Poland requests German approval to send Leopard tanks to Ukraine
Poland has reportedly asked for an export license for 14 Leopard 2 tanks.
Poland has sent an official request to Germany asking for permission to send tanks to Ukraine, Polish Defense Minister Mariusz Błaszczak said Tuesday.
The German economy ministry has received the request “for consent to transfer Leopard 2 tanks to Ukraine,” Błaszczak
wrote on Twitter.
A spokeswoman for the German economy ministry confirmed, saying: “The necessary coordination and procedures in the German government have been initiated; these are ongoing and are being conducted with due urgency.”
According to
Spiegel, Poland is applying for an export license for 14 Leopard 2 tanks. Since the tanks are manufactured in Germany, it must provide permission for their re-export.
“I have expressly encouraged partner countries that have Leopard tanks ready for deployment to train Ukrainian forces on these tanks,” Boris Pistorius, the new German defense minister, said during a press conference alongside
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg on Tuesday morning.
“What we need is heavier, more modern equipment,” Stoltenberg said. “This is urgent because Russia is preparing for new offensives. We need to enable the Ukrainians sooner or faster to be able to repel those offenses and liberate their own territory.”
Stoltenberg added that he and Pistorius “had a good discussion today on the issue of German battle tanks, and I’m confident that there will be a solution soon.”
Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki
announced on Monday that an official request for permission to Germany was on its way.
German reluctance to send battle tanks to Ukraine has
caused fractions in the governing coalition. Leading politicians from the Greens and the Free Democratic Party (FDP), the two junior partners to Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s Social Democrats, have been urging the chancellor to step up military support for Kyiv. They argue that at the very least, Scholz should grant the necessary permission for countries like Poland and Finland to send their own German-made Leopards to Ukraine.
Gabriel Rinaldi contributed reporting.
ghostarchive.org
Poland will request compensation from the EU for any Leopard tanks sent to Ukraine
Poland will ask for reimbursement from the European Union for any Leopard tanks it sends to Ukraine, the Polish prime minister said Tuesday.
In an interview with Polish broadcaster TVN, Mateusz Morawiecki said the request will be “another test of the goodwill of the European Union,” and added that he hopes it will happen.
The German government has received the Polish request to export German-made Leopard 2 battle tanks to Ukraine, a spokesperson told CNN.
Germany has so far resisted calls from Poland, the US and a handful of other NATO countries to transfer the tanks into Ukraine, or authorize other countries to send some of their Leopards to Kyiv.
That position has led to a weekslong spat between German and Polish leaders, with Morawiecki accusing Germany of “wasting time” by failing to come to a decision.
“We are preparing our decision and it will come very soon,” German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius said during a joint news conference with NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg Tuesday, adding that if the decision is to send the tanks, Germany would be able to “act very soon."
CNN's Rob Picheta and Antonia Mortensen contributed to this post.
ghostarchive.org
More officials dismissed from Ukrainian government as part of "personnel" changes
Two more deputy ministers have been dismissed from the Ukrainian government as part of the “personnel” changes announced by President Volodymyr Zelensky last night.
“At a meeting of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine on January 24, a number of personnel decisions were made,” Oleh Nemchinov, the Minister of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine, said on Telegram.
He said that Viacheslav Nehoda, the Deputy Minister of Communities and Territories Development of Ukraine, and Vitalii Muzychenko, Deputy Minister of Social Policy of Ukraine, had been dismissed.
They join Viacheslav Shapovalov, a Deputy Minister of Defense, and Ivan Lukerya, a Deputy Minister of Communities and Territories Development, in leaving the government.
The dismissals follow that of Vasyl Lozynskyy, the Acting Minister of Communities and Territories Development.
Ukraine's Infrastructure Ministry said on Sunday that Lozynskyy had been arrested on suspicion of embezzlement. He has not commented on the allegations.
In a Facebook post published on Monday, Lozynsky’s lawyer, Oleksandr Tananakin, said his client had been dismissed “before he was notified of suspicion.”
“No funds, let alone in the amounts indicated by the NABU [National Anti-Corruption Bureau, which had
accused him of receiving “unlawful benefits”], were found and seized from Mr. Lozynsky,” he said.
Tananakin accused the bureau of “deliberately using manipulative tactics to inform the public in order to artificially create a representation of Lozynsky's guilt and form a negative image of him.”
In addition, the cabinet supported the dismissal of the governors of the Dnipropetrovsk, Zaporizhzhia, Kyiv, Sumy and Kherson regions, Nemchinov said.
On Monday night, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky had signaled that there would be changes to “personnel” within the Ukrainian government, without naming the people impacted.
ghostarchive.org
The US and its allies want Ukraine to change its battlefield tactics in the spring
US and Western officials are urging Ukraine to shift its focus from the brutal, months-long fight in the eastern city of Bakhmut and prioritize instead a potential offensive in the south, using a different style of fighting that takes advantage of the
billions of dollars in new military hardware recently committed by Western allies, US and Ukrainian officials tell CNN.
