Vladimir Putin is desperately deploying troops to the Russian border amid fears that a significant incursion by Ukrainian forces could see them seize or cut off supplies to a key nuclear power plant.
Moscow said it had sent reserves to help repel hundreds of Ukrainian fighters backed by tanks, in a ground incursion that is shaping up to be one of the largest on Russian soil during the war.
On Tuesday, Russian military and security agencies were surprised by a breakthrough on the border of the Kursk region, which had been guarded by lightly armed conscripts, several of whom were captured.
kyiv continued to bombard the region with waves of drone strikes overnight, according to the local governor, with defence systems destroying at least five.
Heavy clashes are expected today as Ukrainian forces, possibly both the army and anti-Putin Russian partisans, try to advance deeper into the region.
Damage in the town of Sudzha on August 6 after Ukrainian shelling, according to Smirnov
There was a wave of warnings today that Ukraine might have bold intentions to capture or surround the Kursk nuclear power plant.
Ukraine launched the incursion across the Russian border at around 5am GMT on Tuesday.
Official Russian social media accounts reported that up to 300 Ukrainian fighters, backed by tanks, had attacked border units in two Kursk towns: Nikolayevo-Daryino and Oleshnya.
Moscow has lost two Ka-52 helicopters: one of them, allegedly shot down by an FPV drone, was shown burning, while Moscow, which bombs Ukrainian civilians and territories on a daily basis, is furious about a “terrorist attack”.
Five people were killed and 28 wounded, and the surprise raid is believed to have forced Russian authorities to evacuate several border settlements.
There were a flurry of warnings today that Ukraine’s intention behind its unprecedented advance into Russian territory could be to capture or surround the Kursk nuclear power plant.
Such a bold plan could later be used as a bargaining chip to negotiate with Putin over the transfer of control of the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant, which has been in Russian hands since the beginning of the war.
The videos reportedly showed the nighttime shelling of Kurchatov, the town around the Kursk atomic plant, about 31 miles as the crow flies (but farther by road) from the Ukrainian incursion across the border.
“Nuclear blackmail,” posted Dmitry Rogozin, a senator who previously served as Putin’s deputy prime minister and head of the Russian Space Agency.
“This is something that all the media in the world will definitely announce. This is what they (the Ukrainians) are counting on.”
He demanded a ruthless response to eliminate Ukrainians crossing the border.
Plumes of smoke rise in the Kursk border region as Russia claims Ukraine has launched an attack
War correspondent Yuri Kotenok wrote: ‘The Kurchatov nuclear power plant is an object that has long been the object of desire of the Ukrainian military elite and its conservatives.’
Despite the warnings, in posts on the messaging app Telegram, the acting governor of Russia’s southwestern region insisted the situation was “controllable.”
Ukraine has launched several waves of drone strikes, prompting at least a dozen airstrike alerts in the past 24 hours, Alexei Smirnov’s posts claimed.
Five people were killed, including two ambulance staff, and at least 20 were wounded, including six children, in clashes that broke out on Tuesday, Russian officials said.
Ukraine has made no official comment, although there was evidence of some military action from its side of the border. Both kyiv and Moscow say their strikes are not targeting civilians.
The Ukrainian military regularly fires artillery and missiles into Russian territory, and has attacked targets deep inside Russia with long-range attack drones, but infantry raids are rare.
The advance into Russia highlighted how Putin had lied to his people about not sending rookie recruits to the war zone and border areas.
Damage to buildings allegedly caused during a Ukrainian attack on the border on Tuesday
Images on social media show a truck on fire after the border raid in the Kursk region on Tuesday
Several Russian recruits appeared in videos after being captured at border crossings.
A private, Danil Kolesnikov, 22, who served in the 488th regiment, was detained while guarding the border in Sudzha.
“I was taken prisoner by Ukrainian troops at the border crossing,” he said, indicating that he, like others, had been abandoned by their commanders.
When his Ukrainian captors asked him what he thought about Putin and his war, the recruit said: “Well, of course… war always sucks. It’s always bad.
“Especially in my region of Belgorod… so many dead bodies, all that shit… there is no support.”
Another Maxim Emelyanin, 21, from the remote Komi republic in Russia’s far north, said the recruits had demanded to be removed from the border point, in line with Putin’s promise to deploy recruits.
Images on social media show damage to a residential building in the region
But they left them there. When asked if they had abandoned them, he said, “That’s right.”
He was asked: “What do you think of your superiors?” He replied: “Negatively.”
“What do you think about the war in Ukraine?” He replied: “I have a negative attitude towards war.
“And Putin?” they asked. “Putin? I don’t know.”
He said he “didn’t exactly support” what his president was doing, adding: “I had been avoiding the military altogether (but I was eventually drafted).”
Another theory is that Ukraine could try to disrupt Russian gas exports through the Kursk region.
Reports indicated that Ukraine had occupied the settlements of Daryevka, Gogolevka and Sverdlikovo.
A badly damaged building in the region, which borders Ukraine, after Tuesday’s raid
Images shared after yesterday’s border advance show damage to buildings
The border town of Sudzha was heavily bombed and most of its residents were evacuated.
Administrative and residential buildings and the infectious diseases department of the city hospital were damaged, Izvestia reported.
Earlier, forces describing themselves as volunteer paramilitaries fighting on Ukraine’s side inflicted minimal damage in a major incursion into parts of the Belgorod and Kursk regions this year, but the purpose of the raids remains unclear.
On Tuesday, the Ukrainian General Staff did not mention any Ukrainian offensive operations inside Russia.
Throughout the more than two years of war, Ukraine’s efforts have largely focused on fighting Russian forces that control nearly a fifth of its territory and have made a series of incremental advances over the past six months.
Ukrainian attacks inside Russian territory have mainly consisted of shelling of border regions and drone strikes against targets such as oil refineries and fuel depots.