Russia concentrates half million troops targeting regional centers - Ukrainian Navy Reserve Captain

He spoke about this on Espreso TV.

"If we look at the overall situation on the front lines, we can see that the Russians have now concentrated an extremely large number of troops in the south and east, estimated at around half a million. When large-scale aggression began, there were 150,000 troops spread across seven different directions. Now, in just three directions, their numbers have nearly tripled. The Russians have been tasked with capturing as much territory in Donetsk region as possible and advancing towards key regional centers like Zaporizhzhia, Dnipro, Sumy, and Kharkiv, using long-range artillery and anti-aircraft guns to fire at distances of 50-70 km. This is part of their strategy to further destabilize the social and economic situation in Ukraine and influence the population," said the reserve captain of the Ukrainian Navy.

Given this fact, the Ukrainian Armed Forces' General Staff is analyzing the situation to deter Russian forces from fulfilling their strategic task, including the influence on regional centers, Ryzhenko said.

“Vuhledar is one of these points that they have been trying to capture for a long time, concentrating serious forces there. They managed to capture this city, which is an unfortunate fact. But if you look at the overall strategic picture, it didn't give them much. Indeed, there was contradictory information about the situation there, but we have to trust the position of the Ukrainian Armed Forces. It was very difficult there, as the Russian army uses tactics of attrition, overwhelming the Ukrainian Armed Forces with a large number of weapons, guided bombs, artillery, rocket artillery, etc," he summarized.

• On Tuesday, October 1, the Russian army reportedly managed to seize the town of Vuhledar, Donetsk region.
• Ukraine's Defense Forces have officially withdrawn from Vuhledar, Donetsk region, to preserve personnel and military equipment and to take up a position for further operations.