A few hours after leaving the front line of his brigade's positions in the middle of the Serebryansʹkyy forest, a colonel, who requested anonymity, looked exhausted and pounced on a bottle of water and a piece of meat in the bunker that served as his command center. Once satiated, he described arriving with his men on the afternoon of Thursday, July 27, and his surprise at being caught in a massive artillery barrage signaling the imminent launch of a new Russian assault against Ukrainian positions. A decision had to be made quickly.

He promptly decided to withdraw to the rear, at the risk of being hit by the mortar shells falling heavily around him. A few minutes later, when he had reached a makeshift shelter, he remembered a huge explosion and the other men's astonishment. Only later would he be informed that a Russian BTR-MD Rakushka, an armored personnel carrier, had just been blown up on a Ukrainian mine during an attempt to breach their defenses.

The next day, in the headquarters of the brigade recently deployed at one of the most violent points of the front line in northeastern Ukraine, the commander proudly indicated on a map the location of the previous day's explosion, around a hundred meters from where he was positioned. It's hard to think that his soldiers from his brigade had laid the mine that blew up the BTR-MD only the day before the attack. The colonel seemed to have regained his composure after narrowly escaping death. "We're outnumbered, we don't have their firepower, we have to be better," he explained to his soldiers, justifying his ventures into extremely risky positions. "I am here to support my men in battle," he said soberly.

The officer visits the highly risky positions of his soldiers, deployed on the front line through the forest and exposed to constant shelling, out of a sense of duty and to "boost their motivation and courage." Indeed, it takes courage and determination to hold these positions, hastily dug in by Ukrainian soldiers, positions which they are constantly changing through this forest where the two enemy armies face each other in this infernal battle of constant bombardments and repeated assaults.

Shifting front line

While Ukraine is managing, at the cost of heavy losses, to recover villages in the south of the country, here in the Kreminna region, Moscow's forces are conversely trying to break through the Ukrainian army's front lines. The small Ukrainian town, occupied since the start of Russia's invasion, has become a logistics hub for the Russian army.

You have 74.91% of this article left to read. The rest is for subscribers only.