the times | Saturday June 11 2022 45
Wo r l d
Every time one of the two T-72 tanks
under the command of Viktor Pokro-
pyvayi fires a shell at the Russian front
line three miles away, five are returned
in his direction.
It has been like that since the end of
February, when he was called up by the
Ukrainian army to resume a career he
had abandoned in 1986. Pokropyvayi,
56, who is from Kyiv and works as an in-
dustrial abseiler, left the Soviet army 36
years ago and never imagined he would
be recalled.
“We cannot compete in terms of
equipment but our forces are better
trained and are more determined than
the invaders,” he says after moving the
Soviet-era tanks into woods where they
cannot be spotted near the village of
Novomykolaivka, about 90 miles west
of Donetsk.
“We would have already won this war
if we had better and bigger equipment.
We need our allies to provide us with
more weapons so that we can defeat the
Russians.”
Moments earlier he received a thor-
ough briefing from a Ukrainian mili-
tary spokesman; there is no doubt that
Pokropyvayi is being told what to say.
Nursery children sing
in praise of ‘Uncle Vlad’
Russia
Julian O’Shaughnessy
Give us weapons and we’ll win the war
Ukraine
Alistair Dawber Novomykolaivka
At every level of the military, all the way
up to President Zelensky, there are calls
for more weapons.
“We have these two old Soviet tanks,”
Pokropyvayi says. “I have seen some of
the new American weapons, the M777
[a howitzer] a couple of times in this
area, but every unit needs more. Our
biggest problem is that we cannot fire
quickly enough. Every time we fire they
can fire five times at us.”
With the exception of a handful of
close-combat battles being fought in
the east, the war is becoming a battle of
attrition, with tank and artillery units
pounding each other and making only
incremental gains.
Andriy Bystrik, the spokesman for
the Ukrainian military in the area
around Zaporizhzhya, reiterates the
point that without more supplies of
heavy weapons from the West the
Ukrainian forces will find it difficult to
push the Russians back far enough.
“We are being outgunned, there is no
doubt about that, but with more weap-
ons the direction of the war would
change very quickly,” he says. “We need
everything. Even our military vehicles
are really private cars and vans people
used in civilian life before the war, but
what we really need now is more tanks,
more artillery and more shells.”He says he is grateful to the countries
that have sent equipment — Poland
and Spain have promised to send new
tanks in recent days — but when Pok-
ropyvayi’s men are asked about those
he feels have fallen short, one simply
says: “F*** Germany.”
Serhii, a 30-year-old second lieuten-
ant and commander of an artillery unit
based in the area since the start of the
war, says his plans for the summer have
been ruined by the conflict. He was
going to take his band on a tour of
Europe but has had to swap the stages
of Berlin and Birmingham for the
battlefields of his country.
“We will have to do that next
year, when we have taken back
the territory the Russians have
stolen and when we have won
this war,” he says, speaking
English perfected by
working for an Amer-
ican technology com-
pany that has given
him leave to fight.
His unit, whichhas one outdated 1989 Soviet self-pro-
pelled gun, was thrown together at the
end of February. Last month it suffered
its first casualty when one of their num-
ber had both legs blown off. “He’s OK
now,” Serhii, who declined to give his
surname, says. “It was difficult, but
there is a good spirit here and we are
making progress, even with this old kit
... It’s calmer here now because the Rus-
sians have moved more men to other
areas, like Severodonetsk. Perhaps
that’s where we will go next. We want to
take the fight to the Russians.”
The Ukrainian military likes to
characterise the war as a David
versus Goliath contest. On this
part of the front line it rings true.
Serhii is an officer only because
he received basic military train-
ing at university a decade ago. “I
had forgotten it all,” he says.
“But I’ve had to remem-
ber it all pretty quickly
since the end of Feb-
ruary. The country
depends on it.”
The arithmetic
suggests that they
should be losing
ground, but they are
defying the odds. In
this part of Ukraine,about 80 miles from Dnipro, artillery
and tanks have pushed back the Rus-
sians by six miles in the past month.
Bystrik attributes this to Russian disen-
chantment as they lose about 20 sol-
diers to death and injury in this area
each day. He refuses to give the number
of Ukrainian casualties.
Part of the reason for the progress, as
Serhii suggests, is that the Russians
have moved troops, tanks and artillery
away from the area and sent them to the
battlefields around Severodonetsk, 170
miles away, where the most intense
fighting of the war is taking place.
Fighting may be less fierce around
Novomykolaivka, but in the three
hours or so we are with Pokropyvayi
and his band of reservists there are at
least 20 exchanges of fire, most coming
from the Russian side. Without better
weapons it will take a long time for the
Ukrainian military to win back all the
territory controlled by the Russians.
The exchange of fire today takes
place across yellow wheat fields against
the backdrop of a bright blue sky. Only
rising black smoke interrupts the image
which resembles the Ukrainian flag.
Pokropyvayi and his men say they
have answered the call to ensure the
country stays in Ukrainian hands. They
want the West to do the same thing.Serhii is an officer
because he received
basic military
training at university
a decade agoChildren at nurseries and schools in
Russia are being forced to perform a
song pledging allegiance to President
Putin and vowing to follow him into a
“final battle” with the country’s
enemies.
