A 40-mile Russian convoy advancing on Kyiv has been stuck in a “traffic jam” with key logistics equipment stranded miles from Ukraine’s capital, Western allies believe.
Intelligence reports suggest that the Russian invasion of Ukraine has been significantly slower than the Kremlin expected because the country’s forces had never trained for such a large operation.
At least three commanders in the Russian military have been killed because they had to move closer to the front line than normal in order to deliver their orders, according to Western officials.
The delay – which has seen the Russians prevented from deploying their most effective weaponry – has allowed Ukrainian forces to strengthen their defences.
An official said: “The scale of this operation as a sort of combined arms manoeuvre, attacking Ukraine from multiple different directions using forces from multiple Russian military districts integrated with such an enormous air package, is beyond the scale of that which they have trained for. We’ve not seen training at this scale. And I believe that that is that has led to part of the problem.”
Kyiv is currently threatened by a convoy of tanks and other military vehicles which are expected to be used to capture the city in what would be Vladimir Putin’s most significant victory of the war so far.
But it has been unable to make progress in recent days, with broken-down and bombed vehicles blocking the route. A Western official said: “It’s got some mobility challenges because the impact of using explosives to demolish bridges has meant that that force hasn’t had the kind of engineering mobility capability to maintain pace.
“You’ve got now in effect an enormously large traffic jam with some vehicles that have been damaged or destroyed. And you’ve got a real problem in passing logistics forward, to enable that force to actually move at pace.”
Three Russian commanders have been killed by Ukrainians, including one who was targeted by a sniper. Western intelligence agencies believe the commanders have “had to go further and closer to the front” than planned in order to “get greater impetus and control over operations” as a result of the Ukrainian resistance.
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