How UK Storm Shadow missiles could help Ukraine blow up Putin’s favourite bridge, retake Crimea & topple Vlad

BRITAIN’S Storm Shadow missiles could finally help Ukraine blow up the strategic Kerch bridge, retake Crimea and topple Vladimir Putin. Storm Shadow air-launched cruise missiles can travel up to 600mph and can blast targets up to 350 miles away that have long been out of reach for Ukraine. It means the weapons could hit targets at maximum range in just 35 minutes – travelling near half the length of the UK. Defence Secretary Ben Wallace confirmed the UK is sending the long-rage missiles to Ukraine – allowing Zelensky’s forces to further push Putin’s troops back into Russia. US military officials described the missile as a “a real game-changer from a range perspective”. The devastating missiles can wipe out well-defended static targets like facilities, bunkers and bridges – including Putin’s favourite Crimean bridge that was attacked last October. A massive gaping hole was blown in the £3.2billion bridge – a highly symbolic link between Vlad’s mainland and annexed Crimea. The weapon cruises low over the land before shooting high into the sky and then coming down on its target from a near vertical angle. As the world awaits Kyiv’s long awaited counter-offensive, experts believe Zelensky’s forces could launch a major operation and even push into Crimea. Behind the frontline, a new wave of troops have been training with Western weapons. As well as Storm Shadow missiles, they will be rolling into battle with Challenger 2 and Leopard 2 main battle tanks, Stryker and Bradley armoured vehicles, and new artillery systems. And the US is speeding up the timeline for the Ukrainians to get M1 Abrams tanks, with training on the vehicles to begin next month. With these weapons – in theory they should outrange and outmatch the Russians, laying the groundwork for the new offensive. US General Ben Hodges believes Ukraine will concentrate their efforts on finally retaking Crimea – which has been in Russian hands since 2014. Crimea holds an important naval base in Sevastopol – home to Putin’s Black Sea Fleet. General Hodges told The Sun Online: “The key is winning Crimea – that will be the decisive terrain. “Once Crimea is liberated, it’s all over, it changes everything. “Ukraine knows that it will never be safe without taking back Crimea.” With Hodges’ extensive military experience, he believes that the offensive will focus on isolating the annexed Crimean peninsula by severing the land bridge from partly-Russian controlled areas in Ukraine’s south. “It will be aimed at breaking this land bridge and more precision weapons to hit targets and make the peninsula untenable for Russian forces,” he explained. This onslaught will involve hitting Russia’s air bases, ambitious attacks on Russia’s Black Sea Fleet and targeting logistics and command centres deep into enemy-held territory in Crimea, he said. And Storm Shadow missiles are difficult to intercept – especially when launched in salvo attacks from different directions – making it an ideal weapon to storm Crimea. “When it makes sense to,” Hodges said Ukraine may “again” blow up the Crimean bridge. Losing the bridge would mark a huge setback to Russia’s forces and an important defeat for Putin. Destroying the bridge would cripple part of Russia’s supply chain. General Hodges claims Ukraine’s offensive will be concentrated in a narrow area to break through the well-dug in Russian lines. “I think Ukraine will pick one or two places to focus their attack on a narrow front a few miles wide and penetrate through the fortified frontlines using tanks, mechanised infantry, engineers and artillery,” he said. “They will use their air force to help cover them and there will be activity in Russian rear area by special forces and partisans to stop them reacting [to the attack].” He explained: “They’ve been busy training, practising and carefully protecting information – they’re waiting on the right conditions for traffic ability – waiting on the ground to be able to sustain the attack.” General Hodges told Newsweek that losing Crimea would “change everything” in Moscow. Experts have previously warned the loss of Crimea could “severely challenge” Putin’s position in the Kremlin. And earlier this year, former Defense Secretary Robert Gates said losing Crimea to Ukraine would cross a “real red line” for Russia. As Ukraine reportedly prepares for its counter-offensive, it is known to be forming a network of new “Storm Brigades” – with around 40,000 soldiers. Named Hurricane, Spartan, Chervona Kalyna, Frontier, Rage, Azov and Kara Dag (a mountain in Crimea), Ukraine’s new units are preparing to play their role in a decisive new offensive to push back Putin’s troops. Ex-Brit Colonel Hamish de Bretton-Gordon predicts the Ukrainians will be ambitious in their counter strike – with the key being their new arsenal of Western main battle tanks. He said the Western armour will outmatch the ageing Soviet-era tank fleet currently being used by Putin, punching through tank traps, trenches and barbed wire like the so-called “Saddam Line” in the Operation Desert Storm back in 1991. Saddam Hussein’s fortifications were breached in a matter of hours by the US forces using M1 Abrams tanks – just as the Ukrainians will soon have in their arsenal. The Desert Storm ground offensive lasted just 100 hours and saw an army led by American and British forces make mincemeat of Saddam’s tanks and troops – who ended up surrendering en masse. Colonel De Bretton-Gordon told The Sun Online: “Over four days [in Desert Storm] we covered a couple of hundred miles. The Ukrainians will probably want to go a bit further but not much further.” The ensuing battles saw Western tanks like the Abrams and Challenger face off against Russian armour and make short work of them. If they Ukrainians can in similar style smash through Russia’s defences, they will then exploit that position to cause havoc and destruction behind enemy lines. The key to Ukrainian victory, Colonel De Bretton-Gordon says, will be putting in place the logistics to maintain such an advance until it can get far enough behind Russian lines to cause maximum devastation. He added: “The Ukrainians are very canny. I’ve been impressed with the way they operate. “There isn’t much we can teach them. Obviously we taught them how to use our tanks and artillery but in terms of teaching the generals, they are already very impressive. “Now they have tanks and artillery for the close fight, I’m pretty confident they’ll be able to [succeed].” It comes as the Institute for the Study of War said it appears that Russian forces have abandoned efforts to encircle the besieged city of Bakhmut. Bakhmut has been referred to as the “bloodiest battle” of the war so far – with both side locked in meat grinder-style combat, with reports of soldiers beating each other to death with shovels. War analysts at the Conflict Intelligence Team said the main goal of the fresh counter offensive will be to “unblock” Bakhmut. “The vehicles are already on the territory of Ukraine at the disposal of its military and may be used in combat in the nearest future,” the team wrote in their situation report on March 28. “We expect that the primary goal of the Ukrainian counter-offensive will be to unblock Bakhmut.” Commander of Ukrainian land forces, Colonel General Oleksandr Syrskyi, said recently: “Our task is to destroy as many enemies as possible and create the conditions for us to launch an offensive.” Russian and Eastern Europe security expert Samantha de Bendern believes Ukraine will launch a “concentrated assault”. She told The Sun Online that troops are “busy defending Bakhmut and are holding it by the skin of their teeth”. “That will change very soon,” she said, when the foreign-trained Ukrainian troops arrive and so do their glitzy new weapons and machinery. Agreeing with the military experts, she believes “they can’t go on all fronts… it will be a concentrated assault”.