With the Ukrainian army in Kursk: ‘We are finally going to take the war to Russia’

The Ukrainian soldiers of the squadron commanded by Mikhail had forgotten what it was like to feel optimistic. The last time was in the early stages of the summer counteroffensive of 2023, into which the Ukrainian army poured huge resources from its international allies. That offensive, focused on pushing back the Russians on the Zaporizhzhia front, was halted in a few months and since then Mikhail’s men, in the ranks of the 80th Airborne Brigade, have dedicated themselves to fighting in trenches in the face of the enemy advance. Their mood changed on August 6, when a surprise campaign began in which thousands of Ukrainian troops stormed the Russian province of Kursk. Since then, they again believe that the wind is blowing in their favor.

“When we were given the order to enter Kursk I thought only one thing; that we were finally going to take the war to Russia,” says Mikhail with a broad smile, raising his arms in victory. It is a phrase that echoes a now-famous August 12 statement by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy: “Russia brought war to others, now it’s coming home.” His government has stressed that the occupation in Kursk will end when Vladimir Putin agrees to negotiate a “just peace.”

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Mikhail, a 22-year-old sergeant, and his unit park their armored vehicle in front of a house five kilometers (3.1 miles) from the Russian border in the Ukrainian province of Sumy. They are gathering supplies to return to enemy territory. They claim, with a touch of euphoria, that every day they can take control of one or two villages. The commander-in-chief of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, Oleksandr Syrskyi, reported on Friday that the Ukrainian advance is covering up to three kilometers (1.2 miles) a day and that the main fighting now is taking place in Mala Loknia, a village 15 kilometers (9.3 miles) north of the Ukrainian border.

The authorities in Kyiv claim that their infantry is fighting more than 30 kilometers (18.6 miles) inside Russian territory. Zelenskiy claimed last Thursday that his troops have already overrun more than 80 Russian localities. Kursk regional government authorities downgraded this number to about 30.

The contrast with the discouragement of Ukrainian troops on the Donetsk front, where Russian superiority prevails, is vast. In Kursk it is different: Ukrainian forces had not felt victorious since 2022, when throughout the year they pushed back the invader at the gates of Kyiv and in other northern provinces, in Kharkiv, and in the western half of Kherson. Another soldier, Roman, from the 43rd Artillery Brigade, expressed himself in the same way as Mikhail: “I was also glad that we were finally going into Russia, because it is better for the war to be in their country than in our cities.” None of the servicemen interviewed wanted to give their full names. As in previous Ukrainian offensives, the Ukrainian General Staff is maintaining secrecy about the operation and placing severe restrictions on the media.

Roman’s meeting with EL PAÍS took place last Friday in Sudzha, the largest Russian municipality occupied by Ukrainian forces to date, eight kilometers from the border. The pre-war population of Sudzha was 5,000, but currently no more than 100 people remain there, according to the Ukrainian media outlet TSN. Russian authorities claim that 200,000 people have been evacuated in the border regions. The streets are deserted and mostly elderly people remain, those who have refused to leave, an officer of the 43rd Brigade reports. “The civilians we come across remain neutral,” Mikhail says. Soldiers from three brigades warned journalists not to go further into Kursk province because of the risk of being intercepted by Russian forces infiltrating the Ukrainian rear.

The situation is strangely calm in Sudzha considering that it was only last Thursday that Zelenskiy announced the municipality was completely under Ukrainian control. A silence reigns, broken only by artillery fire about 10 kilometers away, and on the road connecting Sumi to Kursk, the provincial capital, where Ukrainian SUVs and armored vehicles are constantly moving. The village is practically intact, except for some buildings pockmarked with bullet holes and broken windows. Eight kilometers further south, on the border, the Russian customs buildings are now a jumble of rubble, craters, and bloodstains.

Anti-tank mines removed by Ukrainian troops and the remains of burnt-out Ukrainian vehicles are piled up on the roadsides, evidence of intense Russian drone bombing activity. The vast majority of SUVs and armored vehicles are equipped with radio-electronic systems that can cut off drone communications.

At one point on the road, a U.S. MaxxPro armored infantry vehicle stops and six soldiers emerge from it. They line up in front of the wreckage of what looks like a large vehicle and say a prayer: their comrades died there.

Another major threat, whether to the Ukrainian rearguard on the border or in their forward positions in Kursk, is guided aerial bombs from Russian aircraft. In the three days that the EL PAÍS team worked in the area for this report, it witnessed the impact of two of these bombs in the vicinity of the main Ukrainian supply transport route. International and Ukrainian media have reported in the last two weeks that the Ukrainian air force is especially active in Sumy. Despite this, the only Ukrainian combat aircraft identified by this newspaper’s correspondent have been Soviet Mi-24 helicopters.

Ukrainian units receive radio warnings every few minutes about possible strikes when the takeoff of Russian bombers is identified. The same happens when Russian reconnaissance drones are detected on radar. Both in Sudzha and on Ukrainian territory, the consulted military officials assumed that Russian observation devices such as the Orlan and Supercam could be flying over the area at that moment at several kilometers of altitude, impossible to observe with the naked eye.

