Bohdan Kushnir, call sign Hryz, set foot on his warrior’s path in 2014, volunteering into the Azov [Assault Battalion] at the age of 20. Two months after he had taken an automatic rifle into his hands for the first time, he was appointed to lead a platoon. Hryz fought for Ilovaisk, took part in the Shyrokyne operation. He did not hesitate to respond to the war’s challenge on February 24, 2022. Currently, Lieutenant Kushnir is second in command of the Safari Assault Regiment at the Fury Brigade. Since the start of the all-out Russian invasion, he partook in battles in the Kyiv region, Kherson region, in the battle of Bakhmut. He is currently fighting in Toretsk, a town the adversary is assaulting on an hourly basis, using dozens of infantrymen.

In this interview Ukrinform held as part of its Victory Commanders project, Bohdan Kushnir was talking about the challenges facing the Ukrainian forces defending Toretsk, the enemy’s actual losses, his vision of a peace with the Russians, and about what’s most important in the Assault Platoon Leader job.

- Let's retrospect to 2014, when you joined the Azov Battalion. Tell us what exactly motivated you to make this choice, and what role did you see for yourself in the defense of Ukraine?

- If we retrospect to 10 years ago, if we talk about motivation insofar as it pertains to idealistic values, ​​it goes without saying that I was guided by the need to protect the country. Our territorial integrity was violated, national sovereignty was under threat, and you just stand up to defend all these values. Furthermore, I approach this issue from a kind of philosophical perspective. From this perspective, to me, hypothetically, if we take all men, a certain proportion of them will always, whatever the circumstances, respond to significant social upheavals, be it a revolution, a war and suchlike, any kind of social-political processes. Whatever the circumstances. Because, if you look into history, into ancient society, societies were often caste-based. That’s to say, there were castes of warriors, castes of ordinary workers, castes of politicians, scientists, etc. I believe this all was for a reason. There is a certain proportion of men who, by their character, by the sheer nature of their character, will invariably get involved in such extreme critical events.

I consider myself one of those. That's why I went to this war, let's say, without previously weighing up pros and cons, to go or to not go, or hoping that everything will be settled without my intervention. In other words, I definitely knew that I would go to war and fight. It's not because it's not scary or I'm confident in myself, no. I had no military educational background, was a 20-year-old student. No education, no understanding of how to fight, even how to handle an automatic rifle. But my inner nature says you must be there, must experience it, experience what it is like, what war is at all. It was like a double-blade sword; you know you must go and defend the country, and your gut says that that’s war, and I must be there. That is why my motivation is two-fold - it is the defense of the country and an internal call to experience war as a phenomenon.

- Is it an inner guide or the unthinkability for you to stay away and shut your eyes to it all?

- Yes, probably something like that, you simply cannot remain aloof amidst such dramatic social events, whatever your marital status may be. I disregarded the fact that I am currently studying full-time, can be expelled from the university. It kind of fades into the background. There is a war and you are just looking for an opportunity to get there.

I am convinced that there are warriors by character, by nature; so, no matter how much the wife cries, no matter how much the mother begs, the man goes there, because his nature calls him to do so.

- You are saying it’s just a part of society. In general, based on your views, how do you now feel about the fact that, among the society, very often there is another part of men who are reluctant to defend the country? Does it offend you, cause you kind of internal indignation?

-- If you look at it superficially, in terms of emotions, it is annoying, it makes you angry. But basically, I realize that this is how all societies are organized. I often look at opinion polls in various European countries. Men are asked whether they would defend their country with weapons? And it turns out that just a tiny percentages of those surveyed say they would, will definitely go to war to defend their country and its territorial integrity. That said, there are sky-high percentages of those who say no, I don't need it, I'm a citizen of the world, I'll go somewhere with my family. But mind that our situation is specific in that the Ukrainian army is fighting on its own soil, not in another part of the world, defending national economic interests, for example. We are waging an existential war with an eternal enemy of ours, defending the very existence of our country, our people. These are very serious reasons, ones that cannot be passed over. When a man says no, I will not go, this war is not mine, this cannot but cause a rage inside of me. But I am looking at it soberly, because such emotions, if accumulated for years, can burn you out in the long run.

- This is a philosophical matter in one respect but a practical one in the other. You said that a man must possess some specific character traits to fight. Can these traits be nurtured and developed? Currently, where new recruits are coming, we are talking not about philosophical aspects, but about a requirement. How do you address this upbringing, the training of new warriors?

- Firstly, the current situation is such that you need to train people and to fight both at the same time. But what I think matters the most is to let people understand what a military structure is. Because, if we take many volunteer formations, for example, it was more often than not that people fought organized in kind of gangs, without having any concept of what a military structure is like... I myself come from a gang like this; you understand that you have to fight, but don't understand why should you follow the orders from some dude who comes up and tells me: listen, stand here or dig there. You show that you have your own self, have some opinion of your own, and that's not a bad thing. But there is a military structure where there is a commander above you who is looking; you look straight up, but he looks down on this all, analyzes a bunch of processes, and so he is fully entitled to order you that you stand here or dig there. Accordingly, people need to be made clear why it is like that, that following orders is okay...

That is why people are coming, often travel abroad (for military training - ed.). Out there abroad, basic training is definitely excellent. But in some individual aspects of training - such as adaptation to combat specifics, anti-drone warfare, how infantry should act in an artillery environment like we have, where the density of artillery fire is very high, and the tonnage of iron in the air just breaks all records -- Ukrainians have no equal in the world. I am convinced: this is what we should teach. There are medical protocols that are taught across the world, but we can teach how to adapt these protocols to specific circumstances, where, for example, there is a wounded casualty that needs a five-kilometer long walk to reach under continuous enemy fire. But what will happen to this wounded soldier in 5 hours, for example, or in 10 or 20 hours while you are walking? We have no equal in this field. For example, a soldier completes a basic training course abroad, gets back, and we teach him all the specifics of assault actions, defensive actions, how to work on a vehicle, if it is mechanized infantry. The first thing to be made clear is that there is a military structure, it's okay, we will heed to your opinion, but it is the commander who will have the last word to say, and his order must be carried out. Then the mission will most likely be completed successfully, and you will get back home alive and well.

