2023-07-16 19:50:58
AFP
“You have to kill,” says Ukrainian soldier in the recapture of Bakhmut
Yuriy Korpan is 39 years old, but following a week of bloody fighting once morest Russian troops alongside Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine, he seems to have aged a decade. “On the battlefield, you have to kill,” repeats the father of three. sons, recruited last August and currently fighting north of Bakhmut. The city, devastated by months of fighting, fell to Russian hands in May. The Ukrainian army, which launched a counter-offensive in June, is now seeking to recapture it. Korpan, employed in the construction sector before being drafted, remembers the last day he was at the front. “The shelling began at four in the morning, with mortars and artillery.” “Then it calmed down a bit. An hour later, the enemy began” to attack once more, he added to AFP. Before continuing: “We responded. Machine guns, [lanzacohetes] RPGs, grenade launchers, then mortars. We started the battle”.- “Adrenaline” -When you fight, “adrenaline rises to your blood, you are in a kind of excitement (…) You are fighting for your life and for that of your brothers”, describes Korpan.” We need to be there, in that place. We are tense as a rope and obsessed with a single idea: to destroy the enemy that has come to our land.” When asked if he feels fear, he answers yes, but that it “disappears” when one fights. “Not in combat you have to be afraid, you have to overcome it and carry out the task clearly. Fear is also an enemy,” he replies. After the battle, “the legs and arms ache from the great physical exertion. It takes a few days to recover,” he explains. Since the start of the counteroffensive, the Ukrainians have been advancing slowly around Bakhmut, amid “bitter” fighting, according to the Defense Ministry. The same is true south of Bakhmut, where Kiev soldiers advance towards the town of Klyshchiivka. Vitaliy Stolyarchuk, 31-year-old commander of an infantry section, fights in this town. “Of course it is terrifying, only a madman would not be afraid,” says the soldier, who wears glasses of dark sun “I believe in God and I constantly pray that my brothers and I get out of this battle alive. You need to have a cool head and 360-degree eyes,” he explains. “Killing someone is hard, taking someone’s life is hard. The Russians put up a strong resistance”, but “their chances are slim: following an artillery preparation, we go out and finish off those who remain,” he says. – Mines – He does not count the number of people he has killed. “It is impossible and not It makes sense,” Korpan replies. “I didn’t count the dead Russians! Only beginners do that.” In this area, anti-personnel mines threaten the Ukrainians. “Everything is usually mined. They [los rusos] they run away very fast and leave their weapons behind. They undermine their positions during the retreat. The soldiers [ucranianos] Inexperienced people fall into these traps,” says Stolyarchuk. According to doctor Volodimir Veselovsky, who volunteers at a stabilization point where wounded soldiers receive first aid, this type of injury has increased. “For several weeks, we have more injuries caused by mines. Wounds on the feet, on the legs. One day we had five wounded who later had to be amputated,” he told AFP. But according to him, the origin of most of the injuries continues to be artillery attacks, particularly the feared Soviet Grad multiple rocket launchers.” Yary”, from his nom de guerre, leads a battalion with regarding ten Grad LRM, which can fire up to 40 rockets in 20 seconds, covering “a 400m by 400m square”. “A solid zone where everything burns and explodes. It also has a huge psychological impact. [en los rusos]. After several attacks of this type, they sometimes drop their weapons and flee in an unknown direction”, he assures. Korpan, for his part, has hope: “I hope that we will expel this evil from our land until the [montes] Urals. And the husbands will return to their wives, and the children to their parents. And we will rebuild our country.”epe/ant/ybl/sag/dbh/avl
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