A bridge too far for the Russians, since the entire battalion was destroyed on a failed river crossing mission

military experts agree that crossing a river in the middle of a conflict is not easy. But the attempt by the Russian army to build a pontoon above the Sverskyi Donets river was so catastrophically incorrect that it ended that a considerable part of a battalion was wiped out.

If a battle in the brutal Ukraine war ever symbolically stood for the failure of the Russian military, then it was perhaps that-the catastrophic attempt to build a bridge over the Donez River.

drone shots show the consequences of the bloody battle. Russian army vehicles, including up to three dozen tanks and chain vehicles, were torn into pieces when the battalion gathered to create the crossing. Reports, albeit unconfirmed, indicate that the river, its banks and the surrounding forests are now the cemetery for up to 1,000 Russian troops. If this were correct, the failed crossing of the Donez would be the greatest loss of human life that Vladimir Putin's armed forces have suffered since the beginning of the war.

In the social media, a Ukrainian soldier under the name Maxim explained how the Ukrainian army stumbled across the Russian advance and had thwarted it with a devastating effect. The Ukrainian armed forces would have waited for the Ponton Bridge to be almost completed and Russian vehicles drove on it before the artillery targeted the area, said Maxim, an engineer who was sent out and identified the place where Russia had planned to cross.

In a coordinated counterattack, a Ukrainian river boat group - possibly a special unit - had succeeded in determining when the Russians started building the pontoon. The view was practically zero because Russian troops thrown smoke grenades and set trees nearby.

The Ukrainians had waited until they heard the chucking of Russian tractors, which built the bridge, monitored progress and then requested artillery and drone attacks. The film material recorded with a drone shows the slaughter after the Ukrainian attack: at least two and possibly three makeshift bridges were sunk and the remains of Russian military vehicles on both sides of the river bank and in the woods behind. Russian troops had managed to cross the river and they were then stranded and exposed to a massacre.

Ben Barry, a retired Brigadier and former head of the British army staff in the Ministry of Defense, said: "Nobody claims that river crossings are simple, but the higher the standard of military leadership, command and tactical training, the more likely it is that it is achieved."

Mr. Barry, Senior Fellow for Land Warfiezen at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, had seen and added the photos of the battlefield: "These reports vote with others for the Russian military performance from the fights in Kiev and Charkiw. In other words, a well -trained army would have difficulty crossing the Sverskyi Donez River, and the Kremlin armed forces do not belong to this category.

The Sverskyi Donets (Donez for short) flows 650 miles through the Donbass, the region in eastern Ukraine, into which the fights went on after Wladimir Putin had given up his plan to win Kiev and set up President Wolodymyr Selenskyj. The Donez rises in Russia and meanders southeast through Ukraine before it gets back on Russian territory and flows into the Don, which flows into the Asow's sea at Rostow on Don.

The Kremlin troops had hoped to cross the Donetz near Bilohorivka, a impoverished city in the Luhansk region. It is believed that a Russian battalion had tried to cross the border to surround Lysychansk, an industrial center in Donbass, ten miles away.

In his contribution on Twitter,

Maxim claims to have identified the location of the planned crossing on May 7th and reported its unit. A day later, the sound of Russian tractors, which maneuvered in position, which signaled the beginning of the attack.

There will be speculation that Ukraine had further help from the West. The Washington Post reported on Thursday that "information about the location and the movements of the Russian armed forces flow into Ukraine in real time" and that this information contains "satellite images and reports that come from sensitive US sources", which probably means high-tech espionage.

"The intelligence is very good. It tells us where the Russians are so that we can meet them," said a Washington Post Ukrainian official. The official then made a hand signal to imitate a bomb falling on her.

Russia's progress in Donbass, like his previous attack on Kiev, stalled. His inability to cross rivers will play its own role.

Maxim wrote on Twitter under the heading: "What I did to destroy the Russian Ponton Bridge" and explained that on May 6th he was sent to the river for technical education after secret service reports on Russian troops that had gathered on the other side. "I explored the area and suggested a place where the Russians could try to climb a pontoon bridge to get to the other side," wrote Maxim and estimated the width of the river with the help of distance meters to 80 meters, which required eight platforms with a length of ten meters each.

"With this current of the river I knew that they would need motorized boats to build such a bridge, and it would cost them at least two hours of work," he said, passed on the information to his commanders and added: "In addition, I said the unity that observed this part of the river that they had to look after the sound of motor boats. on fire and threw many smoke grenades.

"You had to hear the tone. And in the early morning of May 8th. Exactly at the point I said. I was there too to check it - and I saw my drone how Russians make the ponton bridge.

he, Maxim, "exceeded" Russia's military engineers because his engineers had "tried to build a bridge exactly where I had suspected".

The Russian armed forces had managed to place the pontoon and troops and vehicles had started to cross it. At this point, said Maxim, "the fight started."

twenty minutes after the Enlightenment team confirmed the existence of the Russian bridge, severe artillery began to shoot their position. According to reports, the 17th Panzerbrigade of the Ukrainian Army, which T-64 tanks and armored BMP vehicles were used, opened the fire by using its 2S1 122 millimeter chainhau.

The shelling destroyed Russian T-72 and T-80 tanks and two dozen armored chain vehicles as well as bridging equipment and a tractor. "I was still in the area and have never seen/heard such heavy fights in my life," said Maxim.

When Russian troops were stranded on the wrong side of the river, engineers tried to build a second pontoon to save them. This was also blown up, with drone shots that showed two platforms that were wedged on the Russian side on the river bank, but did not live anywhere.

"Your strategic goal was to cross the river and then circle Lysychansk. They failed pitifully," said Maxim and quoted reports of up to 1,500 dead soldiers. The number of fatalities may have been lower, but the losses for an exposed Russian battalion that was exposed to heavy bombing are still large.

bridges can become more important in warfare. Think of Bridge on the River Kwai (and the brutal treatment of British prisoners of war when building the Burma railway) or Bridge Too Far, which is the fight for control of the bridges in Arnheim in the cinema. The bridge over the Donez could still be given the best evidence of the military failure of the Kremlin in Ukraine.