Russia Bets on Pokrovsk Push as Resistance Stiffens
The moment we arrived at the drop-off point, we had to hit the deck.
The shelling was constant around these villages in front of the Russian advance to the city of Pokrovsk. A continuous tempo of artillery, some outgoing, most incoming, thudded in the distance as shells flew over our position and slammed into nearby homes. I was embedded with a BM-21 Grad MLRS rocket crew, which was assigned to defend this particular stretch of the Donetsk region. The crew’s commander, “Jäger”, took this time to tell me about some other close calls they’d had recently.
Elements of the Grad fire team traverse the expanse near Pokrovsk. / Photo credit: Dylan Burns
Just yesterday, he said, while packing up to withdraw after finishing a fire mission against Russian troops advancing in the area, enemy counter battery fire missed them by only 150 meters. Four days before during a separate mission, it was only 60 meters. These days, Russian guns are active, and recon drones are constantly hunting for potential targets. Jäger says they only have 3 or 4 minutes to operate on position before they have to scramble back into their hiding positions to avoid return fire. This gives Grad artillery little time to work on positioning, and even less room for error – a battlefield dynamic much different than the roughly 15-minute artillery response times reported at the start of the war.
Pokrovsk, a roughly 70 kilometer drive northwest from Donetsk city, is home to 60,000 souls, though the approaching violence has pushed many away from home. Two months ago, there were an estimated 48,000 residents remaining. At the start of September, 30,000 remained. Today, around 12,000 residents remain in Pokrovsk and the twin city of Myrnohrad, which sits less than three kilometers to the east and has seen similar levels of destruction. More residents leave the area every day.
Between fire missions, the Grad rocket team takes a much-needed rest near an undisclosed village in the environs of Pokrovsk. / Photo credit: Dylan Burns
The city of Pokrovsk was founded in 1875, initially serving as a railway station and then as a hub for locomotive repair, with the city primarily employing industrial workers and the many coal miners the Donetsk region is known for. The city is also known as the place where famed Ukrainian composer Mykola Leontovych wrote the second edition of the composition “Shchedryk” (meaning “Bountiful Evening”) at the start of the 20th century, taking inspiration from the Ukrainian folk melodies he encountered while collecting musical folklore. The song tells the story of a swallow flying into a home to tell the master of the household what a bountiful year they have ahead, with livestock, money, and a dark-eyed beautiful spouse. The song premiered in 1916, and was given English lyrics and copyrighted by Peter Wilhousky nearly 20 years later as “Carol of the Bells”, which now stands as a standard Christmas composition renowned in Western music.
During wartime, however, cultural contributions are secondary to military considerations. In this case, Pokrovsk’s status as a historical railway hub and its position along the major T0504 highway are more relevant factors, especially in the context of Pokrovsk’s current use by Ukrainian forces as a logistics hub.
These pieces of infrastructure – the railway and the highway – provide important logistical support for the defense of vulnerable cities like Chasiv Yar, Toresk, and the numerous small villages scattered across the region. This means the loss of the Pokrovsk would further complicate logistics in these areas, and potentially impact the logistics of Ukrainian forces throughout the broader Donetsk region.
Oleksandr Kalenkov, the President of Ukrmetallurgprom (a Ukrainian association of metals companies), warned that the loss of Pokrovsk could impact domestic steel production and metallurgy by undercutting coal supply, claiming the city’s fall could cut steel production by more than half. “”For the past two years, we’ve been smelting 6-6.5 million tonnes of steel [annually],” he said at an industry forum in September, “and this year we could reach 7.5 million tonnes. If we lose Pokrovsk, it will be 2 to 3 million tonnes.”
When the Grad rocket team received enemy coordinates by radio and set off from their positions to strike, I tagged along on their fire mission to film the attack. After a short drive, we pulled out into an open patch of grass between villages and piled out of the Grad truck. Quickly, the Grad was aimed, adjusted, aimed again, adjusted once more – before pausing momentarily, awaiting the order to fire.
The team launches a single Grad rocket across the horizon during a recent fire mission near Pokrovsk. / Photo credit: Dylan Burns
When it came, Jäger, who aimed the system, dashed inside the truck, then let a rocket fly from the system’s artillery tubes, which careened into the distance towards its target. Two minutes passed, and this process was repeated, with Jäger adjusting the artillery system once more before launching another rocket. Two rockets were fired in total, a process which lasted all of six minutes before we made ourselves scarce and returned to hiding to avoid any possible response from Russian guns.
