From Bucha to Kherson: Zelensky's War Front Trips Underpinning His Leadership

Since the first weeks of the war in Ukraine, President Volodimir Zelensky has wanted to show that, although he lives in the presidential bunker in kyiv, he steps into the mud as soon as his security team allows him to.

This Monday's visit to the city of Kherson, a few hours after his military arrived, is not the first of its kind that he has made.

The president tries to move with relative frequency to the areas liberated or especially punished by the Russians.

In this way, although the military strategy is something that he himself insists is far from his decisions, the president underpins his presence as the country's highest authority while he covers and congratulates the troops.

In addition to gaining visibility, Zelenski sends a double message inside and outside the home.

On the one hand, he allows you to raise the morale of the Ukrainian population and its soldiers;

on the other, he appeals to the international community, to which he conveys his determination not to give up even an inch of the country in the midst of pressure to negotiate.

These trips also complement the speech that he addresses to the citizens from kyiv every night.

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The first outing was made at the beginning of April.

Then, after five weeks of invasion, the Ukrainian army managed to repel the attempt of the Russian troops to take the capital.

Zelensky went to Bucha, a symbol of local resistance and the scene of the massacre of dozens of civilians.

Then came trips to Kharkov, Lugansk, Zaporizhia, Mikolaiv, Odesa and Izium (Kharkov region), in the east and south of the country, where the fighting is concentrated.

All are enclaves that represent the advances or resistance of Ukraine in the military field against what is considered the second army in the world.

Since the invasion began, the president has not set foot outside of Ukraine once.

Yes, his ministers and advisers do.

Even the first lady, Olena Zelenska.

They always do it by land, since the airspace remains closed to civil aviation.

For this reason, these trips by the president, even within the country, are even more important.

In them, the team that runs the reins of Zelenski takes the opportunity to offer the media images that go beyond their interventions in international forums through a screen or receiving leaders or personalities of all kinds in protocol meetings in kyiv.

The president, who has dominated the scene since his days as a television comedian, also knows how to take advantage of these visits.

One of the most popular videos on social networks this Monday was the greeting to some neighbors in Kherson who, from the window of their house, responded with the most popular cry in this war:

(Glory to Ukraine!).

The one on Monday followed the pattern of previous visits: not even the dozens of reporters from around the world who, starting early in the morning, left by bus from Mikolaiv to Kherson, were not notified.

This was also the case when she left her presidential offices for the first time to leave kyiv.

She went on April 4 to go to Bucha, a city on the outskirts of the capital that has since become a symbol of Russian barbarism.

The death of some 400 civilians during the five weeks of occupation of that town is still being investigated.

Then came his first trip to eastern Ukraine during the Russian invasion.

She was also planted by surprise in Kharkov, on May 29.

The country's second city was not subjugated by the invaders, but it is one of the most bombed places due to its proximity to the Russian border, about thirty kilometers.

The last time, on the night of Sunday to last Monday, when three missiles fell on an industrial area.

The following week, the president went a step further in his attempt to demonstrate his intention to maintain the reins of power.

On June 5, he entered the Donbas hornet's nest and spent a few hours with the troops in the towns of Soledar and Lisichansk, in the troubled Lugansk region, also in the east of the country.

The Ukrainian president also traveled to the neighboring region of Zaporizhia, where the largest nuclear power plant in Europe is located, in Russian hands and the constant scene of fighting.

There he visited a sanatorium and spoke with displaced people from occupied towns like Mariupol.

Zelensky then traveled, on June 18, to Mikolaiv, an important enclave on the shores of the Black Sea, a constant target of bombing by the invader and close to Kherson.

Late in July and sponsored by the UN and Turkey, an agreement was reached to unblock the ports so that Ukraine, one of the world's breadbaskets, could export its grain.

The signing of that pact that allows the output of the grain from the Black Sea took place in Istanbul on the 22nd of that same month.

The next day, Russia bombarded the port of Odessa, the country's largest.

The president went there six days later.

Zelensky's last appearance outside the capital, before his visit to Kherson this Monday, was in the town of Izium (Kharkov region), on September 14.

He did it a few hours before he began to dig in the more than 400 graves left by the Russian forces in a pine forest in that city, tremendously affected by the bombing and the occupation.

Some of the bodies showed signs of torture, according to the first assessments made by forensics.

There are no public details about the route and means of transport used by the Ukrainian president to get from kyiv to these points.

Some are more than 700 kilometers from his office.

It did come to light, however, on the evening of September 14, that the vehicle in which Zelenski was traveling had suffered an accident while returning from Izium, from which the president was unharmed.

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