DPR Prepares For Full-scale War With Pro-kiev Forces

The Donetsk People’s Republic is preparing for a full-scale war, which is expected at any day.

Photo: AFP / Getty Images / Dominique Faget

Artillery attacks have dramatically increased around the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) andUkrainian President Petro Poroshenko said that he does not exclude a full-scale Russian invasion in all directions. The smell of a war has again appeared in the east of Ukraine.

An essence of the matter lies in details. Strengthening of attacks may be different: larger artillery calibers, more shots, and more victims. At this time, we can say that the war in Donbass loses its borders – attacks are becoming more frequent and more long-range. The artillery has covered Ukrainian villages in the direction of Mariupol, where shells did not fly for more than the year and a half. Borders of the war in Donbass are very conditional, but, most often, maintained. All Donetsk and all Mariupol are in hitting area of a usual field artillery as 122 mm howitzer, but it is impossible to find any crater on the central Lenin Square in Donetsk or near the Drama Theatre in Mariupol. There is not shelling here.

The village of Chermalyk also has not been shelled since the beginning of the war, although it is located just seven kilometers from the line of a combat contact. But on Wednesday, Andreevka and Chermalyk were covered by shelling. The DPR also reported that over the past day the Ukrainian Armed Forces’ shells targeted Zaytsevo, Golmovskiy, Vasilyevka, Yakovlevka and Mineralnoye villages. Artillery firefights are going along all the line of combat contact around the DPR. For example, on Thursday, the administration of Gorlovka reported that 80 transformer substations, 2 high-voltage lines and the Rumyantsev mine’s structure were de-energized during a night’s shelling.

Spread of the war is a new and dangerous trend in Donbass. Usually, this means a deep impasse in negotiations and an imminence of hot battles’ flash. Donetsk is demonstratively waiting for this. People check air-raid shelters, where water supplies are created, officials are warned of the need to have a three-day supply of food at homes, vacations for military have been canceled. The war is expected at any day since the first reports about the shooting on the border of Crimea.