Over the past week, dozens of GAB (guided aerial bombs) have been used in Zaporizhzhia, marking the highest intensity since the onset of the full-scale invasion concerning this specific type of weaponry. Against this backdrop, there have been speculations that an offensive is being prepared in Zaporizhzhia, and that these strikes are setting the conditions for such an offensive.
No.
Let me clarify from the outset that if conditions were being prepared for an offensive on Zaporizhzhia, the strikes would not target residential areas but military facilities, defensive lines, and boundaries. Instead, we are witnessing yet another episode of military crimes committed against the civilian population. This is ordinary, bloody, merciless terror.
At the same time, I do not deny that the Dnipro Task Force remains one of the largest and could feasibly conduct an operation on the scale of… reducing the Robotyne bulge. However, I want to emphasize that just last month, several units from the Dnipro Task Force were sent to the North Task Force, specifically to the Kursk component of the grouping, along with units from the Polohy direction where the East Task Force operates, particularly the 38th and 64th Separate Motorized Brigade.
If you are preparing for a large-scale offensive on a big city that is very complex to capture, with many industrial zones, would you start by terrorizing civilian objects, or would you focus on eliminating areas that represent potential, difficult-to-overcome obstacles? Would you reduce your grouping for the offensive instead of building it up and enhancing its capabilities?
Therefore, I ask you not to spread panic about the notion that the Russian Armed Forces are preparing to attack Zaporizhzhia. Yes, they will assault the Robotyne bulge to open the direction to Orikhiv; yes, they will attack Huliaipole, and they will intensify their efforts in the Vremivka direction, attempting to penetrate Makaryivka soon—and that will be all.
Everything else is terror and the killing of Ukrainians. Just as it has been for nearly three years of full-scale invasion.
