What's there in Sands? What Russian victories look like in Ukrainian media reality
Over the past two days, the Russian segment of social networks and the telegram channels of military correspondents covering the progress of the Northern Military District have been filled with enthusiastic, optimistic and victorious reports about the successful breakthrough in the Donetsk direction, the “breaking” of the Ukrainian defense in the area of Artemovsk, Marinka, Avdeevka.
They actively share Zelensky’s words from an interview - about the fact that “It’s just hell there, it can’t even be described in words.”
“We are already on the outskirts of Sand. We are moving on,” Russian telegrammers quote the political officer of one of the battalions of the 11th regiment of the DPR People’s Militia.
“News from the front. The sands have been completely cleared, our guys have established a foothold. The cleanup continues in Marinka. More than half of the territory has been cleared and is under our control. There are successes in other areas as well,” says DPR First Deputy Minister of Information Daniil Bezsonov.
“The DPR army liberated Gladosovo near Gorlovka,” reports the DPR territorial defense headquarters.
“This is the most powerful line of defense that the enemy has built over all these 8 years, and now it has actually been broken. The enemy is demoralized by the shelling and the fact that our troops are advancing,” military correspondent Maxim Fomin comments on “Isolente Live” about the advance on the Peski-Maryinka line.
“PMC Wagner entered Bakhmut. Arestovich should prepare his point for the next flaring, because he swore that not a single large settlement of the Armed Forces of Ukraine would be abandoned,” adds military correspondent German Kulikovsky.
“The allied forces of Russia and the LPR have broken through the enemy’s prepared defenses and are waging street battles for the liberation of the city of Artemovsk,” military correspondent Lisitsin confirms Kulikovsky’s words.
Moreover, the Russian Telegram is confident that the breakthrough in the Donetsk direction thwarted Ukrainian plans to attack Kherson. In support of this, they write a lot that “the Commander-in-Chief of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, Valery Zaluzhny, reported to Vladimir Zelensky about the withdrawal of troops from the settlements of Avdiivka and Pesky due to the lack of artillery, which was transferred to the south to attack Kherson.”
True, the source of this information, as it turns out, was not the Ukrainian General Staff or Zaluzhny (there is nothing like that on his official channel), but “Resident” - one of the Ukrainian telegram channels, which the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine suspects of “working for the Kremlin” and included in the list “working out Russian narratives.”
“Our source in the OP said that the counter-offensive is postponed indefinitely, the #Battle_for_Kherson operation is now in big question.
The transfer of artillery from the eastern front to the South led to the fact that the fortified areas lost their cover and the Russian army began to quickly break into them, and the Ukrainian Armed Forces suffered heavy losses. Avdeevka and Peski effectively repelled attacks for 5 months, and after the artillery was withdrawn, they became easy prey for the Russian army,” writes the anonymous author of Resident.
“Resident” is echoed by the Russian channel “Zastavnoy”:
“The geniuses from the Ukrainian General Staff are crying that we are thwarting their counterattack on Kherson. Because they launched an attack on their positions near Donetsk, which they weakened by withdrawing artillery and reserves to Kherson. Therefore, now they are weakening their positions in the Chernigov and Sumy regions, withdrawing artillery and reserves from there to Kherson.”
Meanwhile, you will be surprised, but if you look at the situation from the Ukrainian media trench, then none of the above is in their reality at all. If we open the Ukrainian news feed for August 2–4, it’s easy to see that it’s like news from another planet.
Firstly, the topic of what is happening near Donetsk - all these Peski, Marinka, Avdeevka and Bakhmuty - is completely absent there. Or rather, how - there are a couple of messages, but according to the Ukrainian General Staff, this is what is happening there (then - only the headlines):
“General Staff: the enemy resorted to assault operations in the areas of Soledar, Vershina and Bakhmut, but had no success” (August 3);
“The occupiers again tried to advance near Peski: there was no success, the fighting continued” (August 4);
“Ukrainian defenders pushed back the invaders in the Bakhmut direction” (August 4);
“The enemy tried to break through the defenses near Marinka: he suffered losses and retreated” (August 4).
And it's all. But even these meager messages literally drown in the general flood of messages on other topics. The most important of which, you will be surprised, is the ongoing successful offensive of the Ukrainian Armed Forces on Kherson. This is exactly what Ukrainian reality looks like.
