Disputes broke out between President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyi and his chief general Valery Zaluzhny, chief of the General Staff in Kyiv, in connection with the withdrawal of troops from the city of Bakhmut, writes Bild with reference to sources in the political leadership of Ukraine. .

According to the sources of the German newspaper, Zaluzhny a few weeks ago recommended the withdrawal of Ukrainian forces from this city in the Donetsk region, which Russia has been trying to seize since the beginning of August last year.

The military leadership in Kyiv would believe that Bakhmut is not a city of strategic importance and that leaving here will not have a decisive impact on the front in Donbas.

But the Ukrainian political leadership would perceive this city as a symbol of resistance to the invading troops, because thousands of mercenaries of Wagner’s group, led by Yevgeny Prigozhin, died here.

A large number of Russian soldiers also surrendered during the fighting around the city. Although the losses of the Russians are much higher, a significant number of Ukrainian soldiers also died on this part of the front in the east of Ukraine.

Why Zelensky wants to keep Bakhmut

According to sources in the Ukrainian military, Zaluzhny would like to protect its soldiers as much as possible, but Zelenskyi’s civilian administration fears that the same intense fighting will break out elsewhere if the Ukrainian military surrenders Bakhmut.

Bild notes that Zaluzhnyi’s position is shared by the majority of the Ukrainian military. A Ukrainian military analyst told a German newspaper on condition of anonymity that “the vast majority of soldiers in Bakhmut do not understand why the city is being held.”

“Questions that the guys from Bakhmut ask themselves: what is the strategy? Why should we stay here when we are surrounded by the enemy?”, he adds.

Bild notes that its journalists have spoken to dozens of Ukrainian soldiers in Bakhmut in recent months, and their general mood is clear: the withdrawal should have happened a long time ago.

“If we are completely surrounded here, it will be a disaster,” declared one of these soldiers.

Bakhmut, a trap for the Ukrainian army?

Another Ukrainian military adviser told Bild that “in the beginning Bakhmut was a trap for the Russians, now it has become a trap for us.”

“We kill them in a ratio of 1:7 (for every Ukrainian killed, seven Russians die), this is the only military reason to keep Bakhmut. But the troops should have withdrawn three weeks ago, when the Russians took Krasna Gora,” he added.

Bild published this article on the same day that Ukrainian media reported that Ukrainian soldiers from Bakhmut feel abandoned by the army leadership.

“Our battalion arrived in mid-December, there were 500 of us among the other platoons,” Boris, a military medic from the Odesa region who is fighting in the Bakhmut region, told Kyiv Independent journalists. “Last month there were only 150 people,” he says.

“When you go into a position, there’s not even a 50/50 chance you’re going to get out (alive),” another soldier said. “The odds are more like 30/70,” he says.

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