Victory Chronicles
-DAY 400

Above: The Finnish-Russian border, about 125 miles north of Helsinki, in February 2023. “Finland’s accession to NATO would add one of Western Europe’s most potent wartime militaries to the alliance as well as intelligence and border-surveillance abilities tailored over decades to the threat posed by Russia.”  The number of active-duty military personnel in Finland’s defense is only 23,000 troops, but its wartime strength can grow quickly to 280,000. Read more about Finland’s contribution to NATO.  (New York Times)

Above: A now-13-year-old Russian girl has been put in an orphanage and her father sentenced to prison for posting her artwork, shown, online. A Russian man from the Tula region was given a two-year prison term for publishing the artwork of his daughter last year. The Tula judiciary ruled that the child’s drawing discredited Russian armed forces. On Wednesday, Wager mercenary reps strangely came out with a statement calling the sentence unfair. Inexplicably, the head of Wager forces offered to provide Wager legal counsel in his defense in order to make sure the prison sentence was done legally.  (DW)

Somewhere.
Not the trailer of an epic war film.
Ukrainian 🇺🇦 forces getting ready to make history.#lviv pic.twitter.com/Ze1v2bmote

— TheLvivJournal (@LvivJournal) March 30, 2023

Above: UK Ministry of Defence

• Today, Turkiye is expected to be the final NATO member to vote approval for Finnish accession.  When Finland joins NATO, it will add about 1300 kilometers (800 miles) of NATO bordering Russia, not the outcome Putin calculated when he ordered the invasion of Ukraine.
• At the same time, Turkiye’s president made it clear that his country would leave Sweden on the sidelines for now because he believes Sweden is too soft on Turkish enemies, calling it a haven for Kurdish separatists and other dissidents he considers terrorists. Hungary joins Turkiye in giving thumbs down to Swedish NATO membership. Russia has since added Hungary to its list of “unfriendly countries”.
• Ukraine’s national power company Ukrenergo has signed an agreement with 15 system operators in the European Network of Transmission System Operators for Electricity allowing Ukraine to use the network to get emergency power backup and traverse energy emergencies, such as Russian strikes on power grids.
• Nine EU countries will start a special initiative to identify gaps in EU-imposed sanctions against Russia and implement measures to close those gaps. The Netherlands started the call for an EU-level mechanism to ensure that public and private entities don’t evade sanctions. So far, the countries participating in the initiative are the Czech Republic, Cyprus, Denmark, Hungary, Lithuania, Malta, Romania, Slovenia and Spain.
• Russian Orthodox monks who’ve been ordered out of Kyiv-Pechersk Larva monastery refused to leave on Wednesday, pending the outcome of a lawsuit filed in a Kyiv court last week to stop the eviction. Kyiv notified the muscovy monks that the handover of property would proceed as planned today.
• Iranian Pouya Air Transport resumed regular flights between Tehran and Moscow on March 13 likely to support weapons transfers. The Ukrainian Resistance Center reported that Iranian officials are planning to deliver Shahed-131 drones to Wagner Group personnel and that Wagner personnel have started training to operate the drones.

General Staff’s Daily Video Digest with English subtitles

Above: Ukrainian soldiers using a trophy armored vehicle captured from invaders in Donbas. (New York Times)

Ukrainian General Staff of the Armed Forces estimated enemy losses since February 24, 2022 (with daily additions)

• Liquidated personnel, 172,900 (+560)
• Tanks, 3,610 (+1)
• Armored personnel vehicles, 6,974 (+8)
• Artillery systems/MLRS, 2,671/526 (+12/0)
• Anti-aircraft warfare systems, 278 (+1)
• Aircraft/helicopters, 305/291 (0)
• UAV operational-tactical level, 2,239 (0)
• Cruise missiles, 911 (0)
• Warships/boats, 18 (0)
• Vehicles and fuel tanks, 5,518 (+11
• Special equipment, 291 (+3)

Above:  PBS

"Russki mir" in #Marinka, #Donetsk region. pic.twitter.com/yNaSKlpiW5

— NEXTA (@nexta_tv) March 30, 2023

Glory to Ukraine!
The 400th day of the Russian large-scale invasion has begun.