- Have you ever questioned your own orders? Have you ever questioned the orders of your superiors?

- During this full-scale war – never, because I have already grown up, have lost this youthful maximalism that drives you to reveal who you are. It's normal when a young man blends into society, wants to achieve something and show how strong and smart he is. But once you become grown up, you direct this energy specifically into some kind of professional development, into what you are engaged with. But earlier - yes, when I served with a volunteer unit during the Anti-Terrorist Operation ATO), I did question some else’s orders. It’s not that I sabotaged them, but I tried to bring in some of my own specificity, which could not but annoy my commanders. At present, I have not encountered such situations. I follow the orders from higher commanders. As for the people who serve, I have not encountered people sabotaging orders. Of course, they can ask questions, because people are worried about whether they would be pulled out in case of emergency, whether there will be an evacuation, how long it will take me to get there, or whether I will be able to get out of there, and you provide for possible solutions when planning missions. I have never encountered situations of disobedience or sabotage of orders. Such situations never happen in our unit.

- When did you take the command?

- I got to the war zone in 2014. I came as an ordinary infantryman, like did thousands and tens of thousands of volunteers. But two months later, I was appointed a platoon leader. There was no such thing like ordinary people coming from the street. Instead, there were those who had previous combat experience or were career military personnel. No, there was no such thing. This is just a "rabble" of people who chose to fight. And they look at your character, your decisions, the way how you take them, whether you are ready to take responsibility, how you act in critical situations. At that time, platoons were large, fully sized. At present, this is a common story where there are 20 people in a company and 50 in a battalion. I had plus or minus 40 people in my platoon at that time, which is a lot. Such a platoon is not small. And this was my first such experience, very difficult experience, because I was 20 years old then, was a second-year student, I got to war only a short while ago. It was not until two months later that I took an automatic rifle into my hands for the first time. We were doing assault tasks, and you suddenly take command of not just infantry, but mechanized infantry, with all it vehicles, tanks, armored personnel carriers, and you need to storm enemy defenses, mop up entire cities. It was a truly colossal experience. Well, we passed it through as best as we could.

- These two months…Did you think, ever doubt whether you were ready for this all along or not? And how did you manage to gain trust with your soldiers, given your young age and experience?

The question about trust is a difficult one, because the unit in which I served was manned mostly with people of an emotional temperamental character, given that many of them were frantic football fans in civilian life. All are young, those who have their own opinion, their own self. These are often the people who are generally undisciplined, people, like me, who never did military service previously. Whereas I consider myself to be a calmer, even-tempered person, there are people who are hard to control; all he used to do in his 20s or 18s was to run across a football stadium, around a sector, punching someone in the face. But now he has to follow someone's orders, from some 20-year-old dude. I am not claiming that I am the bravest among them or the best shooter, the best in shooting at the enemy, or killed more of the enemy personnel than they did. No way. There were people who showed their best worth fighting on the battlefield. But if you are good in one particular field, this is where you will most likely be used for. But if you are good as a whole, that is, you combine in yourself all these aspects, it immediately becomes noticeable that this person can take responsibility. And such people are typically singled out immediately. I try to do so immediately after I assess people. The men who come under my command, I immediately look at them, like I was looked at when a newcomer, and immediately assess how valuable this fellow can be in the future. Because we are playing a long game with the enemy, and you just can't live one day at a time, think for one day at a time. A soldier goes down into the trench, I watch how he behaves and immediately assess what tasks, what responsibility can be assigned to him. At one time, I believed it was this versatility that enabled the then commanders to give me a position. Platoon commander is not a high position actually. But a platoon, albeit a small size formation, has an important role to play, since in higher level units, a lot rests on performance of low-to-medium level ones. This was a very difficult team to manage, because no one can become a soldier overnight. To me, these were long, very long months managing this difficult team. But today, many soldiers from this same team have become legendary figures renowned not only in Ukraine, but across the world during this war.

- Tell, if you can, about who you served with side by side.

- When in Azov, I served with the same company as, for example, the now legendary commander of the Assault Brigade Azov (which had been expanded to a brigade size by that time), Redis, who came to serve with our company as an ordinary infantryman. Now he is a famous figure. There is also the commander of the 3rd Assault Brigade (DShBr), who, too, came from our company, served as a private soldier. Among the men I served with are all of the 3rd Azov DShBr commanders. One such is Bohdan Krotevych, who, too, started as an infantry soldier. This team was all made of men like this. We quarreled with each other, clashed with each other, fought side by side, were growing professionally together. At present, these men are known to everyone as the highest-regarded members of the military. But they all came from the difficult-to-manage volunteer units.

- In 2014, were there feelings then that Ukraine might lose its sovereignty? What, in your opinion, helped Ukraine hold out against the invasion then?

- I had no feeling that the war was being waged for the purpose of saving the existence of our State. But still, there was a feeling that the adversary was aiming to capture a particular amount of territory from us. More specifically, the Luhansk and Donetsk oblasts. There were lots of tragic events our country had gone through over that time. But even so, the battlefield initiative was held by the Ukrainian army, despite the poor condition it was in. This condition, I remember it well, was so miserable that one, looking at this army, no longer wanted to eat, drink or talk. You just looked at it and didn't understand how this could have happened at all. The army’s condition was just atrocious. Men were fighting wearing sneakers, shorts, kind of makeshift protective gear, with grenades in their pockets. I recall coming to an entrenchment to see soldiers in Soviet-style helmets of steel. It was a sheer horror to see this all. When we had some surplus equipment in stock, we just provided it to the guys.

