11 months ago
47
At the Battle of the Somme in World War I, British troops were famously told to walk, not run, toward enemy positions on the other side of No Man’s Land. There were reasons for this that sounded good to commanders, and some military historians will defend those reasons to this day. But at the end of that day, 20,000 troops were dead and another 40,000 were wounded, turning it into one of the most horrific slaughters in a horrific war.
Thoughts of that event were thoroughly in mind over the past two weeks as Russian commanders first sent troops forward in knots of tanks and armored transport, then a line of aging trucks, and finally on foot in an effort to capture positions near the city of Avdiivka in eastern Ukraine.
Just as at the Somme, the results of Russian efforts to advance have been jaw-dropping numbers of men killed and machines lost. But now, after more than two weeks of devastation, Russia finally has something to show for all its losses at Avdiivka.
On Tuesday, Russia managed to plant its flag … on a mountain of waste.
