Mood on frontline buoyant in face of increasingly ‘panicking’ Russian forces. On the edge of a copse, Danilo and two fellow soldiers stared intently at a screen. On it was a live video feed from a drone. “It’s quite simple to use. We put the drone up, call in an artillery strike and see where it lands. Then we adjust the position,” said Danilo, a member of Ukraine’s 63rd Mechanised Brigade. The drone offered a panoramic view of the city of Snihurivka, occupied since the spring by Russian troops. (…) On Wednesday, however, they were staging a withdrawal. The Kremlin was retreating from its positions in Snihurivka and other villages on the right bank of the Dnipro. The ruined city is in a sliver of Mykolaiv oblast, close to the administrative border with the Kherson region and the occupied city of Kherson. Serhii Khlan, the deputy head of Kherson oblast council, said the Russian army had blown up all of the bridges over a tributary river, the Inhulets, including the Daryivskyi crossing. During the exit from Snihurivika, Russian forces had destroyed a bridge over an empty canal, turning it into an impassable concrete V shape. “They are panicking,” said Khlan. “The occupiers are preparing their withdrawal. They are disabling the bridges to deter our advance.” The Russians had beefed up some of their positions on the road south of Snihurivka to give cover to departing troops, he added. Russia’s defence minister confirmed his forces would soon be leaving right-bank Kherson, part of a territory Vladimir Putin “annexed” in September. In the meantime, the Ukrainian army pushed cautiously forward. Military traffic could be seen on the road to the frontline, including T-72 tanks on loaders and a US-supplied Himars long-range artillery system.
via guardian: ‘Russia kaput!’: Ukraine brigade eyes victory as enemy retreats from Kherson
siehe auch: Russia orders retreat from Kherson, its only captured Ukrainian capital since invading Kyiv earlier warned any possible Russian withdrawal from Kherson could be a trap. Russia’s military announced on Wednesday that it’s withdrawing from a key Ukrainian city and nearby areas, in what would one of the most significant and humiliating setbacks for Moscow’s forces in the eight-month-old war. Ukrainian authorities, however, cautioned against considering the retreat a done deal. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has warned that the Russians were feigning a pullout from Kherson to lure the Ukrainian army into an entrenched battle in the strategic industrial port city. The withdrawal from Kherson — in a region of the same name that Moscow illegally annexed earlier this year — would pile on another setback after Russia’s early failed attempt to capture the capital, Kyiv. Kherson, with a pre-war population of 280,000, is the only regional capital Russian forces captured since it invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24.; Russland zieht Truppen aus strategisch wichtigem Teil Chersons zurück Die russische Armee hat angekündigt, das westliche Ufer des Dnipro zu räumen. Es bestehe die Gefahr, dass Truppen dort eingekesselt würden, sagt General Sergej Surowikin. Unter dem Druck ukrainischer Gegenoffensiven ziehen sich Russlands Truppen aus dem nordwestlichen Teil des annektierten südlichen Gebiets Cherson zurück. Verteidigungsminister Sergej Schoigu ordnete die Räumung des rechten Ufers des Flusses Dnipro an, wie im russischen Staatsfernsehen zu sehen war. General Sergej Surowikin sagte ergänzend, beabsichtigt sei, dass die Streitkräfte sich auf das Halten des Ostufers des Flusses konzentrieren sollten. Es bestehe die Gefahr, dass das Gebiet am Westufer überschwemmt und die russischen Truppen dort eingekesselt würden. “Wir werden die Leben unserer Soldaten und die Kampfkraft unserer Einheiten sichern”, sagte Surowikin. (…) Der Rückzug wäre ein weiterer Rückschlag für das russische Militär. Cherson hatte vor Kriegsbeginn 280.000 Einwohnerinnen und Einwohner und war die einzige Gebietshauptstadt, die Russland seit der Invasion in die Ukraine erobert hatte. Besetzt wurde die strategisch wichtige Industriestaat damals kurz nach Kriegsbeginn. Im September annektierte Moskau völkerrechtswidrig die gleichnamige Region.