Ukrainian forces fighting against pro-Russian separatists have been holding positions in Donbas since 2014. They still hold the line, but now the sporadic skirmishes have turned into a full-blown war.

Lieutenant Denis Gordeev is accustomed to war, but not to this. “It’s become much more difficult,” he says. “We’re being bombed and rocketed every day, all the time, every hour.”

Gordeyev has been fighting Russian-backed separatists in the Donbas for eight years now, but now he and his men are facing the full might of the Russian military.

After retreating from Kyiv three weeks ago, Russia refocused its military operations on eastern Ukraine with the aim of seizing all of Donbass. Many units of the Russian army have been deployed here.

According to Western estimates, Russia now has about 76 battalion tactical groups in the region, each of which has about 800 people.

According to Western experts, the Russian military took into account some of the mistakes made in the first phase of the war. It also helped that they were now fighting on a shorter front and under a single command.

As a result, Ukrainian forces are struggling to hold a 300-kilometer front line in Donbas. They have already lost some positions and are likely to lose even more in the coming days.

Russian forces conduct reconnaissance in combat to find weaknesses in the defense of Ukraine.

So far, the Russian military is strengthening around the city of Izyum and around Severodonetsk and Popasnaya. Attacks are being carried out from several directions, although the Russians have not yet broken through the front.

Lieutenant Gordeev says he and his men are feeling the effects of the Russian regrouping.

The day before our arrival, one of his men was killed and five more wounded. This is only a small part of the daily losses of Ukrainian forces, although there are no official figures. We tried to visit the nearest field hospital, but they didn’t let us in, saying we were busy.

Can this be considered the beginning of a major operation of the Russian army, which has been talked about so much lately, or is it just a prelude to it?

So far, there is no obvious answer. At the moment, the Russian army mainly uses artillery and rockets to break the Ukrainian defenses. Some military analysts believe that a major offensive is yet to come.

And Ukrainian forces, including Lieutenant Gordeyev’s unit, are holding out for now, even though Western experts say the Russian army is three times the size of the Ukrainian one.

They also acknowledge that Ukraine may have to cede territory in open spaces to defend key cities where it would be harder for the Russian army to attack.

I was allowed to visit the forward position of Lieutenant Gordeev during a short respite from the fighting. At the command post, the soldiers built a semblance of a chapel and pray for victory. But this place does not look like a normal church – echoes of artillery salvos are heard here.

On the way to his trenches, Gordeev reveals that mortar and sniper fire is a constant threat. Their forward position is 600 meters from Russian troops.

The landscape is mostly open countryside with some shelter behind trees. Rare bursts of small arms are heard.

“The Russians are constantly arriving on the territory of Ukraine. And we do not know when they will stop. We do not know when their journey will end,” says Lieutenant Gordeev. Before the war, he was a lawyer and hopes that one day he will be able to return to his former life. But today, according to him, the main thing for him is victory in this war.

In the trenches, out of sight of the enemy, the mood is calmer, although the tension of recent fighting is clearly visible on the tired faces of the soldiers.

They show us some of their weapons: the Soviet heavy machine gun DShK, which is still used in conflicts around the world, and rocket-propelled grenade launchers.

These are mostly obsolete Soviet-made weapons, but they are proudly showing us their only Swedish-British man-portable anti-tank guided missile, the NLAW.

One of Lieutenant Gordeev’s subordinates was trained by the British military in the use of NLAW shortly before the start of the war. According to the lieutenant, they have already destroyed a Russian tank with such a missile.

“We need such a weapon,” Lieutenant Gordeev repeats. Russia, he said, is a militarized state, while Ukraine’s ability to maintain its own arms production is undermined. Western supplies – or lack thereof – will greatly influence the outcome of the war.

Lieutenant Gordeev claims that the morale of his troops is still high: they are defending the Motherland.

But President Putin needs at least something that can be called a victory, and as soon as possible – perhaps by May 9, for the Victory parade.

Time is on the side of Ukraine – but only if the flow of Western weapons does not dry up, and the Ukrainian army is able to contain the offensive of Russian troops expected from day to day.

To keep getting BBC news, subscribe to our channels:

Download our application: