Ukraine’s Western allies did not know the details of its push into the Russian region of Kursk until it was in full swing, an unnamed Western intelligence official told Bloomberg.
It is now more than a week since Ukrainian forces launched a surprise attack on the Russian border region.
The attack has been marked by a thick fog of war that — according to Bloomberg’s reporting — also affected Ukraine’s Western supporters.
Information trickled out by way of Russian officials, Russian military bloggers, as well as social media reports and Ukrainian official statements — little of which can be independently verified. However, a picture is emerging of a meticulously-planned operation of great scope.
Ukraine was weighing several ideas, including a strike on Kursk, an unnamed Western official familiar with the planning told Bloomberg.
The reported secrecy tallies with how Ukraine’s allies reacted in public.
An early response from White House spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre was to say the US would ask Ukraine to learn more, giving the impression it had little prior knowledge.
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Tuesday that his forces controlled 74 settlements in the region, with his military chief saying that Ukraine held some 390 square miles of territory.
Meanwhile, the governor of Belgorod, a Russian region bordering both Kursk and Ukraine, declared a state of emergency.
Ukraine’s NATO allies largely withheld judgment of the attack, other than the European Commission saying last week that Ukraine has the “legitimate right” to operate on Russian soil.
Ukraine has a strong interest in portraying its actions in Kursk — and decision-making elsewhere on the battlefield — as being independent of its Western backers.
President Vladimir Putin alleged on Monday that the attack was, at root, a Western one.
“The enemy, with the help of its Western masters — it is doing their bidding, and the West is waging war against us using Ukrainians,” he said, according to state-controlled outlet TASS.
It’s a familiar line — Putin and his allies have long sought to portray support for Ukraine as a puppetmaster relationship.
Western nations say that, though they are giving support, Ukraine is fighting the war its own way.
