One bang, and the grenade is fired at one of the many trenches on the front line where Russian soldiers are hiding.
The hot and cramped room in the howitzer tank, where VG is also, fills with smoke. The atmosphere is intense and concentrated. The gunner, who sits on a seat slightly above the other two soldiers inside the carriage, opens the hatch to let in fresh air.
Over the radio connection, he announces that the mission has been completed. The tank quickly backs away from its firing position, to avoid being hit by Russian fire, and drives back to its hiding place. It all lasts for ten minutes.
In the trenches where the rest of the Ukrainian soldiers in the unit are waiting, the walls shake.
First because of the loud bang from the artillery shell. Then, after a few seconds, three rapid booms are heard from incoming artillery.
But before the Russians could respond, the Ukrainian tank is on its way back to its hiding place at lightning speed.
Around the town of Orikhiv, the front has stood quite still for five months. Ukraine is fighting to hold back the Russian advances, but the fighting is getting tougher – and the lack of ammunition isn’t helping.
The feedback on the radio link comes at the moment the tank is back – it hit the target: a Russian trench, where they had recently seen several Russian soldiers.
Along the fields that are the front line, you can see the smoke from several impacts. It smells of burning, and the ground is covered in craters. In the background, a steady stream of explosions is heard, we count between 2 and 3 per minute.
In the town of Orikhiv, just a few kilometers away, the destruction is total.
The Russians use modified Soviet-era glide bombs. They have greater precision than artillery shells, and can cause great destruction. But what the soldiers are most afraid of, on both sides, are the drones.
The drones can see everything that happens – and come whizzing down precisely from the sky, completely out of the blue. One of those who has experienced it is 32-year-old Anton.
VG met him at an evacuation bus with injured soldiers from the front. The day before he had been chased through the trenches by ten Russian drones.
– I heard explosions, I tried to throw myself into the trench, but it wasn’t enough. It exploded two to three meters from me.
The drones are everywhere in the war. The Ukrainians still have the upper hand when it comes to this technology, according to the drone group VG has met at the front. But they say the Russians are interfering.
The Ukrainians are controlled from a control room hidden in a basement on the front outside Orikhiv. There, Volodymyr “The Commander” follows everything that happens on a screen – both from the surveillance drones and the attack drones.
– We give them information about where they should fire from, and then they work from there, he says, and looks towards “Oscar”, who leads the artillery soldiers.
The screens show dead Russian soldiers, trenches – and in some places mopeds and ATVs
This is about the changed Russian tactics: instead of advancing towards the front with large amounts of equipment and people, which can be easily detected and attacked by a drone, they spread out and drive towards the front with what they have.
It is vulnerable – but also more effective. This means that the Russian soldiers are more spread out, and can attack with fewer.
When VG is visiting, we are told to wait a while before we move on. The “commander” has observed a Russian surveillance drone, and does not want it to see us on our way out.
After a while, the go-ahead signal comes, and we can go.
“Oscar” has several times experienced exactly what the lack of weapon support means in a combat situation.
He recalls a situation last autumn: the Russians advanced with four tanks against a group of Ukrainian infantry soldiers, but the artillery soldiers he leads did not have long-range ammunition that could reach them.
They watched as the Russians gradually reached the positions of the Ukrainian infantry. Only when they were close could his squad start firing.
By then it was too late. All were killed.
After several months of political wrangling, the US has now approved a comprehensive aid package. President Joe Biden says they can start sending weapons to Ukraine as early as this week.
It gives new hope.
– I’m tired of it – I just want to go home to my wife, says the artillery soldier “Volvo” about the lack of weapons.
“Kherson” takes a smoke, even though he is standing in the middle of the exhaust of a tank he is working on repairing.
He was a construction worker before the invasion, when his home was occupied and destroyed by the Russians. After that he signed up for military service.
He says his motivation is home, children and family. One day he will return home.
– If no one comes back, then no one will rebuild it.
In the next few days, it is expected that Russia will intensify its attacks against infrastructure, while Ukraine is waiting to receive the increased support from the West.
In the evacuation bus from the front are seriously injured soldiers, who are also going home – or eventually back to the war again.
The soldiers say that they have been through hell. A trench war that requires many victims.
According to calculations made by the Norwegian Armed Forces in January, close to 100,000 Ukrainian soldiers had been killed or seriously injured so far in the war, compared to 180,000 Russian ones. The figures are uncertain, and British intelligence concluded in March that Russia has lost 355,000 soldiers.
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