Sudzha had about 5,000 residents before the war. By August 15, 2024, it was in Ukrainian hands, the biggest Russian town taken since Kyiv’s troops crossed into the Kursk region on August 6.
President Volodymyr Zelensky made the announcement himself. He said a Ukrainian military commander’s office was being set up in the town, and gave no detail on what it would do. The Associated Press noted that Sudzha sits on the gas pipelines that carry Siberian gas through Russian territory into Ukraine’s system.
Scripps News put the size of the attacking force at an estimated 10,000 troops. Ukraine claimed control of more than 80 towns and settlements and about 390 square miles of Kursk territory. Zelensky’s own figure, reported by Cathy Young in The Bulwark, was “some 1,000 square kilometers.” Kyiv also said it had captured at least 100 Russian troops, and Young cited reports of roughly 1,000 prisoners.
Moscow’s response
Russia disputed the picture. Deputy UN Ambassador Dmitry Polyansky described the operation as “the incursion of terrorist sabotage groups,” not a conventional offensive. Moscow’s defense ministry said it was blocking further advances, and officials denied pulling significant forces out of eastern Ukraine to respond.
The civilian toll mounted quickly. More than 120,000 people left the area. The acting governor of Kursk ordered the evacuation of the Glushkovo district, around 28 miles from Sudzha, where heavy fighting was under way. Russia raised the emergency in neighboring Belgorod to federal level.
The offensive ran alongside drone strikes on Russian air bases. Satellite images analyzed by the AP showed damaged hangars at Borisoglebsk and possible damage to fighter aircraft. Scripps also listed Savasleyka among the bases hit.
A first since 1945
Scripps News described the operation as the first foreign military invasion and occupation of Russian territory since World War II. That is the point that made the incursion more than a border raid.
It did not go to plan everywhere. Young wrote that the push was meant partly to draw Russian units away from the Donbas, yet the troops that moved came mostly from Kharkiv and Kherson. She also reported that evacuees in Kursk were angrier about propaganda and official inaction than stirred by patriotic feeling, and that the incursion embarrassed Russian security services.
In Kyiv, U.S. senators Graham and Blumenthal called the operation “bold and brilliant.”
Sources
- Zelenskyy says Ukrainian troops have taken full control of the Russian town of Sudzha
- Ukrainian troops seize Russian town Sudzha in Kursk offensive, Zelensky says
- The War Comes Home to Russia (Cathy Young, The Bulwark)
