New Ukraine offensive Operation Vivaldi recaptures several towns and takes out 2,000 Russian troops

Ukrainian forces have liberated three more villages and restored full control to two others on Monday in a push that saw Kyiv take some 250 Russian prisoners and inflict 2,000 casualties, officials said.Ukraine’s 3rd Army Corps successfully retook the villages of Ridkodub, Nove, and Katerynivka in the Donetsk region under Operation Vivaldi, a phased counter-assault aimed at liberating conquered Ukrainian land, Brig.Gen.

Andrii Biletskyi said.Biletskyi said the operation saw his troops trick Russia into desperately trying to protect a position south of their true goal, allowing the Ukrainian soldiers to reconquer 20 square miles of territory — an area about the size of Manhattan.“This forced them to pointlessly burn through their reserves in counterattacks in that direction; in reality, the enemy slept through the main strike, which was aimed at capturing Nove,” Biletskyi boasted.Details of Operation Vivaldi were made public earlier this month, highlighting Ukraine’s widening counterassault along the frontlines this year that has resulted in Russia losing hundreds of square miles of land.

Along with retaking the three villages on Monday, Biletskyi said his forces were also able to restore full Ukrainian control to the villages of Karpivka and Novomykhailivka.The operation was merely the “third season” of Operation Vivaldi, with Ukrainian troops modifying Soviet-era BTR-60 armored vehicles into unmanned kamikaze bombs to break through Russian defenses.The village of Nove was key to the third phase of Operation Vivaldi as the settlement had been converted into a key Russian hub in the region.

With the newly liberated land, Ukrainian troops now have a pincer around the Zelena-Dolyna settlement, the area Russian forces were tricked into defending.Operation Vivaldi alone has so far liberated nearly 68 square miles of land from Russian forces, according to the Ukrainian military.Monday’s operation also saw Ukraine take more than 250 Russian troops priso...