THE SKIES around Antonov international airport in Hostomel, a north-western suburb of Kyiv, were thick with Russian mi-8 helicopters. As one came under attack by a surface-to-air missile, it released an explosive burst of flares. The air assault by Russia—perhaps one of the largest of recent decades—was a bold and brazen attempt to seize a strategic airport near Ukraine’s capital.
As this article was published, the rough contours of the fighting in Hostomel and the whole of Ukraine were only just becoming discernable. At one stage, Russian troops were seen patrolling the airport. Ukrainian forces later counter-attacked, and claimed to have taken back the facility by the evening. The sounds of the fighting could be heard from several kilometres away.
The battle is a pivotal one: Russian control of the airfield would allow more troops and heavier equipment to be airlifted in. Christo Grozev, the director of Bellingcat, an investigative group, said that 18 Russian transport planes had left Pskov, home of the country’s 76th Guards Air Assault Division, heading for Ukraine’s capital. These were probably carrying large numbers of paratroopers. “They’re making a move on Kyiv,” says a senior us defence official. British officials concur that Russian ground forces in Belarus are “advancing towards” Kyiv. They appear to have captured the site of the Chernobyl reactor, to the north of the capital.
The struggle for Hostomel was one of the first and most important battles between Russia and Ukraine in the war launched by Vladimir Putin shortly before dawn on February 24th. It is soon likely to become the largest inter-state conflict in Europe since the Balkan wars of the 1990s. It has the potential to become much bigger still.
Russia’s first attacks involved volleys of missiles against important Ukrainian military facilities, including airports and air-defence radars—a tactic designed to allow Russian warplanes to fly safely over the country. American officials say that Russia launched more than 100 cruise and ballistic missiles from Belarus, Russia and warships at sea. Around 75 aircraft, including bombers, are thought to have been involved. Russia’s defence ministry says that it attacked 11 air bases and 18 air-defence sites, among other targets. Around the same time, Russian ground forces—some of the more than 110 battalion tactical groups that Russia had amassed around Ukraine since November—crossed the border.
Tracking their progress is difficult. Russia and Ukraine share much of the same Soviet-era military equipment. It is hard to distinguish a Russian tank from a Ukrainian one in the satellite imagery and mobile-phone footage that has provided a window into the Russian build-up and now the war. Even so, it soon became clear that Russian forces had made some important breakthroughs. By mid-afternoon Russian armour coming from Belgorod, one of the main staging areas in western Russia (see map), had begun to encircle Kharkiv, the second-largest city in Ukraine, in the east of the country. Russian tanks were near the city’s ring road, said its mayor, noting that there had been no civilian casualties. In the city of Okhtyrka, to the north-west of Kharkiv, video footage showed armoured vehicles in the street, buildings on fire and small-arms fire.
Yet it is far from a rout. Ukraine’s army appears to have had more opportunities to employ anti-tank weapons than many supposed. America, Britain and other European allies gave Ukraine thousands of such weapons, including long-range American Javelins and shorter-range Anglo-Swedish nlaws, over the past two months. In places, these presented serious resistance to Russian advances in the north and east. It is thought that nlaws have never been used in combat before. Video footage taken around Kharkiv appears to show damaged tanks. Ukrainian officials said that Javelins and other weapons had “neutralised” an entire column of 15 t-72 tanks in Hlukhova, in the north-west of the country close to the Russian border. Ukraine’s fleet of Turkish drones, which have been used to good effect in recent wars in Libya, Syria and Azerbaijan, has also been used to mount attacks.
Ukraine put up a strong fight around the airport at Hostomel, too. Ukraine’s armed forces say they shot down three out of the 34 helicopters sent by Russia. A ka-52 helicopter was pictured, damaged, on the ground after an apparent forced landing. Ukraine also paraded captured Russian personnel, whose insignia marked them out as members of the 1st Guards Tank Army, one of Russia’s most vaunted offensive units. Elsewhere, Ukraine’s armed forces claim to have secured the surrender of a reconnaissance platoon near Chernihiv, north-east of Kyiv, though this could not be verified.
In the south, however, Russia’s forward thrusts seemed to meet with greater success. “Russian forces are literally pouring into Ukraine from Crimea,” said Konrad Muzyka of Rochan Consulting, who tracks Russian military movements. So rapid was their advance that some simply drove past Ukrainian units heading in the other direction. Ukraine’s ministry of defence said there was fighting around Genichesk, a port city on the Sea of Azov to the north-east of Crimea, Skadovsk, to the north-west, and Chaplinka, a little way inland. Video footage from Genichesk showed prisoner transport trucks belonging to the Rosgvardia, Russia’s national guard. There was also heavy fighting in Kherson, on the road to Odessa.
Before the war, Western security sources had said that they expected Russia’s army to encircle Ukrainian forces west of the Donbas region, in eastern Ukraine, preventing them from falling back to protect the capital, and to advance on Kyiv from the south. Michael Kofman of CNA, an American research outfit, who had prepared a map of Russia’s likely axes of invasion—and which was similar to official assessments—says that “on the whole it looks relatively close as a representation of where Russian units are attempting to advance”. Mr Kofman warns that only a “fraction” of the Russian force has been committed so far. “What we’re seeing is [the] very early hours of the campaign.”
British defence intelligence said that there had been “heavy casualties” on both sides. Civilian casualties are unknown, though very few have been reported so far. The war “has sent an ominous chill down my spine”, said Peter Maurer, president of the International Committee of the Red Cross. “Now I fear increased suffering, with the potential of massive casualty numbers and extensive destruction of civilian objects like water and electricity plants, as well as mass displacement, trauma, family separation, and missing persons.”
By The Economist