But, despite this all, the Ukrainian army, in the poor condition it was in, was still able to move forward and assault. Just recall the deployment of forces at that time, what it was like, the panic raging through Donetsk, where separatist insurgents were screaming for salvation, fearing that that's it, that they are done. People were fleeing from Donetsk. In the summer of 2014, the Ukrainian army, as weak as it was at the time, was still able to get the Donetsk issue done. But the situation -- like it was in Ilovaisk, for example, or in Novoazovsk in the first days of the fall of 2014, where regular Russian forces were brought in to fight in Ukraine – was such that it was difficult for the Ukrainian army to counteract Russian armored and mechanized forces. But even so, there could have been no talk of a comprehensive defeat. A couple of tragic situations did happen, like, for example, what the Russians refer to as Ilovaisk cauldron, or the Debaltseve cauldron. But there was no question of the Ukrainian army losing everything and fleeing to Kyiv.

- You mentioned the tragic pages of our history, in particular, the Ilovaisk operation, in which you partook among others. Tell us a little more about it, how did you get out of there?

- Our situation was like this: the Ilovaisk operation, those who were fighting out there are aware of this, was planned very quickly, and the plan was communicated to relevant commanders. Currently, where an operation is planned for, every phase of the operation is meticulously worked out in terms of the way it will be fought, who will move where, who will assault, who will hold which defenses. But at that time, in irregular, non-military units, the planning was boiled down to this: look, guys, we are gathering today, will leave in a column, make a stop somewhere near Ilovaisk, and, once there, will act as the situation demands. You probably know of the problems we have with wireless communication, but then the situation with this was a total nightmare. That said, all communication was analog, there was no such thing as normal digital communication, there were no communication repeaters, no direct links like we have now. The situation was awful with respect to communication. There was no coherence or common understanding, nor team work between units. These were just diverse units of volunteers who were coming in Ilovaisk from different directions, got into some clashes, some pitfalls out there. Something similar was with us. We reached a suburb of Ilovaisk, the column stopped, then we joined the units of the armed forces, were entering the town together. Well, I remember as it was with me. We were driving in town as a platoon, in a GAZ-66 truck – a Soviet-style vehicle, a truck with bare sides, a "shishiga", as everyone called it. The driver in the cabin is driving, me and 30 soldiers sitting the truck body. This is how we drove into Ilovaisk, the crowd disembarked, people found seats somewhere. You go into a house, commander is standing there, mines are falling, pieces of broken glass are flying, and he instructs you: look, here and there are houses, can you see this street? I find it on a map. At that time, there were no good maps either. There were no such systems like Kropyva, which we have now. You were just shown a street on some map printed on an A4 sheet. You didn't really understand, but say you did, you move there, occupy the houses, set up the defense. Thus we immediately entered into battle. We suffered losses out there, unfortunately. The fighting was waged in the town proper, but afterwards, our commander, thank God, immediately saw where the situation was going to end up, that the situation was critical, the town could be encircled. And he did not act like some odious figures, who abandoned their soldiers out there in Ilovaisk and rushed to Kyiv to appear in televised interviews. Our commander remained by our side amidst battles, made the decision that the unit had to retreat before it was too late. And we were retreating, I remember it well now, personnel were embarked on vehicles while under fire, the enemy was already behind the nearby fence. Vehicles are being loaded, the convoy starts moving, my vehicle closing the convoy. And, I remember it well, with me was (and still is) a guy, everything is OK with him now, thank God, he served as an infantry machine gunner, such a big guy, carrying a machine gun with a full belt of ammunition. I remember, everyone are already sitting in the truck body, waiting. He is the last to run in with this machine gun, jumps in like a cat, they grab him, pull him up to themselves, the vehicle starts moving, and I get into the cabin, the firing never stops, bullets are whistling everywhere, mines are falling. And I put my automatic rifle out the window towards enemy soldiers and was shooting out the magazines, one by one, just so the enemy, if they get too close and shoot at the vehicle, at least lower their heads, so that we could drive out safely. Then the visibility was lost at all, because we were the last to leave on our truck, which should have been visible at the tail of the column, we were driving in loops along some streets. Finally, thank God, we were able to drive out safely, but our column was caught up on the way. So we were leaving the town as the shooting and fighting continued, and the town was already being encircled from all sides, and Russia’s regular forces began coming in.

- What guided your decisions in these hellish conditions?

- You know, in such conditions, command is very hard to carry out, if possible at all. It played a big role that everyone were in visual and voice contact, because, if we talk about the management of forces on the battlefield, it’s typical that individual soldiers or units cannot see each other. You just understand that you have a partner on the right-hand side, and a partner on the left-hand side. You know their position locations and distances, know what kind of crossfire you can create with this all.  But that was not the case then. You just fly into an area that you have not seen before, one that you have seen now for the first time, and there are no maps, no planning. What played a role there was that everyone stuck together, it was possible somehow to manage people, organize things in a way so that not to forget about anyone. If we are going to fight, then all together, if we are going to leave, then all together, too. Due to the fact that everyone stuck together, everything worked out well, more or less.

- Thank you for your answer... After the Ilovaisk operation, did you ever think about resigning from military service?

- No, there was no such thing. While the war was actively going on, I never once thought of leaving the service.

- Your next experience was the Shyrokyne operation, one of the first offensive operations by Ukrainian forces. Tell us about this period, how did you manage to achieve success in general, and which events are most memorable?

