The completely destroyed town of Avdiivka has also fallen into Russian hands. “Dear God, what are we being punished for?”

As the crow flies it is about fifty kilometers from Bachmut to Avdiivka. Two cities that were wiped off the map within a year by months of Russian shelling and bombing. Both cities in the Ukrainian region of Donetsk suffered the same fate: a months-long siege, an encirclement and finally the Russian capture of a completely destroyed city.

“Mom, you are blessed that you don’t have to see this,” cried an elderly resident when she had to leave her hometown in haste at the beginning of February. The garden next to her home on Kashtanova Street was hit by a Russian shell, one of tens of thousands that have descended on the town in recent months. In the background there were barking dogs and the sounds of war.

Images on social media showed her fleeing, helped by a volunteer, along with her cat Masja, her own dog and a street dog that had jumped into the car. They passed long rows of shot-down and burned-out apartment buildings and the ruins of what were once bakeries, clinics, schools, parks and supermarkets. “People lived in peace here,” she said. “Dear God, what are we being punished for?”

This was once a peaceful place on the old postal route between Mariupol and Bachmut. Close to the regional capital Donetsk, Avdiivka developed into an industrial city with around 31,000 inhabitants. Many of them worked in the industrial complex northwest of Avdiivka in the huge coking plants – one of the largest producers in Europe.

Occupation in 2014

But the problems started in 2014, when war descended on Avdiivka. The city found itself on the front line between the Ukrainian army and separatists supported, aided and encouraged by Moscow. The town was even occupied for several months that year, and after the Ukrainian forces recaptured it, the Avdiivka Coke factories came under heavy fire. Two years later, in 2017, heavy fighting broke out around the city again.

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Partly as a result, over the years Avdiivka was equipped with possibly the strongest defenses along the front lines in the Donbas, a network of trenches and bunkers that protected the city on three sides. Even after the massive Russian invasion in 2022, Avdiivka initially remained proud, but persistent air raids quickly made the residential areas unliveable, causing thousands of residents to seek shelter elsewhere.

But over the course of last fall, the situation for the Ukrainian defenders quickly deteriorated. They were bombarded daily with drones, rockets and grenades, from aircraft and attack helicopters, by tanks, artillery and infantry. In mid-October the Russians started their large-scale offensive, in the same style as earlier around Bachmut: wave after wave, often poorly trained soldiers moved towards the Ukrainian trenches. A Ukrainian sniper she recently described on CNN as “flesh attacks”; Russian soldiers During their waves of attack, they crawled over the corpses of their slain colleagues towards the Ukrainian positions. Relatives of the soldiers in an appeal to President Putin have complained about the “deliberate extermination” of their loved ones at Avdiivka.

Memories of Azovstal

The defenders who remained operated largely from the tunnels and cellars of the large industrial complex, where they entrenched themselves with ammunition and weapons; it evoked memories of the battle for the Azovstal complex in Mariupol, which Ukrainian fighters defended to the last man in the spring of 2022.

Avdiivka is not just a symbolically important victory for Moscow. The town has strategic importance for the Russians, as the gateway to Donetsk, the capital of the region of the same name with almost a million inhabitants. That city is seen as the most important hub for the Russians in the Donbas, the Donetsk and Luhansk regions that have been annexed by Moscow, but are not fully in Russian hands. As long as Avdiivka was in Ukrainian hands, Donetsk was close to the front and the city remained vulnerable to Ukrainian shelling.

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But the capture also has symbolic value for Moscow, comparable to the capture of the front city of Bachmut. President Vladimir Putin celebrated that success exuberantly last year by waving medals and promotions. This probably also awaits the victors of Avdiivka – those who can live to tell the tale. Putin is said to have ordered the city to be conquered at all costs before the presidential elections in March at the end of last year. It is the first Russian military success since Bachmut in May last year.

Psychological blow

At the same time, the fall of Avdiivka represents a new psychological blow to the Ukrainian armed forces and the population. Since the failed summer offensive, the chances of success against the Russians have rapidly diminished, especially now that new American military aid is not forthcoming. The Ukrainian army is struggling with major ammunition shortages, and in various other places along the front the Russian attackers are making territorial gains, so far on a small scale.

According to military analyst Mykola Bielieskov of the National Institute for Strategic Studies, the sagging Western support for Ukraine was even an important reason for Moscow to continue the offensive at Avdiivka, despite the colossal price paid by the Russian troops. There are no reliable figures, but Western estimates say that the Battle of Avdiivka cost the Russian army many thousands of casualties. But according to Bielieskov, a Ukrainian military defeat would feed skeptics in the West. he told Reuters in early February.

Western doubts about support

In December, the Institute for the Study of War had already concluded that the Russian winter offensives at Avdiivka and elsewhere were carried out – despite the bad weather – partly because doubts had arisen in Europe and the United States about continued military and financial support to Ukraine.

In recent weeks, there has been increasing criticism in Ukraine of the army leadership and of President Zelensky, who, following Bachmut, once again had a city defended for months that proved untenable. “The road to Avdiivka is littered with our bodies,” wrote the medium Ukraine Front Lines on February 16, when the first Ukrainian troops had withdrawn. “This is the price Ukrainian soldiers pay because our president did not listen.” The now replaced commander of the armed forces Valery Zaluzhny was also punished because the army wanted to keep Avdiivka “as long as possible”.

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