Special envoy to the Kherson region
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Tuesday, Dudtchani is drowned in a deluge of fire and the crash of artillery.
Columns of smoke swell around, drones fly at low altitude.
Grad missiles are ejected in rolling waves.
The atmosphere is confused, electric.
At a checkpoint, a Ukrainian soldier with a long beard rushes towards our vehicle.
“
Do you want to stay alive?
Turn around
,” he yells.
We run.
The road is blocked, we take a rutted dirt road.
Hungry, a disoriented soldier calls us: he begs for bread.
A strategic crossroads
Twenty-four hours later, relative calm fell on the village.
On Wednesday, the 60th Ukrainian Motorized Infantry Brigade recaptured this hamlet bordering the western bank of the Dnieper - a few thousand pre-war inhabitants - taking a small step further on the road to Kherson.
Concretely, it liberated the southern part of Dudtchani, separated by an arm of the river, pushing the Russian forces further south.
In the opposite direction, some artillery units having completed their mission went north via the coastal road, giving way during the day to infantry and mine clearance units responsible for clearing and securing the area.
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The offensive towards Kherson, officially announced at the beginning of September, has entered an “
active phase
” which seems to be bearing fruit, confirm several military sources.
On Wednesday, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu officially ordered the withdrawal of his troops present on the western bank of the Dnieper, which would theoretically include those defeated at Dudtchani a few hours earlier.
And Roman, who leads a unit of ten men located four kilometers north of the liberated village, displays a bigger smile than the day before.
“
We are very happy
”, confided the young sergeant, Wednesday at the beginning of the afternoon.
The breakthrough to Kherson, which fell into Russian hands at the start of the war, took several directions.
The shortest starts from Mikolaiv, the Black Sea port that the Ukrainians hold firmly, despite almost daily Russian bombardments.
The second emanates from the northeast of Kherson, roughly borrowing the western bank of the Dnieper.
Several kilometers away, the eastern shore is entirely controlled by the Russians.
"
Now we have to gain as much distance as possible, but with as few losses as possible.
“Summarizes Roman.
The capture of Dudtchani opens the way to Berislav, located 50 kilometers further on, at a strategic crossroads: on the left, the annexed Crimean peninsula;
on the right, Kherson.
It is on this last road that a bridge was destroyed on Wednesday, probably at the initiative of the Russians in their retreat.
Hasty retreat
"
We will take Berislav in two or three months
" estimated the young sergeant on Tuesday, while in recent weeks, time has stretched.
"
Our movements are slowing down
," acknowledged Ukrainian Defense Minister Alexei Reznikov three days ago.
The weather is the argument most often invoked.
However, in recent weeks, although the temperatures have dropped, the weather has remained dry.
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The wait weighs on the morale of the two Sergei, sitting around a cup of tea.
In their trench shelter, which they have not left for a month, these two rank and file soldiers show the map of the front in the light of their flashlight, complaining about the obsolescence of their Soviet rifles and the absence military vehicles.
“
The more time passes, the more the Russians strengthen their positions, and the more difficult it will be to advance
”, still feared one of the two comrades on Tuesday.
The geography of the places makes it possible to grasp the challenges facing the Ukrainian army.
The distance separating Dudachi from Kherson - 120 kilometers - is four times greater than that linking the latter town to the Mikolaiv front, complicating the future junction of the two forces all the more.
The villages giving access to Dudtchani and Bereslav are far from each other, separated by poor roads, stretching the logistics lines endlessly.
Some, totally destroyed, or lacking the most basic services, could prevent the units from finding reliable support there.
"
The front is very extended, we are not going as far as we would like and the snow will arrive.
But if winter is the same for everyone, we, unlike the Russians, defend our own land.
And that's a huge advantage
,” reassures Roman who, unlike his men, took up his position a week ago.
And opposite, "
all the Russians know how to do, apart from murder, is dig holes
".
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The proof in a grove, still occupied by Kremlin soldiers in mid-October.
Belongings lie in a deep pit.
Two recently dug graves remained empty.
In their hasty retreat, the Russian soldiers did not have time to deposit the corpses of their comrades there.
A duvet, a blanket and a boned car seat are lying around in a shelter, as is the cover of a short story by Tolstoy,
Tales of Sebastopol.
It is two hundred meters from these relics that a medical team from the 60th brigade is stationed, waiting to transport the wounded from Doudtchani.
We find the group an hour later in an annex of the civil hospital of Novovorontsvoka (North), where the chief doctor draws up an undervalued assessment of the losses.
Several dozen injuries are to be deplored, including one seriously, in the left leg and pelvis.
The death toll remains, a priori, unknown.
"
In Dudtchari, the fight was tough but very effective
," says Oleg, his bloody skull wrapped in a bandage and his arm in a sling.
The American armored Humvee he was driving on Wednesday morning hit an anti-tank mine, causing four minor injuries.
At the same time, on the road to the village, a drone hit a checkpoint a few minutes after our vehicle had passed, killing several people.
Sergeant Roman, who heard the news, called us in stride, worried: “
Are you alive?
For the non-commissioned officer, who lost his comrades in the drone attack, the last 24 hours will remain mixed.
