Ukraine Counteroffensive's 'Ultimate Goal' Revealed: 'Allies Want To Participate'

Ukraine is aiming to liberate all its territories from Russia's control when it launches its highly anticipated counteroffensive operations in spring, according to Ukraine's defense minister.

Speaking with Madrid-based Spanish newspaper La Razon, Minister of Defense of Ukraine Oleksii Reznikov said they aim to liberate all Ukrainian territories recognized internationally in the 1991 Ukrainian independence referendum. This includes Crimea, Luhansk, and Donetsk — which sees daily fights between Russian and Ukrainian forces.

"I can tell you that Ukraine's ultimate goal in this war is to liberate all territories temporarily occupied by Russia up to the internationally recognized borders in 1991, including Crimea, Lugansk and Donetsk. It was our goal in 2014," he said, as translated via Google Translate.

In the interview, Reznikov also said Ukraine's allies in the West and Europe are supportive of its planned counteroffensive, adding that they "want to participate" in the country's victory against Russian troops.

"More than 80% of the inhabitants of the Atlantic Alliance countries support it. Last summer I felt that the danger of war fatigue in the rest of Europe and in the US could be a real threat. It made me very happy to see that this was not the case. The allies want to participate in our victory," he added.

His statements come about a week after leaked Pentagon documents showed that, according to U.S. analysis, Ukraine will likely only have "modest territorial gains" in its anticipated spring counteroffensive.

The documents also claimed that Ukraine has suffered between 124,500 and 131,000 casualties in the war, including 109,000 to 113,500 wounded and 15,500 to 17,500 dead.

In response to the figures in the leaked Pentagon documents, Reznikov said Ukraine's losses in the war are less than the number of victims of the earthquake in Turkey and Syria.

"Of course, we have losses, because we are at war. But they are critically smaller than the Russian losses. I cannot give a figure, but I can assure you that the total number is less than the death toll from the earthquake in Türkiye," he said, as translated by Ukrainska Pravda.

Turkey and Syria were hit by two earthquakes of magnitude 7.7 and 7.6 in February. The earthquake killed more than 50,000 people cumulatively.