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30.09.24 15:36 8 096 1

Call sign Scout: "No one said: "Oh, there are more of them, so that’s it, guys, let’s make deal and give something back." No! Everyone is in their place."

Denys, with the call sign Scout, joined the army at the age of 19, before the Russian-Ukrainian war in 2009. That was when he signed his first contract. To this day, he still renews them because, as he admits, he likes what he does. Today he is the chief sergeant of the 2nd division of the 1039th anti-aircraft missile regiment. He is fighting in the Pokrovsk sector.

-Why did you decide to serve?

- I listened to the stories of my friends who served in the 25th separate parachute brigade. It was so romantic! I loved the adrenaline and the drive. It was interesting - parachuting, constant training, shooting. It was so cool! So I decided to give it a try.

- In 2009, we could hardly have imagined that five years later, the Russian-Ukrainian war would break out, right?

- Of course! To give you an idea, in 2012 we had joint massive exercises with Russian and Kazakh paratroopers. Indeed, no one at the time even thought that in two years we would be at war with the Russians.

- But in early 2014, that's exactly what happened. Where were you at the time?

- On 8 March, we loaded onto a train and headed for Donetsk Oblast. We travelled for a long time through railway stations, stopped at the Debaltseve railway junction, returned, unloaded in Dobropillia, and then marched to Zaporizhzhia region. Then - to the border with Donetsk region. We stayed there for a month. And in May, we went to Kramatorsk airfield to take control of it.

- An important page in the history of this war was the capture of Sloviansk by terrorists. It happened on 12 April. Our troops liberated it in three months. Were you involved in that?

- No, I was in hospital at the time after being wounded. But my unit took part in the liberation of Sloviansk and Kramatorsk.

- How and where were you injured?

- In the village of Malynivka, Donetsk region. It was already the beginning of active operations, our troops were approaching Kramatorsk and Sloviansk. By the way, we fought in Semenivka for a long time - it was hot. So during that movement, I was on a reconnaissance patrol. We hit a mine. Three of the four of us were injured. There was such an offensive dynamic on our side that we waited eight hours to be evacuated. We were taken by helicopter to Chuhuiv. It was probably my most frightening flight (smiles - O.M.). Before that, when our offensive intensified, the "DPR" near Sloviansk shot down an AN-26 and an MI-8 with Serhii Kulchytskyi on board, a real fighting general, brave and loyal. So during this evacuation, I was a little worried.

- Where else did you fight in 2014?

- I took part in a big raid when we went beyond Shakhtarsk and also at Savur-Mohyla.

-Back then, the Russians said that they were not in Donbas. Have you seen them?

- In 2014-2015, there were locals there who had been brainwashed by Russian propaganda. At that time, the Russians were just curators. But in 2022, of course, everything was already open.

- Yes, on 24 February 2022, a full-scale Russian offensive began. Where have you been that day?

- By that time, we had been near Kupiansk for two days...

-So were you preparing for the attack?

- Yes. We have all already understood everything. Before that, of course, we were joking: "We are going to study" (smiles - O.M.). We were with an additional BC. The division went to their districts. Everyone was aware of what was happening. On 24 February at 4.30 am, a fighter woke me up: "Dan, wake up, it's war!". I did not immediately understand, because I went to bed at two in the morning. But I got up. I heard explosions - it was the air force. That's it, it started!

In general, all our units were put on alert number one, the air enemy was detected and neighbouring units were alerted. In principle, we were immediately engaged in combat.

- Earlier in the "Telethon", we were told that Russians are stupid, chmobiks, and so on. Indeed, if they were, this war would have ended long ago with our victory on their territory. Unfortunately, we have a different situation.They are advancing, particularly in the Pokrovsk direction, where you are now. It is very hot there. People are evacuating from Pokrovsk, which is being approached by the enemy. The press reports that Russian troops have been instructed by Putin to liberate the Kursk region by the first of October. However, their task is to do this by any means necessary, without withdrawing from key areas where Russia is waging an offensive in Donbas. We are talking primarily about the Pokrovsk and Toretsk directions. What do you see there now?

- The Kursk offensive is the right move. Do you remember our offensive in the Kharkiv region in September 2022? It was led by General Syrskyi. It turned out great! Now the operation in the Kursk region is also going very well. So there is a positive trend in this direction. Again, the question is about the resources of the Russians. This is a "meat processing plant" - there are a lot of them! Look, there is an offensive in the Kursk region, but the intensity in our direction is not decreasing...

- And our calculation was also to draw the enemy's forces away from Donbas, right?

- I think so. I also have the impression that there will be some other interesting moments. Syrskyi is an extraordinary general. Everything is not as simple as it may seem now. There will be some other strategic and operational manoeuvre.

- The military often says that Russia wants to completely capture Donbas by the end of the year. Do you feel it according to their pressure?

- Their desires may not coincide with their capabilities. I repeat: they have a very large human resource. We are on the defensive. For every one of our soldiers, they need ten of theirs. Our soldiers are dug in. The supply of weapons, in principle, does not stop. I am optimistic about this situation. But if we look at it globally, there are some nuances. It all depends on the training of our soldiers and firing positions, on logistical routes and supplies. For example, our unit is creating some discomfort for the enemy by destroying their aerial reconnaissance equipment. By doing so, we prevent the enemy from gathering certain information. Each destroyed board is a failure of the mission: they cannot see anything and do not understand what is happening in a certain area. This discomfort leads to the postponement of other tasks, including offensive operations. But they do not save on equipment. We shoot down three or four reconnaissance UAVs - "Zala" and "Orlan" - in one 2x2 square in an hour. They want to conduct reconnaissance and inflict damage so badly that they send so many of them.

