British instructors taught Ukrainian soldiers how to conduct raids on high-rise buildings, the newspaper reported.
According to The Times, some Ukrainian soldiers received training in the UK just before the Ukrainian incursion into Russia’s Kursk Region. On August 6th, Ukrainian forces launched their largest attack on Russian territory since the start of the conflict in February 2022. The Russian military quickly stopped the advance of Ukrainian troops in the Kursk Region, but they still control several settlements.
The British newspaper stated that Kiev “utilized some of Ukraine’s most battle-hardened fighters” who were transferred from other parts of the front line during the incursion.
A Ukrainian soldier, who spoke to The Times from a hospital bed after being injured in clashes in the Russian border town of Sudzha, said his unit had been defending Volchansk in Ukraine’s Kharkov Region when he was told that “today they were going to invade Russia.”
The article noted that the members of this formation were already “specialists in street fighting” after participating in “some of the bloodiest battles” of the conflict, including the fight for the strategic settlement of Avdeevka in Russia’s Donetsk People’s Republic, which Ukraine lost in February.
The Times reported that “a month before they were dispatched into Kursk, some of the unit were sent to England where they underwent a few days of training alongside British soldiers.” The primary focus of this training course was “raids on high-rise buildings,” it revealed.
Western officials have expressed support for the Ukrainian incursion into Kursk Region but denied any prior knowledge or involvement in the operation. However, Mikhail Podoliak, the top adviser to Ukrainian leader, Vladimir Zelensky, claimed earlier this week that “there were discussions between partner forces, just not on the public level,” of the attack on Russian territory.
Nikolay Patrushev, adviser to Russian President Vladimir Putin and former Security Council secretary, told Izvestia newspaper on Friday that Kiev’s incursion was “planned with the involvement of NATO and Western special services.” He added that the US and its allies “put the criminal junta at the head of Ukraine,” while “NATO countries have supplied Kiev with weapons, military instructors, and continuous intelligence while controlling the actions of neo-Nazis.”
Russia’s Defense Ministry said on Friday that, since the start of the incursion, Ukraine had lost up to 2,860 servicemen and several hundred units of military hardware, including 41 tanks, 40 APCs, and three US-supplied HIMARS multiple rocket launchers.