And in the region of Bakhmut, which witnessed fierce battles in recent days, the military losses were great, and there are those who guarantee that the men mobilized by the Wagner group are being used as bait by the Russian forces themselves.
They are like “cannon fodder”: Russian soldiers, recruited by Wagner’s group, are sent in small groups to the battle front to denounce the Ukrainian positions, well defended by artillery, to allow the fierce onslaught of the Russian army.
according to El Mundo newspaper Citing the commander of the Ukrainian Army’s Svoboda battalion, who is in charge of the battlefront in the city of Pakhmut in Donetsk region, the Russian strategy is to make between six and seven attacks a day, sacrificing more than 500 men, in order to attack the Ukrainian positions.
“The Russians insist on the same tactics: convicts are thrown into our fronts and we have to destroy them, and thus the enemy discovers our firing points and tries to hit them with his artillery,” Petro Kozik explained, adding that in addition to that. To use the soldiers as “cannon fodder”, they still use them as a “target”, allowing them to move around and help locate Ukrainian bunkers, and end up dying in the Russian bombing themselves.
The Ukrainian commander even said that “the enemy’s losses are enormous” and that the corpses were not counted until they were left in the fields. “The forest in front of our positions is littered with corpses.”
To CNN Portugal, Major General Isidro de Moraes Pereira explained that this military strategy dates back to Stalin’s times, being a noted Soviet practice.
“What is happening is that in order to defend the P66 highway, those who have been mobilized by the Wagner Group, who have been taken out of prisons in Russia, as well as from prisons in the Central African Republic, are being thrown onto the battlefront, like ‘cannon fodder.’” The first wave is they. Those.In the second wave, the population is mobilized and poorly prepared, demoralized and not convinced to fight.Behind them are only the professional and mercenary forces of the Wagner Group, the so-called barrier forces whose sole and exclusive purpose is to ensure that these first two waves do not stop fighting.And those who are shot are shot. who immediately turn back. And that’s what happens.”
The military expert confirms that what is happening in the region is a “bloodbath”. “Reliable sources are aware that in this major battle about 500/700 soldiers die every day.”
“Those who attack usually lose more men,” the general stresses.
Isidro de Morais Pereira also explained that the General Staff of the Ukrainian forces had begun to reinforce the lines in Bakhmut and that there were also indications that the Russians were trying to encircle the area, with reports that “a new counterattack is being prepared by Ukrainian forces”.
“There is a possibility, which is to launch a large-scale counterattack to break the land bridge connecting Donbass with Crimea (…) and to cause a final imbalance in the Russian ground forces, but it may also be in Bakhmut,” he reveals. Pointing out that “Ukraine will not lose Bakhmut in the short term,” because it “will not do what happened in Mariupol.”
The city of Bakhmut, east of the Donetsk region, was the scene of fierce fighting on both sides. It is a city that has become an important target for Russia, which has not been able to advance on the ground, even being forced to withdraw in some of its surrounding areas.
Russian forces besieged the city and Wagner’s group was reinforced in an attempt to recapture Bakhmut. However, after two days of advancing and retreating, on SaturdayUkrainian forces achieved victory by shooting down a Russian plane that bombed the city.
