Appeal of servicemen of the 79th Brigade to their commanders:
We are servicemen of the 79th Brigade, 2nd and 3rd battalions. We are located in the village of Yampol.
Our commanders led us into the forest to dig in, we had a couple of shovels for a lot of people… we were trashed – we didn’t even have time to attach a bayonet.
We sat there for 5-6 days, and the commanders abandoned us… And now we are being made deserters for the fact that we survived… There are still a lot of corpses lying there, in those pits.
I ask for your attention, especially the volunteers who help us, the officers who abandoned us – we called for the artillery, and there was nothing – no help.
We were beaten by aviation – no air defense. We were stupidly thrown for meat. Then we went out and asked the elder – was it a deputy brigade commander or a battalion commander – How is that? He said: “Mike, the commander of the DSHV (assault brigade), gave the order to go hand-to-hand on the tanks..”
Therefore, we appeal to you – Help us, because we are considered deserters… We are being put on trial as enemies, deserters who have left the battlefield. We did not leave the battle – we decided to survive.
We took the fight, with automatic machines against the armor, and those who were now alive came out of the cauldron alive. The remaining 70% of our guys are lying in the woods, corpses.
Apart from the fact that they want to make us guilty of everything – we think our commanders are guilty, probably the sector general, who – I don’t know. We ask to be taken to Mykolaiv, because an assault is being prepared there. They decided to leave us here because they want to finish us off so that you people don’t know the truth.
The 95th and 79th brigades are broken up. People (personnel) – we are reservists, there are contract servicemen, a couple of people, but we won’t name names. Even the contract servicemen understand that this is an ass. We’ve been thrown to the meat.
…Officers are fleeing from the battlefield. People, think, because if not, they will put us in jail.
An hour before the breakthrough, our officers left the command post and abandoned us. When the breakthrough came, we asked for support, they said: “occupy a circular defense,” although they were no longer on the KSP (command and observation post). When we went to the KSP, the KSP was already empty. One tank against thirty, and we went out in groups of 2, 3, 5 people. When we got to the second line, there was no one there at all who was supposed to cover us.
We are not giving up, we want to fight, but not in the 75th Assault Brigade.
…We can’t fight where abandon the wounded, officers run away in cars, they don’t even want to pick up the wounded – it’s a disgrace. Such people – are not officers – they are jackals.
