Nova Kakhovka: Who benefits from breaching the dam?

A immense dam successful the Russian-occupied country of confederate Ukraine has been breached, unleashing a flood of h2o downstream. So who benefits from this enactment of vandalism?

With some sides, Russia and Ukraine, blaming the different for breaching the dam, determination are echoes of past year's unexplained Nordstream state pipeline explosions. In some cases occidental suspicions person instantly fallen connected Russia. But some times Moscow has responded with: "It wasn't us. Why would we bash this? This hurts us".

In the lawsuit of the Kakhovka dam breach Russia tin constituent to astatine slightest 2 ways it damages their ain interests. The flooding of onshore downstream has forced it to evacuate troops arsenic good arsenic civilians eastwards, distant from Kherson and the banks of the wide River Dnipro. This volition supply immoderate constricted respite for Kherson's residents who person had to unrecorded with regular Russian artillery and rocket strikes.

Secondly, this could impact the h2o proviso for Russian-occupied Crimea, an arid peninsula that relies connected caller h2o from a canal adjacent to the breached dam. Since it was illegally annexed by Russia successful 2014 it has go a heavy fortified portion of onshore that some Russia and Ukraine assertion arsenic their own.

But the breaching of the Kakhovka dam needs to beryllium seen successful the wider discourse of the Ukraine warfare and much specifically successful the airy of Ukraine's summertime counter-offensive, which shows signs of already being nether way.

In bid for this counter-offensive to succeed, it needs to interruption Russia's stranglehold implicit a swathe of territory it seized past twelvemonth that connects Crimea to Ukraine's eastbound Donbas region. If Ukraine tin find a mode to interruption done Russian antiaircraft lines southbound of Zaporizhzhia and divided that territory successful 2 past it tin isolate Crimea and execute a large strategical victory.

But the Russians person learnt a batch of lessons since their full-scale penetration successful February past year. They've looked astatine the map, worked retired wherever Ukraine is astir apt to onslaught and spent the past fewer months gathering genuinely formidable lines of fortifications to artifact immoderate Ukrainian beforehand towards the Sea of Azov.

It's by nary means definite that Ukraine was readying to nonstop its forces astir to the occidental broadside of those defences. The High Command successful Kyiv sensibly keeps its cards adjacent to its thorax to support Russia guessing.

But this action, whoever did it, present makes that enactment acold much problematic.

The Dnipro was already a wide stream by the clip it reaches confederate Ukraine and getting an armoured brigade crossed it, nether Russian artillery, rocket and drone occurrence would beryllium highly hazardous.

With the dam crossed it present breached and immense swathes of onshore downstream flooded the country connected the near (eastern) slope other Kherson has efficaciously go a no-go country for Ukrainian armour.

One humanities footnote is that Russia does person past signifier successful this area. In 1941 Soviet troops blew up a dam implicit the aforesaid River Dnipro to artifact the beforehand of Nazi troops. Thousands of Soviet citizens are said to person perished successful the ensuing floods.

The bottommost enactment present though, is that whoever breached the Kakhovka dam this week has upset the strategical chessboard successful confederate Ukraine, forcing some sides to marque a fig of large adjustments and perchance delaying Ukraine's adjacent determination successful its long-promised counter-offensive.