- Those on the front line at the time were in depression due to the events in Debaltseve. And one of the goals pursued was to divert the attention of the enemy so that they withdraw some of their forces and capabilities to other fronts, weaken their presence at that particular front, and, at the same time, push the enemy, who was approaching Mariupol closer and closer, away from the city. So we spent a certain amount of time conducting reconnaissance, exploring logistical routes, traveling through the gray zone, and sending our subversion and recon groups for subversive attacks. There was quite significant gray zone where our forces were present alongside enemy forces. We determined an area for an offensive. And it was a very cool experience, it was really cool to move 20 kilometers forward and push the enemy away. Why the operation is called Shyrokyne? It was named after the settlement of Shyrokyne where our advancement stopped, could no longer go further, and more severe battles broke out there. The first kilometers of the gray zone flew by quite quickly. There were some small enemy units remaining there, but they were immediately eliminated. But on the close approaches to Shyrokyne, the battles were severe out there, already involving tanks and infantry fighting vehicles. The battles were really serious. That's where the Shyrokyne operation got that name, which made all the headlines then. Basically, there were very severe battles that continued, if I remember correctly, until the fall of 2015. We succeeded to squeeze all enemy forces out of there, and to get full control over Shyrokyne.

- What was the situation like with weapons supplies?

- The situation with the availability of weapons was grave. We were short of equipment. Our unit had almost no tracked vehicles - the most effective and battle-worthy, there were no tanks. Maybe 1-2 tanks were available to us at that time. There were mostly wheeled vehicles. Where there are wheeled vehicles used, a wheel can get punctured or blown up, or shot through, and that's it, it doesn't move any further. Weapons were in short supply, especially infantry weapons, which were not that diverse as those we have now. Currently, we have a widely diverse range of weapons, thanks to foreign supplies and the Lendlease. At that time, the range of the weapons available to our infantrymen was limited to automatic rifles, Soviet-era RPG rocket-propelled anti-tank grenades, underbarrel grenade launchers and hand grenades. That's what made the situation so grave. But the enemy saw a similar situation, excepting that they had more of heavy equipment. So the infantry, ours and theirs, were fighting with similar weapons.

- February 24, 2022 – what that day was like for you?

- I had a plan for this time, and everything went, roughly speaking, to my plan. Let me explain. At that time,  there was a tension in society, they understood that something is going to happen. Someone didn't believe, someone did, it doesn't matter. I tried to take it cold-bloodedly, was thinking, yes, okay, something may happen. But I didn’t expect [the invasion] would be that massive, so sweeping, didn’t expect that they would assault right away on Kyiv. I invented a story for myself: February 25 is my birthday, and my wife and I usually go snowboarding in the Carpathians. So the story I’d invented had it that, amidst such tensions, anything can happen; if a war does happen, there will be a massive panic, everyone will flee, there will be traffic jams, some commotion. Maybe the enemy will use aviation, or maybe some long-range weapons, which turned out to be the case. I was thinking it over, and decided for myself: I will collect everything, all the essentials, IDs, other documents, money, and we will go for a rest. If everything is okay, then we will just get back. If it is not okay, then my wife will stay where she was. Thus I would remove this problem out of my head, would not need to think about what to do with her, where she is leaving to, where she is now. That is, this headache is removed, I just take my car and go to war. And that’s how it happened actually. That is, on February 23, we are snowboarding, amusing ourselves, then the night of the 24th comes, morning, phone calls, hello, it has begun. We go down to the hotel lobby, everyone there are sleepy, calling someone, don't understand what is going on, what is happening. But we are already so sure about it, excepting my wife. I take our bags, we're ready to go, I just put them in the trunk of my vehicle. I took my wife to her relatives’ home (she has some of her kin residing out there). I myself, when already on the way, called my friends (there was quite a large gang of us hanging out in western Ukraine for some reason or another). And now everyone is calling each other: hello, where are you, are you OK? Then we flock together and take a flight to Kyiv.

- What guided you to join the patrol police?

- I found myself there by sheer chance. Why? Because, as with ATO, you start fighting at full strength, and then you think about how to get it legalized, how to do all the formalities required to get yourself officially registered. Because it’s inappropriate to fight as part of an illegal gang. Sometimes this needs to be done where there is no time to think. You enter the battle, use all your resources to maximum extent possible, there where you are needed at a given time. But when this panic subsided a little, everyone saw that Kyiv would not be taken in 3, 5, nor 10 days’ time, actually never. Once the situation kind of stabilized, the question arose, what to do next, you need to get officially registered somewhere. And it was necessary to do it quickly, so as not to spend your time on some bureaucratic procedures. And a friend of mine contacted the group with which I was fighting, and said: there is patrol police, there is a unit, which is ready to employ us officially. It is clear that this will have nothing to do with police functions proper. It's just that you will be officially employed, will be officially authorized to take part in hostilities. And there were big pluses in this – we ourselves could choose the particular front to fight at. If you prefer Kherson or the Donetsk region, welcome, go and fight out there, choose a front for yourself, will just need to submit reports specifying how you are performing, where you are, where you are fighting. And this option suited us best. It took just one single day to complete the formalities. They arrived, put all the signatures required, but there were left some formalities that needed to be followed. And then we immediately left for the chosen front to fight.

- Over that time, you have fought in battles in the Kyiv region, Kherson region and in the battle of Bakhmut. Let's start with the capital city, the defense of the Kyiv region. What tasks were set to you?

