On May 11, the Russian command reportedly sent about 550 troops of the 74th Motorized Rifle Brigade of the 41st Combined Arms Army to cross the river Siverskyi Donets at Bilohorivka, in the eastern Luhansk region, to try to encircle Ukrainian forces near Rubizhne.
As satellite images show, Ukrainian artillery destroyed several Russian pontoon bridges and left a concentration of Russian troops and equipment around the river.
Read more: More Than 2,500 Kadyrovites of Russian forces Invaded Ukraine
The Institute for the Study of War indicated that there could have been up to 485 Russian soldiers killed or wounded and more than 80 units of equipment destroyed.
It is worth noting, how pro-russian military bloggers kept claiming russian success and Ukrainian cowardice up until this military disgrace.
When the news of the losses at the river crossing in Bilohorivka started to spread, some pro-Russian bloggers burst out criticizing incompetent leadership.
Western military analysts have also commented upon the satellite images and say the attempted crossing demonstrated a critical lack of tactical sense.
They assumed that Russian commanders, desperate to make progress, rushed the operation. Some also suggested that it was a significative of disorder in the Russian ranks.
This engagement of the war will definitely become the deadliest if the estimates that hundreds of soldiers were killed or injured prove accurate.
There were more than 500 sailors aboard the Russian Black Sea flagship Moskva when it was struck by a Ukraine-manufactured Neptune missile in April. The Kremlin at first insisted that all the sailors were rescued, later saying one was killed. But even as the families of missing sailors have publicly demanded answers, the Kremlin has largely kept up an official silence on the fate of the crew, part of a larger campaign to suppress bad news.
Based on the New York Times article by Marc Santora and Anton Troianovski.
Read more: It became Know When War Can be Over
