Jag misstänker att anfallet mot Mariupol kommer inledas de närmsta veckorna när marken tillåter stridsvagnarna att röra sig fritt igen. Antagligen i samband med firandet av Seger Dagen den 9:e maj.
Ryssarna kommer förmodligen försöka ta Mariupol på mindre än
48 timmar eftersom en långdragen belägring skulle inleda hårdare sanktioner från väst. Lyckas man ta staden snabbt hinner väst inte reagera och kommer då acceptera att staden fallit. En sådan omringning och stormning kan genomföras med de hundratals stridsvagnar som de ryska förbanden har i Ukraina.
Detta bekräftas av separatisternas ledare Zakharchenko i en intervju.
Citat:
In the Bloomberg interview published April 16, a Kremlin-backed separatist leader revealed his intentions were to capture Mariupol in violation of ceasefire agreements, and unite with Russia. He put chances of a return to war at “90 percent.” And in claiming that “nobody wants to come back to Ukraine under any pretext,” he wrote off the Minsk II agreements that he and the leader of Luhansk-based separatists had signed just two months earlier, according to the Bloomberg interview. Those agreements envisioned Ukraine’s gradually re-integrating politically and economically with Ukraine.
Boasting that he now had some 23,000 regular troops and 30,000 in reserves, Zakharchenko pledged to launch an offensive on Mariupol.
“We will liberate all our compatriots. It’s easy to outflank it and they will surrender. Don’t forget, our mothers and our sisters live there, so don’t make us out to be bloodthirsty beasts,” he said.
“We thought, still think and will think of ourselves as a part of the Soviet Union, of Russia,” he added.
http://www.kyivpost.com/content/kyiv-post-plus/war-heats-up-near-mariupol-386406.html