Report: Ukraine Forced to Alter Spring Offensive Plans After U.S. Document Leak
The Wall Street Journal: Intel breach possibly “one of the most significant leaks of highly classified in recent history.”
News reports claim that the Ukrainian military has changed plans for its much-anticipated spring offensive following an alleged leak of classified U.S. documents. “Ukraine has reportedly been forced to alter plans for its coming counter-offensive because of the leak of highly-sensitive US intelligence,’ the UK newspaper Telegraph reported Tuesday.
The change in the Ukrainian military plans comes in response to the supposed leak of U.S. Defense Department documents containing classified information regarding the war in Ukraine, as well as sensitive intelligence on China, Russian and other countries. The Wall Street Journal on Tuesday described the intelligence breach under President Joe Biden’s watch as possibly “one of the most significant leaks of highly classified in recent history.”
The U.S. Defense Department has yet to confirm the veracity of the documents.
If the leaked intelligence is genuine, it could have a significant military impact on the ongoing war in Ukraine, media reports suggest. “First things first: this is the biggest leak of secret American information on the war in Ukraine since Russia’s full-scale invasion 14 months ago. Some of the documents are as much as six weeks old, but the implications are huge,” the BBC reported. “Pentagon officials are quoted as saying the documents are real,” the broadcaster noted.
The leaked intelligence could have ‘deadly consequences for the Ukrainian soldiers, the British TV channel Sky News reported Tuesday:
A leak of highly classified US documents could have deadly consequences for Ukrainians at war with Russia, a US official has said.
If confirmed as authentic, “it won’t be hard for the Russians to cut off [intelligence] avenues that might be saving lives every day,” Jim Himes, of the US house intelligence committee, said.
“Anything that points to sources and methods carries the very real risk that those sources and methods go away,” the Democrat said.
“And that can mean people being killed, that can mean technologies being shut down. And that translates into bad outcomes on the battlefield.”
Mr Himes said he had not been briefed on the documents, and could not confirm whether or not the leak is authentic.
There have been conflicting reports about the authenticity of the documents, which allegedly first emerged on the social media website Discord.
The leaked documents suggest that the Ukrainian air defenses could run out of ammunition “within weeks.” Besides pointing out Russian weaknesses, the leaked “information also suggests the Ukrainian military is in dire straits, too. Among other things, some of the documents outline critical shortages of Ukrainian air defense munitions,” the Ukrainian news website Kyiv Independent reported Tuesday.
The revelations come as Ukraine gears up for a spring offensive. For months, Ukrainian soldiers have been preparing for a major ground offensive, aided by tanks and artillery supplied by the U.S. and European NATO allies.
Russia, still eying to take the strategically important eastern city of Bakhmut after eight months of bitter fighting, is fortifying the 600-mile frontline in anticipation of a Ukrainian offensive. French newspaper Le Monde reported Saturday:
The Russian fortification campaign, which began in the summer with the construction of the first defensive lines around Mariupol and Donetsk, has been stepped up in recent months. Now, most of the major roads and railways in the territories occupied by Moscow’s forces are protected by trenches and anti-tank mines.
Moscow is conducting a nationwide recruitment drive and shoring up the size of its fighting force in Ukraine. German state-run DW TV reported Saturday that “Russian army aims to recruit some 400,000 new contract soldiers in order to send them to fight in the war against Ukraine.”
U.S. allies respond to the Pentagon Leak
The leaked Pentagon documents revealed the U.S. espionage activities in hostile foreign countries and pointed to intelligence-gathering operations in friendly allies such as Israel and South Korea.
On Monday, The Washington Post reported the official reaction to the leaks from Korea and Israel:
The government of South Korea, a key U.S. ally, said over the weekend that it would discuss in a summit later this month “issues raised” by leaked memos detailing apparent U.S. spying on top officials in Seoul.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, already navigating a growing rift with the Biden administration, issued a statement Sunday describing media reports about a memo detailing potential domestic meddling on the part of the Mossad intelligence agency as “mendacious and without any foundation whatsoever.”
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We have all known that this war has been stalemated for a while, with both sides running out of ammo and troops. The lines on the battlefield have hardly moved in 6 months. I doubt this leak amounts to all that much. Still, it should not have happened. There is a problem inside the Pentagon.
Yes, its called a desperate need for a complete and thorough enema.
So, Putin sucks.
And Zelenskyy sucks.
Our money is making Zelenskyy and other criminals in Ukraine rich.
