KYIV, Nov 21 – Russia will probably use airstrikes, artillery, and tanks in an attack on Ukraine that may take place late January or early February, the head of the Ukrainian military intelligence said Saturday.

Russia has amassed 92,000 troops on the border with Ukraine over the past several months, a development that has raised serious concerns within the U.S. and European intelligence communities.

Kyrylo Budanov, the head of Ukraine’s Main Intelligence Directorate, said the attacks may have massive scale and will be followed by airborne assaults in the east, amphibious assaults in Odesa and Mariupul and a smaller incursion through neighboring Belarus.

He said U.S. and Ukraine intelligence assessments about the timing of a Russian attack are very similar.

“Our evaluations are almost the same as our American colleagues,” Budanov told the Military Times.

The attack Russia is preparing, said Budanov, would be far more devastating than anything before seen in the conflict that began in 2014 that has seen some 14,000 Ukrainians killed.

Dmitry Peskov, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman, told Russian news agency Tass that the assessment by the Ukrainian military intelligence chief, was “hysteria that is artificially inflated.”

The Pentagon on Saturday declined to comment on Budanov’s assessments about the timing and nature of any potential Russian attack, instead pointing to comments made Wednesday and Thursday by Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin.

The U.S. continues to see “troubling behavior from Russia,” Austin told reporters Wednesday.

“We are not sure exactly what Mr. Putin is up to,” he said. “But these movements certainly have our attention. And I would urge Russia to be more transparent about what they are up to take steps to live up to the Minsk agreements.”

“Our support for Ukraine sovereignty territorial integrity remains unwavering,” Austin said.

Russia’s large-scale Zapad 21 military exercise earlier this year proved, for instance, that they can drop upwards of 3,500 airborne and special operations troops at once, he said.

Speaking to the Washington Post on Friday, Ukraine’s new Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov said it was unclear whether Russian President Vladimir Putin has yet decided to attack.

But Russia is building capacity to do so, Budanov told Military Times, increasing troop levels and weapons systems in occupied Crimea and staging systems like Iskandar short-range ballistic missile systems and other weapons elsewhere near the border. And he scoffed at suggestions that the brutal weather conditions during that time of the year would dissuade the Russians from attacking.

“It is no problem for us and the Russians,” Budanov said of fighting in the frigid weather.

Budanov said that ideally, the U.S. would help deter any Russian incursion, through additional military aid and increased diplomatic and economic pressure, including more sanctions against Russia and the seizure and blocking of Russian banking accounts. (mt/ez)