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Wagner founder Yevgeny Prigozchin: "Even tanks and infantry fighting vehicles can move in it"
Photo:
Uncredited / dpa
The founder of the Russian mercenary group Wagner, Yevgeny Prigozhin, reportedly justified the bitter drive to take the small Ukrainian town of Bakhmut with huge tunnel systems there in which troops and tanks could find shelter.
"The icing on the cake is the Soledar and Bakhmut mining system, which is actually a network of underground cities," Prigozhin said on Saturday, according to Reuters information via Telegram.
"Not only can it accommodate a large group of people at a depth of 80 to 100 meters, but tanks and armored personnel carriers can also move in it."
Weapons have been stored in these tunnels since World War I.
Bachmut is an important logistics center with unique defensive positions.
The Russian army and the Wagner group have been trying to take Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine for five months.
Western military experts have expressed surprise, given the heavy Russian casualties and the possibility that Ukrainian forces could withdraw to nearby new defensive positions if a Russian victory were won.
So it would be a Pyrrhic victory.
According to Reuters, US sources said on Thursday that Prigozhin wanted to take control of the salt and gypsum mines in the region for commercial reasons.
The alleged military use of the underground facilities was not mentioned.
There are indications that financial motives drive Russia and Prigozhin's "obsession" with Bakhmut, Reuters quoted an unnamed official as saying.
Bakhmut is called Artjomowsk by the Russian side.
It is known that a tunnel system of mines extends over more than 160 kilometers in the region.
In peacetime, concerts and football matches were held in a large underground hall.
Sol/Reuters
