WASHINGTON – The United States has provided intelligence on Russian troops that has allowed Ukrainians to target and kill many Russian generals killed in the war in Ukraine, according to senior US officials.
Ukrainian authorities say they have killed approximately 12 generals on the front line, a number that surprised military analysts.
The targeting assistance is part of a secret effort by the Biden administration to provide real-time intelligence on the battlefield in Ukraine. The intelligence includes expected movements of Russian troops based on recent US assessments of Moscow’s secret battle plan for fighting in the Donbass region of eastern Ukraine, officials said. Authorities declined to say how many generals were killed as a result of US aid.
The United States has focused on providing the location and other details of the mobile headquarters of the Russian military, which often moves. Ukrainian officials have combined this geographical information with their own intelligence – including intercepted communications warning the Ukrainian military of the presence of senior Russian officers – to carry out artillery strikes and other attacks in which Russian officers were killed.
Sharing intelligence is part of an increased flow of aid from the United States, which includes heavier weapons and tens of billions of aid, demonstrating how quickly the early US support restrictions for Ukraine have changed as the war enters a new phase that may end. months.
The support of American intelligence for the Ukrainians has a decisive effect on the battlefield, confirming the goals identified by the Ukrainian military and directing them to new goals. There are few precedents for the flow of current intelligence on the movement of Russian troops that America has given to Ukraine.
After failing to advance towards Kyiv, the capital, at the start of the war, Russia tried to regroup, with more concentrated pressure in eastern Ukraine, which has so far been slow and uneven.
Officials interviewed for this article spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss details of secret intelligence being shared with Ukraine.
The administration is seeking to keep much of the intelligence on the battlefield secret, fearing it will be seen as an escalation and provoke Russian President Vladimir Putin into a wider war. U.S. officials would not describe how they obtained information about the Russian military headquarters for fear of jeopardizing their collection methods. But throughout the war, US intelligence agencies used a variety of sources, including classified and commercial satellites, to track the movement of Russian troops.
Minister of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III went so far as to say last month that “we want to see Russia weakened to the point where it cannot do the things it did when it invaded Ukraine.”
Asked about the intelligence provided to Ukrainians, Pentagon spokesman John F. Kirby said he “will not talk about the details of this information.” But he acknowledged that the United States is providing Ukraine with information and intelligence that it can use to defend itself.
Following the publication of this article, Adrien Watson, a spokesman for the National Security Council, said in a statement that battlefield intelligence had not been provided to Ukrainians “with the intention of killing Russian generals.”
Not all strikes were carried out with American intelligence. The weekend strike in eastern Ukraine, attended by General Valery Gerasimov, Russia’s top-ranking uniformed officer, was not backed by US intelligence, according to many US officials. The United States has banned the provision of intelligence to Russia’s top leaders, officials said.
But US intelligence has been critical of the deaths of other generals, officials said.
The United States regularly provides information on the movement of Russian troops and equipment and helps Ukraine confirm the location of critical targets. Other NATO allies are also providing real-time intelligence to the Ukrainian military.
The Biden administration is also supplying new weapons that should improve Ukraine’s ability to target senior Russian officers. The smaller version of the Switchblade drone, which is now arriving on the battlefield, can be used to identify and kill individual soldiers and can retrieve a general sitting in a vehicle or giving orders on the front line.
U.S. officials have publicly acknowledged that the United States began providing real intelligence to Ukraine on the eve of the February 24 Russian invasion. Prior to the invasion, for example, US intelligence agencies warned of an impending attack on Hostomel Airport north of Kyiv. This allowed Ukraine to strengthen its defense. In the end, the Russian airborne forces failed to hold the airport.
Although the information provided by the United States to Ukraine proved valuable, Russian generals have often been exposed to electronic eavesdropping by talking on insecure telephones and radio stations, current and former U.S. military officials said.
The war between Russia and Ukraine: Key developments
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Fears of an extended war are growing. As the Russian military is still fighting, Western officials are watching with increased concern on May 9, Victory Day. There are growing concerns that President Vladimir Putin will use the celebration of the Soviet triumph over the Nazis to step up attacks and officially declare war.
The Russian oil embargo. The European Union has unveiled a plan to halt imports of Russian crude oil over the next six months and refined petroleum products by the end of the year. If approved, it is expected to be the bloc’s biggest and most expensive step to end its own dependence on Russian fossil fuels.
Support for Moldova. The EU has promised to provide additional military support to Moldova, Ukraine’s increasingly pressured neighbor. Fears of security grew there during the invasion, swelled after a series of explosions that rocked Transnistria, a breakaway region of the country where Russia has supported troops since 1992.
On the ground. Moscow continued to demonstrate its destructive power. In the western city of Lviv, strikes at three power plants cut off electricity in many areas. In the eastern region of Donetsk on May 3 killed 21 people, which is the highest number of victims in a day last month.
“This shows poor discipline, inexperience, arrogance and an inability to assess Ukraine’s capabilities,” said Frederick B. Hodges, a former senior US military commander in Europe who now works at the Center for European Policy Analysis. “It’s not difficult to locate someone on the phone who speaks clearly.”
Russian military tactics have also made senior generals vulnerable. A top-down centralized command hierarchy gives decision-making powers only at the highest levels – compared to the more decentralized US structure, which directs many battlefield decisions to senior servicemen and junior officers – forcing Russian generals to take risky trips to the front lines. line for solving logistical and operational problems.
“When there are problems, the officers general must solve them,” said General Hodges.
Although the administration remains cautious about inciting Mr Putin to such an extent that he is further escalating his attacks, President Biden has said he will not send US troops to Ukraine or create a “no-fly zone” there, current and former officials said White House found some value in Russia’s warning that Ukraine had the burden of the United States and NATO behind it.
Some European officials believe that despite Mr Putin’s rhetoric that Russia is fighting NATO and the West, he has so far been deterred from starting a wider war. U.S. officials are less confident and have been discussing for weeks why Putin has not done more to escalate the conflict.
Officials said Moscow had its own calculations to judge, including whether it could handle a bigger war, especially one that would allow NATO to invoke its mutual defense charter or enter the war on -direct.
“It is clear that we want the Russians to know at some level that we are helping the Ukrainians to this extent and will continue to do so,” said Evelyn Farkas, a former senior Russian and Ukrainian Defense Ministry official in the Obama administration. “We will give them everything they need to win, and we are not afraid of Vladimir Putin’s reaction to this. We will not abstain. “
But sharing intelligence is considered a safe form of help because it is invisible, or at least it can be denied. U.S. intelligence has provided classified information to Ukraine in a wide range of areas, from Russian troop movements to targeting data, officials said.
Last month, the United States increased the flow of intelligence to Ukraine about Russian forces in Donbass and Crimea as Kyiv’s military prepared to defend itself against Moscow’s renewed offensive in eastern Ukraine, U.S. officials said.
“There is a significant amount of intelligence coming to Ukraine from the United States,” General Mark A. Millie, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told a Senate committee on Tuesday. “We opened the pipes.”
Michael Schwirz contributed to the reports from Ukraine.
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