There has yet to be a good accounting of just how many Russian soldiers were killed or captured in Lyman and during the attempted retreat from the city. But when the death toll is tallied, it will no doubt be huge.
One soldier in that fight — an American volunteer — spoke over social media with a friend back home and described the gut-wrenching scene.
Only a few mins here. Ran out of ammo and backed off south. Am a bit traumatized and need some sleep. I have no idea what is going on except we engaged a lot of elements headed to Kreminna. They have to be coming from Lyman and Zarichne. Right now we are in a safe area, it seems.
I have never seen so many dead, soon to be dead, and wounded people in my life. People begging for help, but no way we can help them. We have little to help them with, a small medical kit each, no morphine, and no time to render any kind of useful aid. No idea if they will live or die. You just keep moving.
One guy had obviously stepped on a mine by the side of the road. One leg was gone at mid-thigh, the other one was broken lower down and his foot was backward. He was trying to crawl somewhere on one good knee, trailing flowing blood out of a busted artery. Unless he got help quick, he was gone. He was talking calmly in Russian, saying over-and-over, “I will be home soon mother.”
This American volunteer was communicating with a writer who covers defense for Popular Mechanics magazine and posted it to a blog.
A number of commenters noted that the American (whose identity is kept anonymous) is a Vietnam vet and thus must be kind of long in the tooth to be in combat.
And then the American describes a macabre scene.
Yeah, just tired and mentally warped. At one point, we were running down the side of the road and —— slipped in a pool of blood running into the ditch from a still living Russian laying across the stripe (dead people don’t bleed very fast…only gravity feed), and he slid onto the shoulder and got up cussing with blood all over him. “get me some water, this fucking c*nt probably has some kind of fulminating disease.” We almost fell over laughing.
It’s shocking and it’s hard to imagine how someone could witness such things and not be forever affected, but that’s the reality of war.
I came away shaking like a leaf, not scared, just wired and sick of killing people. On the way back —— got in a stream and washed off, and vomited his guts out. I was looking at his eyes and he was seeing things way back home.
