Russia loses terrain – NATO air force exercises in the east

Kyiv According to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, Russia should prepare its citizens for the loss of occupied territories. Russia has not only destroyed its own future with the war in order to take the territories, but will also lose all occupied territories, Zelensky said in his video distributed every evening in Kiev on Sunday evening. “There is and will be no alternative to our steps of de-occupation.” Step by step, Ukrainian forces were moving forward to liberate their country, he said.

Zelenskiy announced that Ukraine expects new military aid commitments from its allies in the coming days. On the visit of representatives of several African countries to the head of the Kremlin Vladimir Putin in St. Petersburg, he said: They could have been convinced there that Ukraine was out for peace, while Russia wanted war in order to “continue to destroy life”.

According to the African delegation with representatives from South Africa, Egypt, Senegal, Zambia, the Republic of Congo and Uganda, they developed a ten-point plan as part of their peace initiative. However, after almost 16 months of Russian war of aggression, the hope of success is extremely slim. Before their visit to St. Petersburg, the delegation visited Zelensky in Kiev on Friday. This presupposes the withdrawal of Russian troops for negotiations.

In his video, Zelensky also poked fun at Putin, who claimed in St. Petersburg on Friday that Russian forces in Kiev had already destroyed five US Patriot anti-aircraft systems. According to US media, however, there are only two of these systems in Ukraine. The Ukrainian leader said all systems are intact. “Not a single patriot is destroyed!” he stressed. In the past seven days alone, three dozen Russian missiles have been destroyed.

Brigadier General: Reluctance to assess Ukraine offensive

Brigadier General Christian Freuding, head of the Defense Ministry’s situation center for Ukraine, said caution should be exercised when assessing the Ukrainian counter-offensive. “We have to be a bit careful so that we don’t become presumptuous in judging Ukrainian tactics from the Berlin summer terrace,” said Freuding on Sunday evening in the ARD “Report from Berlin”.

Ukrainians have paid a heavy price in this war for over 400 days. “And I think we have neither the perspective nor the right to judge the Ukrainian actions of the units in terms of whether they were good, bad, expedient or inexpedient.” According to Freuding, Ukraine is doing very well restrictively with information about the situation. “We call this militarily “operational security”. That is of course also understandable, because otherwise the enemy could draw conclusions from it.”

Freuding said that he did not want to agree with the verdict that Ukraine’s actions were not going so well. There is a regaining of the initiative by the Ukrainian armed forces and first attack successes. “But we also saw that the defensive positions of the Russian armed forces were very well prepared.” The Ukrainian forces are currently consolidating to see where and with what they were successful.

Air Force exercise “Air Defender 2023”: ground attack aircraft to Lithuania

In the shadow of the Russian war against Ukraine, the participants in the Air Defender 2023 exercise this week will be flying fighter jets on NATO’s eastern flank. On Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, six A-10 ground attack aircraft would fly to Lithuania for take-off and landing, the Air Force told the German Press Agency in Berlin. At the start of the week, four F-16 aircraft and two each of F-15 and Eurofighter and a tanker aircraft fly over Poland.

According to this information, eastern NATO partners have asked for such a signal of reassurance and military cohesion. Until June 23, 25 nations with 250 aircraft and 10,000 soldiers will take part in the exercise under German leadership. NATO is involved. “Air Defender 2023” is the largest relocation exercise of air forces since the founding of NATO and uses a fictional scenario in the airspace over Germany to practice how the western defense alliance reacts to an attack by an eastern alliance and in doing so reconquers areas already occupied by the enemy.

In the meantime there have been more than 1000 flights during the exercise. The inspector of the Luftwaffe, Ingo Gerhartz, described this as an outstanding achievement on Sunday. He said: “Half is done.” The relocation of more than 1,600 tons of material and 100 aircraft from the USA to Germany went smoothly.

This is how the Handelsblatt reports on the Ukraine war:

The lieutenant general said about the exercise: “In the beginning there was a crunch here and there. Different levels of training, language challenges and the technology first had to get up and running.” It is becoming clear that “Air Defender 2023” has operational, logistical and human added value for everyone involved.

What will be important on Monday

In the east and south of Ukraine, the offensive of the Kiev troops against Russian aggression continues. Recently, there had also been gains in territory, in which the Ukraine freed towns and regions from the Russian occupation.

A meeting between Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) and Chinese Prime Minister Li Qiang in Berlin is likely to be about the Russian war of aggression against Ukraine. Beijing is trying to mediate in the conflict with its special envoy Li Hui.

More: All developments in the Ukraine war in our news blog