Headquarters hit: Putin’s Black Sea Fleet takes the next big blow Gold bars and luxury car: US Senator Menendez indicted for corruption

It is the next serious blow to the Russian presence in the occupied Crimean peninsula. After a rocket hit on Friday morning, the headquarters of the Russian Black Sea Fleet in the port city of Sevastopol was still on fire in the afternoon. The extent of the damage will only become clear in the coming days. It is also unclear whether senior Russian officers were hit. The attack on Sevastopol appears to have been part of a larger operation.

Parallel to the attack on the headquarters of the Black Sea Fleet, there were reports on social media of explosions in other parts of the occupied Ukrainian peninsula. Photos of smoke clouds near the town of Poshtowe circulated. Opposition Telegram channel Crimeanwind said there was a workshop for Russian army trucks at the site. The Russian government in Moscow only confirmed that a Ukrainian missile attack had taken place on the naval headquarters in Sevastopol.

Western cruise missile attack?

It is still unclear what type of weapon was used to carry out the attacks. According to unconfirmed reports, these could be Storm Shadow or Scalp EC cruise missiles that Britain and France had supplied to Ukraine. The Russian governor of Crimea, Sergei Aksyonov, claimed on Telegram that Russian air defenses had shot down several cruise missiles in the vicinity of the peninsula. He did not give an exact number; the information cannot be independently verified at this time.

This video, shared on Twitter, claims to show the headquarters in Sevastopol shortly after the attack:

The anti-aircraft defenses in Crimea were literally blinded

The building is located in the center of Sevastopol and was previously hit in an attack on July 31, 2022. A kamikaze drone was used, causing minor damage and injuring six people. The latest attack was likely significantly more devastating and appears to be part of a Ukrainian attack strategy. In recent weeks there have been several successful attacks on Russian air defenses on the peninsula.

In late August, Ukrainian forces destroyed first a key radar system and then an S-400 anti-aircraft system. A week and a half ago, Kiev managed to recapture two oil rigs that Russia had occupied in 2015 and used to monitor the Black Sea. After the loss of the oil rig, Russia’s Black Sea Fleet and air defenses in Crimea appear to have gone virtually blind.

That is why Crimea is so important

On September 13, the Ukrainian army suffered another serious blow: the landing ship “Minsk” and the submarine “Rostov-on-Don” were seriously damaged or even destroyed in an attack on a dry dock of the Black Sea Fleet in the port of Sevastopol. The dock will also likely be unusable for months. After the attack, Moscow was forced to withdraw its submarines from Sevastopol and move them to the Black Sea port of Novorossisk. Western-built cruise missiles are also believed to have been used in this attack.

The Ukrainian Air Force can fire Storm Shadow and Scalp-EG from the air from its Soviet-built fighter jets. The projectiles have a range of approximately 250 kilometers. It is conceivable that Ukraine has systematically eliminated air defenses over Crimea to bring cruise missile aircraft close enough to targets on the peninsula.

From the Ukrainian perspective, the liberation of Crimea is crucial. From the peninsula, Russia controls the northwestern Black Sea, threatening transport ships carrying Ukrainian grain and firing cruise missiles from ships and submarines at Ukrainian cities. The Russian occupation forces in southern Ukraine are also supplied via Crimea, which has been connected to the Russian mainland via the Kerch Bridge since May 2018. The illegally built structure has been the target of Ukrainian attacks several times.

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