“Behind us are our families. We cannot back down, we have no choice”: in the trenches and under grapeshot, on the north-eastern edge of Kharkiv, Ukrainian soldiers are defending the country’s second city from attacks by the Russian army.
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Welcome to “Point Zero”, the last Ukrainian position “before the enemy”, greets Captain “Best”, who welcomes AFP to the front line to share with him a moment of the dangerous and exhausting daily life of his squadron.
Eyes red with fatigue, but apparently in good spirits, these men belong to the 92nd Mechanized Brigade, the main army unit in charge of the defense of Kharkiv.
Not far from a four-way and a forest marking the limit of the city, they camp in an old suburban area, half buried in the gardens and the ruins of the houses exploded by the shells.
The place is “strategic” because it is located on a road that leads straight to the city center. It is defended by several tanks, a solid network of trenches and forts.
The earth trembles at regular intervals to the rhythm of the shells falling here and there over the entire area, in a steely crash that freezes to the spine.
Five corpses of Russian soldiers, half undressed, lie on the lawn of a service station. A bird pecks carrion. The remains of a “Russian infiltration attempt behind our lines”, explains a lieutenant.
“The bodies have been rotting there for almost two weeks.” Too exposed to shells for an ambulance or anyone else to pick them up. Ukrainian soldiers have many other things to do.
“We are under constant attack, day and night. The last time was this morning, artillery fire”, details the young captain “Best”, the Kalashnikov at the side.
“It was waking up gymnastics,” jokes one of his men, Oleksy, a lawyer with steely blue eyes and a committed volunteer.
The captain points to a gaping hole in the facade of a house that is already in bad shape, a little set back from the forts. Smoke rises from a pile of rubble, the remains of a nearby wooden hovel that served as a meal for the troops.
“These bastards blew up the restaurant! What are we going to eat now? ”, bursts out laughing a sub-off, drop in the nose and Cossack hairstyle, the tuft falling on his shaved head.
Landed at the wheel of a backfiring van with shattered windows, the voluble soldier with a mustache is in charge of “logistics”. He snoops in the shambles of the battlefield for everything that can be useful to the squadron, going as far as the no man’s land separating the belligerents.
“I recover a bit of everything there, the Russians come to take back their corpses there”, laughs this modern Taras Boulba, after having told how he killed four Russians with a grenade.
In his trailer that morning, boxes of Russian ammunition, a generator, an old shovel, Kevlar body armor plates, one of which was pierced by a bullet…
The “Ivans” – as Ukrainians sometimes call Russian soldiers – are less than 4 kilometers away. “Their scouts regularly attempt small raids on our lines. Five were killed a few days ago during their last attempt,” says the captain.
A lawn mower engine suddenly sizzles in the ear, eyes roll up to the sky. The silhouette of a small plane stands out under the gray clouds. A Russian “Orlan” drone, according to Oleksy.
These strange birds “spot the Ukrainian positions and help to adjust the Russian artillery, we must imperatively shoot them down”. Soldiers swoop down on the aircraft, which continues its flight imperturbably.
“That means the rockets are going to fall,” warns the non-commissioned officer, pushing visitors down a narrow staircase hidden under sandbags and descending underground.
Well sheltered in their bunker, two soldiers seated in front of a small table are preparing tea on a stove. Children’s drawings are stuck to the wall, including that of a tank in the national colors of blue and yellow: “Dear soldiers, thank you for fighting for our beloved Ukraine”, wrote the hand of a schoolboy.
On the surface, we jump into the trenches, we slip into the forts, waiting for the storm of Russian iron. “If it’s a tank that fires, it goes down in two seconds. If it’s a rocket, it comes in thirty seconds…”.
The war here is also done by ear.
Artillery fire can also herald a dismounted attack, Olevsky explains. “Once the shelling lasted almost six hours. The Russians thought we were dead and then advanced on our positions. Error…”, ironically the non-commissioned officer, a murderous gleam in the glance.
Reference-www.tvanouvelles.ca