- In the Kyiv region, most of our operations were focused towards Chernihiv, the Brovary highway, the Chernihiv highway the Russian troops used to break through to [Kyiv]. The Russians were using small convoys of vehicles, just draw into the highway from time to time in an attempt to break through. But there were anti-tank weapons emplaced there; their vehicles were attacked and destroyed, this followed by the hunt for those who jumped out for life, but we were shooting, killing them all. That was a kind of positional war. And even now, when I sometimes drive along the Chernihiv Highway, I see the place where we were digging a small dugout for ourselves. I still remember the place where Russian vehicles were parked, even the places where dead Russian soldiers were lying on the road. This is a rather memorable place for me.

- What do you think turned the situation around?

- I think that was when the enemy realized that a large metropolitan area such as Kyiv and the surrounding towns is simply impossible to seize. After all, this is the capital city, where our troops were concentrated in very large numbers. Indeed, some critical situations did happen. They realized that it no longer works like that in the modern world, that you can't just invade and capture a huge city, the capital. When all of their air assault aircraft had been shot down, when their air assault troops were landing [outside of Kyiv], they were excessively optimistic they would succeed, doing WWII-style landings. Once they saw that it doesn’t work like that, came across our brave national guardsmen, the enemy landed with equipment just to be burnt out. We all saw these videos of enemy corpses being thrown out from vehicles. When the enemy realized this, I think the turning point was where they realized that, first of all, they will not be in a position to control these huge areas far away from the line of battle, which they had just marched through in columns travelling along the main highways. When they realized that they couldn't take the capital, I think, this was the turning point when they realized that there is no way for them to succeed.

- How much time and dead Russians do you think it took for them to understand this?

- I don't know the exact number of the Russian soldiers who died advancing Kyiv, but I estimate there were thousands of them, lots of thousands. Much of the work was done by our mobile groups, because the enemy was moving by the main big roads, but there are also lots of smaller roads, along which our groups moved quite quickly, destroying their rear columns. We know that their helicopters were often piloted by commanding officers, who hoped that they would arrive at a place where everything would have been captured already, and they would deploy their command and control posts and report the success – this never happened. The helicopters had been all downed, burnt out with all these officers sitting inside, leaving the landing forces without command. That is, the enemy's losses in the Kyiv region were huge, I think they were shocked to see how catastrophically the situation would end for them.

- Then you got to the Kherson axis, right?

- Yes. After the enemy withdrew from Kyiv, Chernihiv, and Sumy regions, we sat down and decided that we should probably go southward. This is how we found ourselves at the Kherson front. It was May-June 2022. We got into positional battles, holding defenses, fighting off enemy assaults, making some miscellaneous sorties. We fought there, then moved to the Bakhmut axis, and by the time Kherson was liberated in the fall of 2022, my guys and I had been scattered across different units.

In the city of Kherson, there were no battles fought; the enemy was able to quickly (and in an organized manner) roll back to the other bank of the Dnieper... Indeed, we caught up with someone, captured someone, destroyed some equipment of theirs. Then we, being in bold, literally flew into Kherson, now empty from Russian troops. We, too, were among those who flew into the city, looked at the happy faces of local residents, gave kisses and hugs, and proceeded to the next front. That's how it was like then.

- What do you think made the Russians decide to withdraw?

- Logistics decides everything; where there is no logistics, you cannot supply ammunition, provisions for your troops fighting out there, given that the Dnieper is a pretty wide river, almost unsuitable for pontoon transport.  Where there is no bridge - that's it, boats will not solve the problem, and tanks will not be able to be transported across the river on barges either, because they will be destroyed quickly. This situation developed after the Armed Forces had conducted several successful operations north of Kherson, so it became clear to the Russians that the encirclement was tightening, that there was no point for them to stay any longer on the western bank. So they chose to withdraw, and that decision was appropriate. Indeed, it caused them a huge political turmoil, caused very high tension in their society. Even though their people are accustomed to being humiliated, it really cased their media to explode with rage. It was cool, I really liked it. But for the Russians, such a decision was appropriate in terms of military tactics.

- The events in Bakhmut, which you have already mentioned… The enemy began assaulting the town in 2022, but the fiercest battles took place in 2023. Tell us about this.

- At that time, I and the guys were looking more at the Zaporizhzhia front, wanted to fight together with another renowned unit. And so we chose Zaporizhzhia for ourselves. But before leaving, the leader of the unit to which we were attached at the time requested that we go to Kramatorsk for a few days, to do a few tasks there. And once in Kramatorsk - why not go and see what the situation is like in Bakhmut. We went to see it and it turned out that we stayed there for three long months.

In the summer, there still were no battles fought in the city itself, we continued holding a village near Bakhmut. But then Wagner’s units were already engaged in clashes with us, they just began gaining strength, were less visible in the media yet, almost no one had heard of them, but it was then when they were rolling in, were deployed to that front as early as in the summer of 2022. And we fought with them for control over the villages surrounding Bakhmut first, then over Bakhmut proper. That is, the town was more or less okay in those summer months, even supermarkets and public utilities were working, trolleybuses running, the town lived its regular life, more or less. But in late summer, sometime in August-September, the town began to gradually sink into darkness, because the enemy had already approached it closely, nearly crossed its boundary. And it became obvious that a massive evacuation was needed, the adversary forces were already pounding the city market, where people were killed in several such strikes. All establishments, supermarkets were got closed, utility services ceased to work... In other words, the town practically died out, with only military personnel staying there, holding the defense. And, since early August, Bakhmut began to be meticulously erased from the face of the earth.

- What was this battle of Bakhmut like for you personally?