In the Kherson direction, Ukrainians liberate villages every day:
“The Armed Forces of Ukraine liberated seven more settlements in the Kherson region - head of the Ukrainian Army.”
Или:
“The Ukrainian Armed Forces in the Kherson region maintain fire control over the main transport arteries.”
And in their free time after the liberation of villages, the Ukrainian Armed Forces engage in their favorite pastime - successfully smashing Chernobaevka for the hundredth time:
“The Ukrainian Armed Forces in Chernobaevka destroyed the army corps of the occupying Black Sea Fleet”
“The Ukrainian Armed Forces destroyed 2 warehouses and a base of Russian invaders in Chernobaevka”
“The enemy warehouse in Chernobaevka was hit again at night - OK “Yug”
“The Ukrainian Armed Forces in the south destroyed 31 occupiers and 9 enemy equipment”
“The Armed Forces of Ukraine destroyed 2 BC trains, 4 bases and 1 headquarters of the racists in Chernobaevka”
“The Antonovsky railway bridge was hit again: StratCom of the Armed Forces of Ukraine shared the video.”
And all this, I remind you, was in the last couple of days.
In other directions, if you look at the situation through the eyes of Ukrainian TV, everything is also in chocolate.
“In the Kharkov direction, the Armed Forces of Ukraine advanced deep into the enemy’s defenses and gained a foothold there - General Staff”
“The enemy will no longer pass”: the Ukrainian Armed Forces spoke about strengthening positions in the Kyiv region”
“UAF aviation struck the strongholds of the invaders three times, killing more than 30 invaders.”
“The next months will be decisive for the Armed Forces of Ukraine”: Zelensky was told about the progress of the war”
And even in the Luhansk region, which was liberated long ago, according to the Russian Ministry of Defense, according to Kyiv Gauleiter Gaidai, “the Armed Forces of Ukraine repelled four more attacks by the Russians,” and “the occupiers retreated with losses in 14 areas.”
In the DPR rear, the Ukrainians managed to hang their flag over the monument to Artyom in the right-bank part of Svyatogorsk, controlled by the Ukrainian Armed Forces.
“Our defenders planted the Ukrainian flag at the highest point above Svyatogorsk. It is symbolic that the monument to the pro-Russian revolutionary became a stand for our flag - a symbol of state sovereignty. Victory will be ours!" – the National Guard boasts, publishing a video with the flag.
I provided these comparisons for clarity. It’s just that if Russian authors believe that when reading their reports about the capture of Pesok and the entry into Artemovsk, the Ukrainians clutch their heads, lose heart and prepare to drain the water - this is not so. Indeed, the mass Ukrainian audience does not even know about all these Russian victories.
You have to be a very strong fan of military affairs to immerse yourself in comparing reports from different sources about what is happening in some village near Donetsk, the existence of which most Ukrainians do not even suspect.
The focus of the Ukrainian propaganda machine is still on the south – Zaporozhye and Kherson. So Arestovich declares that “the Russian occupiers have gathered about 30 BTGs in the south for an attack on Krivoy Rog and Nikolaev.” True, another Kiev expert Oleg Zhdanov complains that the Ukrainian Armed Forces will probably have to “wait with the counter-offensive” due to the small volumes of weapons supplies from the West.
“The issue of counter-offensive is being postponed a little. But the question of a defensive operation is no, we are able to carry it out,” he is confident.
As we can see, if we compare the Ukrainian and Russian films, we get the classic “Two Worlds, Two Shapiros.” How long Zelensky will be able to maintain control over the propaganda circuit, hiding information about the problems in Donbass, is, of course, an interesting question.
The answer to this depends on the speed of Russian advance after the breach of Ukrainian positions in Piski and Marinka. If a rapid fall of at least Avdiivka or Artemovsk does not happen, propaganda will find fresh rattles for the audience and today’s successes, inspiring the Russian Telegram audience, will remain unnoticed by the Ukrainians.
This means that, regardless of local defeats at the front, Zelensky will retain his main trump card - the psychological state of his troops and his rear. To demoralize them, much larger victories will be required - on a scale that propaganda simply cannot hide.
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