There are some towns that Ukraine can just never afford to lose, and Lyptsi is one of them. <\/p>\n
But the grip the nation keeps is tenuous: The streets are aflame from an airstrike moments earlier when we race in, under the cover of darkness. Night affords them the only respite from drone assault; the hours before we arrive have seen the town hit eight times. <\/p>\n
Yet the soldiers of the 13th Khartiia National Guard have to endure, as the stakes here are huge. Russia\u2019s relentless onslaught has a key goal: If they take Lyptsi, then they can position artillery within range of Ukraine\u2019s second city, Kharkiv, 20 minutes down the road. <\/p>\n
Down in a bunker, Oleksandr, a commander, looks at one of his many drone feeds. \u201cYou saw yourself how everything is burning. It is like that every night.\u201d <\/p>\n
His men were among the first to tackle Russia\u2019s new advance into Kharkiv region nearly two weeks ago. He says they are fighting trained professional soldiers. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe can see it from their equipment and tactics,\u201d he says. \u201cThey\u2019re not sending just anyone into the assaults.\u201d <\/p>\n
His stare lengthens when asked about what fortifications were in place before the surprise Russian attack. \u201cNothing was prepared here. Nothing. Just nothing. All the positions are being built by the hands of infantry.\u201d <\/p>\n
Outside, the night is shaken by more blasts. \u201cThree weeks ago the civilians were living a peaceful life here. Rebuilding, everything was all right,\u201d he says. \u201cAnd now most of the houses are ruined.\u201d <\/p>\n
As we leave, a loud drone buzzes overhead, close by. Our escort does not flinch or run. I ask if the drone is friendly. \u201cHow the f*** should I know?\u201d he replies, tugging on a cigarette. <\/p>\n
Another unit is forced to use a Soviet artillery gun made in the 1940s. Hidden in dense foliage, its metal is rusty in parts, limiting how often it can be fired. Artun, their commander, uses newer Polish shells, but now only fires 10 a day, when in the autumn it was 100. <\/p>\n
Drones are \u201ca big problem,\u201d Artun says. \u201cI have shrapnel in me as a keepsake,\u201d he adds, referring to the remnants of a Russian Lancet drone still in his hand and stomach, which the surgeons could not remove. \u201cBut there are certain actions that can save you from drones.\u201d <\/p>\n
One of them springs into life: an alert from a $30 frequency scanner on his webbing. It has picked up the approach of another Orlan drone, sending Artun into the bunker. He looks out into the sky above, and sees it pass overhead. He commands a diverse unit, epitomizing the manpower challenges Ukraine is facing in its third year of war. Some, like him, are wounded infantrymen, put on the guns further back from the front. Others are older, while one of his team is on his first day in artillery. <\/p>\n
For nearly two years, Kharkiv thought the threat from its neighbour had passed. A lightning Russian retreat in late 2022 left Kharkiv region peaceful and the launchpad for Ukrainian attacks across the border into Russia proper. Attacks persisted in the distance however, keeping the city\u2019s residents awake through violently loud nights, now amplified by the threat of Russian artillery edging closer. Flares, anti-aircraft fire, and blasts regularly punctuate the enforced blackout, as Russian drones, rockets and airstrikes hit targets in the dark. <\/p>\n
On Wednesday, city officials reported an attack on a gas station, which left four people in hospital. On Sunday, two missiles struck a lakeside resort in Cherkaska Lozova, outside the city \u2014 a horrifying attack on a civilian target which also used a \u201cdouble-tap\u201d tactic, in which a second missile hit 10 minutes after the first, injuring first responders. <\/p>\n
A few hours after Sunday\u2019s blasts, rescue workers clambered over the ruins of a waterside terrace, retrieving <\/strong>two bodies from the seven who died in the attack. One was a woman, seven months pregnant. Another was only found later, their body fragments in the wreckage. As police combed the eviscerated terrace on the lake for evidence, another air alert sounded, causing half the workers to flee for cover, and some to carry on, almost oblivious. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" There are some towns that Ukraine can just never afford to lose, and Lyptsi is one of them. But the grip the nation keeps is tenuous: The streets are aflame from an airstrike moments earlier when we race in, under the cover of darkness. Night affords them the only respite from drone assault; the hours before we arrive have seen the town hit eight times. Yet <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3580,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-3579","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/digitaltradecenter.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3579","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/digitaltradecenter.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/digitaltradecenter.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/digitaltradecenter.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/digitaltradecenter.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3579"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/digitaltradecenter.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3579\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/digitaltradecenter.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3580"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/digitaltradecenter.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3579"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/digitaltradecenter.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3579"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/digitaltradecenter.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3579"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}