Nearly 100pc of preset Russian troops are now in Ukraine: Pentagon

Washington: Nearly all of Russia’s troops it amassed on Ukraine’s border are now fighting inside the country, a senior Pentagon official said Monday.

President Joe Biden has previously said Russia positioned approximately 190,000 troops outside Ukraine.

Yet even with so much manpower deployed, the two main Russian convoys outside Ukraine’s major cities of Kharkiv and Kyiv remain stalled, the official said, according to NBC News.

Invading Russian forces have struggled to overcome a weak logistical resupply system, which has resulted in scores of Russian tanks and trucks being stranded across eastern and central Ukraine because the vehicles broke down or ran out of gas.

The United States will deploy another 500 troops to Europe, bringing the total number of American forces on the continent to more than 100,000, the senior defense official said.

In recent weeks, thousands of these troops have taken up positions in countries along NATO’s eastern flank, among them Poland, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia.

Still, the logistical problems on the ground haven’t stopped Russia from pummeling Ukraine with heavy artillery. To date, the official said Monday that Russian forces have fired more than 625 missiles at Ukrainian targets.

SOURCE: CNBC