One of the marines who was part of the elite brigade that the UDF is said to have destroyed at Vugledar has spoken about what is happening on the battlefield as Vladimir Putin boasts on state television that the Russian military is “fighting heroically”, writes Meduza .

Ukraine’s armed forces have reportedly destroyed “almost an entire brigade” of 155 Marines during fighting in Vugledar in the Donetsk region, Politico reported Sunday, citing Ukrainian military official Oleksiy Dmytrashkivskyi. This is the third destruction of a Navy brigade since the beginning of the war.

Ukraine’s armed forces have reportedly destroyed “almost the entire brigade” of 155 Marines during the fighting in Vugledar in the Donetsk region, Politico reported, citing Ukrainian military official Oleksiy Dmytrashkivskyi. This is the third destruction of a Navy brigade since the beginning of the war.

Russian troops were also losing 150-300 riflemen per day near Vugledar, said Dmytrashkivskyi. According to his estimates, the brigade consisted of about 5 thousand soldiers, whose members were killed, wounded or captured.

A marine of the 155th brigade told the independent Telegram channel 7×7 that the Russian military had been storming Vugledar since January 23.

The brigade consisted of 80-90% of the mobilized, and due to heavy losses, “new troops were brought in.”

After the last assault, no more than eight men remained in the third company of the amphibious assault brigade, the marine claims. Many soldiers were captured.

“I would rather be captured”

“Those who survived were said to be deserters. I would rather be captured and never come back. The attitude (probably the attitude of the Russian command towards those who survived in the brigade) is as good as possible. They have already killed 500 people, maybe even more. The brigade commander said we would only go home with 200 dead or 300 wounded,” said the Marine.

The information about the prisoners is confirmed by the data of another Telegram channel “Don’t wait for me from Ukraine”, which publishes information about the dead and captured Russian soldiers.

According to 7×7, the names of 13 marines of the 155th brigade, captured since February 3, are known.

The Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation did not comment on the reports of the defeat of the 155th brigade and losses among the marines.

“The Marines are doing the right thing right now. Fight heroically. Both the Pacific Fleet and the Northern Fleet,” Russian President Vladimir Putin said on February 9 after a meeting of the Supervisory Board of the Agency for Strategic Initiatives.

A fragment of this quote was heard on February 12, when the Ukrainian Armed Forces announced the destruction of a brigade of elite troops, in the “Moscow. Kremlin. Putin” program on the “Russia 1” TV channel.

The failure in Wulgledar speaks of problems that may be reflected elsewhere on the front

Vugledar is a scene of chaotic scenes, and Russian military bloggers call it a fiasco: Russian tanks wobble wildly before exploding or driving straight into minefields, soldiers running in all directions, some of them on fire, bodies of soldiers stuck in tank tracks, writes CNN.

The scenes were recorded by Ukrainian military drones over the past two weeks around the town of Vugledar in Donetsk, eastern Ukraine, where successive Russian attacks have failed.

The disaster at Vugledar shows the chronic failures of Russian command and tactics as they prepare for the spring offensive. If such failures are repeated elsewhere on the long military front in Donetsk and Luhansk, they could jeopardize the Kremlin’s plans to seize additional territory.

Elite brigade, destroyed for the third time in a year

This is not the first time that this elite brigade of naval forces has been destroyed.

“The 155th brigade had to be replenished three times already. The first time after Irpin and Buchi; the second time they were defeated near Donetsk – they recovered again. And now almost the entire brigade has already been destroyed near Vugledar,” said Dmytrashkivskyi.

An open letter attributed to Marines of the Pacific Fleet’s 155th Brigade has gone viral on Russian social media and Russian Telegram channels after they complained of being wiped out during the battle, which they said was instigated by their commanders , to get prizes and medals.

Shortly after their letter was widely shared by well-known Russian military bloggers who have hundreds of thousands of followers on Telegram, a video showing artillery strikes by marines also appeared on social networks of Ukrainians in the village of Pavlivka, Donetsk region.

In their letter, the marines asked the governor of the Primorye region, Oleg Kozhemyako, to launch an independent investigation by the Russian Ministry of Defense into why they were sent to attack.

The Russian military claimed to have lost 300 men in just 4 days of fighting, the unit suffered more casualties than in both Chechen wars in which it participated.

One of the reasons their message went viral on Russian social media was that the attack really appeared without any clear military objective, taking place almost 150 kilometers from the city of Bakhmut, where the main Russian offensive from Donetsk is heading. region.

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