25 Apr: Nice! Ukrainians unveil & erase a top-secret Russian tank base - Reporting from Ukraine [View all]

Day 792: Apr 25

Today, there are a lot of developments in the Kurakhove direction.

In the last few days, there have been a series of attacks and counterattacks around Krasnohorivka, which have increased in intensity and signaled Russian forces' high priority to establish control of this town as a preliminary step to launching an attack on Kurakhove.

After the fall of Marinka, Krasnohorivka became the next logical step due to its high tactical value for the Russians. Taking the town would allow them to push forward into the fields, compromising the supply to the Ukrainian fortress settlements further along the line behind Marinka and providing fire control into the Ukrainian flanks. This way, the Russians would gain a significant advantage by attacking the Ukrainians also from the flanks.

Russian attacks over Krasnohorivka, which have been ongoing for weeks, are conducted on two main vectors: from the south towards the residential district and from the east, through the farms and field lands. The Russians faced heavy resistance in both vectors because these areas had already been heavily fortified since the initial conflict in 2014. As a result, Russian assaults on the city's southern district and from the east through the farms and countryside areas ultimately failed in their first attempt because Russian forces could not consolidate their positions, forcing them to retreat.

However, it took only a short time for Russian forces to regroup and begin preparations for the next assault. These efforts included significant artillery preparation. Among other objectives, geolocated footage confirmed the destruction of Ukrainian electronic warfare equipment, which was in the process of being deployed.

Shortly after that, the Russians finally launched their next wave, attacking from both the east and south vectors. In this last vector, the mechanized assault was remarkable in size, consisting of about two platoons.

The geolocated footage shows a first advance with six armored vehicles, which got under heavy artillery fire already on the approach. Ukrainians made extensive use of cluster munition, and the mechanized attack was finally repelled with the help of FPV drones. What happened next has been the subject of worldwide attention: the Russians led the next mechanized wave with a wholly welded metal plates-covered tank intended as protection against FPV drones. In addition, a strong electronic warfare device was placed at the upper part in order to undermine FPV attacks. This interesting assembly, nicknamed “turtle tank”, was, in fact, able to advance through the southern district and return to its base without being destroyed.

This event prompted remarks from several Ukrainian military analysts for two reasons. Firstly, no FPV drone attacks over the turtle tank were reported, so electronic warfare devices on board proved to be effective. Secondly, the fact that ATGM units did not attack the tank either, and only artillery fire were reported, indicates a worrying material shortage in this front area.

As for the turtle tank, after countless comments on social media, Russian forces finally published a more detailed video where they illustrated the development process of the turtle tank, showing further details. Unfortunately for the Russians, this footage got geolocated by Ukrainian forces, and shortly after that, the turtle tank base was hit and destroyed by a Ukrainian HIMARS attack.

Up next, it was the turn of the Ukrainians.

Geolocated images show Ukrainian forces' counterattack in the same areas of the earlier Russian attack, indicating that Ukrainian troops regained their positions following the initial Russian mechanized assault. The videos show a number of shell and FPV drone attacks over a building in the eastern part of the city. This building was one of the main Russian positions in the area. In the end, the upper floor of the building started to burn, and some parts even began to collapse.

The Russians found it difficult to accept this setback, and as if the scale of the last attack was not big enough, Russian forces doubled down on their effort and increased the scale of their next offensive to a massive level.

Firstly, Russian forces relaunched the turtle tank concept with new iterations, with the same tactical idea of leading several waves of mechanized attacks.

A Ukrainian officer stated that Russian forces conducted mechanized assaults near Krasnohorivka using dozens of armored vehicles...