The Aydar Separate Assault Battalion is one of the units that has been taking part in the battle for Bakhmut since early 2023. The unit held the defence on the outskirts of the city, and is now storming the occupiers’ positions south of Bakhmut.
Slidstvo.Info journalists spent a day with the unit’s artillery chief, who goes by the call sign “Chychen”. The video has English subtitles.
“I DON’T KNOW MY OBLAST AS WELL AS DONBAS”
Chychen is from the city of Slavutych, Kyiv oblast. He is a career soldier and has been in the army since 2014, and since 2018 he has been almost constantly deployed with his unit in the Donetsk region.
“I don’t know my oblast as well as I know Donbas. I’m seriously telling you. In Chernihiv oblast, I only know the road from my town to Chernihiv and from Chernihiv to Kyiv. That’s it. Here, damn it, any village. I can go wherever you want. I only haven’t been to Donetsk yet,” the soldier said.
A soldier with the call sign “Chychen”
The journalists met the man at an observation post. The monitors display live images from about ten drones. These are the “birds” of Aydar and related units.
In one of the “squares”, explosions are visible every few minutes. This is the enemy artillery working on Aydar‘s infantry. Chychen is informed about light 300 (wounded – ed.). He tells them to which position the soldier should be brought to for evacuation.
The soldiers live in the same room.
“You can recognise my room by the mess,” laughs Chychen.
However, it’s not the mess that makes it stand out, but the bass guitar in the corner.
“I used to go to music school, but I didn’t finish,” the soldier says with a smile.
He bought the guitar recently, but he admits that he rarely picks it up because he doesn’t have time.
Now the unit is actively working south of Bakhmut in the area of Klishchiyivka, so in addition to the usual work on targets, the unit has to work intensively before and during the assault – supporting their comrades with fire.
“Any settlement is important – this is the territory of Ukraine. Even if it was a village with one person, we would fight for it. This is our territory. In this case, it’s the outskirts of Bakhmut, which we need to control in order to liberate the city,” says Chychen.
“GUN! SHOT!”
The journalists of Slidstvo.Info are on their way to a firing position with a serviceman. On one of the sections of the Kostyantynivka-Bakhmut road, the soldier explains that the Russians came closer than a kilometre to the road. In a few months, they were significantly pushed back.
“Today, you can see the direction from Ivanivske to Klishchiyivka, how many tasks have been completed by our battalion – the 5th Assault Brigade, the 80th Airmobile Brigade. Now the main task is to move on and support our men in the offensive,” explains the unit’s artillery chief.
Aydar’s artillerymen are firing at the enemy with a Soviet D-30 howitzer. According to Chychen, during the offensive, these guns can fire about 100 shells before lunchtime. The soldiers are preparing the cannon to work on Russian manpower.
“We will work on the infantry, on the Russians, who are still unsuspecting,” Chychen clarifies.
The guys put a shell in the muzzle and wait for the command. The radio announces “fire” and with a single movement of his hand, Chychen sends a “hello” to the enemy.
The work at the firing position is intense today, as the boys are handed target after target. First, manpower, then Russian artillery, and finally, they report the enemy’s advance over the radio.
The artillery chief himself is surprised by this development and takes the initiative.
“Come on, guys, let’s go, I’ll shoot at them,” the commander says and stands up to the gun.
“It’s a pity that it’s not always possible to come to work. When you’re a commander, you have to organise everything somehow, keep everything under control. But I would have been a better gunner. It’s an awesome job. It’s not as interesting to be a commander as it is to be a gunner,” admits Chychen.
The man says he tries not to get “stuck” only at the observation post, but to visit artillerymen, mortar gunners and UAV operators who correct their work.
“THAT’S IT, STAY HERE AND FIGHT”
Returning from his firing position, Chychen reflects a lot on the changes in the army and society during a full-scale war. He says that at first it seemed that everything would be completely different: “It’s a shame when we go to the ‘big land’ and see that there seems to be no place for war. Everyone expected that we would build a defence and that everyone would live with this war, that men would understand and prepare for the army. In fact, we built this defence, we withstood it, we did not let the enemy in, and we were told: “That’s it, stay here and fight here”.
The man adds that he often hears criticism about the qualifications of commanders in the army, but in his opinion, the blame for this lies partly with civilians who supported a dismissive attitude to conscription.
“We should have dealt with the army earlier, but everyone wanted to avoid conscription. Just think of those reserve officers who were promoted to junior lieutenant and did not go for military service. Now they go through trials and become platoon commanders without having learned any military skills. And people are dying because of this. And then people look at this and say that we have arsehole commanders, corruption is everywhere, and you caused it,” Chychen believes.
He believes that all of this is due, in part, to the fact that until 2014, the Ukrainian government did not pay due attention to the development of the army: “It’s good that we have help. We would have been able to hold on on our own for maybe three months. We had no imported artillery, only our own. We thought that we didn’t need an army, we had our ‘brothers’ as neighbours. And our ‘brothers’ tried to take over Crimea, Donbas, and then Kharkiv… it didn’t work.”
According to Chychen, the army will need even more attention after the war is over.
“Many soldiers already feel useless. Because here (at the front – ed.) I was needed, but in civilian life, no one needs me. That’s what many people think. In reality, it’s not true. And it’s a pity that the civilian world is not interested in the lives of the military,” the man says.
