Inside the battle on the Eastern Front. By David Patrikarakos.
Barbed wire knots together sky and earth. Burned-out vehicles, modern-day carcasses of industrial warfare, dot the landscape. The ground is strafed and cratered: Eastern Ukraine has been disembowelled by shelling. The war here is fought with 21st-century drone technology, but it flies over soldiers who carry 50-year-old Kalashnikovs. …
[Ukrainian soldier] Dima shows me an image on his phone. Four bodies lie in the dirt. The image is grainy, but their ragged outlines are clear. Just 20 or so metres away, their comrades sit and eat. “It’s incredible,” says Dima. “They’re eating lunch right by the decomposing bodies of their friends.” He continues: “I don’t understand the Russians. Sometimes they just drop the bodies of their mates into trenches. We found a grave of 15 bodies. They’d thrown a bit of dirt on them, but that was it. They don’t even respect their own people.” …
The Ukranians remain confident, having already pushed the Russians back from Kyiv. More than this, they are angry. Mass graves discovered in towns such as Bucha mean no one I meet is interested in territorial compromise. “Even if they drop a nuclear bomb on Kyiv they will not win,” Dima tells me.
He snorts at Russia’s plans to take southern Ukraine and link Russia up with Transnistria. “Sometimes you play poker with a bad hand, but Russia is playing without any cards at all. Their tactics are insane. Take Chernobaivka: it has a small military airport. Seventeen times they’ve tried to take it. Seventeen times we’ve smashed them. Still they come. Our soldiers ask: ‘Are they dumb?’ No, just incapable of independent thought. They just follow orders — no matter how crazy.”
Ukraine’s problem is resources: the army doesn’t have enough ammunition and artillery, but this is also something of a blessing: it forces them to be creative. “The Russians use Soviet military tactics that were out of date 30 years ago,” he says. “But we study the Afghanistan war and Israeli tactics. Russia just tries to press with mass.” …
Chechens:
What about the feared Chechen soldiers, I ask? “We call the Kadyrovites [named for Chechnya’s leader Ramzan Kadyrov] TikTok soldiers. They’re always filming. … I heard a story from the [battle for] Hostomyal airport. There were a load of conscripts refusing to fight. So the Kadyrovite commander asked them: ‘Who doesn’t want to fight?’ One guy raised his hand and the commander shot him. ‘Now, who else wants to go home?’ he asked. It’s Soviet tactics.”
From the beginning, Dima tells me, the Kadyrovites had a reputation for committing war crimes. The locals hate them and there are sometimes problems when the Ukrainian army captures one and the locals want revenge. But he says he’s never seen anyone mistreat a prisoner. “Our guys understand the Geneva convention, and also that prisoners are a resource. For every Russian we capture we can get one of ours back. I’m not a general, but at a guess I’d say maybe 1,000 of our guys are prisoners. Prisoner exchanges take place continuously and quietly.” …
Zelenskyy:
Dima continues to talk as we drive. He’s from Kryvyi Rih, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s hometown. “I knew him a bit when I was younger,” he says. “I used to see him around the place in a cheap coat. I thought he was a great guy but not suited to running a country. Now I support him 1,000%. The most important thing that he did was stay. It was vital that the people saw that the head of the government didn’t flee.”
Musk:
Beyond Ukraine, Dima is especially positive about two things, or rather, two people. “Elon Musk’s Starlink is what changed the war in Ukraine’s favour,” he tells me. “Russia went out of its way to blow up all our comms. Now they can’t. Starlink works under Katyusha fire, under artillery fire. It even works in Mariupol.”
Britain:
“I know you British have a complicated relationship with your Prime Minister, but here Boris Johnson has become something of a national hero,” he continues. “The NLAWs you have given us are the best. Easy to use — lock, load and move. Without them we wouldn’t be taking out so many Russian tanks. We knew from the beginning that Britain was a very ancient and important nation. Now we know it’s a country that stands by its word.” …
Deaf:
As we draw closer to the front, we meander around potholed roads. … We get stuck behind two pheasants waddling in front of us. “They’re totally deaf,” he says. “Shelling has blown out their eardrums. We can hoot all day and they’ll never hear.” …
On the modern battlefield, anything that can be seen can be destroyed (by missiles, or artillery, or bullets):
Everything is geared toward staying hidden. We are asked not to gather in groups outside for fear of Russian drones flying overhead. Night falls. Inside, the lights must be switched off. Windows are always covered.
The base’s command centre sits in a compact bunker. Flat-screen TVs fixed to cement walls show live feeds of the battlefields. …
Battalion commander, Yuriy Bereza, a former politician and one of Ukraine’s most famous fighters”
“For me, the IDF is the ideal army because like Israel, Ukraine is surrounded. Israeli citizens live normally despite their fucked-in-the head neighbours who continually fire rockets at them.” …
I ask him why the Russians have fought so badly. “For the reason the guy who looks after their tanks shot himself,” he replies. “Me and Dima were buying equipment from those fucks for ten times less than it was worth. Thanks to their very effective corruption we very effectively killed their own guys.” …
He’s into his stride now. “Look at General Zhukov, the ‘Great Marshal’ [of WWII] who was just a butcher. The Russians are fighting like Zhukov. They send wave after wave but our guys figured out they fight just like Soviets. The tank commander is always in the first tank, so we shoot it. Once you shoot the first and last tanks, they’re immobilised.” …
He leans forward and gives me his final thoughts. “Look, we are standing with our blood for Western values.”
