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Russia will retreat from the city of Kherson in the most-humiliating loss yet for Putin’s military, Putin’s defence minister has announced.
Sergei Shoigu, who is already under pressure over his handling of the war, appeared on state TV where he was shown agreed to a plan by General Sergei Surovikin – Russia’s top commander in Ukraine – to withdraw from the city.
Surovikin told Shoigu that the city is now impossible to defend and recommended that troops withdraw across the Dnipro River ‘in the near future’ to defend the other bank. Shoigu squirmed in his seat as he agreed to the plan.
Witnesses say Putin’s men have already abandoned key checkpoints around the city and have destroyed bridges in an apparent effort to stop Ukrainian soldiers pursuing and capturing them.
Giving up Kerson – the capital of a region Putin annexed to Russia just weeks ago, his only toe-hold west of the Dnipro River, and a key checkpoint on the road to Crimea – is the most-humiliating loss his military has yet suffered.
Russia captured Kherson back in March (pictured) and Putin annexed the region just a few weeks ago, vowing it would be ‘forever’ Russian
General Sergei Surovikin (left) has announced that Russia will retreat from Kherson, a decision agreed by defence minister Sergei Shoigu (right)
Ukraine has been attacking towards Kherson since early August, and recently broke through Russian defensive lines to the north of the city.
But it has been hard to track the progress of the assault ever since, as Ukraine has imposed a news blackout on the region.
Last week, Western officials briefed that Russia appeared to be in the final stages of preparing for a retreat which was being disguised as a civilian evacuation.
They said ‘reinforcements’ being moved to the area were actually conscripts covering the backs of regular troops as they withdrew.
The officials said Russia’s commanders had concluded the city was ‘not worth defending’ and would try to out-last the winter by building a strong defensive line over the other side of the river.
However, the waters have been muddied by briefings from Kyiv that Russia is actually trying to lure its forces into a trap.
On Monday, Ukraine’s generals staff said Russian troops were disguising themselves as civilians and hiding in homes in preparation for urban combat.
They added that defences had been beefed up and Putin’s men looked set to fight for the city.
The news came just hours after Russia announced that Kirill Stremousov, the deputy leader of Putin’s puppet government in the region, had died in a ‘car accident’.
Ukrainian troops are pictured on patrol near the Kherson frontline, shortly before Russian announced it will be withdrawing from the city
Vladimir Putin is pictured meeting with the head of the Medical-Biological Agency as it is announced his armed forces will withdraw from Kherson
A Ukrainian serviceman surveys a former Russian trench in Kherson Oblast near the front line, after Putin’s troops began abandoning their positions
The 45-year-old was a driving force in organising and supporting the referendum on Kherson’s illegal annexation by Russia.
Recently, he had evacuated civilians from the west bank in Kherson as Ukrainian forces advanced towards the Dnipro River.
Stremousov, who was appointed two months after the invasion of Ukraine, was wanted in Kyiv for treason.
A Ukrainian legislator reacted to the death of Stremousov, calling him ‘a traitor.’
Others speculated that his death had been staged in order to get him out of the city to avoid reprisals by advancing Ukrainian troops.
While withdrawing from Kherson is the biggest defeat yet for Putin’s army, it is hardly the first it has suffered.
In April, his soldiers were forced to retreat after a botched attempt to take the capital of Kyiv that saw some of his best units wiped out.
That was followed by an offensive in the Donbas which had largely ground to a halt by late July.
Ukraine then went on the front foot and launched its counter-offensive towards Kherson, having blown up most of the major bridges that supply the city.
Kirill Stremousov, 45, the deputy head of the Kherson occupation government, was claimed to have died in a car crash shortly before the announcement
A surprise second attack was then launched further to the north in early September, heading east out of the city of Kharkiv, that routed Russian forces.
Almost the entire region was returned to Ukrainian control in just a few days.
Kyiv’s men then made a breakthrough to the north of Kherson in October, pushing Russian troops back to their second line of defence.
Now, In November, Russia looks to have abandoned Kherson altogether.
Taking back the city is a huge propaganda win for Kyiv, which now aims to re-take all of its occupied territory – including areas it has not controlled since 2014.
Kherson is a key waypoint on the road to Crimea, the crown-jewel of Putin’s 2014 war and where President Zelensky has said the current war ‘will end’.
While Ukraine’s troops are not expected to mount an immediate assault across the Dnipro – at least not immediately – it does put positions around Crimea within range of its HIMARS rockets.
Securing the entirety of the west bank of the river will also allow Kyiv to free up units for other attacks, possibly south from Zaporizhzhia towards Melitopol – and then into Crimea from the east.