Day 1166

On 4 May, there are a lot of interesting updates from the Pokrovsk direction.

Here, in the open fields southeast of Pokrovsk, Russian forces are desperate to push Ukrainians back and salvage what little is left of their logistics.

However, as specialized Ukrainian equipment prevents Russians from even launching their assaults, Russian wrecks and bodies are quickly piling up, leading to another disaster for the Russian army.

The goal of the Russian forces is to advance north of their positions in Nadiivka across open fields to consolidate positions along the Solona River. This is because the Russian bridgehead on the western flank of Pokrovsk is too narrow, allowing the Ukrainians to constantly strike their logistics and forcing them to cancel their operational goals.

By advancing to the Solona river and expanding their control here, the Russians hope to facilitate a larger crossing and a wider pincer maneuver, hoping this will ease their logistical challenges if they have less of a chokepoint for Ukrainians to target.

The first attempts to expand their control here, in the direction of Uspenivka, proved to be complete failures, as Russian corpses litter the approaches. So, Russians doubled down on their efforts from the south.

Here, Russian supply lines are not as exposed and in a fire pocket as in the western pincer, meaning that Russians can employ armored vehicles without them being intercepted by Ukrainian drone and artillery fire along the way.

To counter this, the Ukrainian forces are employing remote mining techniques to scatter landmines in the fields between them and the Russians. The remote mining is conducted through the use of specialized artillery shells that open up to drop and scatter anti-personnel and anti-tank mines out over a specific area. Additionally, Ukrainians use heavy octocopter drones to carry and lay landmines on roads and chokepoints to further enhance and replenish the minefields.

Geolocated combat footage from the area reveals how the Russian armored units struggled to continue their attacks due to landmines. BMP infantry fighting vehicles, poorly armored against anything beyond small arms fire, were obliterated by landmines that detonated their internal ammunition, killing all aboard. Russian tanks, though more resilient, were eventually disabled by multiple mine blasts, forcing crews to abandon them, only for the tanks and the crew to be finished off by Ukrainian FPV drones.

After these assaults, the Ukrainians sought to prevent more Russian units from coming their way, knowing that they would eventually try to advance by overwhelming the Ukrainians with sheer numbers through heaps of destroyed metal and blood. To prevent the Russians from being able to even launch their assaults,Ukrainians decided to scatter landmines in the Russian rear to prevent them from initiating any new assault.

The Russians heavily rely on the town of Selydove for logistical support, where they station all of their tanks, armored vehicles, soldiers and ammunition. The Russian frontline positions are connected to it by one asphalt road, leaving it as the only route for their logistical support to deploy their forces. Unfortunately for Russians, this made it the best place for the Ukrainians to scatter their landmines to prevent Russians from launching their assaults.

Geolocated footage from the area reveals how Ukrainians mined the entire road, as one of the Russian vehicles moving to Nadiivka was completely obliterated by the landmine explosion.

The footage shows how the landmines up to 6 other wrecks lay scattered around the same crossing, indicating that Ukrainians are constantly replenishing these minefields after Russians cleared them one way or another. When still trying to conduct larger assaults, Russians moved in with platoon-sized formations of three vehicles closely grouped together.

However, these formations consistently drove onto landmines, one after another, which led to the destruction of the entire assault formations. Additionally, the Russians deployed many of their infantrymen in unarmored vehicles, resulting in the deaths of entire infantry squads from a single landmine.

Overall, the Russians changed their operational plans on the western flank of Pokrovsk, forcing them to try and assault the Ukrainian positions further to the southwest, trying to salvage their logistics lines. However, the constant Ukrainian remote mining operations are posing a major obstacle to these offensive plans as well, disrupting Russian assaults, dealing high losses, and often preventing them from launching outright. With whole minefields suddenly appearing on previously cleared roads, Russian efforts here have been stumped, as soon this area will be impassible for Russian armored vehicles as well.

In our daily frontline report, we pair up with the military blogger Reporting from Ukraine to keep you informed about what is happening on the battlefield in the Russo-Ukrainian war.

Read also:

• Frontline report: Russia plans to deploy North Korean troops to new offensives in eastern Ukraine
• Frontline report: Europe moves fast—for once—and floods Ukraine with shells
• Frontline report: What Russian commanders plan in Pokrovsk and what actually happens there are two different wars