Russians may have killed, buried 9K near Mariupol, locals report

KYIV, Ukraine — Satellite images released Thursday showed what appeared to be mass graves near Mariupol, and local officials accused Russia of burying up to 9,000 Ukrainian civilians there in an effort to conceal the slaughter taking place in the siege of the port city.

Satellite image provider Maxar Technologies released the photos, which it said showed more than 200 mass graves in a town where Ukrainian officials say the Russians have been burying Mariupol residents killed in the fighting.

The imagery showed long rows of graves stretching away from an existing cemetery in the town of Manhush, outside Mariupol.

Mariupol Mayor Vadym Boychenko accused the Russians of “hiding their military crimes” by taking the bodies of civilians from the city and burying them in Manhush.

The Mariupol City Council said Thursday in a post on the Telegram messaging app that the graves could hold as many as 9,000 dead.

US ramps up deliveries of artillery

Eight weeks into the war, the Biden administration’s decision to dramatically ramp up delivery of artillery guns to Ukraine signals a deepening American commitment at a pivotal stage of fighting for the country’s industrial heartland.

It also brings into stark relief Moscow’s warning that continued U.S. military aid to Ukraine would have “unpredictable” consequences, suggesting that Russia sees the international wave of weaponry as a growing obstacle to its invasion as well as a Western provocation.

“We’re in a critical window” of time now, President Joe Biden said Thursday in announcing he had approved an additional $800 million in battlefield aid that includes 72 of the U.S. Army’s 155mm howitzers, along with 144,000 artillery rounds and more than 120 armed drones that will require training for Ukrainian operators.

This brings to $3.4 billion the amount of security assistance provided since Russia began its invasion Feb. 24. That is an extraordinary total of U.S. military aid for a country to which the United States has no defense treaty obligation.

A look at the U.S. assistance and U.S. expectations for what it will accomplish:

Why is artillery so important now?

Heavy weapons such as artillery are shaping up as a key feature of the unfolding battle for Ukraine’s eastern region known as the Donbas. The relatively flat terrain is suited for what the military calls maneuver warfare — the movement of tanks and other ground forces backed by long-range guns like the 155mm howitzer.

The Russians have been deploying their own additional artillery to the Donbas region in recent days, along with more ground troops and other material to support and sustain what could be a long fight for terrain in Ukraine’s industrial heartland.

The howitzers the U.S. is sending to Ukraine will be the latest American model, known as the M777, used by the Army and the Marine Corps. Smaller and more maneuverable than the older model, the M777 can be deployed on the battlefield by heavy-lift helicopters and moved relatively quickly between positions by seven-ton trucks that also are being provided by the Pentagon.

“What makes it important is the kind of fighting that we expect in the Donbas. Because of the terrain, because it’s open, because it’s flat, because it’s not as urban, we can expect the Russians to rely on long-range fires — artillery in particular,” said John Kirby, the Pentagon press secretary. “So we know that this is going to be part of the Russians’ playbook.”

A senior U.S. defense official said the first of the 72 howitzers are expected to begin moving to Europe by this weekend. Of 18 other 155mm howitzers that Biden approved last week for shipment to Ukraine, an unspecified number already are in Europe, and U.S. howitzer training for Ukrainian personnel began Wednesday in an undisclosed country outside of Ukraine.

Will this be enough to hold off the Russian offensive?

Probably not, and Biden said he already has asked the Pentagon to get to work on additional potential military assistance.

Biden said this phase of Russia’s invasion will be “more limited in terms of geography but not in terms of brutality.” He also acknowledged that he needs Congress to approve the funds necessary to continue providing key weapons to Ukraine beyond the latest $800 million package, which he said would ensure a steady flow of arms only for the next few weeks.

U.S. officials say the Russians are trying to adjust their approach in Ukraine after early setbacks, suggesting the fight could be a long one.

After failing to take Kyiv, the capital, in the early weeks of its multipronged invasion, Russia has since narrowed its objectives by focusing on the Donbas, where Moscow-backed separatists have been fighting since 2014, and on a stretch of coastal territory along the Sea of Azov from Mariupol to the Crimean Peninsula. One Russian advantage is this region’s proximity to Russian territory, which allows for shorter supply lines than earlier battles in Ukraine’s north.

What else is the US providing?

In addition to the 72 howitzers and the vehicles required to move them around the battlefield, the new weapons package for Ukraine includes artillery rounds and armed drones from U.S. Air Force stocks. Still in the pipeline from a separate $800 million weapons package announced only last week is a wide range of articles, including radars used to enable the targeting of Russian artillery, as well as air surveillance radars and unmanned coastal drone vessels.

“Artillery and drones are the exact things Ukraine will need as Russia heads into its next campaign in the East and South,” said Mark Montgomery, a retired Navy rear admiral who previously served with U.S. European Command in helping improve U.S.-Ukrainian military relations. Montgomery is now an analyst at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.

The drone included in the latest package is called the Phoenix Ghost, made by a U.S. company, Aevex Aerospace, which bills itself as a leader in “full-spectrum airborne intelligence solutions.” Kirby, the Pentagon spokesman, declined to describe the drone’s capabilities beyond saying that it is used “largely but not exclusively to attack targets.” It also has onboard cameras.

Kirby said the drones are especially well suited for the terrain on which the Ukrainians are fighting in the Donbas.