- During the summer months, we were fighting in these villages surrounding Bakhmut, continued during the fall, and, in the winter of 2023, I was not there on a regular basis, just stopped by several times for short-term missions. The battle was extremely heavy. The artillery fire was very dense and violent, and it was then when Russia’s military began deploying drones in significant numbers. That is, the balance in the number of drones deployed by the Ukrainian and Russian armies began to level off, they already started deploying these drones en masse, particularly for dropping munitions... Plus dirt, cold, the winter was very cold, temperatures were far below freezing, there was a lot of dirt mixed into a pastry mud, with inclusions of “minced human meat", let’s call it so. It was really like that  - just an unbelievable meat grinder. I maintain that Bakhmut was one of the heaviest battles this war has seen so far: it was like walking on [Russian] corpses, literally. It was really tough out there, very tough. As for those who were fighting there on a regular basis during winter months, I just cannot imagine how they were able to endure this all. I had traveled there on short-term missions, let's say so, but our troops were stationed there on a permanent basis, the conditions were simply inhumane: cold, winter, and the defensive positions were inaccessible for vehicles, so soldiers had to walk to reach them. So, I arrived at the assigned defensive position and began fighting; it was nearly impossible to get to the positions, getting to these positions was already a success, it was a really tough challenge just to reach them. Therefore, the defense of Bakhmut was simply unreal in its difficulty.

- But the Russians, despite being overnumbered and overgunned, were suffering huge losses…

- Yes, I think it was the bloodiest time for the Russian army, because Prigozhin himself admitted one day that they had lost 20,000 soldiers dead, plus wounded casualties. He admitted this publicly, and this war, I reiterate it, is the war of artillery. That is, if we look into a Soviet army manual, it says that, in every battle the proportion between dead and wounded is typically one to three, that is, for every dead soldier there are three wounded.  This statistics is very approximate. But since we have a lot of lethal hits involved in this war, I estimate this proportion can reach one to ten. That is, typically, from my experience, it is like this: where there is one dead, there will be ten wounded. That is, if there are more than 20,000 dead, and it is the Wagner army alone – Wagner was not the only one to fight there, the Russian Ministry of Defense, too, was involved, assaulting from the flanks (battles were also fought on the flanks). I myself fought in flanking engagements -- in Klishchiivka, Kurdyumivka – the settlements on the flanks of Bakhmut where I had time to fight previously, and where the [Russians] suffered heavy losses, plus the losses suffered by their Ministry of Defense, which are numbered in the thousands. These 20.000+ Warger soldiers dead… Now just count the number of the wounded, the resulting numbers just don't stick in your head, it's tens of thousands of the wounded – those who will never come back to the war zone, they're cripples, severely injured, those who have been written off. Now we are reading about what they do in Russia: they kill, rape, rob, are sent back to prisons. That is, their losses were enormous, really huge. That summer (we can see this from Russian obituaries) was one of, if not the bloodiest for them. I think that this Bakhmut operation is perhaps the bloodiest for Russia, because the losses they suffered out there are simply sky-high. Well, I think Avdiivka stands somewhere alongside in terms of the losses the Russian military suffered seizing it, and this cannot but please us.

- How much more losses do you think they are ready to sacrifice?

- I assume that they still have a sufficient amount of forces and capabilities in reserve to attack within a wide front, which they are doing now actually. Because the number of volunteers they are hiring for money, big money, is high. They are offering really good terms for those who join; some regional authorities offer a one-off bonus worth up to $20,000 for joining the service. That's why there are so many rednecks fighting, those who have never seen such money in their lifetime. Plus they tell them that they would be additionally paid 266,000 rubles (nearly $3,000) every month. Indeed, nobody is expecting that they would be sent off to war just to be killed. Everyone hopes that they will kill, but will not be killed. ... But he comes there, is got killed, and that's it, no one is going to pay him. But due to this bait – this huge one-off bonus -- lots of Russian men volunteer into service; they have a really enormous human resource, provided primarily by different Russian regions. But those who volunteer guided by patriotic motivations, I don’t think there are many of them. So, they still have sufficient resources to fight on a broad front this year. But we should not look at this through rose-tinted spectacles. I think they will continue to attack, even if not within a wide front. Russia will never run out of resources to put a severe pressure on us until the end of this war, no matter when it is over. That is, come what may, a large country such as Russia will be able to collect sufficient human resources, no matter what their quality is. They will be able to collect enough human "meat" to succeed on at least one single front.  It should be taken to mind that there will be no time where they run out of steam and that’s it, they can't do anything anymore. No, never will this happen, they will be able to assault, put pressure on at least one single particular front.

- Tell us about the time you served with the Assault Regiment Safari. What makes it specific?

- I joined the Safari Regiment in March 2023. I learnt that a brigade such as Fury was being organized from several regiments. I was within the structure of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, as was the Fury Brigade. So, I thought that why not, why not try to. And as it turned out, I already had acquaintances serving with the Safari Regiment, because it used to be a separate regiment previously, and ultimately merged into the Fury Brigade. I contacted them, they told me: yes, okay, we are recruiting people, no problems at all - and I immediately joined the unit. It took me just a week to complete all the formalities. I didn't think for a long while, just saw that the unit was manned mostly with volunteers like me, with men who have already had combat experience, fought at many different fronts, joined as volunteers...

- Where are you fighting now, on which front? Tell if you can.

- We are currently fighting on the Toretsk Front. Soon it will be three months since we started there, but three months in Toretsk is perhaps like a whole year elsewhere. Currently, this front is definitely the most difficult among all others. And that is where we have been fighting nowadays.

- Tell me more, if you can, about the current situation out there.

