DISINFO: Kakhovka dam attack: A pretext for more sanctions
SUMMARY
Most probable reasons of Ukraine's attack on the Kakhovka dam are:
1. To create a media reason for further sanctions against the Russia and get NATO's assistance to the Ukrainian army. The recent visit to Ukraine of British Foreign Secretary James Cleverly, falls into this context.
2. To stop the Russian counterattack in the Kherson region;
3. To flood the Russian defenses and prepare the advance of Ukrainian military;
4. To deprive Crimea of water in summer;
5. To shift the focus from the failed counter-offensive of the Ukrainian army on June 4-5.
RESPONSE
The EU condemns the Russian attack on the dam which happened with an explosion inside the hydroelectric powerstation located on Russian occupied area.
See the Statement by EU High Representative Josep Borrell and Commissioner for Crisis Management Janez Lenarčič on the destruction of the Kakhovka dam.
The attack looks like an attempt to limit Ukrainian forces in their counterattack. It represents a new dimension of Russian atrocities and may constitute a violation of international law, notably international humanitarian law. The downstream flooding is putting at risk the lives of hundreds of thousands of civilians in around 80 settlements, including the city of Kherson. It aggravates the already dire humanitarian situation in those areas.
The Kremlin disinformation follow a usual pattern, also seen most prominently in connection with the Russian forces shooting down of the civilian airliner MH-17, or the massacres in Bucha, the bombing of the Mariupol theatre, the Mariupol maternity hospital or sabotage of grain export terminals, harbours, burning fields or agro-equipment - all with the aim of deflecting responsibility for this which may eventually be qualified as a war crimes.
As usual, the main RU narratives were structured around a broad spectrum of speculations about the alleged Ukrainian willingness to destroy the dam – from the attempts to damage the Russian defence structures on the Dnieper river left bank, to “falsely accuse” Russia in order to increase international pressure against Moscow and hide the lack of success of the Ukrainian counter-offensive. The latter statement was made by Putin's Press Secretary Peskov, who also claimed that Ukraine thus wanted to deprive Crimea of water.
Starting from 5 June, both the RU Ministry of Defence and a wide plethora of Russian military bloggers have been reporting about the beginning of a full-scale Ukrainian counter-offensive. Reportedly, the fiercest fighting is taking place in the south of the Donetsk region (Vuhledar direction) and around Bakhmut. On late 5 June, several Russian war correspondents reported about an advance of the Ukrainian forces in the Vuhledar direction and the conquest of the settlement of Novodonetskoye.
Pro-Kremlin outlets have a track record of trying to blame Kyiv for sinister acts around the Kakhovka Dam, while Russian forces already in October 2022 placed explosives at the hydropower plant - see examples from our data base here.