The New York Times reported on Wednesday, citing unnamed U.S. intelligence sources, that intelligence provided by the U.S. to the Ukrainian army allowed a number of Russian generals to be killed near the front lines.
An American newspaper, citing senior US officials, said that a “large number” of about a dozen Russian generals killed by Ukrainian forces were targeted with the help of US intelligence agencies.
The US National Security Council called “irresponsible” the information that the US is helping Ukraine to kill Russian generals.
“The United States is providing battlefield intelligence to help Ukrainians defend their country,” National Security Council spokeswoman Adrian Watson told AFP in an email.
“We do not provide intelligence with the intent to kill Russian generals,” Watson said.
And The New York Times wrote that Washington’s intelligence efforts to closely assist Ukraine in combat “focused primarily on the location and other details of the mobile headquarters of the Russian army, which is constantly on the move.”
Officially, the Pentagon said Monday that Russian Chief of Staff Valery Gerasimov made a “day” visit to the front in eastern Ukraine’s Donbas last week, suggesting top Russian military officials were closing in on the battle.
But the Pentagon did not confirm the rumors about Gerasimov’s injury.
An adviser to Ukraine’s interior minister said on Sunday that several Russian officers had been injured in an “explosion” in Izium in eastern Ukraine, explaining that the chief of the Russian General Staff was on the scene. But another Ukrainian official said the Russian general was unharmed.
The Ukrainians have stated several times that they have killed Russian generals in the field since the start of the war on 24 February.
The municipality of Novorossiysk in southern Russia, for example, confirmed in early March that General Andrei Sukhovitsky, deputy commander of the 41st Army, died as a “hero” in Ukraine.
U.S. assistance to Ukraine in intelligence activities that Washington does not disclose is added to the cost of billions of dollars of military equipment that has been delivered — more transparently — to the Kyiv army, including anti-tank weapons, ammunition and, most recently, heavy artillery. , helicopters and drones.
“We want Russia to be so weak that it cannot do things like attack Ukraine,” US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said on April 25.