- Toretsk is currently one of the stretches of the frontline the enemy is pressing on most heavily. Soon after we entered, a few days later, the enemy launched a massive attack towards the town. Once there, we were deployed in very close vicinity to the town of Horlivka. Just at the time we were holding defenses near Horlivka, which has been occupied since 2014, the enemy launched a massive offensive - so massive it was that never in my combat experience have I seen that many enemy infantry. We were looking not as much at the enemy's vehicles, which could blow up on mines or we could burn them out, but more at the number of their infantry, where ten go – ten eliminated, twenty go – twenty did not make it, thirty go every hour, just wave after wave were going. So heavy was the onslaught that it was simply impossible to contain it on any one single defensive position; the soldiers were holding  on as long as they could, but still they had to begin gradually retreating, while fighting, from those positions which faced the risk of encirclement or being bypassed from flanks. We in our unit are guided by the principle that it’s better to save people than to report that we were holding defenses to the end. It goes without saying that we hold a given defense line for as long as possible, but once the line of defense ceases to be effective, i.e. the enemy has bypassed it and moved on, that is, it no longer plays a role in defeating enemy infantry, in containing them, why then make people stay there so that they would ultimately be encircled, cut off and killed. That's why we were gradually retreating while fighting, and while some of the soldiers continued holding defense lines on most critical stretches, others were already setting up new defensive positions behind the old ones. The enemy had hit in this new line of defense, and slowed down very much, and we, for several bloody weeks, were able to contain enemy’s assaults for as long as we could. Then reinforcements arrived, several Armed Forces brigades, and full-fledged battles began. The enemy already realized that they could no longer advance by infantry only, and already began throwing in a large amount of armored equipment. Well, the third month is already going on like this. The enemy hasn’t advanced very deep, just several kilometers, not dozens. And right now battles are already being waged in Toretsk town proper; this is completely open information provided by DeepState, it is accessible to everyone, it is being updated; the enemy is already right in the town itself. Toretsk, like Bakhmut previously, is being erased from the face of the earth; Russia’s bomber airplanes are working extremely hard on Toretsk, dropping dozens of glide bombs every day. The situation is really critical out there, very tough. I would describe it as very tough, but not a disaster.

- What is the solders’ morale like?

- If we talk about physical and moral fatigue, it is present with everyone, indeed. But we take particular measures, where the warriors can undergo some kind of recovery, for example, are occasionally taken away to the rear, replenished, can go to see and have rest with their families, do additional combat team training and return to the war zone, it's okay. Moral fatigue is always there where a soldier is fighting in areas of the fiercest battles for a long while. Where this critical situation continues constantly, the fatigue will be there for sure, because you don't sleep, you are constantly in this situation, and it is very tough, really. But moral fatigue -- like everything is lost, we are tired of fighting, we will not be able to succeed -- there is no such thing, there is no talk of it, of course, there is no such thing among the units.

- Tell as more about your unit: what is your daily life like, are there any specific traditions followed? May be you have in stock some interesting stories to tell?

- Our whole life is in this war. Actually, there is no such thing as we go to rest somewhere, do not fight but instead are busy improving our living conditions. There is no such thing with anyone deployed to a war zone. There may happy pretty bizarre situations where a soldier, for example, who probably had skipped classes on orientation or cartography, can, when walking to a position, get lost somewhere, fall out of sight of our drones, walk around enemy positions and enter there some dugout just to see what it is like, and afterwards return back safely. This really is a kind of miracle. We have seen several such situations where soldiers were walking, somehow missed our positions, did not notice our guys hiding somewhere, that is, they were sitting, holding the defense and did not notice these soldiers passing by. Neither of them noticed each other. It was like a miraculous coincidence of circumstances: they came straight to the enemy's position, enemy infantrymen are sitting there, our guys come and say "yours", and they reply "what kind of yours?"; a firefight breaks up, but, miraculously enough, ours were able to escape whole and unharmed.  But upon arrival at the base, they were shocked to find bullets stuck in their rear body armor. There happened strange and curious situations, when guys surprisingly got out straight to an enemy’s dugout, but were lucky enough to ultimately get back without losses. Strange enough, we may suffer losses while moving to own defensive positions, but escape safely after entering a dugout with enemy infantrymen sitting inside.  

-- You’ve travelled a long path from 2014 to the present day. Are there any memorable stories you would like to tell us?

-  One such story took place during the ATO, when the adversary was assaulting towards Mariupol, it was some time in August or early September 2014. My platoon and I were assigned to a defensive position located somewhere nearby Volnovakha. We were standing, holding the defense alongside some unit, I don't even remember which one, and, in the morning, soldiers from this allied unit collected their belongings, got on their vehicles and just took off, leaving us alone. I call my commander and say: so and so, we are standing at such and such a location, there is no one on the right-hand side, no one on the left-hand side, the enemy is approaching, what should do next? He replies: gather the people, move towards Mariupol, you will receive further tasks, will hold the defense on another front. We all embark a "shishiga", people take seats on the back, there are 30 of them, I take a seat in the cab, we are driving, approach a roadblock in Mariupol; the whole city was surrounded by roadblocks, which were set up on every highway, every road, literally. Up ahead I see a roadblock made of concrete blocks, with a ZU-300 mounted onto it, a large-caliber anti-aircraft gun, a heavy machine gun, simply put, with civilian vehicles waiting on both sides, stuck in a traffic jam. We are driving along a lane squeezing between those vehicles, and, as we are driving closer, I see civilians jumping out of their vehicles and diving into a ditch, fleeing their vehicles. I don’t understand what’s that, what’s going on. And I see soldiers at the roadblock begin fussing around, running to-and-fro, someone grabbed an RPG [rocket-propelled grenade launcher]… I understand that they are mistaking us for the enemy, since we are heading from the Volnovakha Front, to which, as rumors had it, the adversary had just advanced too close, and we are driving along this same highway, with no identification marks on our truck. I see that they mistake us for the enemy, see this ZU, see the gunner taking his seat, rotating the gun mount, the barrel is gradually turning towards us, and I realize that this ZU is going to shoot at our vehicle. Everyone will be dead, the whole platoon eliminated. I had a really hard time deciding what to do: if you stop - they will start shooting, drive back - they will start shooting, drive forward – the gun barrel is already pointed at you... Beneath my feet was my backpack with a Ukrainian flag inside. I remember my hands trembling when hastily searching for it. I am looking at this ZU while simultaneously searching through my backpack. Finally I found the flag, drew it up so that they could see it when we already got close to the roadblock. I look out of the window to see one helmet sticking out from one side, another helmet... We drive up, and they at the roadblock, with their eyes frightened wide open, just say, using swear words: “Guys, what on earth are you doing, where are you heading, we almost shot you”. The situation was just like that, it has etched in my memory. I just could have died due to this lack of organization and of understanding of who is moving where, who is advancing, who is retreating. This situation, albeit curious, could really have ended up with a tragedy.

