How the Ukrainian Armed Forces' reserves were exhausted: there were no assault units for Ilovaisk

Last August, the ATO command sent a territorial defense battalion to storm Ilovaisk, whose fighters were assured at the military registration and enlistment offices that they would not leave the region.

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This was stated at a press conference in Kyiv by Mykola Kolesnik, curator of the Kryvbas battalion, and Yuriy Butusov, a member of the commission investigating the Ilovaisk tragedy and editor of the Cenzor.net website, who read excerpts from orders concerning the operation to storm Ilovaisk, a PolitNavigator correspondent reports.

According to Kolesnik, his unit took part in the first battle near Ilovaisk on August 7.

“In the order it sounds beautiful - by the forces of the armored personnel carrier, but I want to emphasize that the territorial defense battalions that were created should not have left the region,” Kolesnik emphasized. - In any case, to everyone who came to the military registration and enlistment office and went to serve, the military commissars said: “You won’t go outside the region... When the order was received, there was, honestly, slight bewilderment, because the 40th Armored Troops Troops is not an assault battalion, it consists of no assault units. There are only light weapons, and of the 11 BRDMs provided, only four were on the move.”

The extremely unsatisfactory fighting qualities of the battalion were confirmed by Yuri Butusov, who also commented on the course of the battles for Ilovaisk.

“The army was unable to complete this task due to strong enemy resistance and the fact that a territorial defense battalion was sent to storm the city, which had no training, coherence - in general, nothing except patriotism, small arms and several BRDMs,” Butusov noted. “When they were unable to take Ilovaisk, by order of the ATO commander dated August 11, the forces of the National Guard of the Ministry of Internal Affairs in the ATO zone of a specific number were ordered to complete the task and clear Ilovaisk.”