A Ukrainian commander has been filmed taking out multiple Wagner thugs in a rare 11-minute point-of-view video depicting his company’s fight for the last road to Bakhmut. The astonishing footage, posted by the “Gonor” company of the Da Vinci Wolves, a highly-celebrated, long-standing outfit of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, who helped defend Mariupol prior to its occupation last May, shows the moment they come face to face with the Wagner Group.
Ukrainian Eastern Group of Forces spokesperson Colonel Serhiy Cherevaty said that Russian and Ukrainian forces engaged in 34 combat clashes in Bakhmut in the last 24 hours as Putin’s men ramp up their attempts to encircle the city.
The footage, believed to be from earlier this month, opens with a Russian attack on a bunker in which Ukrainian soldiers are taking shelter in land adjacent to the O0506 highway.
The road, which snakes from the town of Chasiv Yar into Bakhmut from the western side, is the only remaining major supply route to Ukrainian forces still holding out against the Wagner Group.
The northeast regions of the city clockwise down to the southwest are largely under Russian occupation after more than 10 months of fighting.
Protection of this last highway, to permit supplies in and a potential withdrawal out, are vital to the lives of the Ukrainian soldiers fighting in the city.
In the footage, the “Gonor” company is urged to the “first trench” after a Russian grenade explodes at the mouth of their shelter, prompting the commander to scream: “Orcs have jumped in”. The term “orcs”, in reference to Lord of the Rings, is what Ukrainians often call Russian soldiers.
The company commander then proceeds to shoot his way out of the shelter and onto the land above, shielded only by the cover fire of his soldiers.
He proceeds to shoot two Wagner mercenaries attempting to advance on the positions of his soldiers below.
After reloading multiple times and eliminating the immediate threats, he calmly says to his soldiers: “Guys, one come to me.” He then orders the other soldiers to the “right trench”.
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But Russia is gaining significant territory in the besieged city of Bakhmut, though not without great expense to its personnel, after months of marginal gains.
Donetsk People’s Republic (DNR) advisor Yan Gagin claimed that Russian forces control about 90 percent of the city, while the Institute for the Study of War assessed Russian control at 87.9 percent.
That is roughly a 10 percent gain, according to ISW estimates, in less than a week, showing that the attack is accelerating.
The commander of a Ukrainian territorial defence brigade, Colonel Dmytro Zavorotnyuk, noted that Russian forces in Bakhmut are now attacking in squad-sized assault groups of five to six people having abandoned their old, WW1-style over-the-top advances.