Typically, Grad operators discharge more than one or two rockets at once, but the situation on the battlefield has changed. This drip feed of artillery strikes, necessitated by supply shortages, is different from the highly saturated bombardment these systems are known for. But when every shot counts, you have to try to make it work.
The ammunition situation has improved, Jäger said, though he claimed the shell disparity on his part of the front was still stark – his rough estimation being 15 Russian shells fired for every two Ukrainian shells. The situation is different on each part of the front, and the commander-in-chief of the Ukrainian armed forces, Oleksandr Syrskyi, claims the overall ratio of Russian shells to Ukrainian shells fired has been reduced to 2:1 as of September – but Jäger’s experience paints a stark and uncertain picture for Ukrainian forces near Pokrovsk.
No matter what dataset you observe, it’s clear Russia maintains a significant numerical advantage in artillery shells on hand, meaning Ukraine must use its ammunition accurately and efficiently if it intends to hold the front and inflict maximum attrition on Moscow’s forces. This dynamic sometimes leads to artillery teams passing on certain targets if they’re deemed too low-value, like a few Russian soldiers moving from position to position. Instead, artillery teams often wait for larger groupings of soldiers and armor to better utilize the limited ammunition they do have on hand, while relying on FPV drones and other available munitions to pick up the slack.
The problem around Pokrovsk is that there has been a lot of slack. Avdiivka fell in February of this year, due to a combination of manpower shortages and equipment shortages, with much attention paid to the delay in American support due to partisan congressional deadlock and EU munition shortfalls during the pivotal battle. The situation was further exacerbated by Kyiv’s delayed decisions on troop mobilizations needed to address the personnel shortage.
This all meant Russia had an opening. Avdiivka was known as a fortress, one which Russian forces had set their sights on ever since Ukraine recaptured it in 2014 from Russian-backed militants during the war in the Donbas. Since then, the city of Avdiivka – which sits precariously less than five kilometers away from Donetsk Airport – has been under major pressure.
Donetsk city, the former declared capital of the Russian-backed separatists in the region, is a major logistical hub which can readily support combat operations. This means the local garrison in Avdiivka had to build up defenses to adjust to the reality of being a frontline city for 8 years before the full-scale invasion. When these defenses were finally destroyed, bypassed, or otherwise overcome, and Ukrainian forces made the decision to withdraw and avoid encirclement, no other major defenses stood in the Kremlin’s way west – outside of villages and farm fields – before the logistical hub of Pokrovsk.
While Ukrainian forces were overstretched and under-supplied, Russia was using its manpower and artillery advantage to press on. Kyiv had finally passed mobilization legislation, but training and preparing new soldiers takes time. The US Congress did eventually pass the Ukraine aid bill in April to provide much needed equipment resupplies, but manufacturing, transporting, and delivering that equipment also takes time, and subsidizing domestic arms production through such appropriations bills doesn’t translate to an immediate increase in shell manufacturing.
Ukrainians needed more time, and the Russians did their best to deny it, throwing waves of APCs, IFVs, jury-rigged tanks, and even ATVs and dirt bike assault squads at the front line in an attempt to break through in the face of staggeringly high armored vehicle losses.
This situation worsened when a breakthrough occurred at the village of Ocheretyne, where soldiers of the 115th are alleged by some analysts to have left their positions during its defense. While the specifics of what led to this breakthrough are still disputed, the Russian 30th Motor Rifle Brigade was able to walk into unmanned Ukrainian positions before the hole was plugged.
In May and June of this year, Russian advances in the area started to pick up pace. By August, Russia was seeing its largest gains in Ukraine since October of 2022, capturing 15 square kilometers a day on average for the month, with less than 8 kilometers (4.9 miles) separating Pokrovsk from the opposing army. This means Russia now has the city in range of its artillery and powerful glide bombs, and is starting to complete its piecemeal destruction of the infrastructure necessary to sustain life in the city – like electrical substations.
Russia was still taking losses that would make most Western military leaders dizzy, but their forward motion had improved from a grinding crawl to moderate advances In August, as Russia saw these gains, Ukraine launched the surprise invasion of Kursk, the first time since World War II that Russia had been occupied. Kyiv’s commanders said this was at least partially intended to divert Russian forces from the Pokrovsk axis, pushing the Russians to defend themselves at home instead of advancing in Ukraine. While forces were eventually moved from regions like Kherson, Kharkiv, and even Kaliningrad to try and slow down the forward advance of Ukrainian forces in Kursk, no evidence has been presented showing that Russia has had to pull from the Pokrovsk front. There are other stated goals which have yet to bear fruit, like capturing land for leverage in negotiations and creating a buffer in the Sumy region. But there has yet to be any tangible effect from the incursion on the fight for control of Pokrovsk as of writing.