For nearly six months, Ukrainian forces have been going toe-to-toe with the Russians over roughly 36 miles of
territory in Bakhmut, which lies between the separatist-held cities of Donetsk and Luhansk. Heavy shelling has left the city almost completely destroyed.
“It is a brutal and grinding fight,” a senior Western intelligence official said last week, with each side exchanging anywhere from 100-400 meters of land per day and exchanging several thousands of artillery rounds almost daily. “[Bakhmut] is less attractive militarily, in terms of any sort of infrastructure, than it might have been if it had not been this destroyed.”
Now, ahead of what is widely expected to be a
brutal spring of fighting, there is a tactical opening, US and Western officials say. In recent weeks they have begun suggesting that Ukrainian forces cut their losses in Bakhmut, which they argue has little strategic significance for Ukraine, and focus instead on planning an offensive in the south.
That was part of a message delivered by three top Biden officials who traveled to Kyiv last week.
In a meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, deputy national security adviser Jon Finer, Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman, and Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Colin Kahl, said the US wants to help Ukraine shift away from the sort of pitched battle of attrition playing out in Bakhmut and focus instead on a style of mechanized maneuver warfare that uses rapid, unanticipated movements against Russia, sources familiar with their discussion said.
The hundreds of armored vehicles the US and European countries have provided to Ukraine in recent weeks, including 14 British tanks, are meant to help Ukraine make that shift, officials said.
Convincing Zelensky
It is not clear, however, that Zelensky feels prepared to abandon Bakhmut.
People familiar with his thinking tell CNN that Zelensky does not believe that a Russian victory in Bakhmut is a fait accompli, and that he remains reluctant to give it up. Holding Bakhmut would give Ukraine a better chance at taking back the entire Donbas region, Zelensky believes, and that if Russia wins, it will give them an opening to advance further to the strategically important eastern cities of Slovyansk and Kramatorsk.
Bakhmut is also an important symbol of Ukrainian resistance.
Zelensky visited Bakhmut just before traveling to Washington DC last December, where he told US lawmakers that “every inch of that land is soaked in blood, roaring guns sound every hour. The fight for Bakhmut will change the tragic story of our war for independence and of freedom.”
In short, the senior Western official said, Bakhmut “matters because the Russians have made it matter — probably more than the terrain does.” A US military official also expressed skepticism that Ukraine will abandon Bakhmut — not because of its battlefield value, but because its strategic messaging value is so important.
There are also some benefits to trying to exhaust the Russians in Bakhmut.
On Monday, a senior US military official told reporters that Russia has “rushed in” tens of thousands of “ill-equipped, ill-trained” replacement troops across the front line over the last several months, including to Bakhmut, amid the losses suffered. Despite the large numbers, the new troops have not changed the dynamic of the fight, the official said.
But Ukraine is also suffering enormous casualties in the battle and expending tremendous amounts of artillery ammunition daily – a style of fighting that the US does not believe is sustainable. In terms of sheer volume, Russia still has more artillery ammunition and manpower, with the
paramilitary organization Wagner Group using thousands of convicts to “throw bodies” at the battle, the Western intelligence official said.
US officials are hoping the latest delivery of armored equipment and the newly expanded training for Ukrainian forces in Germany will encourage Ukraine to shift its tactics.
“Depending on the delivery and training of all of this equipment, I do think it’s very, very possible for the Ukrainians to run a significant tactical or even operational level, offensive operation to liberate as much Ukrainian territory as possible,” Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley told reporters on Friday.
Putin’s calculations
The push for Ukraine to shift its battlefield tactics comes amid signs that Russian President Vladimir Putin is weighing making a big move in the next several weeks to regain the initiative in the war, officials familiar with the intelligence told CNN.
CIA Director Bill Burns traveled to Kyiv earlier this month to brief Zelensky on the US assessment of Putin’s plans, sources familiar with their conversation told CNN.
There are also indications that Putin is considering another troop mobilization of as many as 200,000 men, US and Western officials familiar with the intelligence told CNN.
The Kremlin has begun to conduct polling domestically to gauge the popularity of another mobilization, two officials said. The next mobilization, some believe, would be quieter compared to the first one, when Putin himself made a televised announcement, calling it a “partial mobilization.”
Putin is aware of how unpopular the first mobilization was late last year, when protests erupted and hundreds of thousands of Russian fighting age men fled the country to escape conscription, the officials said, and he has yet to make a decision on another mobilization effort.
But Russia continues to need bodies to throw at the fight. The first mobilization nearly doubled Russia’s troop presence in Ukraine – even if it produced fighters that were untrained and undisciplined – and overall, sources familiar with US and Western intelligence said, Putin’s grip on power remains secure.
