In Ukraine's 'fortress,' soldiers struggle to save a city almost empty of life

A paint-chipped, smoky wood stove is the only source of heat in an abandoned, drafty home where a Ukrainian artillery gun crew has been sent to rest.

The tired members of this tight-knit group are normally dragging an old Soviet-style 122 millimetre D-30 howitzer around the smoldering ruins of Bakhmut, the eastern Ukrainian city described by President Volodomyr Zelenskyy as the country's "fortress."

The city — and the gun crew — have held on through the months of bitter, relentless fighting that turned this once sedate provincial town of 73,000, nestled in the rough folds and jagged cuts of coal-rich Donbas, into an enormous graveyard.

The gun crew's billet — hidden behind a high, gated wall and sheltered by a web of tree branches bearing rotting, frost-scorched fruit — is far enough away from the fighting to allow the troops to relax, but close enough for occasional crunch of artillery to remind them of what they left behind.

As nearby Russian troops press a grinding, slow-motion offensive, the Ukrainians sleep with their rifles and body armour beside their beds.

CBC News was granted access to the Ukrainian National Guard artillery unit, whose members offered first-hand accounts of how the Russian Army is changing tactics and, in some cases, becoming more deadly. They provided a fascinating glimpse of the techniques that have allowed the Ukrainian military to hold on.

Aside from their ingenuity and fighting skills (and the Russian military's apparent inability to cross even small rivers), the Ukrainians have benefited, said one soldier, from their ability to rapidly treat casualties — battlefield first aid skills taught to them by Canadians through the Operation Unifier training mission.

For those still hunkered down in the embattled region, and those who've fled to safety in nearby Ukrainian cities, the whys and hows matter little as they grapple with bigger questions about how to survive and when — or even if — they want to go home.

It could be a long time.

Most observers agree Moscow's long-anticipated offensive to claim all of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions has rumbled to life, with its territorial gains to date amounting to one or two-kilometre stretches.

According to a British Ministry of Defence assessment, the Russians are paying an enormous price in blood for that territory: Russia is now losing soldiers at a rate higher than it was at the beginning of the full-scale invasion almost a year ago. Ukraine's General Staff estimates Russian losses at over 800 killed each day, a figure that could not be independently verified.

A career soldier who was trained by Canadians (CBC News is using only his first name, Volodymyr, in keeping with Ukrainian military identity restrictions) said he and his comrades have been fighting in Bakhmut since October and have watched the agony of the city as it has been torn apart block by block.

"Behind the river, it is like completely, completely ruined, completely grey and just burned out," he said.

"Some areas of the city just don't have buildings because they are ruined and burned."