Four Russian Groups Attacked In Donetsk—And Ran Into A Wall Of Drones

It took months of bloody fighting, but in December, Russian forces occupied the ruins of Kurakhove, a fortress town anchoring Ukrainian positions on the southern edge of Donetsk Oblast in eastern Ukraine. Battered and exhausted—and desperately low on armored vehicles—the Russian field armies couldn’t extend their control more than a few more miles to the west.

Four months later, they’ve finally mustered the reserves for a fresh push. “We … expect Russian offensive actions to expand further in the south in the coming months,” Tatarigami, the founder of the Ukrainian Frontelligence Intelligence analysis group, warned on Thursday.

In fact, those actions kicked off days earlier. On Tuesday, a large Russian force attacked at several points simultaneously north of Kurakhove and south of Sribne. “Within two hours, four combined groups set off from different directions and at different times to the area of the settlement of Bohdanivka: infantry, on buggies and motorcycles, armored vehicles, infantry fighting vehicles and tanks,” The Ukrainian Khortytsia Operational-Strategic Group reported.

Each Russian group had its own mission, the group added. “The probable plan of the operation was to break through (or destroy) the Ukrainian defense and capture the settlements of Bohdanivka, Troitske and Horikhove.”

Wall of drones

But the Ukrainian line in the area is held by the powerful 72nd Mechanized Brigade and a clutch of marine units, as well as the usual drone teams. Surveillance drones saw the Russians coming. First-person-view attack drones swarmed them. The resulting carnage was shocking, even by the terrible standards of Russia’s 38-month wider war on Ukraine.

Drones immobilized vehicles and then chased down the surviving passengers and crew as they bailed out. So many drones attacked at the same time that the explosion of one drone triggered the warhead of another flying nearby. Russians lost limbs and bled out.

None of the four Russian assault groups even reached Ukrainian positions, the Khortytsia OSG claimed. Surveilling the aftermath, Ukrainian drones counted two destroyed tanks, two destroyed armored personnel carriers, four wrecked all-terrain vehicles, four immobilized motorcycles and 50 dead Russians.

Tatarigami wouldn’t have been surprised at the outcome. “The situation for Ukrainian troops remains complicated, and the overall balance favors Russia” owing to the latter’s greater reserves of manpower, they noted. “That said, despite recent Russian efforts to portray Ukraine’s position as dire, they have so far failed to capitalize operationally or strategically inside of Ukraine.”