Ukrainians create ‘kill zone’ as bitter fight for Bakhmut goes on
UKRAINIAN soldiers have created a “killing zone” across a no man’s land in central Bakhmut to mow down Russian mercenaries.
The British Ministry of Defence said Ukrainian and Russian forces now face each other across a river that runs through the centre of the city in the eastern Donbas region.
“Ukrainian forces hold the west of the town and have demolished key bridges over the river, which runs north-south through a strip of open ground 200m-800m wide,” it said. “This area has become a killing zone.”
Russian forces have laid siege to Bakhmut, home to 70,000 people before the war, for seven months. Thousands of soldiers have died fighting street-to-street battles.
The Kremlin’s Wagner mercenary group has a particularly high casualty rate, with a quarter of the 40,000 fighters it recruited dead or injured.
Yevgeny Prigozhin, the Wagner group chief, yesterday broadcast propaganda videos from semi-destroyed rooftops apparently in the city, claiming that his forces are close to the centre.
The BBC said it had geo-located his position to a nine-storey building roughly 700m from the frontline.
Both Russian military bloggers and Western intelligence agencies have also said Moscow’s forces have advanced through the city and moved close to the AZOM metal plant, which has been heavily fortified by Ukrainian soldiers.
The US-based Institute for the Study of War said that if Russian soldiers tried to capture the plant, it would be a bloodbath.“This will likely be very costly for the Wagner Group,” it said.
The fight has also been costly for Kyiv, but Oleksandr Syrsky, the ground forces commander, said it had “bought time” to “build reserves and launch a counteroffensive, which is not far off ”.
For Russia, Bakhmut’s value is more symbolic than strategic, offering Vladimir Putin his first chance at a battlefield victory in almost a year.
Both sides have fired so many shells they have had to divert resources from other parts of the 600-mile front line.