According to The Journalist, Ukrainian Defense Minister Andrii Taran said that at the moment there are no signs of direct preparation for active hostilities by the Russian occupation forces near the administrative border of the Kherson region with the temporarily occupied territory of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea.
On July 17, during the Hour of Questions to the Government in the Verkhovna Rada, Minister of Defense Andrii Taran said that the leadership of the Ministry of Defense and the Armed Forces of Ukraine are planning to conduct strategic command and staff exercises United Efforts 2020 in the last decade of September this year.
“At the same time, taking into account the accumulation of enemy troops under the pretext of preparing for the strategic exercises “Caucasus 2020”, the leadership of the Ministry of Defense and the Armed Forces of Ukraine is planning to conduct the strategic command and staff exercises “United Efforts 2020” in the last decade of September. As part of these exercises, we plan to test the ability of the General Staff in the new J-structure to act in accordance with NATO standards,” Taran said.
According to the Minister of Defense, it is also planned to test the ability to organize interaction with the command posts of the NATO Armed Forces.
“It is planned to conduct not only command and staff exercises, but, also, within the framework of these strategic command and staff exercises, a check of combat readiness, conduct combat firing of anti-aircraft missile systems with aircraft of the Air Force, certain units and military units of the Ground troops, as well as other military formations at our training grounds, which are located in the south of Ukraine,” Taran stressed.
The Minister of Defense specified that Ukraine expects representatives of NATO member states to participate in these exercises.
“This asymmetric response, according to our assessment, firstly, will show the readiness of the Armed Forces of Ukraine to provide a worthy rebuff to any attempts by the Russia to aggravate the situation or start large-scale hostilities,” Taran said, adding that at the moment the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine is not observing any real preparation of the Russian Armed Forces to an armed offensive during the Caucasus 2020 exercises.
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