Inside a secret Ukrainian mission behind enemy lines | DW News

I'm going to tell you about an operation going on in the south of Ukraine that not many people have heard of a few groups of Marines are holding out an enemy controled territory living in a swamp drawing fire and harassing Russian troops in an attempt to protect a Ukrainian City and keep pressure on Crimea Ukrainian soldiers have crossed the river into enemy territory and established Bridge heads across the nepro river a bridge head is a strong position secured by an army inside enemy territory from which they can advance or attack now we don't know how many of these Bridge heads exactly exist and how many fighters are involved in the operation what we do know is that the bridge heads so far couldn't be expanded but their success can be measured already let's look at what those soldiers are doing how they first got into enemy control territory and what all of this means for the defense of Southern Ukraine cap first of all what does their presence there mean for the Russians you stri make Russians bring as much reinforcement as possible and make it as a target for main Ukrainian forces on the right Bank of Neo so they are basically a kind of bait for Russia uh they make them do regrouping braing reinforcement and Me time they get destroyed mola Bellis knows this stuff he is a research fellow at the National Institute for strategic studies as well as a senior analyst for comeback alive a nonprofit focused on defense sector analysis UK according to open-source investigations Russian equipment is getting destroyed with a ratio of 5 to1 for Russia fighting off the ukrainians here is crucial so they have to respond these Bridge heads are only 100 km away from Crimea the Peninsula has come under attack by Ukrainian air strikes Naval drones and Special Forces operations in recent months it is vital for Russia's Supply and any pressure exerted is a major concern for Russia well Crimea has a special place uh well both for the Russian great power psychology but also it's a major source of problems for Ukraine I mean infrastructur there if we can get closer to Crimea uh well and isolate it start isolating it then Russian grouping of forces in zap paria region would feel uh a lot of problems so that's that's why crimeia is so important for them and that's why they are so desperate to reduce to zero any any chance that we might uh enlarge this bridge heads and uh Advance towards crme again following the successful liberation of the city of hon in Fall 2022 the Russians withdrew To the Left Bank of the nepro River from there they continue to indiscriminately Shell the city ukrainians were fighting them long distance with artillery in summer last year the ukrainians arrived on the other side well we applied small Squad tactics to to cross so Russians are unable to spot every every single place from which we're doing this Cross River work and they can suppress fully Logistics so we by this fact we were're able to create this uh Bridge heads and then to sustain them so we have this uh in general tentative balance when neither we are able to enlarge this bridge head the city of hon is literally on the front line Russian occupied territory is just a few hundred meters away in range of snipers drones and artillery and the Ukrainian Marines are keeping some of them busy this soldiers there are fighting in swampy terrain with thick vegetation the Russians in front of them and the river at their backs it is not a normal Battlefield disguise is crucial in these conditions you have to hide it's almost impossible to fight and build fortifications in these conditions the geography makes it almost impossible if you have a body of water between you and your rear positions it makes everything that much more difficult if you get injured you can't just be picked up by a car of course that affects Morel it's harder just to do your [Music] job infantry is involved uh yes they cross uh involving boats also you a Visa employed uh for uh Logistics including uh and and it's natural again we are able to create only small Bridge heads and sustain small Bridge heads cuz if we uh try to create major Crossings makeshift uh Bridges it would be a point of extreme vulnerability the Russian Orcs go after the boats very aggressively they're a valuable Target for them it's tough for armorel you get used to it but it's hard it just goes with a job here it's all about disguise being cautious and never letting down your guard as soon as you let down your guard you can get wounded or even [Music] killed the reason these Crossings were possible in the first place is an event that took place on June 6th last year the Novak kovka dam was breached and flooded large areas left and right of the nepro river yes they created disaster but it worked this incident worked both in their favor and in our favor the number of enemy troops there was small and we managed to gain a foothold It is believed that Russian forces in control of the dam destroyed it to prevent a large scale offensive by the ukrainians it was uh valuable for Russians to destroy this Dam to Temporary increase the level of the water and to create problems for any uh attempt to to do Crossings to create Bridge head and then to enlarge them so that's uh a part of the story that uh unfortunately didn't uh materialize but that's my understanding how we plan to do this offensive and the role of uh this bridge heads in the original plan the plans for a large- scale offensive were foiled but amid the chaos Ukraine was able to deploy troops to the other side now the Marines are soaking up the Russian attention preventing them from moving closer to the river and drawing some of the fire that will be targeting cities under Ukrainian control if we're pushed out of there the enemy will come straight in it's really close to Kon the enemy will come and be much too close to and while we see that some cities are spared others unfortunately are not that Spar so it's it's not that even story but yes uh basically any activity of military it's diverting attention from Strictly civilian size but only to the certain extent since Russians are employing indiscriminate fire all alone including in Heron direction there's a small contingent of troops working in these Bridge heads on a rotational basis how many exactly is a well-kept secret the military hasn't shared any specifics with us but from what we've been told everything has to get in by boat so they are limited to light arms the Marines are receiving support from Ukrainian forces on the right Bank the bird does everything for us we send it over flies we control it from here basically we find the targets there find enemy there we identify them sent all the information to headquarters these men are part of a reconnaissance units they identify targets for artillery attack drones and serve as the eyes of their own infantry on the ground the skies in this region are downright infested with drones both Ukrainian and Russian here we see everything from the sky we can share that info we know what we're facing the enemy just like us is learning is digging in they don't want to give up their [Music] positions the ukrainians are on the other side of the river but only a few of them they would need makeshift Bridges to move enough soldiers and weapons to the other side to really move the front line it seems the Russians can't wipe them out in order to be able to do that they would have to move many troops from other parts of the front line it seems like a stalemate while the Russians continue to hit Heron the Ukrainian Marines risk their lives to make it cost as much as possible

Channel: DW News

Views: 154,258

Keywords: DW News, ukraine, russia, war in ukraine, bridgeheads

Id: eLwF5bul0Q8

Length: 9min 52sec (592 seconds)

Published: Tue May 14 2024