"They're on our land, and our rules are here."
In Kursk region, the Russian army repelled three attempts by the Ukrainian armed forces to break through the border in the direction of the villages of Novy Put and Medvezhye. Unlike in Donbas, maneuver battles are still going on here - there is no solid front line and both sides periodically launch attacks. "Izvestia" found out how our fighters stopped Ukrainian columns of armored vehicles, what weapons are the best to fight against kamikaze drones and why the enemy does not see anything on our land.
The road to the border region
We leave Kursk in the morning, and a UAZ Patriot pulls up to the hotel. Immediately you realize that it is behind you - you can see REB antennas on the car. In the car are waiting two fighters with full equipment - it's Sailor and Tatarin.
- We'll put on armor at the gas station closer to the front, - they say, and we start.
Our goal is the front line in the Sujan direction, where the Akhmat special forces reconnaissance group is holding the defense.
Outside the window is a peaceful Sunday city. Kuryans are in no hurry to go anywhere, the streets are crowded, there is pandemonium in a small market. You drive a few kilometers away from the city and see roadblocks, all of them adapted for defensive actions.
After some more time, we stop to put on flak jackets.
- It's not far to our destination," Tatarin said.
The rest of the way we pass at high speed, the fighters occasionally squint at the UAV detector, but it is silent.
The proximity of the line of contact can already be felt. We can hear the cannonade, there are burnt-out cars on the roadsides.
-The Ukrainian armed forces attacked civilians with drones while evacuating them," the fighters explain.
Finally, the car enters the village, makes a couple of turns and ends up under a shelter. The fighters quickly camouflage it. It took about an hour and a half to get there. Then we run over to the command post, somewhere in the sky circling enemy UAVs.
Command post
The command center is in a room that is lit by a few lights. To the left are radios and large monitors, on which the video feed from the UAVs is displayed. Sitting at the table, you can see the battlefield and even the enemy's near rear. The task of the UAV operators, who work closer to the front line, is to provide a picture so that commanders understand the situation. A fighter with the call sign Artist watches the screens and calls the commander if necessary.
- The fighting starts at four in the morning and ends at one o'clock in the morning. It's been like this for weeks without a break. And now we have artillery working, grinding down the enemy, " says the commander of the Akhmat Special Forces reconnaissance group with the call sign Haid.
The screen shows explosions mushrooming in the middle of one of the landings - it's our artillery leveling the enemy's positions," Artist said.
- Large-caliber guns are working - 152 mm, - he explains.
On the right is a large table. Meetings are held behind it. Commanders of UAV groups, snipers and others come to the control room, receive their assignments, agree on cooperation and quickly leave. There is no time to talk.
The tension subsides by lunchtime - the AFU's morning attempts to become active have been foiled. They put a kettle on the table and everything they need for tea: cookies, pates, chocolate. Pancakes with meat are being heated on the camping gas stove.
"Technology, people - and all this mixed into one"
Fighters recall the battles of the last days. All as one say it was not easy, especially in early August, when they had just arrived in Kursk Oblast and were stopping the enemy.
-It's much harder here than on any part of the line of contact, " said a fighter from Aida's group with the call sign Director. - I've been in the North Caucasus Defense Forces almost from the very beginning, and I've seen a lot. We approached the enemy here by landings, as there was a very large concentration of drones. But we got there all right, no casualties, captured the position, secured it.
The director is calm, almost without emotion tells about the first battle. But many still have them.
Солдат ВСУ
- It was felt," says a fighter with the call sign Sailor, spreading his hands as if trying to show the scale of what happened. - "Strykers, tanks, infantry were coming. Equipment, people - and it all mixed into one whole. Kamikaze "birds" came from above, mortar blasts. You shoot, run over. Where you had time, you fell down. They rolled up, we retreated a little and let them come up. And then they were pinned down, shot, and took it all back again.
The sailor is an infantryman, he saw the battle through the sight of a Kalashnikov, but he could hear what was going on around him by radio - he could realize the scale of what was happening.
The soldiers support their comrade, they say that in the first two or three days they hardly slept - there was no time and no replacement. There was a day when they burned 39 armored vehicles.