Our money is making weapons manufacturers rich.
Our sanctions are making Russian natural petroleum providers rich.
Although it’ll suck to be a Ukranian for quite a while, we should stop using them as crash test dummies for our weapons testing, and force them to the bargaining table with Putin.
We have a Bradley Manning redux and you cut and paste what the left was saying about Iraq 2004-2010.
—-Our money has always made arms manufacturers and dealers rich.
“Lots of leading Americans got rich during the Revolutionary War by selling supplies and equipment to the Continental Army at inflated prices, many of them members of Congress, ”
—- Our sanctions are making Russian natural petroleum providers rich.
Lithuanians hate the Russians. They knew the Russians would leverage energy. So, they built a f’kn LNG port. It was completed 2014. They also ran energy cables across the Baltic Sea to Sweden. Russian warships repeatedly harassed and harried the Swede-Lithuanian contractors laying the cable. Repeatedly. With malice.
VILNIUS/WARSAW, Feb 28 (Reuters) – A natural gas pipeline called GIPL linking Poland and Lithuania will open on May 1, earlier than the scheduled mid-2022 start, linking the Polish grid with a route to a liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal in Lithuania.
So, your whole argument is shot to shyte. We’re making those &^%##$ greedy Lithuanians rich! BLARG!!!
—-Although it’ll suck to be a Ukrainian for quite a while.
No. It will suck to be a Ukrainian for a very long time. If you think there won’t be reprisal killings after “The Peace”, then you’re sadly mistaken. But it’s easy to barter other people’s lives and freedom. You did it in one sentence.
Says Neville Chamberlain, Rev. 2.0.
Damn!
Somethin awfully fishy about this leak and timing now that the ‘muddy season’ is ending. The following is thorough and LONG and has its own suspect bits, but here goes:
https://bigserge.substack.com/p/russo-ukrainian-war-leak-biopsy
interesting article. Thanks for linking it.
It almost makes me wonder if the US leaked it on purpose to stop the Ukrainians from launching an offensive that was bound to fail.
When dealing with intel matters there are a number of conflicting possibilities. Consider that much of our bureaucratic/military/political command structures have long been more loyal to certain hostile countries dating back to the Cold War than to the United States. This could also be. This could be a plain old attempt to aid the Russians as much as it is to stop the Ukrainians. As our Social Contract has broken down, we have a lot of factions with loyalties in all directions BUT to the Constitution.
Just a thought. I figure we will find out when we find out, and there is little that we can do to influence our government [or any factions therein] in any direction. We ain’t gonna vote our way out of this.
Subotai Bahadur
If anyone is interested in more about the Pentagon Leak, this blog and link covers some of the matter.
https://turcopolier.com/the-importance-of-thermal-cameras-on-drones/#comment-221668
This link has two tracks as the title mentions the first regarding thermal cameras, but intertwined a bit down the page is the leak.
Please tell me they didn’t cancel the Zelensky’s next vogue shoot!
No fear of that. But it’ll be a long time until the FBI again has the time to spare to pursue school shooters. (Not that they ever did when they had any.)
“Ukraine Forced to Alter Spring Offensive Plans After U.S. Document Leak”
Cui bono? Who benefits most if this war drags on longer?
Our enemy is not in Moscow. He’s in the white house.
The leaked documents suggest that the Ukrainian air defenses could run out of ammunition “within weeks.” Besides pointing out Russian weaknesses, the leaked “information also suggests the Ukrainian military is in dire straits, too. Among other things, some of the documents outline critical shortages of Ukrainian air defense munitions,” the Ukrainian news website Kyiv Independent reported Tuesday.
This just begs the Russians to wait a couple of months for a cake-walk.
Believe it at your own risk.
Considering Macron letting the cat out of the bag this weekend and stating in so many words “France and Europe is out of the Taiwan and supporting the US” game I’d say pull all support and let Europe deal with Russia like it should have in the first place. In fact, take all of our troops out of Europe. Screw them and France who never met a war they couldn’t lose.
How could there have been any intelligence leak from this administration? /s
It’s the stuff KJP has been assuring us “is just earwax.”
Original choices : Make Ukraine a “Finland” or push EU/NATO membership. Who really benefited from the latter choice? Remember when 0bama defined Russia as a regional power and pushed the color revolution? The Balkans was a regional issue…until it wasn’t in 1914. To “defeat” Russia has upped the nuclear ante. In the world of MAD, I hope those that cashed in on the corruption within Ukraine get their own personal MIRV.
