Russia claims to have destroyed HIMARS
In its daily briefing, the ministry said it had destroyed more than 300 rockets in the strike.
Total Views |
Moscow, Aug 10: Russia’s defence ministry said on Tuesday that Russian forces had destroyed an ammunition depot near the central Ukrainian city of Uman storing U.S.-made HIMARS missiles and M777 howitzers.
In its daily briefing, the ministry said it had destroyed more than 300 rockets in the strike.
Kyiv has hailed the arrival of the advanced, long-range HIMARS from the United States as a possible gamechanger, while Moscow has accused the West of “dragging out” the conflict by arming Ukraine. Russia has shown off US weapons and other spoils of the war captured during its ongoing invasion of Ukraine. The footage of the weapons, reportedly seized from Ukrainian forces, was shared by Russia's Ministry of Defence on its official Telegram channel on Sunday. In the 2-minute 15-second clip, a Russian soldier can be seen holding and talking about the weapons, including anti-tank grenade launchers made in the US, UK, Poland, and Sweden. The accompanying post in English calls these weapons "trophies", which are mainly of foreign origin. The small haul of weapons obtained during the "special military operation" also includes machine guns and small arms of Soviet origin abandoned by the Ukrainian soldiers. "Among the trophies, weapons are mainly of foreign manufacture. Hand-held anti-tank grenade launchers made in Great Britain, the USA, Poland, and Sweden, including Javelin and Carl Gustaf missile systems, as well as heavy machine guns and Soviet-made small arms abandoned by Ukrainian nationalists," the Russian defense ministry's post said. However, the display of weapons seems to pale in comparison to images of Russian tanks and other weapons captured by Ukrainian soldiers, as shown by several news outlets.
According to Oryx, a military and intelligence blog which keeps a count of Russia's military losses in Ukraine, the Russian military has lost more than 5,000 military vehicles in Ukraine. The Ukrainian military has been able to achieve so much success in the war against numerically superior Russian forces due to the support provided by Western forces. The US, the UK, Germany, and other countries have sent javelins and several other state-of-the-art weapons to Ukraine to help in their fight.