Putin tries to claim Mariupol victory

Russian President Vladimir Putin tried to claim victory in the strategic port of Mariupol on Thursday, even as he ordered his troops not to storm the last pocket of Ukrainian resistance in the war’s iconic battleground.

Russian troops have besieged the southeastern city since the early days of the conflict and largely pulverized it — and top officials have repeatedly indicated it was about to fall, but Ukrainian forces stubbornly held on. In recent weeks, they holed up in a sprawling steel plant, and Russian forces pounded the industrial site and repeatedly issued ultimatums ordering the defenders to surrender.

“The completion of combat work to liberate Mariupol is a success,” Putin said. “Putting such an important center in the south as Mariupol under control is a success.”

But the Russian leader said that, for now, he would not risk sending troops into the warren of tunnels under the giant Azovstal plant, instead preferring to isolate the holdouts who have captivated the world’s attention “so that not even a fly comes through.” His defense minister said the plant was blocked off, while giving yet another prediction that the site could be taken in days.

Putin’s order may mean that Russian officials are hoping they can wait for the defenders to surrender after running out of food or ammunition. Bombings of the plant could well continue.

Even though Putin painted the mission to take Mariupol already a success and said the city had been “liberated,” until the plant falls, he cannot declare a complete victory.

2K Ukraine troops still at plant

Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said about 2,000 Ukrainian troops remained in the plant, which has a labyrinth of tunnels and bunkers that spread out across about 11 square kilometers (4 square miles). Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that about 1,000 civilians were also trapped there.

Russian-backed separatists in the area previously seemed bent on taking every last inch of the city, which has seen some of the most dramatic fighting of the war and whose capture has both strategic and symbolic importance.

The scale of suffering in the city on the Azov Sea has made it a worldwide focal point, and its definitive fall would deprive Ukraine of a vital port, complete a land bridge between Russia and the Crimean Peninsula, which Moscow seized in 2014, and free up Russian troops to move elsewhere in the Donbas.

Russian officials now say capturing the Donbas, Ukraine’s eastern industrial heartland, is the war’s main goal. This week, Moscow’s forces opened a new phase of the war, in a deadly drive along a front from the northeastern city of Kharkiv to the Azov Sea. Detaching the region from the rest of Ukraine would give Putin a badly needed victory two months into the war, after the botched attempt to storm the capital, Kyiv, and amid mounting Russian losses.

Victory Day timing?

Britain’s Defense Ministry said that Russia likely wants to demonstrate significant successes ahead of Victory Day on May 9, the proudest moment on the annual calendar marking its critical role in winning World War II.

“This could affect how quickly and forcefully they attempt to conduct operations in the run-up to this date,” the ministry said.

Retired British Rear Admiral Chris Parry described Putin’s remarks as reflecting a change in “operational approach” as Russia tries to learn from its failures in the eight-week conflict, which turned from initial hopes of a lightning fast invasion of a neighbor into a war of attrition with ever mounting casualties and costs.

“It seems to me that the Russian agenda now is not to capture these really difficult places where the Ukrainians can hold out in the urban centers, but to try and capture territory and also to encircle the Ukrainian forces and declare a huge victory,” Parry said.

In the meantime, Western powers are doubling down on their support of Ukraine, moving to push more military hardware in, heightening geopolitical stakes.

The latest in a long line of Western leaders venturing to Kyiv, Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said Thursday: “One of the most important messages today is that Denmark is considering sending more weapons. That is what is needed.”

Several Western officials have promised similar in recent days.

New missile test reported

With global tensions running high, Russia reported the first successful test launch of a new type of intercontinental ballistic missile, the Sarmat, on Wednesday. Putin boasted that it can overcome any missile defense system and make those who threaten Russia “think twice.” The head of the Russian state aerospace agency called the launch out of northern Russia “a present to NATO.”

The Pentagon described the test as “routine” and said it wasn’t considered a threat.

On the battlefield, Ukraine said Moscow continued to mount assaults across the east, probing for weak points in Ukrainian defensive lines. Russia said it launched hundreds of missile and air attacks on targets that included concentrations of troops and vehicles.

The Kremlin’s stated goal is the capture of the Donbas, the mostly Russian-speaking eastern region that is home to coal mines, metal plants and heavy-equipment factories.

In a video address, Zelenskyy said the Russians were not “abandoning their attempts to score at least some victory by launching a new, large-scale offensive.”

The Luhansk governor said Russian forces control 80% of his region, which is one of two that make up the Donbas. Before Russia invaded on Feb. 24, the Kyiv government controlled 60% of the Luhansk region.

Analysts have said the offensive in the east could become a war of attrition as Russia faces Ukraine’s most experienced, battle-hardened troops, who have fought pro-Moscow separatists in the Donbas for eight years.

Russia said it presented Ukraine with a draft document outlining its demands for ending the conflict — days after Putin said the talks were at a “dead end.”

Moscow has long demanded Ukraine drop any bid to join NATO. Ukraine has said it would agree to that in return for security guarantees from other countries. Other sources of tension include the status of both the Crimean Peninsula, seized by Moscow in 2014, and eastern Ukraine, where the separatists have declared independent republics recognized by Russia.

___

Associated Press journalists Mstyslav Chernov and Felipe Dana in Kharkiv, Ukraine; Yesica Fisch in Kramatorsk, Ukraine; Danica Kirka in London; and Robert Burns and Aamer Madhani in Washington contributed to this report, as did other AP staff members around the world.