You’ve made a hash of Finn/UKR history. Both countries were borderland cushions between hostile countries. A succession of Tsars spent much time and effort trying to “russify” both Finland and Ukraine – long before WWI.
After the fall of Nicholas II. Kerensky never changed the original russification policy and refused to grant Finnish and Ukrainian independence. After the fall of Kerensky the Bolsheviks simply continued the time honored Russification policy .. now imbued with Bolshevik chaos.
Lenin granted Finnish independence because he believed that the Finnish Social Democrats would immediately overthrow the Finn government. Yeah, it didn’t happen. Ministers fled north into White occupied territory.
Between 21 January 1918 to 15 May 1918: the Finnish Whites under C.G. Mannerheim won a series of decisive battles over the Red Finns (and approx. 7000 Russian Bolshevik infantry, marines and sailors.) The street fighting was a very bloody affair.
The fighting in Ukraine came later – and by then Ukraine was the focus of the Bolsheviks. The Bolsheviks held to the original russification policy, then reversed the policy, only to later reinstate the policy. But I’m getting ahead of myself.
The point being- no matter who it was that was in charge of Russia – they always believed Ukrainians to be the untermensch. The serf-slaves of Big Brother Russia. And just like dogs, the untermensch were always deserving of a good old fashioned beating. And now? Putin wants Ukraine in the same way Nicholas, Kerensky, Lenin and Stalin wanted Ukraine. Putin is a irredentist. He’s a throwback, living in the past, living in a sunken civilization while trying to rebuild the Lost Empire.
People say President Putin is a reasonable man, then, in a fit of frustration, immediately claim that he will start nuking things.
So, which is it? is he reasonable man or a madman? If Putin nukes Ukraine, he ruins Ukraine, which kinda defeats the purpose of “saving” those poor, innocent, beleaguered Russian-Ukrainians from the horrible Ukrainian-Ukrainian “NAZI’s”.
And as we all know, Ukraine is CRAWLING with NAZI throwbacks, just as America is SWAMPED by white supremacists.
Not hash of modern times. With the initial failure by Stalin to take Finnish land in the Winter War, he was later able to win and gained negotiated land around Leningrad as a cushion. Finland was allowed sovereignty. but if one looks at the Finnish military… its armament was Soviet manufactured such as their aircraft. Considering the immensely long border of Finland with Russia and with only road and railway up to Russian fleet paralleling the Finnish border, keeping Finland as a buffer was important.
Ukraine. Or “Lesser Russia” to “Mother Russia”… that is a historical back and forth from outside control versus long held dreams of full independence. Also a back and forth of animosity between the two regions. Banning languages, writings, and history. Mostly, the heavy hand of Russia. In the long term, Russia has been dying and in a few more decades will be neutered. Why not wait out its demise? What would be gained by a corrupt country being pushed into the arms of the EU and NATO if not for 1) national pride, 2) revenge) and 3) $$$$$ with Ukraine being the world’s piggy bank with all those pipelines, all the resources?
Think of Ukraine’s eastern border lands as being the same as Finland’s eastern border lands. The aspirations of Ukrainians for once and for all removing any yoke by Russia was the key to open the treasury. It didn’t have to happen so soon and now everything is HASH.
Oliver Stone’s “Ukraine on Fire” should be taken carefully but does give a good history of the main players. As an aside, if Germany had truly liberated lands from the Soviet Union and not been the Nazis that they were… they could have pushed the USSR back to the Urals forever. Getting around Poland would have been interesting but who knows what the Poles would have done. Ukraine has suffered up both national and international socialism.
Tiki, that is some excellent knowledge of history of that part of the world (and solid analysis). One thumbs up for you.
Alaskabob, do you still believe that Russia attacked Ukraine due to some sort of threat of NATO membership? That was just Putin’s B.S. for public consumption. The real reason is just plain old domination and reconstitution of the old Soviet Union, or parts of it at least. Now if you are still convinced that Putin attacked Ukraine to prevent another NATO member being on its border, you have to admit that Putin now looks like some special short bus “genius” now that Finland is part of NATO thanks to his actions.
So why don’t we declare Ukraine a “gun-free zone”, and end the war in a snap????
No one cares about the Pentagon leaking classified information as long as they use the correct pronouns!
Anyone consider that this leak might just have been payback for all that woke nonsense destroying our military including Milley ordering the Catholic Priests out of Walter Reed during Easter?
“Intel breach possibly “one of the most significant leaks of highly classified in recent history.”
