In the Donbas, which is the front line in the war in Ukraine, battles are often fought at distances of 10 miles or more. The war has become, as one soldier said, a game of “artillery Ping-Pong.”
is not the same conflict that it was earlier this spring. The Russian Army’s initial campaign, in February and March, was a three-front invasion with little coherence or military logic. Ukrainian troops mounted small-unit ambushes and used rocket-propelled grenades, antitank weapons, andto destroy Russian troop formations and armor. Viral videos show their direct strikes, with tanks disappearing in flame and smoke.
The next day, I drove down the highway to another city in the Donbas—the military command requested its precise location not be identified for security reasons—where I met Brigadier General Oleksandr Tarnavsky, the deputy commander of Ukrainian forces on the eastern front. Tarnavsky described the shift in Russia’s tactics. “If before they simply marched in large columns, now they have started to actually fight,” he said.
The toll on Ukrainian forces in recent weeks has been immense. The country’s President, Volodymyr Zelensky, has said that as many as a hundred soldiers are killed each day, and five hundred wounded. On a highway in the Donbas, I passed a convoy of trucks with signs that read “Cargo-200” on their windshields, military parlance for soldiers killed in action.
Days later, outside of Svitlodarsk, another city facing Russian attack, Derekh spotted a column of three Russian trucks carrying troops. He fired, destroying them, and slowed the siege. After that, Greek said, “They simply went crazy.” Russian aircraft flew four sorties over Derekh’s position, and the artillery fire was unceasing. A guided missile, likely launched by a Russian fighter jet, hit Derekh’s dugout. He was killed instantly.
Vladislav told me he was eager and ready for battle, but not this kind. “When a person is shooting at you, you have a clear idea of how to fight back, of where to direct your adrenaline,” he said. “But when a piece of metal is flying at you, you don’t know where the enemy is and how to survive. I’m a rifleman, I have no weapon to defend myself from that.”
Oleg recalled a recent battle near Marinka, a town near the would-be separatist capital of Donetsk. A commander had relayed that Russian forces were moving a Grad rocket system, truck-mounted multiple-rocket launchers, into position to fire on his troops. The Grad launcher was at a range that would have been difficult for the unit to reach with its old systems. “We hit it on the third shot,” Oleg said. The commander radioed with his thanks.
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