брифинг в пентагоне в понедельник- And then if you don't mind, kind of giving us a better picture of what's going in Bakhmut, what's going on there? We've been seeing a lot of imagery of the craters and everything. Who is winning right now in that area? How would you describe what's going on with the intense fighting?
SENIOR MILITARY OFFICIAL:
The -- in terms of Bakhmut, you know, if you think of Bakhmut as a triangle -- I want to -- and if you'll wait -- if you'll give me a minute, I'm going to pull up a graphic that I've got because I think it will help, in terms of defining for you some size and space. Just one second, I'm sorry.
Hey, I'm sorry, Carla. So I can't find the graphic. The team's going to look for me while I'm doing it. What I was hoping to do for you is kind of describe to you the -- what the battlefield looks like, in terms of size and space, to give you some perspective, particularly back here in D.C., for those who are in the D.C. area.
The bottom line is if you look at -- if it's a triangle the northern portion of that triangle is Soledar, and then you work your way south, again, through Bakhmut and then down south of Bakhmut -- Andrivka is the other town on one of the axis, and then Chasiv Yar -- if you come out to the northwest to Chasiv Yar and then you drive that thing back to the northeast, over to Soledar, that would give you the triangle that I'm talking about.
Throughout the past and you all have watched this as well as I have. In fact, there may be people on the line now that have been there who will have better SA on this than I do -- but essentially, over the last couple of months, as you know, this fight in Bakhmut has been just really savage.
And what I mean by "savage" is you're talking about thousands upon thousands of artillery rounds that have been delivered between both sides. In many cases, you know, you're looking at, you know, several thousand artillery rounds in a day that are being exchanged.
I think I mentioned the last time I did a presser, where I talked about the comparison between World War I and, you know, I had a picture, a graphic, and that graphic was from Bakhmut. And essentially it showed, you know, the devastation that's been or the devastation that's resulted because of that.
You also, as a result, because of the trenches and because of the rain, and this is rolling terrain. So, you've got -- if you were able to zoom in on the terrain itself, you'd find that there are a number of valleys and as a result a number of spurs or larger pieces of high ground that also transport them -- or that are a part of this portion of this triangle.
And so, you had, and you have trench lines and others across all of these to the point where over the course of a day you may see an exchange of 100 meters. You may see an exchange of 300 or 400 meters. You'll have a platoon position, and this is on either side, you'll have a platoon position that is overrun -- or overrun's a wrong term, but platoon position that is taken by one or the other and then the next day you may see that platoon position change hands again. So, over the last 10 days or so we've seen some movement in the north on Soledar.
And so, Soledar itself is a town which is at the base of one of these draws I was talking about, has been contested now pretty significantly. So, we do think that there are a good portion of Soledar that the Russians have in their hands and the Ukrainians do as well. And these exchanges are -- and as I mentioned, savage. So, when you -- they have these rolling volleys of artillery fire and then the Russians we know will follow that with all sorts of people that are not their best fighters.
So, read, you know, the prisoners from Wagner Group, read mobilize soldiers. And then once those folks go up and, you know, essentially take the brunt of whatever Ukrainian response there is, then you have better trained forces that move behind them to claim the ground that these individuals have walked over. And if you go back in Russian history, you'll see that there are plenty of examples of the Russians trading individuals for bullets and we're seeing that in this area.
So again, really severe and savage fighting that's occurring along this series of axis. I think the different -- or the distance from Soledar, and again, I'm still working on this graphic, but the distance between Soledar and Bakhmut I think is really somewhere around 7 kilometers. It's not very far. But, so anyways, back and forth fighting here and, you know, forces are rolling people into the line as quickly as they can, in some cases to preserve what they have on either side.
- расскажите, что происходит в Бахмуте. Мы видим много изображений с воронками и всё такое. Кто побеждает?
- Бахмут, знаете там на самом деле такой треугольник, сейчас найду картинку.
Извините, не нашёл, сейчас опишу словами. В общем, там такой треугольник, на севере Соледар, потом на юг через Бахмут в Андриивку
(Андриивки я там не нашла, может, он попутал), в потом на северозапад в Часив Яр.
