PUTIN’S QUAGMIRE
Russia fail in TWO MORE attempts to cross Ukraine river after 73 vehicles and ‘1,000 troops’ blown up in tank graveyard
MAD Vlad's troops have failed two more attempts to cross a river in Ukraine after 73 vehicles were blown up in a fierce battle - leaving a tank graveyard in the mud.
Two battalions are said to have been wiped out after the suicidal mission to rescue comrades and kit that got stranded on the wrong side of the Donets River in the first disastrous assault.
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Hundreds of Russian vehicles and men were reportedly trapped after their attempt to cross the waterway on May 8 failed in spectacular fashion when their pontoon bridges were blown apart by Ukrainian artillery.
More than 50 vehicles are estimated to have been destroyed and 1,000 troops lost in the surprise counterattack by Ukrainian troops, who correctly guessed the exact place the enemy would cross.
Their second and third missions also apparently ended in costly failure, with fresh satellite images showing another sunken pontoon bridge and half a dozen abandoned military vehicles.
In total, Russia lost more than 70 tanks, trucks and armoured cars in four days of attempts to cross the river, according to Ukrainian investigative site .
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It has been a humiliating week for Russian forces who have been forced out of the eastern city of Kharhiv and surrounding villages.
And it comes almost a month after Putin's depleted and exhausted forces were forced to retreat from Kyiv and later beaten back from Mykolaiv by a rag-tag band of territorial defence troops and civilians following "huge" losses.
Meanwhile, embarrassing footage has surfaced of a Russian military unit on the run from Kharkiv.
The 50-second clip posted on Twitter allegedly shows Luhansk mobilised forces left abandoned after withdrawing from Kharkiv.
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There were allegedly not allowed to re-enter Russia.
"For two days already people are at the border, they are not let go and not given any comments," a translated transcript of the soldier's speech says.
"They are threatening us with poison, shooting and so on."
It appears Russian commanders tried to surround the cities of Lysychansk and Severodonetsk by crossing the body of water but had their surprise attack thwarted by Ukrainian troops who correctly guessed their plans.
Maxim, a Twitter user claiming to be a Ukrainian military engineer, said he identified the exact spot Russia was most likely to cross on May 7 and told his commanders, who ordered troops to be on the look-out for sounds of tugboat engines pushing a pontoon bridge.
It comes as Mad Vlad's forces suffered another humiliating week:
- Harrowing footage shows the moment an entire column of Russian 'Z' tanks were blown up in a barrage of enemy fire
- Russia's prized T-90M tank, worth $4million, exploded into a massive fireball after being hit with a Ukrainian rocket
- Moscow was forced to ditch its weeks-long planned aerial performance due to 'bad weather' and had to scale back its Victory Day Parade by 35 percent
- A 'cancer-stricken' and feeble-looking Putin was caught watching the parade with a blanket over his legs, sparking rumours he could be terminally ill
- Those rumours continued to swell when the ailing autocrat mysteriously missed his beloved annual ice hockey match and instead sent a video message with a 'blotchy face'
On May 8, Russian troops blanketed the river by burning nearby fields and let off smoke grenades, the military engineer said.
His commanders detected the sound of boat engines and used drones to spot the battalion before ordering a devastating artillery strike.
"Roughly 20 minutes after recon unit confirmed the Russian bridge was being mounted, heavy artillery engaged against Russian forces, and then aviation chipped in as well," Maxim said.
"I was still in the area, and I have never seen or heard such heavy combat in my life.
"After one day of combat, 9th May morning the bridge was down.
"Some Russian forces - roughly 30 to 50 vehicles and infantry - were stuck on the Ukrainian side of the river with no way back.
"They tried to run away using the broken bridge. Then they tried to arrange a new bridge.
"Aviation started heavy bombing of the area and it destroyed all the remains of Russians there, and the other bridge they tried to make.
"Rumors say it's 1,500 Russian dead. Their strategic objective was to cross the river and then encircle Lysychansk. They miserably failed."
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According to , the attack wiped out more than 50 vehicles and up to 1000 Russian soldiers.
The River Donets is just one of several water barriers the Russians need to cross in order to advance West into Ukrainian-held territory and complete its aim of capturing the Donbass.
Images of the bloody battle show the shoreline littered with bombed out T-72 and T-80 tanks and armoured vehicles.
A tug boat was wiped out, along with two pontoon bridges that were left floating in the river with huge shell holes visible on top of them.
The humiliating defeat comes as Mad Vlad's coveted military kit - regularly flaunted as a sign of Russian military might - is being decimated by Ukrainian rockets.
A Russian tank was reportedly blown up and its turret sent hurtling 250ft into the sky following a Ukrainian missile strike while dramatic footage caught the moment a Russian helicopter was destroyed by an enemy drone on Snake Island.
Meanwhile, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said his men had pushed Russian troops out of the eastern city of Kharkiv and are beginning to encircle them in the strategic town of Izyum.
Brave Ukrainian defenders pushed the invaders out of the city and back beyond the border.
The push mean Ukrainian artillery can now reach the important town of Vovchansk, which contains a vital highway and rail line supplying Russian forces in the Donbas.
The UK's Ministry of Defence said Russian troops deployed around Kharkiv were "vulnerable to the mobile, and highly motivated, Ukrainian counter-attacking force".
"Despite Russia's success in encircling Kharkiv in the initial stages of the conflict, it has reportedly withdrawn units from the region to reorganise and replenish its forces following heavy losses," the ministry said in an update Thursday morning.
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"Once reconstituted, these forces will likely deploy to the eastern bank of the Donets River, forming a blocking force to protect the western flank of Russia's main force concentration and main supply routes for operations in the vicinity of Izyum.
"The withdrawal of Russian forces from Kharkiv is a tactic recognition of Russia's inability to capture key Ukrainian cities where they expected limited resistance from the population."
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