian military bloggers, who are often critical of the war as well as Russian tactics and strategy, have harshly criticized the Russian military command for failing to detect Ukraine’s preparations for an offensive operation on Kursk or to stop the initiative.
Russian Security Council deputy chairman and well-known hawk Dmitry Medvedev has called on Russian forces to destroy Ukrainian units in Kursk.
“We need to draw serious lessons from what happened and carry out what Chief of the General Staff Valery Gerasimov pledged to the supreme commander-in-chief, which is to resolutely defeat and crush the enemy,” he stated on Telegramaccording to Google translation.
