A Ukrainian military man told the BBC about the fighting on the bridgehead on the left bank of the Dnieper in the Kherson region near the village of Krynki.
He said he spent several weeks there under heavy Russian fire.
“The entire crossing is under constant fire. I saw how boats with my comrades on board simply disappeared into the water after the impacts, being lost forever in the Dnieper. You need to take everything with you – generators, fuel and food. When you build a bridgehead, you need a lot of everything, but supplies to this area were not planned. We thought that after we got there, the enemy would run away and then we could safely transport everything we needed, but it didn’t work out ,” says the military man.
“When we arrived on shore, the enemy was waiting. The Russians we managed to capture said that their troops had been informed of our landing, so when we got there they knew exactly where to find us. They threw everything at us – artillery, mortars and flamethrower systems. I thought I’d never get out. I was evacuated after being concussed by a mine, but one of my comrades did not survive. I feel like I came out of hell, but the guys who replaced us ended up in even worse hell. But the next rotation is coming soon and I will need to cross the river again ,” said the military man.
However, several hundred marines were able to gain a foothold on the left bank, thanks in part to Ukrainian artillery fire from the higher western banks of the Dnieper.
At the same time, the fighter says that the goals of creating a bridgehead are not very clear.
” Nobody knows the goals. Many believe that the command simply abandoned us. The guys believe that our presence had more political than military significance. But we just did our job and did not go into strategy. Several brigades should have been stationed here, not separate companies – we just don’t have enough people. There are a lot of young guys among us. We need people, but trained ones, not the green ones we have now. There are guys who trained for only three weeks and only managed to shoot a few times. You will Laugh at this, but some of them don’t even know how to swim ,” says the fighter.
According to him, he and his comrades bought much of their kit themselves – generators, power banks and warm clothes.
“ Now the frosts are coming, it will only get worse – the real situation is being hushed up, so no one will change anything. It’s a complete nightmare. A year ago I wouldn’t have said this, but now, sorry, I’m tired of it.
Everyone who wanted to volunteer for the war came a long time ago – now it is too difficult to seduce people with money. Now we are receiving those who did not manage to escape the draft ,” says the military man.
Source : Kherson
