Russia Capable Of Making Tactical Gains In Ukraine, No Significant Breakthroughs - Burns

Muhammad Irfan Published March 09, 2023 | 11:00 PM

The Russian military is capable to make some incremental tactical, but no strategic breakthroughs on the battlefield in Ukraine in 2023, CIA Director William Burns said on Thursday

WASHINGTON (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 09th March, 2023) The Russian military is capable to make some incremental tactical, but no strategic breakthroughs on the battlefield in Ukraine in 2023, CIA Director William Burns said on Thursday.

"The Russian military is capable of making incremental tactical gains and they made some in the course of the offensive they've launched over the last four or five weeks in the Donbas in eastern Ukraine. But it is our collective assessment... that they're unlikely to be able to make significant strategic breakthroughs or sustain them over the course of the rest of this year," Burns told a House Intelligence Committee hearing.

According to Burns, Russian President Vladimir Putin is convinced that he can make time work for Moscow's benefit in Ukraine, as well as that Ukraine matters more to him than to the United States.

On February 24, 2022, Russia launched a special military operation in Ukraine.

In late September, Putin and the heads of the Donetsk and Luhansk people's republics, as well as the Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions, signed agreements on the accession of these territories to Russia, following referendums that showed that an overwhelming majority of the local population supported becoming part of Russia.

The Kremlin has repeatedly emphasized that Putin has always been and continues to remain open to negotiations on Ukraine, as is evident from his attempts to initiate dialogue with the United States, NATO, and the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe even before the start of the hostilities.

Moscow has said it agrees with US statements that the resolution of the Ukraine crisis must be based on fair and long-term peace, but at the same time, it sees no prospects yet for negotiations.