The rock song, Uncle Vova, we are
with you, was recorded shortly after
Russia annexed Crimea in 2014, and
gained new relevance for Kremlin
supporters with Putin’s full-scale inva-
sion of Ukraine on February 24. “Vova”
in Russian is short for Vladimir.
The song, which was written by
Vyacheslav Antonov, a former taxi
driver, contains lyrics promising to
maintain Russia’s rule in Crimea and
return Alaska, which tsarist Russia sold
to the United States in the 19th century,
to the motherland.
The chorus says: “From the northern
seas to the southern borders, from the
Kuril islands to the Baltic coast, on this
earth there would be peace, but if the
chief commander calls [us] to the last
battle, Uncle Vova, we are with you!”
It has been sung by children from the
western borders to Siberia since the
start of the war. In a video posted to
social media by a nursery in Saratov, a
city in central Russia, small children
and their teachers performed the song
while wearing Z ribbons — the symbol
of support for the Kremlin’s invasion.
Some of the children wore military uni-
forms. “Russian kids are being prepared
for death,” wrote Grani, a Russian
opposition website. Teenagers sang the
song at an open-air concert in Chita, in
eastern Siberia. The children put their
hands on their hearts and saluted when
they reached the line “Uncle Vova, we
are with you!”, a gesture compared by
some critics to a Nazi salute.
In Bryansk, a city near Ukraine, the
song featured at a school-leaving con-
cert. Not everyone is a fan, however. In
Pskov, a city on Russia’s western bor-
ders, a parent complained after his
daughter’s nursery included the song in
a Victory Day event. “This is another
low,” he wrote on social media.
A version of the tune has also been
recorded by a pro-Putin MP to the
backdrop of a monument commemo-
rating the Soviet soldiers who died at
the Battle of Stalingrad in the Second
World War. Last year, police broadcast
a recording of the song to drown out a
crowd of protesters angry about vote-
rigging at parliamentary elections.
Opposition figures have accused the
Kremlin’s spin doctors of paying musi-
cians to record tributes to Putin. This
has not been proven, but there has been
a swathe of songs praising Putin since
the ex-KGB officer came to power more
than two decades ago. In 2000, a female
pop duo had a hit with a song that con-
tained the lyrics: “I want a man like
Putin, full of strength, I want a man like
Putin, who doesn’t drink.” In 2016
Timati, a rapper, released Vladimir
Putin is My Best Friend.
The popularity of Uncle Vova reflectsan increase in rhetoric. State television
threatened recently to swamp Britain
in a “radioactive tsunami” by detonat-
ing an atomic warhead off its coastline,
and Dmitri Medvedev, the former
president and prime minister, said last
week that the fighting in Ukraine could
lead to a nuclear war. “The horsemen of
the apocalypse are already on their
way,” he said.
The Kremlin has sought to ensurethe loyalty of teachers and their pupils.
Schools have been ordered to hold spe-
cial lessons explaining that Moscow
was forced to invade Ukraine to defend
people in the Donbas region from
“Nazis”, as well as to ensure that Kyiv
did not become a platform for an attack
on Russia by Nato. Some teachers who
have spoken out against the war have
been denounced by their pupils.
The battle for the hearts and minds ofRussia’s children has also reached the
toyshops. Last week Russia’s national
guard, often called Putin’s private army,
announced the release of miniature
models of its vehicles and equipment,
as well as toy soldiers dressed in the
force’s uniform.
The national guard said that the toys
would help instil patriotism in the
younger generation. “Our children
need the right toys,” it said.A burger and two fries? McDonald’s Russian clone unveils its logo
Ian Morris
The two orange lines are apparently
French fries, and the red blob a ham-
burger. Together they form a shape not
unlike the letter M.
A clone business that took over the
850 Russian McDonald’s restaurants
after the company fled the country has
published its logo, which has a similar
feel to the golden arches it will replace.
According to a spokesman for the
new company, “the green background
of the logo symbolises the quality of
products and service that our guests are
accustomed to”. Fifteen of the rebrand-
ed outlets are expected to open in Mos-
cow and the surrounding region to-
morrow, which is Russia Day, a patriotic
holiday. About 200 should be operating
by the end of the month.
Possible names put forward for theRussian children in their special Z uniforms are expected to sing their hearts out to show their allegiance to President Putinrestaurants in Siberia. McDonald’s,
which is based in Chicago, wrote off an
estimated £1.2 billion in the withdrawal.
Its logo was removed at all outlets but it
retained its copyright in Russia and an
option to buy back its restaurants with-
in 15 years.
Many western companies have de-
serted Russia in protest at the Ukraine
war. BP wrote off up to £20.5 billion on
its holding in the Rosneft oil giant.chain include Tot Samiy (That
Same One) and Svobodnaya
Kassa (Free Till). Its tempo-
rary title is Moy Burger (My
Burger).
The menu will mirror
what came before: Chicken
McNuggets will become“Nuggets” and the McMuffin
the “Muffin”. Filet-O-Fish
will become “Fish Burger”.
McDonald’s closed its
restaurants in Russia in
March, weeks after Presi-
dent Putin announced the
invasion of Ukraine. In May
it withdrew from the country,
selling up to Alexander Govor,
a businessman who had run 25 of itsThe first of the rebranded
outlets open in Moscow tomorrow