September 7, 2022 at 02:00 EDT
A Ukrainian soldier wounded during the first fighting of the new offensive in the Kherson region is being treated at a medical center in southern Ukraine. Ukrainian forces are pushing to retake territory occupied by Russia. (For The Washington Post/FTWP) Comment on this story
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SOUTHERN UKRAINE – In dimly lit hospital rooms in southern Ukraine, soldiers with severed limbs, shrapnel wounds, mangled hands and broken joints recounted the disadvantages their units faced in the first days of a new offensive to drive Russian forces out of the strategic city of Kherson. .
The soldiers said they lacked the artillery needed to dislodge Russia’s entrenched forces and described a yawning technological gap with their better-equipped adversaries. The interviews provided some of the first first-hand accounts of a push to retake captured territory that is so sensitive that Ukrainian military commanders have banned journalists from visiting the front lines.
“They used everything on us,” said Denys, a 33-year-old Ukrainian soldier whose unit fell back from a Russian-held village after a long barrage of cluster bombs, phosphorus munitions and mortars. “Who can survive an attack for five hours like this?” he said
Denys and eight Ukrainian soldiers from more than seven different units offered rare descriptions of the Kherson counteroffensive in the south, Kyiv’s most ambitious military operation since the expulsion of Russian forces to the capital’s perimeter in the spring. As in the battle for Kyiv, Ukraine’s success is not assured and soldiers’ accounts indicated a long fight and many more casualties.
“We lost five people for every one they did,” said Ihor, a 30-year-old platoon commander who injured his back when the tank he was riding in crashed into a ditch.
Ihor had no military experience before Russia’s February 24 invasion of Ukraine. He earned his living by selling animal feed to pig and cow farms. His replacement as squadron commander also has no prior military experience, he said.
Soldiers were interviewed in stretchers and wheelchairs as they recovered from injuries sustained in last week’s offensive. Some spoke on condition of anonymity to avoid disciplinary action. Others, like Denys and Ihor, agreed to reveal only their names. But most spoke clearly of the drawbacks they had.
Russia’s Orlan drones exposed Ukrainian positions from more than a kilometer above their heads, they said, an altitude that meant they never heard the drone of the aircraft tracking their movements.
Russian tanks emerged from newly constructed cement fortifications to blast the infantry with high-caliber artillery, wounded Ukrainian soldiers said. The vehicles would then shrink back under the concrete shelters, protected from mortars and rocket fire.
Counter-battery radar systems automatically detected and located the Ukrainians targeting the Russians with projectiles, prompting a barrage of artillery fire in response.
Russian hacking tools hijacked the drones of Ukrainian operators, who watched their planes drift helplessly behind enemy lines.
Ukraine has discouraged coverage of the offensive, leading to a delay in reporting on a potentially key turning point in the nearly seven-month conflict.
Battle for Kyiv: Ukrainian valor, Russian mistakes combine to save capital
When Ihor fired at Russian soldiers with his Kalashnikov rifle this week, he said, it was the first time he had ever shot a human being. “Don’t think about anything,” he said. “You see, if you don’t, they will.”
Despite the challenges, Ihor said he is eager to return to the front line as soon as he heals. “My people are there. How can I leave them?” He said.
Other soldiers will not return to the battlefield.
Oleksandr, a 28-year-old former construction worker, lost his arm in a mortar blast during last week’s counteroffensive. On Sunday, she winced in ghostly pain in her hospital bed, saying she felt a sting from her fingers and hand that were no longer attached to her body.
Oleksandr said the Russian artillery fire was relentless. “They were hitting us all the time,” he said. “If we fire three mortars, they fire 20 in return.”
Ukrainian soldiers said they had to carefully ration their use of ammunition, but even when they did fire, they had trouble hitting targets. “When you give the coordinates, it’s supposed to be accurate, but it’s not,” he said, noting that his equipment dates back to 1989.
Oleksandr had never traveled to Kherson before the war, but said the goal of expelling the Russian invaders was worth sacrificing a limb. “It’s our country,” he said.
President Volodymyr Zelensky said Ukrainian forces retook two villages in the Kherson region, and one of his aides posted a picture of the Ukrainian flag raised over the village of Vysokopillya over the weekend.
