Under the ground are several million bottles of “Soviet champagne”, as the sparkling wine is called. There are millions of bottles of wine in the old cellars of ArtWinery in Bakhmut. The cellars are part of a massive network of caves that were excavated to produce gypsum and salt. Photo: ArtWinery / Wikimedia Commons The precious drops from the wine cellar in Bakhmut were once on the lips of the top Soviet leaders, making the city’s name known throughout the Eastern Bloc. Bakhmut was then called Artjemivsk, before it regained its old name Bakhmut in 2016. news visited the champagne factory down in the old salt mines in 2016. Bakhmut has been known as Ukraine’s champagne capital Now the drops may be dripping out of their broken bottles. On the surface, the bombs are falling to prepare the advance of the notorious Wagner Group. The wine cellar is in the middle of the area where the fiercest battles are taking place. – The occupiers have actually crushed Bakhmut. Another city in Donbas the Russian army has reduced to burnt ruins, said President Zelenskyj in his evening speech on 9 December. According to The Institute for the Study of War, Russian air forces have recently stepped up support for the Wagner group in Bakhmut. That means more rocket attacks against the already badly damaged city. Photo: Libkos / AP According to The Institute for the Study of War, the Wagner group is leading the offensive. The Russian mercenaries have been trying, for many months now, to penetrate Bakhmut. Lars Peder Haga is an associate professor at the Norwegian Air Force School. Photo: Air Force School – Bakhmut is an important city for those who want to control Donetsk Oblast. The Russian forces have a political directive from above that they should take control of Donetsk. Then they continue to attack in Bakhmut even though they are making almost no progress, and are clearly suffering heavy losses, explains military expert Lars Peder Haga. Haga says that Bakhmut is so important precisely because it lies on the road to two other central cities in Donetsk, namely Slovjansk and Kramatorsk. Bakhmut in the northeast of Donetsk county in Ukraine. The traces of a former life Among the hollowed-out apartment blocks, only 15,000 of the city’s 70,000 inhabitants remain, according to a humanitarian worker to the Kyiv Post newspaper. Gas for the car is impossible to get, so they cycle and walk past the traces of a previous life. Two men wheel a bicycle through a part of Bakhmut where fierce fighting took place. In the Catholic cathedral of Bakhmut, no one prays anymore. A volunteer prepares food in a basement where the citizens of Bakhmut gather to eat, warm themselves, and seek refuge from the attacks on the surface. The sports stadium where the home team from Bakhmut won the regional sumo wrestling championship in October 2020 now has a large gaping hole in the eastern wall. Many of those who remain in Bakhmut are those who have lived there the longest. The trees that once shaded this playground are gradually being cut down. Meat Grinder Tens of thousands of soldiers fight on each side. According to Forbes, at least eight Ukrainian brigades are fighting in Bakhmut. With approximately 3,000 soldiers in each brigade, there could be more than 24,000 Ukrainian soldiers involved in the battle. No man’s land on the battlefield outside Bakhmut. Photo: Ministry of Defense of Ukraine / Wikimedia Commons And if champagne is not dripping in the wine cellar, blood is dripping on the battlefields around the city. According to Vice Media, 50-100 Ukrainian soldiers are treated for injuries in one of the city’s hospitals every single day. The figures on the Russian side are comparable, if not higher. Both sides use heavy artillery in the battle for Bakhmut. This is a Ukrainian cannon being fired at the Russian positions. Photo: Libkos / AP – There have been very high casualty figures there since the Russians attacked. It is really characteristic of the war in all of Donetsk. There, the Russians have attacked prepared positions, because after all there has been war there for eight years. The Ukrainians have defensive positions in several layers and have rotated their best soldiers in the area, explains Lars Peder Haga. Stretchers are placed outside a hospital with broken windows in Bakhmut. Photo: LIBKOS / AP The spokesman for the US Security Council, John Kirby, estimated on 22 December that the Wagner group alone had lost a thousand soldiers in the last few weeks around Bakhmut. Military leaders on both sides call the battle for Bakhmut “a meat grinder”. Haga says it is difficult to predict how long it will last. – Both parties have resources and prioritize keeping the area, so this may well last for several more months.
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From champagne town to meat grinder – news Urix – Foreign news and documentaries
