Russia-Ukraine war live: US pushing Kyiv to adopt ‘active defence’ throughout 2024

The UK risks a repeat of the 1930s unless more is invested in its armed forces, a former chief of the general staff of the British Army has warned.

General Lord Dannatt hit out at the shrinking size of the army, which he said has fallen from 102,000 in 2006 to 74,000 today “and falling fast”.

Writing in The Times, he drew parallels with the 1930s when the “woeful” state of the UK’s armed forces failed to deter Hitler. “There is a serious danger of history repeating itself,” he said.

Pointing to rising geopolitical uncertainty, he said: “If our armed forces are not strong enough to deter future aggression from Moscow or Beijing it will not be a small war to contend with but a major one.”

Under Government proposals, the size of the regular army will be cut from a commitment of 82,000 troops to 73,000 by 2025. But analysis by The Times suggested numbers could drop below that as soon as next year and continue on a steep downward trajectory.

Russian forces will be able to determine the location, tempo, and operational requirements of fighting in Ukraine if Kyiv commits itself to defensive operations throughout 2024 – as some US officials are reportedly pressing Ukraine to do, a think-tank has warned.

A theater-wide defensive posture would cede the strategic initiative to Russia and permit Russia to launch major attacks at times of its choosing, forcing Ukraine to burn scarce resources it would supposedly be generating during a period of “active defense”, said the Institute for the Study of War.

“This extended period of theater initiative would also give the Russian command significant control over determining what resources both Ukrainian and Russian forces must bring to bear,” it added.

“The Russian command would therefore have an ample operational window to conduct a series of campaigns of differing intensities across the theater in Ukraine that could be specifically designed to constrain and degrade critical Ukrainian operational capacities needed for a future counter-offensive.”

Four tanks at an oil depot in western Russia caught fire on Friday following a cross-border Ukrainian drone strike, officials said, forcing residents in the area to evacuate.

The inferno at the facility controlled by oil major Rosneft was spread over an area of 1,000 square metres along with tanks in Klintsy, Bryansk Region, Tass news agency said.

Bryansk governor Alexander Bogomaz said that a Ukrainian “aeroplane-style drone” was brought down and fire erupted after the munitions dropped over the oil depot.

The drone strike was the second on Russian oil facilities in two days this week.

My colleague Shweta Sharma has more in this report:

The United States is advising Ukraine to adopt a “more conservative approach” to Russia’s invasion rather than launch new ground offensives to regain territory, according to a report.

A Western official working on Ukraine policy told the Financial Times that there is “little prospect of an operational breakthrough by either side in 2024”, let alone in the next few months.

The official said a strategy of “active defence” would allow Ukraine to “build out its forces” this year and prepare for 2025, when a counteroffensive would have a better chance. In such a strategy, Kyiv would seek to hold its defensive lines while probing for Russia’s weak spots, alongside long-range air strikes,

According to the paper, this aligns with the strategy that the US is reportedly selling to Ukraine, with Joe Biden’s administration said to be pushing for a more conservative approach. “Instead of ground offensives, the focus would be to hold the territory it has now, entrenching positions and beefing up supplies and forces over the coming months,” the report suggests.

A new military doctrine adopted by Belarus considers the deployment of nuclear weapons as a forced measure of strategic deterrence, the Tass news agency has reported.

Tass said the new military doctrine also describes the actions the Belarusian army would take in case of any armed aggression against Minsk’s allies in the Collective Security Treaty Organisation (CSTO), which comprises several former Soviet republics.

At the same time, Minsk says it is ready to resume dialogue with Nato countries, “provided their aggressive rhetoric against Belarus is stopped”, Tass reported.

Vladimir Putin could launch an attack on Nato in the next five to eight years, Germany’s defence minister has said – with one top officer within the alliance even calling on nations to be ready for an all-out war with Moscow within two decades.

With the Russian president’s rhetoric towards Nato nations becoming increasingly hostile, conflict could come at any time.

“We hear threats from the Kremlin almost every day … so we have to take into account that Vladimir Putin might even attack a Nato country one day,” Boris Pistorius said.

While a Russian attack is not likely “for now”, the minister told German outlet Der Tagesspiegel, he added: “Our experts expect a period of five to eight years in which this could be possible.”

Our reporter Tom Watling has the full story here:

Volodymyr Zelensky has invited Donald Trump to visit Kyiv, following his assertion that the former US president could stop the Russia-Ukraine war within 24 hours if re-elected, reports my colleague Oliver Browning.

The Ukrainian president made the comments during an interview with Channel 4 News which aired on Friday night.

“Please, Donald Trump, I invite you to Ukraine, to Kyiv. So, if you can stop the war during 24 hours I think it will be enough to come,” he said. “Maybe Donald Trump has a real idea and he can share it with me.”

Russian politicians have prepared legislation allowing for the confiscation of money and property from people who spread “deliberately false information” about the country’s armed forces, a senior member of parliament has said.

Vyacheslav Volodin, speaker of the State Duma, said the measure would also apply to those found guilty of what he described as other forms of betrayal. These include “discrediting” the armed forces, calling for sanctions against Russia or inciting extremist activity.

“Everyone who tries to destroy Russia, who betrays it, must face deserved punishment and compensate for the damage inflicted on the country, at the cost of their own property,” Mr Volodin said, adding that the bill will be brought to the State Duma, the lower chamber of parliament, on Monday.

The Ukrainian government has allocated millions of dollars for the construction of fortifications, Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal said, calling it a “record amount”, The Kyiv Independent reports.

Before the winter, authorities received some criticism for slow progress on fortifying defensive lines. A group was established in November to coordinate fortification efforts, it said.

More than 1,000 people rallied in the Russian region of Bashkortostan on Friday, continuing a series of protests triggered by the conviction and sentencing of a local activist and handing a new challenge to the Kremlin.