In Ukraine, the battle for Soledar may be a life-wasting diversion for a looming, larger fight

In recent days, the town of Soledar has become Ukraine's latest killing field.

Russian forces appear to have finally taken control of at least most of the practically annihilated community in the eastern Donbas region — but not before Ukraine's army exacted a heavy toll. 

Both sides have made frequent and unverifiable claims of inflicting heavy casualties on the other, but Ukraine's Deputy Defence Minister Hanna Maliar described the situation in especially harrowing detail.

"The enemy literally steps on the corpses of his own soldiers, massively uses artillery, volley fire systems and mortars, covering even its own soldiers with fire," she wrote on social media.

With unverifiable estimates from the Ukrainian side putting Russian losses over the past few weeks in the thousands of wounded or killed, the cost of capturing Soledar has been catastrophic for Russia, said Oleksiy Melnyk, a former Ukrainian Air Force lieutenant colonel who's now with the Razumkov Centre, a Kyiv-based think-tank.

"The Ukrainian military command [is] trying to kill as many newly mobilized Russians and mercenaries as possible," he told CBC News.

He says the heavy Russian losses validate Ukraine's efforts to cling to the town, despite its minimal strategic significance. 

More broadly, Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhaylo Podolyak said this week that over the past seven months that Russian forces fought in Soledar and in nearby Bakhmut, their losses have ranged between 10,000 and 20,000 men killed or wounded.

Melnyk said he believes the short-term Ukrainian goal is to try to exhaust the Russians to make it much more difficult for Russia's army of regular soldiers and mercenaries to mount subsequent offensives later this winter and spring — even though Ukrainian losses have been very high as well.

"[Both sides] are trying to prevent the other from conducting another offensive operation," Melnyk said.

Before Soledar became a battlefield objective, it was best known for being the site of a vast complex of tunnels used for mining salt. 

Fanning out from the town for hundreds of kilometres underground, parts of the salt tunnel maze are accessible to the public, creating an unusual local tourist attraction. 

Russia's primary target since the summer had been the nearby city of Bakhmut, roughly 10 kilometres away. But in late December, Russian mercenary forces from the Wagner Group — which had been spearheading the long, grinding head-on assault — instead turned their attack to the north and made Soledar the focus.

Melynk says the Wagner forces, which are controlled and paid for by Russian business tycoon Yevgeny Prigozhin, were determined to get President Vladimir Putin a victory no matter what the cost, to strengthen Prigozhin's influence with the Kremlin, and to embarrass rival commanders in Russia's Defence Ministry.