Kyiv, Ukraine (AP) – Andrei Gonchruk served with Russian troops when Ukraine was part of the Soviet Union and called them brothers. But on Wednesday, the 68-year-old man wiped his face with one hand and grabbed his rifle with the other, ready to withstand their invasion. on his side.
“It’s a blitzkrieg,” Gonchruck said. He was standing in the rubble of a house that had just been destroyed by a Russian air strike in Gorenka, a village on the outskirts of the Ukrainian capital that came under crossfire as Moscow tried to take Kyiv.
The white-bearded pensioner is one of tens of thousands of Ukrainians who have voluntarily defended their homeland from Russia. He and his son Kostya took up arms after the invasion last week. Together they patrol the village.
Among the patrols was 81-year-old Piotr Verco, a French language teacher who lost his wife, Lydia, to skin cancer from the Chernobyl nuclear accident. Verko said he was ready to use his rifle to shoot at invaders because he had a daughter and a grandson. But he is also considering what he would do without his firearm.
“If they come here, I will hit them with a pitchfork if I don’t have a weapon, but I have a weapon,” he said.
The pain of the loss is shared by the volunteer defenders. Locals said at least two Gorenka people had been killed in the Russian offensive in a week and a dozen had been injured. Several houses were destroyed on Wednesday. The women stood in the ruins, weeping.
“There was a lot of destruction,” Gonchruck said. “But the people here are behaving well.” Many men in the village have military experience like him.
The Ukrainian army has distributed weapons to anyone who wants to defend the country and has deployed thousands of reservists. Across Kyiv, civilians in jeans and winter coats wearing yellow armbands squatted behind piles of tires at checkpoints or watched the streets.
They are outnumbered, but “we will try to get (more) weapons,” even if they are not delivered, Gonchruck said. “We will do it ourselves. We will kill the enemy and take their weapons, “he added.
In the days of his Soviet army, Gonchruk saw the Russians as brothers in arms. Now that has changed.
“Everyone who comes to our territory is an enemy. Nobody invited them here, “he said. “Maybe there are good people among them, but for me it doesn’t matter. They came to kill my people. “
Gonchruk is shocked by Moscow’s invasion. He predicted that Russia would eventually take over separatist territories in eastern Ukraine, but he never expected a full-scale offensive that hit the heart of cities like Kharkiv. and sent hundreds of thousands of people to flee across the border.
Others are heading to bomb shelters, with growing anger at Russia. “We do not need to be free. Leave us alone! “Said another Gorenka resident, Larisa Lipatova, who fled to a cellar amid Wednesday’s attack and huddled under a blanket among containers of pickled tomatoes and jams.
With a veteran’s gaze and despite the wreckage at his feet, Gonchruk was grimly proud of the apparent failures the Russians faced in the week after their invasion, while the Ukrainians resisted.
“They thought they could come here and take Kyiv in a day or two, but look how they’re doing so far!” He said.
Elsewhere on the outskirts of the capital, another volunteer defender helped people cross the wreckage of a ruined bridge on the way to the city. With a pistol across his chest, the man held the glove of a little boy, who smiled shyly at him.
Others, one by one, crossed the river through an open pipe in the falling snow. Locals said the bridge was destroyed to impede Russian progress.
Some exhausted residents of Kyiv celebrated even the slightest victory. The one who gave only her first name, Rosa, showed off her groceries. “It has everything: bananas, butter, even fresh croissants,” she said.
Like Gonchruk, she had decided to stay instead of fleeing, armed only with determination, as the war few could have imagined came in the second week.
“We are running to the basement, trembling and worried, but we believe in victory,” she said.
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