- What supports you the most in difficult moments?

- I understand that no matter how difficult it is, no matter how much I want some actions to stop, everything to end, want to have some rest, I invariably find the strength and the will power to continue on. What influences and motivates me is that I do not manage my life alone, but, since you have people under your command, you understand that if you fail, degrade in terms of your mental abilities, in terms of your effectiveness and efficiency, capacity to work, this will affect the guys fighting out there. That's why you don't have the right to degrade like that, degrade mentally, surrender to something that you could not;  you just don't have the right to do that, because the guys who are sitting there in the trenches, they are expecting from you explicit planning, explicit orders, an understanding of the situation and a support in a critical moment. If I become ineffective, begin filling my head with some ass thoughts, like I am depressed, tired, have no strength left, this may cause people to die. Accordingly, I just have no right to even think of this, and that’s what motivates me the most.

- The Ukrainians have recently been surveyed about what they are ready to sacrifice for peace. Around 20 percent of those surveyed said they favor peace negotiations with Russia. What do think a potential peace deal should be like? On what terms the peace deal could be agreed upon?

- Look, I make a distinction between peace and ceasefire. To me, a peace is when we and the enemy have resolved all our disputes and are going through some difficult process of restoring our relationships. For example, we, hypothetically, have a disputed territory with some enemy, we fight and this territory goes to someone, or it is divided in half, and the parties come to an agreement that any further war would make no sense. I do not apply the word "peace" to the Russians in any way, I can only talk about the cessation of hostilities, that is, I will never accept any kind of peace with them. As long as I'm alive, I can only stop fighting with them, because that's what the politicians will decide. I can only stop shooting at them, but never will I put up with them after what they've done. I just cannot put up with anyone who totally rejects my Ukrainian ethnicity, that is, the one who hates my people. I cannot put up with them, they are an eternal existential enemy of ours. In other words, I will never have peace with them, and will bring up my children with this same understanding.

Regarding a ceasefire… Well, it can be reached and will be reached some day, it is obvious, because all wars end sooner or later. On what terms? Certainly not on those that are existing now. It is impossible, no matter how tough its now, how hard it is to recruit more people, maintain morale, fight against the Russians. After all, the Russian army is one of the strongest armies in the world. Stories like "they are recruiting rednecks, will simply throw us up with human meat” don’t work out on me. Yes, they do throw us up with "meat", but they are still a very mighty army, very resourceful, highly technological in many respects; they are cool in fighting, deploying lots of EW capabilities, long-range weapons, we feel it on ourselves, it’s not always that Western donated systems can counter them effectively enough. This must be factored in, they have a centuries-old, powerful history of warfighting. We have to admit it, because we are otherwise going to lose this war. Ukrainian leaders are explicitly stating that there will be no peace on these terms, and it’s really great that this will not be the case, because it is simply impossible. Indeed, we all aspire to get our territorial integrity back, secure our sovereignty and have the right to build our future as we wish, join whatever international organizations or military alliances we wish. I, on my own land, do whatever I want. Some Russian, some redneck will never dictate me what I should do, which alliances join or not join. As long as he will be dictating me what I should do, I will be fighting with him until he has no arguments or strength left to impose anything on me. We will be biting their throats until they say: OK, let there be Ukraine, let there be Ukrainians, let them do what they wish, let's mind our own business, we have enough of our own problems at home. Once that happens, we will cease fire, fence ourselves off with some unrealistic multilayered defense, set up some impervious defensive positions, will just isolate ourselves from these monsters for several centuries to come. Fate decreed that this is our neighbor, we cannot do anything about it, this is our destiny - to be strong not for one year, not for two, not for three, not for five, it will never pass, we need to be strong throughout all our history. Russia is the biggest country on planet Earth, they have a lot of resources, a lot of people, and a lot of capabilities to kill us, so we need to be ten, twenty times stronger than any other nation on this planet. And I'm sure we will be able to tackle this challenge well.

- Well, I thank you for these words and for what you are doing. Now that our interview is wrapping up, I would like to offer you blitz questions; I ask you to answer quickly and briefly, are you ready?

- Yes.

- To you, the war is...

- An opportunity to be a man, satisfy military needs, to protect and defend the nation.

- Who is your hero?

- For me, a hero is every soldier who scarifies all he has to defend our State in the current conditions.

- The assault soldier, in one word…

- Meat.

- What would you choose for your vacation after the war is over: the best resort in the world, Black Sea beach in Odesa, the Carpathians, you continue?

- Probably just to sit in a dark room for a few days with some Negroni or Whiskey Sour, just alone with myself.

- With what thought do you wake up?

- What happened there at the positions over the night.

- How do you rest after a job well done?

- Where and whenever possible, I go to see my child.

- What is your favorite dish amid war?

- Boiled eggs.

- What is the greatest reward for you?

- Recognition of the people who chose me to be a commander.

- What does independence mean to you?

- The ability to independently determine own future.

Interviewed by Diana Slavinska

The full video of this interview as available on Ukrinform TV YouTube channel