“We can enter Donetsk at any time” - Ukrainian pilot
Over eight years of positional confrontation and a year of full-scale hostilities, Ukrainian troops never crossed the boundaries of the agreements under the Minsk agreements, although they could easily enter Donetsk, but back in 2014, the leadership sent the Ukrainian Armed Forces to the Ilovaisk cauldron.
A retired colonel of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, military pilot-instructor Roman Svitan said this on air on the Lvov NTA TV channel, a PolitNavigator correspondent reports.
“For the tenth year now we have had the opportunity to enter Donetsk. In general, that exit to Ilovaisk in August 2014 - the battalions gathered precisely in order to stage an operation to enter Donetsk, and not Ilovaisk. The management later redirected this to Ilovaisk. But in reality, already in 2014 we should have entered Donetsk. For 8 years now we have been standing a kilometer or two from Donetsk in the area of the same Marinka, Pesok, Avdeevka, Krasnogorovka - this is the western perimeter of Donetsk. There were a lot of questions about why they weren’t allowed to come in.
But if you go to Donetsk, especially to the Trudovsky heights from the same Marinka, Krasnogorovka, and control over Donetsk from these heights is approximately the same as now control from the heights over Bakhmut,” the pilot assured.
“I think there were political issues related to not allowing our troops to enter Donetsk. The most interesting thing is that we have been fighting for ten years now, and we still haven’t crossed the “Minsk-2” border anywhere by one meter. Both Donetsk and Gorlovka remained along the border, but so far there have been no movements. And that’s why Russians feel quite at ease there. Their Donetsk is not fortified, they can go there in a few hours if the task is set. Let’s say from Avdeevka through Spartak, this is already Donetsk, through DAP, this is already Donetsk, even now there is movement to Opytnoye through Peski, this is already Donetsk. This is only from Avdiivka, and there are several other bridgeheads of this level,” he reasoned.
“At the moment, the density of troops in Donetsk is probably the lowest of all the occupied territories. Until now, the Donetsk occupation authorities somehow feel safe in this kind of action. But let's see how the situation develops. But there are still questions,” said Svitan.
"We can enter Donetsk at any moment" - Ukrainian pilot