As they ramp up attacks on occupied Crimea, Ukrainian forces are repeatedly targeting the fleet based there, a key to Russia’s attacks deep into Ukraine and its blockade of Ukrainian ports.
Ukraine’s military claimed on Monday that it had killed the commander of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet in a strike on Crimea — a blow that, if confirmed, would be among the most damaging suffered by the Russian Navy since the sinking of the fleet’s flagship last year.
Citing “new information about the losses of the enemy as a result of the special operation,” Ukraine’s special operations forces said in a statement that the strike on Friday killed 34 officers, including the fleet commander, and wounded 105 others. It did not name the naval leader, but the commander of the Black Sea Fleet is Adm. Viktor Sokolov, one of the most senior officers in Russia’s Navy.
The attack came during a meeting of Russian commanders, Ukraine’s military said, and badly damaged a headquarters of the Russian fleet in Sevastopol, Crimea. The chief of Ukrainian military intelligence, Kyrylo Budanov, also told Voice of America on Saturday that the strike had badly wounded two senior Russian generals — Col. Gen. Aleksandr Romanchuk and Lieut. Gen. Oleg Tsekov. There has been no further word from either side on their condition.
There was no immediate comment from Russia’s Defense Ministry on the status of any of its commanders, and there was no independent verification of the claims.
In recent weeks, Ukraine has sharply increased the pace of strikes in Crimea, a strategically vital peninsula illegally annexed by Moscow nearly a decade ago. Kyiv has used missiles and aerial and maritime drones to attack warships, a naval port, bridges and military depots.
By going after Crimea, analysts say, Ukraine is making it harder for the Kremlin to use the region as a logistics hub for the territory it seized last year in southern Ukraine, where Russia is now battling a Ukrainian counteroffensive. It is also raising the price that Moscow must pay to maintain control of the peninsula and use it as the base for a fleet that regularly fires missiles into Ukraine, attacks and attempts to enforce a blockade on Ukrainian ports.
“Any target inside Crimea is essentially fair game to demonstrate to the Russians they do not have security, they do not control skies over Crimea, they are vulnerable to Ukrainian strikes, and Ukraine can get to them whenever it wants,” said Samuel Bendett, an analyst of Russia’s military at CNA, a think tank based near Washington.
