“I saw small units of up to five of our guys on foot destroying huge numbers or Russian vehicles – three tanks at once,” he added, sipping coffee on a cold morning in central Kharkiv. Russian soldiers and fighters from the separatist regions of Donetsk and Luhansk had fled, he said.
Russians on the run
“They left a huge amount of vehicles and ammunition. We couldn’t carry them or evacuate them all to our rear.” Few of the pro-Russian forces remained to fight, with many donning civilian clothes to flee, Birdie added. “There were a lot of uniforms around. We caught some of these guys trying to escape in civilian clothes, they were saying some incredible nonsense trying to get away.” Other Russian troops were unable to distinguish their own forces from the advancing Ukrainian troops. “I heard them asking what the white crosses on the vehicles were. Then I heard them die in real time while I was listening to them,” he said.