“We don’t think Putin has yet made up his mind, particularly with regard to when to do it,” the senior Western intelligence official said, “because he almost certainly is concerned about societal blowback and negative economic repercussions.”
‘Nothing but a meat grinder’
Putin’s intentions for a new offensive became clearer to Western officials earlier this month when he elevated General Valery Gerasimov, chief of the Russian General Staff, to become the overall commander of the war, the officials said.
Gerasimov, who symbolizes Russia’s early failures in the war, is eager to prove that he can turn the tide of the conflict, and is pushing for a fresh offensive to retake territory in the east and south.
“I have no doubt that Gerasimov feels to the very fiber of his being that he had better launch an offensive in the spring – so one will come,” the Western intelligence official said.
Some senior Russian military officials have even been overheard in recent weeks discussing the possibility of trying to capture the northeastern city of Kharkiv, according to people familiar with the conversations intercepted by Western and Ukrainian intelligence.
But US and Western officials and military analysts told CNN that Kharkiv – a major city that was held by the Ukrainians last fall following a surprise counteroffensive – does not appear to be a remotely achievable target for the Russian military. As much as Putin would like to try to target Kyiv again, officials say, that too is currently out of his forces’ reach.
As CNN has reported,
Russia’s artillery fire has declined dramatically from its wartime high, in some places by as much as 75%, in a likely sign that the Russians has been forced to ration ammunition.
That could be a huge problem for Russia if it wants to launch a big new offensive against major cities, noted one military expert.
It is more likely, officials said, that Russia will continue to focus most of its attention on taking more territory in the Donbas region – with Bakhmut as a potential springboard – and in the Zaporizhzhia region, where the Ukrainian military reported on Saturday that Russian forces were already beginning to step up hostilities.
Russia is intent upon keeping its “land bridge” from its Rostov region to Crimea, officials said, and needs to maintain its southern Ukrainian holdings to do so.
“A major Ukrainian breakthrough in Zaporizhzhia would seriously challenge the viability of Russia’s ‘land-bridge’ linking Russia’s Rostov region and Crimea,” the UK Ministry of Defense reported in its regular intelligence update earlier this month.
Broadly, though, the US and its allies are skeptical of Russia’s ability to mount a serious offensive.
“
doubt very much, given what we’ve seen of the Russian ability to mobilize, man, train and equip effectively, that it is going to be anything different than what we’ve already seen,” said the Western intelligence official. “And what we’ve already seen is nothing but a meat grinder.”
CORRECTION: This story has been updated to reflect that Russian forces never captured the city of Kharkiv.
CNN’s Oren Liebermann contributed to this report.
ghostarchive.org
Undercover sanctions loopholes in anti-Russian trade, warfare costs of invasion
Last year, China also had a high import and export of India 1 ～ 3.4 times in November
China and India have expanded their trade with Russia. In 2022, China set a record high for both exports and imports. India's trade value increased by 3.4 times the same period last year with a cumulative total of 1 ～ November. It effectively supports the procurement of Russian labor costs that have invaded Ukraine, and is a loophole in anti-Ross sanctions.
According to the China Customs Office, the amount of mid-Russia trade in 22 years increased by 190.3 billion dollars （ about 24 trillion yen ） by 3% from the previous year, the highest for the second consecutive year.
ghostarchive.org
Lithuania’s MoD on military support to Kyiv: We don’t have tanks but we have opinions
Although Lithuania does not have tanks to send to Ukraine, it has partly joined the so-called “Leopard coalition” by pressing other countries to provide military support, Defence Minister Arvydas Anušauskas says.
“A statement was adopted in Estonia a few days ago, [...] and 11 countries made that statement. The ‘Leopard coalition’, if you can call it that, included those countries that are willing to discuss this matter and to send support to Ukraine. Those countries that do not have these tanks are excluded. But as far as I have had the opportunity to talk within the Ramstein format, we have still expressed our position,” Anušauskas told LRT TV on Monday. “We have actually joined it to some extent. Well, yes, we don’t have tanks, but we do have an opinion on tanks.”
The defence minister also pointed out that Lithuania had handed over 62 armoured personnel carriers to Ukraine, adding that the Ukrainian army appreciates them for their simplicity.
Berlin has recently come under pressure to send German-made Leopard tanks to Kyiv, but it has yet to make such a decision. Poland has decided to hand over its German-made tanks, but Warsaw is waiting for Berlin’s permission.
Hopes were high for last week’s meeting at Ramstein Air Base, but the countries failed to agree on the transfer of this heavy military equipment.
Anušauskas himself came under criticism for announcing in advance that a decision would be made in Ramstein on the transfer of Leopards to Ukraine.