Всё время, как минимум последние 2 месяца бои там ужасно свирепые.
Под "свирепыми" я имею в виду - тысячи и тысячи артиллерийских снарядов с обеих сторон. Несколько тысяч снарядов. В день.
В прошлый раз я сравнивал с первой мировой войной, показывал фото, эти фото были из Бахмута. На фото можно было видеть разорительные результаты.
И там пересечённая местность, и окопы, и дождь.
В общем в течение дня можно увидеть, как кто-то продвинулся на 100 м. Или на 300-400 м. Вот тут одни взяли позицию взвода, вот на след. день назад потеряли. Последние 10 дней мы видим какое-то движение в Соледаре.
Соледар сам по себе город, в котором происходят вот такие движения, как я описал, там сейчас борьба за него. Большую часть Соледара рашисты захватили, и большая часть у украинцев. И свирепые перестрелки. Т.е. сначала эти залпы артиллерии, потом рашисты кидают туда мясо похуже. Вагнеровцев этих, мобиков. Плохое мясо получает на себя основную силу ответа от украинцев, а за ними идёт мясо получше натренированное и заявляет, что они всё заняли. Если посмотреть на рашистскую историю, это их любимая стратегия - обменивать мясо на пули (trading individuals for bullets).
Короче, суровые и жестокие бои там. И вы знаете, расстояние от Соледара до Бахмута всего 7 км, недалеко. Но бои там туда-сюда, и военные подгоняют новых людей насколько могут быстро, чтобы сохранить то, что отбили.
Q: Hey, thanks for doing this. I just had a question about given Russia's ongoing aerial barrages from cruise missiles and Iranian drones, I was wondering if you can give us a sense of how you view the state of Ukrainian air defense? Do they the capabilities to continue pushing back against these and intercepting a high percentage of them and just how you see that capability holding up as we hit -- as we near the one year mark.
SENIOR MILITARY OFFICIAL: Yes, you know it -- this is interesting that you asked that, Oren. I think -- you know I said this last summer. Last summer we were talking about the Ukrainian withdrawal from Severodonetsk and I mentioned that I thought at some point we would probably study the Ukrainian's ability to conduct, you know, withdrawal under contact.
I think we will do the same thing as it relates to air defenses. If you look at the way the Ukrainians have created an air defense network of all sorts of different types of air defense and you look at the success that they're having against not just cruise missiles but in particular against the UAV situation. It's really staggeringly positive.
And so the question will be, you know -- again, it's not like -- it's not unlike any other stuff. I mean how long until the Russians decide that, you know, this is a kind of fruitless effort on their part. And you know recent decisions by the international community, again, to support the air defense aspect of the site I think are only going to enhance the Ukrainian ability to sustain themselves from that regard.
- у меня вопрос про этот постоянный шквал крылатых ракет и дронов от русских. Как вы оцениваете украинскую противовоздушную оборону? У них есть способности продолжать противостоять и перехватывать большой процент? как вы вообще оцениваете, если учесть, что скоро год уже.
- Интересно, что вы спросили. Прошлым летом я говорил про украинское отступление из Северодонецка и говорил, что мы это занесём в учебники, как офигительно умелое отступление под огнём.
Ну мы то же самое сделаем про их воздушную оборону. Если посмотреть, какую они создали сеть различных типов вооружений, и какой у них успех не только против крылатых ракет, но и против дронов. Это просто потрясающе.
Т.е. вопрос конечно, как обычно, в том, когда русским надоест, когда они поймут, что всё бесполезно. И то, что международное сообщество недавно добавило украинцам ещё оружия, украинцам ещё больше поможет.
SENIOR MILITARY OFFICIAL: So Lara, no significant adjustments to what we're seeing in Kherson. The -- you know, the Ukrainians continue to receive shelling from across the river from the Russians and they continue to try to resolve the situation the Russians left behind, in terms of armaments and booby traps, mines, you name it, but no other major adjustment.
- В Херсоне мы не видим особых изменений. Рашисты продолжают их обстреливать через реку, и им ещё приходится почистить всё, что рашисты оставили, когда драпали, - мины, ловушки.