Making the Russians choose between diverting forces from Pokrovsk to try and expel the invasion of the motherland, or retaining pressure on Pokrovsk while giving the Ukrainians an opportunity to fortify their positions in Kursk, is undoubtedly painful for Moscow. Still, they’ve become closely familiar with pain during this war, and so far it seems Russia is adamant in pursuing their offensive until the next administration is sworn in. With the Russian attacks on Pokrovsk and occupied Kursk escalating into winter, they seem to want both at the same time.
Photo credit: Dylan Burns
A separate, but also significant, threat is posed by advances on Ukrainian positions in the south of the Donetsk region. This was shown recently through the fall of Vuhledar, a small Ukrainian fortress town that had been defended against wave after wave of Russian attacks by the 72nd Mechanized Brigade, along with other defenders, for the majority of the war. The 72nd Mechanized Brigade effectively destroyed multiple Russian brigades and eliminated hundreds of vehicles in the process, but the town was ultimately lost. There were no strong fortified positions behind the city to hold back the enemy advance, which led to the villages behind Vuhledar falling quickly, with Russian forces advancing around nine kilometers in a month.
As Russian troops capture new villages every other day advancing north of Vuhledar, the occupation of most of unoccupied southern Donetsk looks all but certain, with Russian forces reaching the outskirts of Kurakhove as of writing. If left unaddressed, the southern advance could not only help secure the flank of advancing Russian troops, but eventually may add pressure to Ukrainian positions in the Zaporizhia region as well.
The defense of Pokrovsk itself has only been made more difficult with the recent fall of Selydove to the Kremlin’s advance. My conversations with soldiers and commanders in the 59th brigade’s Shkval company, made up of former prisoners who volunteered to join the armed forces, and which assisted the defense of the Selydove area, indicate that the issues which previously plagued the army still run rampant. Their battalion commander testified to poor communication, inexperienced commanders, supply deficits, and manpower shortages, on top of many of the new mobilized men being barely willing conscripts taken off of buses and crosswalks, indicating that large scale structural changes and supply shifts are needed for the survival of the Ukrainian armed forces.
Ukrainian command have redeployed forces to the Pokrovsk axis, including the 15th Kara-Dag Brigade of the National Guard, the 93rd Separate Mechanised Brigade, and the 12th Special Operations Brigade “Azov”. These forces have conducted some small-scale counter-offensives as they try to stabilize the front before Russian forces reach the city, resulting in advances towards Pokrovsk slowing back down to a crawl since early September while Russia attempts to secure its flanks.
With local coal miners digging trenches outside the city to defend their homes, the question of whether Pokrovsk will fall will likely be dependent on several factors: whether the front is supplied with enough ammunition and manpower to harden defenses; whether Russian forces can continue offensive operations despite the sustained casualties needed to push forward; and whether sufficient operational diversions can be created by Ukrainian forces in Kursk.
While talk by opposing government officials and military representatives may be tough, anxiety fills both armies over an uncertain battlefield outcome and the implications of Pokrovsk’s potential fall. If the city doesn’t fall before the onset of bitterly freezing weather and slow-paced winter combat, it will likely be another boost to Ukrainian morale, one which allows them to keep using the already battered logistics hub to support the defense of other cities in Donetsk. If the city does fall, logistical support to embattled cities like Toresk, Chasiv Yar, and Niu-York will suffer, snapping the T0504 highway which connects these communities struggling against occupation. On the other hand, if the Russians push as hard as possible to take the city, they could risk exhausting their offensive potential while avoiding the Ukrainian frontline collapse that is often used to justify the need for constant pressure. This would dash the hopes of many Russian military Telegram channels, who have been hoping for and whispering about a potential collapse for months.
Regardless of the outcome, war is wearing hard on those tasked with fighting it, and the realities of life as a soldier on the front line often stand in stark contrast to the reality of life elsewhere in the country. Jäger, who volunteered at the start of the war (and who considers himself a Ukrainian nationalist), expressed a sense of frustration surrounding the lack of rotations and demobilization of volunteers fighting since the start of the war. “We’re running out [of people],” he said. “We need to be rotated. We want to go home and rest….If people don’t change their attitude, and stop hiding from recruitment officers, then it won’t be possible. There’s no one to replace us. War is terrible. It’s terrifying. I came here voluntarily, but I don’t want to stay here any longer. I want peace and tranquility.”
As explosions sound in the background, Jäger reaches for a cigarette and explains the difficulties his team has encountered as a result of conditions on the front. / Photo credit: Dylan Burns