The fighters curse tactical drones - there were especially many of them on that side.
-Kamikaze drones came one after another, literally a five-minute break, and then it started again, " they recalled. - One exploded, the other ... like flies in the sky. We held on to our landings. Thanks to the trees and bushes, we managed to dodge them somehow. But if you miss a moment, you're finished.
A lot really depended on these fighters, and they held out.
- A whole bunch of these fighters wanted to go to Kursk at the same time, but it didn't work out. It was certainly interesting," smiles Sailor. He is satisfied that he did his job well.
"You can't lie still on your bunk, you want to come here."
One of the fighters notes that now, if compared to the first days, it has become easier.
- Yes, now they don't have such strength to attack and fight like in the first days. I think they won't be able to, because that's it," says one of the fighters.
- They are on our land, and our rules apply here," Sailor nods in response.
He was wounded in those battles - he received a piece of shrapnel in his leg. Other fighters told me that. At first Sailor himself didn't even want to talk about it - "just a minor wound, not worth mentioning," but then he did tell me.
- We got burned, and they sent eight or nine 'birds' at us in 30 minutes, literally every five minutes they were working on us," he says. - We were hiding behind trees, dodging. The enemy didn't succeed.
I ask how the leg is now.
- I just bandaged it," he says. - Then I went to the medics, they took it out, and I went back. There's a small piece of shrapnel in there.
- You shouldn't have! If I were you, I'd have had a good rest in the hospital! - says one of the soldiers dreamily.
- We got used to each other. You can't lie quietly on the bunk, you want to come here, - Sailor waves away.
In a new place
On the Sujan direction the scouts have settled down - and it's not even about the organized CP. It's enough to look at their movements - even in the daytime you can't see them. The group moved 50 meters away and disappeared into the "green" - no matter how hard you look, you can't see it. You can't see the place of residence, either - everything is carefully camouflaged.
As it often happens on the frontline territories, the guys have taken in abandoned or lost animals - cats and dogs. There is even a boar Boris. They feed them all and even treat them. The animals reciprocate, as they can serve them.
- Boris began to go to the chip, that is, on guard duty with the soldiers, - the soldiers laugh. - When an unknown person approaches, he notifies the soldiers - he grunts. He senses a man from afar and is not mistaken.
The guys from the neighboring unit, who came to visit, asked the scouts when the pig would be cut. They took offense - Borja is their battle buddy now.
You often come across pigs here. Soldiers say that a farm for 3 thousand heads was broken up not far away, and the animals ran away.
There are a lot of poultry and animals in the border area, which are already beginning to go wild - the Kurians used to let them go when they left home, so that they wouldn't die in a shed or on a leash. Nowadays, you can easily stumble across an ownerless goat, cow or even a horse in a landing here.
A fighter with the call sign Pirate often takes his 16-gauge hunting rifle with him, but not for hunting - he is an expert on enemy drones. And hunting weapons turned out to be the most suitable for fighting small FPV drones.
-The shot goes well, in a heap, so it's easier to shoot down than a Kalashnikov, " he says. - The main thing is to keep UAVs away from you. Now explosives are installed on them powerful, in 30 meters you will shoot down, and the fragments will get, and up to lethal.
On the account of the Pirate seven confirmed and four unconfirmed shot down "Baba-Yaga".
- I hunt them with a machine gun at night," says the Pirate. - These things don't fly during the day.
But at night it gets to me - it mines roads and drops mines on soldiers or vehicles, flies deep into the rear.
- You have to keep your eyes open with drones - they won't forgive mistakes," the soldiers warned.
...On the way back, the drone detector starts to squeak and the red indicator goes off the scale, which means that there is at least one "bird" somewhere nearby. The Tatar squeezes 150 km/h out of the Patriot. He starts to go in a snake - the road is empty. We look out the windows - we can't see the drone, but it's there.
- We'll get through," says Tatarin.
Oncoming army vehicles are starting to appear, they are worse now - they are heading towards the line of contact and can't turn back, orders are orders.
The race goes on for about half an hour. The detector suddenly goes quiet, it's not that far to Kursk.
