100 days of war: Battle stories that defined Ukraine-Russia conflict

As the Ukraine-Russia war touches Day 100, here are some of the defining battles that shaped the ongoing conflict.      

The first 100 hundred days of the war in Ukraine witnessed quite a few battles that delineate the true nature of hostility, resilience and war tactics of the Russian invasion. Here are some of the defining battles that shaped the ongoing Russia-Ukraine conflict.

A piece of 42-acre rock sitting above the Black Sea became the cynosure of the conflict from the very first day. Merely 45 km from the Ukrainian coast, the island was attacked by the Russian Naval forces on February 24 — the first day of the invasion. The assault on the island was particularly highlighted in the mainstream media due to the dramatic radio conversation between a Ukrainian soldier and a Russian warship that asked the Ukrainian guards to surrender. The Ukrainian guard famously responded to the Russian warship with ‘F**k yourself’. The island was soon captured by the overwhelming Russian naval forces.

In the following weeks, what began as a story of sheer defiance started to resemble a classic revenge drama as Ukrainian sources claimed to have seriously damaged Vasily Bykov — the Russian patrol ship that was allegedly used in the takeover of the Snake Island. However, the revenge story turned out to be too good to be true when the Russian patrol ship was seen unharmed at Sevastopol Harbor on March 16. Just when the battle of Snake Island was considered over, the most unthinkable thing happened.

On April 14, in a dramatic turn of events, it was reported that the most powerful warship of Russia’s Black Sea fleet had been sunken in a Ukrainian anti-ship missile attack. ‘Moskva’ was the flagship guided-missile cruiser of the Russian Navy that had a crew of around 500 which played its role in the capture of the island. By the last week of April, Ukrainian counter-attacks on the island started to increase. Ukraine used the Turkish Bayraktar TB2 unmanned combat aerial vehicle to carry out aerial attacks on Russian targets on and around the Snake Island.

Commercial satellite imagery collected during the first two weeks over the island established the damages caused by the Ukrainian counterstrike.

Despite heavy damages, Russia continues to control the strategic island with a continuous supply of anti-aircraft missile systems and multiple launch rocket systems. Ukraine has started receiving Harpoon anti-ship missiles from its western allies. "The coastal defence of our country will not only be strengthened by Harpoon missiles they will be used by trained Ukrainian teams," Ukrainian Defence Minister Oleksiy Reznikov earlier said. As the war enters its Day 100, the control over the tiny Snake Island remains critical for both the countries considering the economic blockade imposed by Russia and its grip over the Black Sea. Ukraine is a net exporter of food and moved 70 per cent of its exports by sea before the war began.

The home of the world’s largest flying aircraft—the Antonov An-225 Mriya—was attacked by Russia’s elite airborne Vozdushno-desantnye voyska Rossii (VDV) on February 24. The company-sized grouping of light infantry soldiers launched the assault using extremely low flying Ka-52 and Mi-8 helicopters.