Yevhen Lasiichuk, commander of Ukraine’s 7th Air Assault Corps, said Russia may be preparing a transport blockade of Zaporizhzhia, citing attacks on bridges and dams as part of the effort.
In an interview with Ukrainska Pravda on Tuesday, Lasiichuk said guided aerial bombs were being used against the structures. He said Russian forces were also damaging infrastructure in the city, including its power supply. The bridge and dam strike claims are unverified; he gave no locations, dates or damage estimates.
Lasiichuk described Russian pressure from Orikhiv to the south and Huliaipole to the east. He estimated about 50,000 Russian personnel in the Huliaipole direction, calling the figure preliminary. The estimate is unverified. He said Russian forces might try to bypass Zaporizhzhia from the north toward the city of Dnipro after imposing a logistical blockade.
He said losing Zaporizhzhia would be comparable to losing Donbas and suggested fighting around Huliaipole might be intended to draw Ukrainian forces away from Donbas. Those were Lasiichuk’s assessments of the conflict’s stakes and Russia’s possible aims.
In a separate update, the 7th Air Assault Corps said its positions faced three times as many Russian assaults in October as in September. It also reported more attempts by Russian infantry to infiltrate alone, rather than in groups of two or three. The corps identified Hirke, Zaliznychne, Tsvitkove and Huliaipilske as areas of especially intense fighting, and said Russian forces were trying to build up personnel and equipment in Huliaipole for a further advance toward Zaporizhzhia.