“The flags of Ukraine are returning to the places where they should be,” Zelensky said in a video address. But it was impossible to gauge how much progress Ukrainian forces have made in their push to drive the Russian invaders out of Kherson.
The region, which was captured by Russia early in the war, forms a crucial part of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s coveted “land bridge” to Crimea, the peninsula that Russia invaded and annexed in violation of international law in 2014.
Bloody as the fighting is, Ukrainian soldiers said they saw no alternative.
“If we don’t stop them, they will just rape and kill our people like they did everywhere,” said Oleksandr’s roommate at the hospital, a 49-year-old conscript soldier who asked to be called by his nickname , “Pinochet”.
Pinochet said his knee was shattered by shrapnel from a mortar that was fired after a drone spotted him in last week’s counteroffensive. He said that while Ukrainian casualties are heavy, the side on the offensive always loses more soldiers.
“There’s nothing we can do about it,” Pinochet said. “And we can still win.”
Russian electronic warfare also posed a constant threat. Soldiers described ending their shifts and turning on their phones to call or text relatives, a decision that immediately drew Russian artillery fire.
“When we turn on the cell phones or the radio, they can recognize our presence immediately,” Denys said. “And then the shooting begins.”
Despite a ban on media visits to the front line, there were signs that Russia’s grip on Kherson may be loosening.
In fiercely contested Kherson, Ukraine is pushing to take back occupied land
In a statement on Monday, a Kremlin-backed occupation authority said plans for a referendum to be held in the Kherson region, a precursor to Russian annexation, were suspended due to security concerns. The Russian statement was later retracted, but it gave Ukrainians optimism and suggested that, at the very least, the counteroffensive was causing some disarray for the Russians.
Kyiv hopes the Kherson counteroffensive will boost national morale and show Western governments that its billions of dollars in economic and military aid are paying off, even as sanctions against Russia have pushed up energy prices and inflation and have raised fears of an even more expensive winter. .
Ukrainian claims of retaking villages such as Vysokopillya could not be confirmed, although soldiers interviewed said they were able to advance into some villages previously controlled by Russia. Those soldiers refused to name the villages, citing instructions from their superiors.
A group of Washington Post reporters who traveled about three kilometers from Vysokopillya, north of Kherson, on Monday were prevented from entering the village by Ukrainian troops and could not determine its status. A local official said Ukrainian and Russian forces are still fighting for control.
A clear picture of Ukraine’s losses could not be independently assessed.
Denys, sitting upright in his hospital bed, said almost every member of his 120-strong unit was injured, although only two died.
A 25-year-old soldier who was being treated for shrapnel wounds said that of his unit of 100 soldiers, seven were killed and 20 wounded. Ihor, the platoon commander, said 16 of the 32 men under his command were wounded and one was killed.
Wounded Ukrainian soldiers have been distributed to different hospitals in southern Ukraine to free up the main medical facilities near the Kherson region for incoming patients.
The Post is withholding the names of hospitals treating soldiers because those medical facilities have been targeted by Russian forces during the war.
On the brink of Russian attack, the city of Bakhmut clings to freedom
On Sunday, a hospital in Mykolaiv, a city near Kherson, was bombed by Russians. The facility’s pediatric clinic was so damaged it was no longer functional.
As for casualties, Rob Lee, a military analyst at the Foreign Policy Research Institute, said Ukraine needs to ensure it retains a combat force large enough to fend off Russian advances in the east, given Moscow’s much larger armed forces.
“If they’re suffering heavy losses and it continues for a long period of time, it can be a problem,” Lee said.
Ukraine’s reliance on inexperienced soldiers is also a vulnerability, but not unique to its forces.
At the beginning of the conflict, Russia and Ukraine fought with professional military units. After suffering heavy losses in the eastern Donbas region, each side began deploying less experienced volunteer or reservist units.
The Kherson counteroffensive now tests Ukraine’s forces in new ways, Lee said.
Ukrainian soldiers who have faced the Russians in recent months gained new battlefield insight “but a lot of that experience probably involved holding defensive positions,” he said. “Conducting offensive operations is much more…