A group of Ukrainian infantrymen were standing in a warehouse in south-west Ukraine when they came under fire from Russian artillery. Serhiy was hit in the face with shrapnel. He and his new best friend Hennadiy took a selfie clutching a part of the grenade that didn’t hit them.
Moments later, Russian tanks appeared on a hill opposite and fired through the village in front of them, including at the warehouse. Hennadiy and the rest of the group – all natives of the Zaporizhia region – were also hit by shrapnel and all suffered hearing damage.
“They had three tanks on the hill and they just shot down on us. We only had guns,” Hennadiy said. “We had some equipment that the Americans and Poles gave us, but it wasn’t enough to fight.”
They said they fled the warehouse in a puff of smoke and went to the nearest village, from where they were taken to the Zaporizhia military hospital.
Gennadiy and Serhiy’s selfie after they were attacked. Photo: Ed Ram/The GuardianThe Guardian has been granted access to the military hospital to speak with soldiers on the condition that reporters do not identify specific battle scenes or release the full names of soldiers interviewed.
“There are a lot of people who are motivated to fight,” said Serhiy, speaking from an infirmary to the rest of the company that had fled the warehouse. “But we’re underarmed and trying desperately to hold the whole crowd [of the Russian army].”
“Besides, there just isn’t enough time to train everyone who wants to fight,” added Dmytro, another company member, who was lying on a bed in the infirmary.
Ukraine has criticized the West for handing it arms, and President Volodymyr Zelenskyy appeals almost daily because his country cannot produce the weapons or ammunition it needs to repel Russian invaders. Demanded equipment ranged from fighter jets and tanks, which the West was reluctant or slow to deliver, to artillery and armored vehicles – and quite simply all guns and ammunition.
On Thursday, the US said it would ship $800 million (£620 million) more in weapons, including 72 howitzers, bringing the total value of its arms shipments since the start of the war to more than $3 billion, including “more than 50 million rounds of ammunition.” “. said US President Joe Biden. But even if weapons are delivered, it can take fourteen days or more to arrive in Ukraine.
Other major countries have been slower or more reluctant, most notably Germany, which has scaled back the heavy weapons it was willing to offer Ukraine and whose Chancellor Olaf Scholz has admitted that supplies of what it is willing to send are running low . The speed with which Ukraine’s armed forces are deploying arms and ammunition has also surprised the West, which has begun ramping up industrial production to help Kyiv hold out.
Ukrainian forces currently hold a line stretching hundreds of kilometers from Kharkiv in the northeast to just outside Mykolaiv in the southwest.
Serhiy (left) and Gennadiy talk about their time in combat. Photo: Ed Ram/The GuardianSerhiy, his face slashed by the shrapnel, was happy to be photographed despite the risks a military spokesman pointed out if he were captured by Russian forces. “We are not afraid of anything,” Serhiy said. The Guardian reconfirmed before publication that permission had been granted to use the soldiers’ images.
Earlier that day, the group had avoided fire from a Russian plane. “A plane flew overhead and bombed us a bit. It was a bit awkward,” Serhiy said with a smile. “Well, not a bit actually, absolutely uncomfortable.”
Another member of the group who fled the warehouse, Mykola, said the Russians had drones and knew exactly where their positions were.
“Things are very tough,” Mykola said. “I can only speak for our situation. I don’t know how the other one is [battalions].”
Of all the cities in central and eastern Ukraine, Zaporizhia feels like the one where life is closest to the pre-war era, but Russian troops occupy more than 70% of the Zaporizhia region. Twenty percent of the region now forms the southern front of Ukraine and is a battle zone between Russian and Ukrainian forces.
New movement restrictions on journalists south of the city of Zaporizhia seem to indicate that the situation on the southern front is deteriorating. According to soldiers interviewed by the Guardian, Ukrainian troops have been driven out of at least one of the three towns and villages an hour south of the city the New York Times visited three weeks ago.
Zaporizhia region’s military spokesman Ivan Ariefiev said journalists are currently not allowed to travel to these places, but said it was not because the situation at the front was worsening. He said the travel restrictions were because the active phase of the war had begun on the Southern Front.
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A group of soldiers that the Guardian visited in the Zaporizhia region were about 12 km from Russian positions. They didn’t expect the fighting to get to them quickly and said the lines were holding farther south – although shells fell two to three miles away.
They said they lack medical equipment. Between 23 people, they had just six helmets and six tourniquets — some hand-sewn by civilian volunteers. They said that while the helmets were en route from Poland, volunteers and suppliers had trouble finding tourniquets abroad, too.
The injured soldiers at the hospital said they received an overwhelming warm welcome from the villagers, who often bought them food. As they retreated, they removed the license plates from the cars they were using so the Russian soldiers could not identify the locals who had loaned them vehicles.
There were widespread reports of local residents suspected of aiding the Ukrainian army being tortured and even killed by Russian forces.
Serhiy said he used his own car to get around the battlefield for just under two months before he was injured and left it. “I’ll never get that [the car] back,” said Serhiy. “Though it may come back to me itself.”