Present diplomacy centers and muscle-car garages excepted, goes without saying.
Don’t forget about the Pentagon’s commitment to combat alleged “white rage.” Tranny accommodation and fighting alleged “white rage” are DoD’s top priorities, now.
Well, it doesn’t get any whiter than Russia, I guess….
it doesn’t get any whiter than Russia, I guess…
Funny you say that, because it’s exactly how neocons like David Frum see things.
“Major theme of Trumpapocalypse: Trump admirers like @TuckerCarlson describe themselves as ‘nationalist.’ But their nationalism attaches not to the multiracial American nation and its capital in Washington, but to a multinational white race with a capital in Moscow.”
– David Frum
Bill Kristol suffers from similar brain poisoning, but he expresses this animus with more polish and restraint.
The Ukrainian’s are getting pasted in Bakhmut b/c the Russians are using old school doctrine of slow advances following massive artillery strikes. Slowly and steadily grinding them down yard by yard. I can understand why the Ukrainian govt wants to keep it and why they might be willing to expend troops there to tie down the Russians as they prep for a counter offensive using just acquired NATO equipment. Either way it still suck balls to be sitting in Bakhmut getting shelled for a sort of economy of force, defense/blocking op so someone else gets to learn how to play with the new toys.
Sounds as if the Biden regime has decided that the proxy war against Russia isn’t what they want going into the 2024 presidential elections and are now building a case to either; (1) abandon Zelenskyy and leave him and the Ukraine to their inevitable fate or; (2) force Zelenskyy to negotiate with Putin for a negotiated peace no matter how repugnant that might be. Why else the sudden appearance of these classified documents but to help Biden bail out of a proxy war we never should have been involved with in the first place.
Brandon & Co got their kickbacks from that $100 Billion dropped on Ukraine with not tracking or accountability. Zelinsky is about to find out how grift is played by the big boys.
And it’s going to get pretty ugly when pretty boy Zelenskyy discovers he’s no longer the darling of the Leftists and the West. Guaranteed.
You people really are that dumb. The $100M wasn’t cash. It’s mostly been obsolete hardware we had in storage. Unless you’re stupid enough to believe the 62-year-old M-113 APC that saw service in Vietnam is somehow modern.
Even the Bradley’s we’re sending are no longer modern. They’ll be fine against Russia’s equipment, but they’re also obsolete.
Then there are the TOW missiles. Obsolete.
The 105mm Howitzers. Obsolete.
Eight NASAMS. Finally something relatively modern by US standards. But it’s just eight.
Mi-17 Helicopters. Obsolete.
WIth few exceptions, such as the Javelins, it’s all obsolete crap we dug out of our arms basement.
Us rocks know that real money was shipped to Ukraine. Several billion in “aid”. Who is paying pensions in the Ukrsine? The US.
Not for nothing but the US Army still uses those M113 though in direct combat support roles; Medic, Mechanics, Co HQ, Mortar tracks and so on. The move along just behind Co level mechanics infantry and armor units going into the fight. The Tow 2 anti tank missile is still standard inventory as well.
Yeah, no. All the equipment and money was current inventory. Troll somewhere else where people don’t know the real story
Strange. The Deep State including the FBI, CIA, State Dept, Pentagon etc leaked and leaked under Trump for 4 years to breathless reporting of “unnamed sources familiar with the matter” by the MSM and it was the height of patriotism. Now the shoe is on the other foot and unlike The Pentagon Papers Brandon and his sliver of a man mouthpiece tool Kirby is demanding the MSM not report. How odd
Some leaks are more equal than others?
Not to worry; the Dumb-o-crat, self-styled “adults” are supposedly in charge.
Also, how galling is this leak? Not only its occurrence on dotard-marionette, Biden’s watch, but, the media’s predictable non-coverage of it, and, the thought that this major national security breach was occurring around the same time that Biden, DOJ and that National Archives weasel were contriving utterly farcical, sham allegations against President Trump for allegedly improperly retaining classified documents.
These Dumb-o-crats snakes are so vile, contemptible and dangerous. Their incompetence is rivaled by their stupidity.
Someone in our deep state is Putins puppet. They released it to stop the Ukrainians from surprising Putin.
I read that some Russians thought that the leaks were part of a disinformation plan. Maybe that was disinformation?
Will there be public trials of the leakers? No, if there are any trials, they will fail under the FISA Courts.
I do believe there is more going on than is publicly disclosed or it is all just another distraction from something really bad going on.