The city of Sumy, 35 kilometers from Russia, is periodically attacked by Russian drone bombs and missiles. Between August 14 and 17, the days that this newspaper’s special envoy was in the provincial capital, the city center and its transport network were hit by rockets every day. The main Russian objective is to disrupt the Ukrainian military logistics chain — the same objective is pursued by Ukrainian missiles in Kursk — although attacks against the civilian population are still common: last Saturday morning, a Russian rocket hit a parking lot in the center of Sumy, surrounded by residential buildings, where only civilian vehicles were parked. At noon, another explosion, caused by an Iskander missile, shook the urban center.

Inexperienced soldiers

A major difference with respect to other fronts in this war is the lack of experience of the Russian troops, according to the sources consulted. The vast majority of them have recently been incorporated into the army. Even the reinforcements that are arriving in the defense of Kursk are new recruits, not veterans, U.S. intelligence services have reported. “They are soldiers who have nothing to do with those we faced in Donbas, we take prisoners every day,” Mikhail says. Kyiv claims there are hundreds of Russian prisoners of war being held in Kursk. Zelenskiy stressed last Saturday that the raid into Russia has allowed Ukraine to replenish “the exchange fund” with which to recover its POWs.

In the vicinity of the border is a field hospital commanded by Igor, a high-ranking officer in the Ukrainian Medical Forces Command. He reveals that about three months ago, they were tasked with finding an underground location to establish an emergency care center for wounded soldiers. “Everything was conducted in top secret; only a civilian, the site manager, knew what was going to happen,” he explains.

The biggest difference from other fronts, Igor says, is that wounded Russian soldiers pass through his hospital every day. The Center for Strategic Studies, a Ukrainian defense analysis institute, puts the number of Russian prisoners of war wounded in Kursk at over 2,000. Maxim, a medic with the 82nd Assault Brigade, commented last Thursday at the border that he was aware of at least 1,000 Russians in captivity since the start of the incursion on August 6. Maxim corroborated that he too was transferring Russian wounded to Ukrainian territory on practically a daily basis. Asked about his feelings about occupying Russian territory, the 23-year-old doctor replied that “first it was fear, and then honor to take part in this mission.”

Despite assessments pointing to the poor training of Russian soldiers in Kursk, Ukrainian casualties are high. An agreed meeting of this newspaper with a mortar unit of the 117th Mechanized Brigade was cancelled because of a funeral service for 14 of its members killed in combat. Activity at the Sudzha border medical stabilization center never ceases either. Suddenly a Humvee bursts onto the scene, honking its arrival. The rear doors open and screams of pain emanate from inside. Four soldiers from an assault unit have been seriously wounded in an ambush. One of their comrades shows his rifle; a bullet has hit the weapon. He says this saved his life.

Echoes of Kharkiv 2022

The concentration of Ukrainian troops in the Kursk offensive is exceptional, as was the case of the Kherson counteroffensive in 2022, the summer offensive of 2023, and the defense of Bakhmut. The permanent parade of dozens of infantry vehicles supplied by NATO allies is impressive, involving Canadian Roshel Senators and Strykers, and the U.S.-produced MaxxPros and Humvees. More than 12 brigades are taking part in the operation, according to EL PAÍS estimates. The Ukrainian General Staff does not provide specific data. Michael Kofman, a war researcher at the Carnegie Endowment, estimated on August 10 that the Ukrainian soldiers destined for Kursk would number up to 15,000, although the total may be much higher.

Kofman and Carnegie Russia analyst Dara Massicot drew parallels — in terms of the speed of advance, type of weaponry, and the surprise factor — between the Kursk invasion and the counteroffensive that drove the Russians out of Kharkiv province in 2022. Mikhail, of the 80th Brigade, explained that they are following the same tactical logic of Kharkiv, with rapid attacks with small units of no more than a dozen soldiers, opening breaches in the Russian defensive lines, supported by artillery and drones.

That this is possible is due to the poor defensive structure that the Russian army had erected in this border sector. It is precisely the reinforced Russian defense lines in the occupied territories of Ukraine, in addition to air superiority, that have largely prevented the Ukrainian army from regaining ground since the end of 2022.

A question mark that Ukrainian analysts and media are beginning to raise is whether the operation in Kursk will make it possible to curb the Russian push into Donetsk province, one of the positive spillover effects expected from the campaign in Russia. The Kremlin has put all its efforts into conquering the city of Pokrovsk, one of the key bases of the Ukrainian defense in Donetsk, and as yet Moscow has not transferred experienced regiments fighting in Donbas to Kursk. Maxim and his comrades in the 43rd Brigade are asking for time as they are convinced that the Russian siege of Pokrovsk will eventually ease because, in their opinion, the Russian relief troops that could go to Donetsk will now have to be diverted to Kursk.

The coming months will reveal whether Zelenskiy’s gamble in Russian territory has been successful. What he has succeeded in doing for the moment is to instill optimism in the army, in the thousands of soldiers advancing on Kursk. “If Russia does not want to withdraw from our country and go back to the borders established for Ukraine in 1991, perhaps we will decide that we want to recover those of 1919,″ Mikhail says proudly: part of what is now Kursk province was then Ukrainian territory.

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