The darkness becomes even deeper due to the lack of electric lighting. It’s five in the morning, the ground is a layer of ice and the tree branches are frozen. The only lights come from dozens of cars that begin to move like fireflies through the battered streets of Pokrovsk. They are heading to their positions on the fronts surrounding the city of Avdíivka, 60 kilometers away. The changing of the guard must take place before the first rays of light.
After 25 minutes of driving, Commander Rustam’s pick-up is parked in front of a store that has the only light on in a village with a few houses. On the other side of the fence, a woman receives the order for the coffees that the man picks up before starting the day. “From now on, put your cell phone in airplane mode. “They can’t see us arriving in a caravan,” says Rustam, with a beard and dark eyes, before getting into his car and disappearing.
“Winter makes everything more difficult. Look how the car slides. Many times we stay buried in the mud and it is very easy for them to attack us. They have much more night vision equipment,” explains Andrew, in charge of dropping us off at the point, under a frozen bush in the middle of a white plain.
There is Rustam with three men. They connect the Starlink that provides them with the internet and begin to assemble the grenades and other types of artisanal bombs on the drones with which throughout the day they will seek to destroy Russian equipment and stop the advance of the troops trying to break the lines. “The Russians are in Stepove, three kilometers from here,” the man says when he sees us arrive. At that time you hear all kinds of explosions, some coming in and others going out: artillery, Grad rockets…
Stepove is a town on the eastern flank of Avdíivka, a city desired by the Russians since 2014, when it was on the front line. The Russians have not given him any respite. Moscow’s ultimate goal is to enclose it completely. And the task of these men is to avoid it. They are part of the 47th brigade, which until October 18 participated in the failed counteroffensive that sought to retake the occupied territories of southern Ukraine. “This is more difficult for us, there we advanced and here we defend,” says Rustam. That day they moved them to this region and a few hours later they were launching their drones to stop the Russian advance, which had unleashed a major offensive to take Avdíivka. The Russians do not stop launching attacks. “There have been five major attempts so far, but every day they are sending men,” says the commander. As happened in Bakhmut, there is no longer a single building left that is not affected. Even so, around 1,100 people remain in the city, as confirmed by some volunteers who risk their lives to bring them humanitarian aid.
“It was one of the most difficult days, maybe yes. But also the most satisfying day,” the four men agree when talking about the October day when Russia launched the offensive. “Sapsan alone destroyed twenty targets, including tanks and other types of equipment,” explains Hummer, a businessman who enlisted from the first day of the invasion. The four operate as a single team, but they divide their tasks. One duo is in charge of the drone intended to discover enemy positions and the other is in charge of operating the FVP, as the kamikaze drones used on both sides are known. Sapsan says his biggest fear is that the Russians will send him one of the drones like the ones he operates.
The Frontelligence Insight team, which uses satellite images to monitor the situation on the front, counted as of November 28, 211 Russian vehicles destroyed or abandoned in the vicinity of Avdíivka. “Today there is little visibility, but other days with the drones we see dozens of bodies abandoned on the ground,” says Sapsan. The drone camera allows them to witness how once the Ukrainians manage to control the advance of one group, the Russians send another next. “They are suffering enormous losses in personnel and equipment. Almost all the equipment they used is being damaged. Whoever attacks, suffers huge losses. But for them it is not a sign. They have already changed three brigades and they still have many men,” explains Hammer.
The famous Z storms, which were first seen a year ago in the offensive to take Bakhmut, are now identified as V storms. No one can quite explain the difference, but Rustam has a theory: “Now they combine more ex-convicts, used as meat cannon, with experienced soldiers.”
The Russian numerical superiority makes the situation for the Ukrainians extremely difficult. And this is a constant both in Avdíivka and in other eastern fronts where Russian pressure has intensified, such as Bakhmut, Kremnina and Kupyansk. In each of them, the soldiers agree that this is one of the hardest moments for Ukraine after the first invasion.
The Institute for the Study of War has spoken that Russia is seeking to improve its tactical positions and everyone in the area believes that Vladimir Putin will do everything possible to advance as much as he can in the Dobass before the Russian elections on March 18. In Bakhmut, for example, they are pressing hard and have managed to recover some positions gained by the Ukrainians in the summer.
“There is pressure from them and also our mistakes. There are some commanders who come from the academy and have made mistakes,” says a veteran soldier who has operated in Bakhmut since the beginning of the Russian offensive to take the city and who only identifies himself as Orest. Previously he always seemed optimistic, now he does not hide that he is worried. He says Ukrainian soldiers are using everything they have to defend themselves, but they feel a lack of ammunition and are rationing it. They also know that they need more men in their ranks.
“We will not abandon the fight, but the resources of the State are much less than those of the aggressor,” Hammer concludes. The passing of the hours begins to take its toll. They eat chocolates and drink energy drinks while changing their synthetic heat envelopes on their hands and feet. They tell all this between the drone launches, the installation of the bombs and the attack on the enemy. There was poor visibility but when we left them, at two in the afternoon, they had destroyed an anti-tank guided missile system.
