Ukrainian soldiers learned the truth about Kiev’s counteroffensive from the social network TikTok, Yaroslav Mironyuk, a captured serviceman, told Sputnik.
“The commanders didn't say a peep. Some said it had already begun, others said it hadn’t started yet,” Mironyuk noted.
He said that he was also in the dark about the goals of the advance, adding that he learned about what was going on from "what's on TV" and from watching TikTok videos.
According to Mironyuk, his unit was supposed to be replaced in the Staromayorsk area on the Southern Donetsk front three days after they were deployed there, but the rotation had never happened.
What’s more, he went on to say, they ran out of food on the very first day, which was followed by a shortage of water. When he and his comrades-in-arms heard the Russian Armed Forces shelling their positions, they decided to lay down their weapons and surrender, as per Mironyuk.
The remarks came a few days after Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov said that since the start of Kiev’s counteroffensive, the Ukrainian Armed Forces had lost more than 43,000 soldiers and over 4,900 pieces of various weaponry, including 26 aircraft, nine helicopters, and 747 field artillery guns and mortars.
This followed Western media reports citing unnamed Ukrainian and Western officials as saying that Kiev's forces had lost approximately one-fifth of their Western military equipment over the last two months, including enormous numbers of armored vehicles, as well as using up much of the stockpiles of munitions it was given.
Earlier, both Ukrainian and Western officials admitted that Kiev’s counteroffensive, which was launched by Ukraine's military on June 4, is going “slower than desired,” and is “behind schedule.”