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- cross-posted to:
- [email protected]
Gasping for air from a trench in eastern Ukraine, an infantryman was ready for the worst when a suffocating white smoke spread into his position.
A Russian drone had just dropped a gas grenade into the trench, an internationally banned practice in warfare used to suffocate Ukrainian soldiers hiding inside. Forced out in the open, the Ukrainians immediately became vulnerable targets for Russian drones and artillery.
. . .
Russia has increasingly deployed chemical agents in its grand offensive to occupy the last cities in the Donbas region under Ukrainian control. The suffocation tactic is to take out entrenched personnel and dampen the morale of Ukrainian soldiers who – severely outmanned and outgunned – have been withdrawing village by village in the east for nearly a year.
The thing about air: there’s a lot of it. Not many gases take that long to settle/dissipate. And a gas mask is pretty effective at filtering. I do imagine worst case scenario in the heaviest bombardment is a brief evacuation of current line of defense only, as this is what happened back in the somme. It was far more effective vs artillery: artillery regiments weren’t equipped as well and thus they were denied counter battery fire for enough time to allow front lines to cross no mans land. Which were backed up by creeping barrages, which I haven’t read much out in Ukraine yet