The forces of murderous Russian tyrant Vladimir Putin have been dealt a major military defeat by defenders of Ukraine.
Russians were forced to desert the small, strategically located Snake Island in the Black Sea.
This came after Ukrainians managed repeatedly to pummel Russians with drones and US-made missiles.
Snake Island Becomes Hellhole For the Russians
Snake Island is a small rock with a territory of about 100 acres off the delta of the Danube River, about 80 miles from Ukraine’s coast near the city of Odesa.
The island had a small garrison of Ukrainian troops who were captured by the Russians. Since then, Putin’s commanders tried to use it as a coordination and command post armed with anti-aircraft and anti-missile systems.
Ukrainian defenders, however, have kept harassing the Russian troops who made it to the island. This offers no natural cover. Ukrainian fighters managed to destroy multiple Russian naval vessels trying to resupply and reinforce the doomed garrison.
The Ukrainian strikes on Snake Island intensified in the past couple of weeks, using drones, as well as US-made anti-ship missiles.
According to the latest brief out of Ukraine’s Ministry of Defense, as of Friday morning, after 126 days of fighting, the Russian military lost more than 35,750 soldiers in combat.
The number doesn’t include the casualties of Russian mercenaries from Putin’s private armies, auxiliary National Guard troops, or proxies from the ethnic Russian conscripts of Ukraine’s occupied regions.
When all are factored in, more than 70,000 Russian fighters may have been killed in Putin’s war already.
KABOOM!
No Russian troops on the Snake Island anymore. Our Armed Forces did a great job.
More kaboom news to follow. All will be 🇺🇦 pic.twitter.com/ItdP3oQvHK— Andriy Yermak (@AndriyYermak) June 30, 2022
#UPDATE Russia has announced it is pulling its forces from Ukraine's Snake Island, calling it a "goodwill gesture" to allow Kyiv to export agricultural products.
📸 Satellite image shows Snake Island in the Black Sea pic.twitter.com/zZleL8rtMK
— AFP News Agency (@AFP) June 30, 2022
Russia withdraws from the Snake Island, claiming it's a sign of 'goodwill'. The truth is they have been pounded by Ukrainian forces using Western artillery. The conclusion: give Ukraine more Western weapons to force Russia do more 'goodwill' withdrawals from the occupied 🇺🇦 land
— Olga Tokariuk (@olgatokariuk) June 30, 2022
Russia claims it relinquished Snake Island as a "goodwill gesture", though Ukraine is claiming it as a victory.
Military footage appears to show Ukrainian soldiers 'repelling Russian forces' from Snake Island.
Latest: https://t.co/X3flQUBL0r pic.twitter.com/VRbkuq26tJ
— Sky News (@SkyNews) July 1, 2022
Moscow Telling Blunt ‘Goodwill’ Lies Again
Snake Island was abandoned in a rush by the Russian military on Thursday in yet another battlefield humiliation for Putin’s hordes.
The total Russian pullout occurred several days after the biggest missile attack of Ukrainians against the occupiers holding the island, the naval vessels reaching it, and several natural gas rigs formerly belonging to Ukraine, but now seized and militarized by Russians.
According to the Ukrainian military, the last remaining of Putin’s troops on the island fled in the dead of the night using two speedboats.
Andriy Yermak, head of the office of Ukraine’s President Zelenskyy, announced on Twitter the defeat of the Russians with a “KABOOM!” He praised the Ukrainian forces, vowing more victories in chasing away Russian aggressors.
Putin’s Defense Ministry tried to portray the withdrawal from Snake Island as a “gesture of goodwill”, not that anybody (save for the brainwashed Russian public) believes the lying, laughable propaganda of the Moscow regime.
The Russian impudence went even further.
Moscow claimed it was withdrawing to open a water route for the exports of Ukrainian grain. This is the very thing Russia has been blocking in order to cause inflation in the Ukraine-supporting West.
Putin has also been also stealing the grain of occupied parts of Ukraine and trying to sell it in the Middle East.
Ukrainian authorities said Russian missiles struck an apartment block and two holiday camps near Odesa, killing at least 21 people, hours after Russia abandoned nearby Snake Island. Moscow denied the strikes https://t.co/NiGBouQQdo pic.twitter.com/89xGVI99IZ
— Reuters (@Reuters) July 1, 2022
These are the indicative estimates of Russia’s combat losses as of July 1, according to the Armed Forces of Ukraine. pic.twitter.com/QFiJYUd5Wd
— The Kyiv Independent (@KyivIndependent) July 1, 2022