- What are our options?

- I'll tell you about a pilot I know who has entered this area. He flies a "Leleka". Yesterday he asked if I could help him with a place to stay. I asked him how many people would be there and for how long. He said: "We will definitely not stay long, because we have two boards. According to statistics, they can be shot down in a week." And the pig-dogs, as I have already told you, have many times more UAVs. So we have a lot of work to do.

- Have they recently increased the number of UAVs?

- They move them around. For example, there are twice as many in Pokrovsk as in Serebryanskyi Forest. That is, where they are planning a breakthrough, there are more of them. So we are able to reach them and shoot them down more often.

- We see that Russians are learning...

- Of course. And so we are. But they do it because they're on the military track, and they adapt faster than we do. I told you earlier about the project idea of my commander, call sign Charlie. He is a very experienced and competent commander. Six months ago, we were discussing a new project over a cup of coffee, planning and thinking about it. It took us six months to launch the first board. Volunteers helped us. We put it together from what we had. Now everything we have collected can be ordered from the Ministry of Defence's warehouses. So things have started to move. It is no longer the case that volunteers find everything. Yes, there are certain organisations that do this. We are grateful to Sergii Sternenko and the "Wild Hornets", who help with large batches of drones - 50-100 of them. It is clear that this is not enough for infantry brigades, but it is still very cool.

The Russians are adapting about four times faster. They used to barrage five of them in a square at an altitude of 1,200 metres, but now they fly at 2,700. It's okay - we can still get them. Recently, the guys from the Third or Fifth Assault (I can't remember now) caught up with a new "Zala Z-20" at an altitude of 3300 and destroyed it. They squeezed everything out of the FPV.

-Tell us more about your project...

- Everything is much better now than it was at the beginning. The most important thing is that it works. Yes, it was hard at first. We fell down, made mistakes, but we improved. Today, it is already delivering positive results. We told the command that we had such a project and wanted to try it. Why? Because we actually have almost no missiles. Due to the shortage of missiles, we thought, why not take an FPV? The guys did something similar: they attached an RPG-7 ammunition to the FPV and hit the tank! This is how it all started. We decided to try to raise the FPV to an altitude of 1200 metres. We started to do it slowly. We invested our own and volunteer funds in this. In Kyiv, there is a great school run by Oleh Stelmakh. In a week, he taught us an almost zero pilot who had previously flown only in a simulator. He got a very good base there. He came back well-trained - he could do such tricks! So we slowly started to raise the boards. We realised that with a seven-inch board we could climb to an altitude of two thousand metres without any problems at all. Then we realised that the battery was running out quickly, so we changed it. The cost of a new one is also normal - one hundred dollars. So, by trial and error, we assembled the first board. The pilot already had enough experience. And that was it - we succeeded!

- Technology in warfare is indeed gaining momentum. This way we can save the lives of our soldiers...

- As I said, the Russians have a very large human resource. Say what you will, but when there are five people at the checkpoint and 150 people are pushing in, it is very difficult to resist. We have come to the point where we are fighting with our brains - with technology. No one has given up or said: "Oh, there are more of them, so that's it, guys, let's negotiate and give something back." No! Everyone is in their places - working, improving, constantly looking for something. There is talk of artificial intelligence, particularly in the area of automatic system guidance. This is also a step forward.

- You mentioned negotiations.This topic is being actively discussed again. Most of the military people I talk to are against negotiations with the aggressor. They argue that, firstly, we have lost too many people. Secondly, it is impossible to negotiate with such an enemy, because he will not fulfil any obligations. Thirdly, they will most likely not leave us alone and will attack us again in some time, but with even greater force. How do you see this situation?

- There is an important point: any negotiation is better than war. Of course, it is better to solve problems through dialogue than to fight and kill someone. But negotiating with terrorists is another matter. Some people call Russia an aggressor country. It is not the country, but the government that is the aggressor. Therefore, there can be no negotiations with them. Except under one circumstance: they go beyond our borders, completely liberating Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson, Zaporizhzhia, and Kharkiv regions, and give us Crimea. Then we can talk about some negotiations. But again, these are terrorists. The first and second Chechen campaigns had already taken place. What was the point of those negotiations? To freeze the war for a year or two? So much for agreements with Russia.

- We understand that they will not return the occupied territories to us.

- No, they won't.

-The President, by the way, spoke about a new development that, in my opinion, should also "open the eyes " of the Russians a little bit- the Palianytsia drone missile...

- I hope that we will move to a production level in this matter. Because, at the beginning of the year, the President announced that the Armed Forces were purchasing drones. But they appeared in the warehouses only six months later. Although FPV is not some kind of super-complex technology. It is not even, let's say, a military technology. If we had them immediately, the results on the battlefield would have been different.

- Do you think that the Russians could stage a coup d'etat in the country? The fact that we are destroying their oil depots and military facilities, entering their territory, could push them to do so?

- I think so. In any case, we are causing them discomfort and considerable problems. The local population already understands that Russia is not as powerful as Putin has shown it on TV. In the Kursk region, we have made good progress. Our drones are flying into Russian territory, and very far away. We have flown into Moscow itself several times. The Russians see that something is wrong here (smiles - O.M.) - they tell us one thing, but it turns out to be something else. We have to look into it. Why is there such funding? Why are schools, kindergartens and hospitals being closed, and roads not being built? What can I say about the situation in the hinterland? Because everything goes to the Russian armed forces. And then there are the drones flying around the country, objects are burning. Even on video, they ask questions: "When will it all end?". But we still need to work hard. The sooner we have the resources, the sooner we will organise a meeting with the ground for them.

P.S.: Dear friends, our defenders of the sky need a pick-up truck. If you have the opportunity, please help.