• During the past day, the enemy launched 5 missile and 25 air strikes, launched 34 attacks from rocket salvo systems.
• The probability of launching missile and air strikes on the entire territory of Ukraine remains high. As a result of an airstrike on the infrastructure of the cities of Berislav, Kherson region, and Druzhkivka, Donetsk region, civilians were injured, private houses and civil infrastructure objects were damaged.
• The enemy is concentrating its main efforts on conducting offensive actions in the Lyman, Bakhmut, Avdiiv and Marin areas. Units of the Defense Forces of Ukraine repelled more than 60 enemy attacks against them. Bilogorivka, Bakhmut, Avdiivka and Maryinka remain at the epicenter of hostilities.
• During the past 24 hours, the enemy shelled the areas of the settlements of Chernatske, Esman, Kucherivka, Bilopillya, Volfine and Basivka of the Sumy region, as well as more than 15 areas of the settlements in the Kharkiv Among them: Udy, Strelecha, Hlyboke, Krasne, Pischane, Gatishche, Vovchansk, Bochkove and Komisarove.
• In the Lyman direction, during the day, the enemy conducted unsuccessful offensive actions in the districts of Stelmakhivka and Vyimka. Areas of Kupyansk, Kolodyazne, Dvorichna, Zapadne, Petropavlivka, and Kislivka settlements of Kharkiv region were subjected to artillery shelling; Stelmakhivka, Nevske, Kuzmyne, Bilogorivka – Luhansk region, as well as Kolodyazi, Spirne and Siversk regions of Donetsk
• In the direction of Bakhmut, the enemy continues its assault on Bakhmut. In the course of the enemy’s assault actions, our soldiers repelled 28 enemy attacks. At the same time, during the day, the enemy conducted unsuccessful offensive actions in the area of Orihovo-Vasylivka. He shelled the settlements of Orihovo-Vasylivka, Bakhmut, Ivanivske, Chasiv Yar, Novomarkove and Oleksandro-Shultyne of the Donetsk
• In the Avdiiv and Marinka directions, the enemy carried out offensive actions in the direction of the settlements of Novokalynove, Stepove, Avdiivka, Severna, Pervomaiske, Marinka of the Donetsk region, without success. Shelled, in particular, Novokalynovka, Stepove, Avdiivka, Severne, Vodiane, Pervomaiske, Karlivka, Krasnohorivka, Maryinka, Pobyeda, and Novomykhailivka.
• In the direction of Shakhtar, during the day, the enemy shelled the areas of Vugledar, Prechistivka, and Velika Novosilka.
• The enemy is defending in the Zaporizhzhia and Kherson Shelled more than 20 districts of settlements, including Malynivka, Gulyaipole, Zaliznychne, Novodanilivka, Novoandriivka, Staroukrainka, Charivne of the Zaporizhia region; Mykhailivka, Novooleksandrivka, Novoberyslav, Tomarine, Rozlyv of the Kherson region and the city of Kherson.

Support the Armed Forces! United we will win! Glory to Ukraine!

Above:  “Spider shoes” are one innovative product designed for sappers that a Kharkiv company, Ukrainian Resource Center, has developed as it pivots from consumer spare parts to war materiel. Ukrinform spoke with company principles and learned how the company has retained 70% of its employees as it scattered facilities across Ukraine and retooled to meet new demands. 

• Russian forces conducted limited ground attacks along the Kupyansk-Svatove-Kreminna line on March 29. Russian forces conducted unsuccessful ground attacks near Krokhmalne (20km northwest of Svatove), Novoselivske (14km northwest of Svatove), Stelmakhivka (12km northwest of Svatove), Bilohorivka (10km south of Kreminna), Verkhnokamianske (18km south of Kreminna), Vymika (27km southwest of Kreminna), and Berestove (30km south of Kreminna).
• Geolocated footage published on March 26 shows Russian elements striking Ukrainian positions northeast of Kupyansk. Russian forces continue to use ”classic army tactics” with a considerable number of armored vehicles in the Kupyansk-Lyman
• Luhansk Oblast Military Administration reported on March 29 that Russian forces are concentrating their main efforts on offensive operations in the Lyman direction and that Russian forces attempted to storm Bilohorivka, Donetsk, 17 kilometers due west of Lysychansk.

Above: Wall Street Journal

🌭 Free delivery of coffee and hot dogs to the front-lines#UkraineWar #Ukrainian #UkrainianArmy #Ukraine️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️️ #RussiaIsATerroristState #RussiaIsCollapsing… pic.twitter.com/pAq6H3lKBy

— Intermarium 24 (@intermarium24) March 30, 2023

• Russian forces continued offensive operations in and around Bakhmut on March 29. Geolocated footage published on March 28 and 29 indicates that Russian forces advanced in southern and southwestern Bakhmut.
• Russian forces continued offensive operations along the Avdiivka-Donetsk City frontline on March 29. Geolocated footage published on March 29 indicates that Russian forces likely advanced north of Vodyane (8km southwest of Avdiivka) and in Vesele (7km northeast of Avdiivka).

Above:  A steelworker at Zaporizhstal steel plant in Zaporizhzhia city.  Southeastern Ukraine contains a number of huge steel production plants, most founded under Stalin in his drive to industrialize the Soviet economy in the early 1930s. Today it belongs to Metinvest, Ukraine’s largest company that also owned Ilyich Steel and Azovstal in Mariupol. (New York Times)

Above: Some of Zaporizhstal’s infrastructure looks like it did when it was founded by Stalin in 1930. It currently employs 5,000 workers per shift. One of Ukraine’s top ten in terms of size. It made international news in 2017, the then-Russian owners were linked to payments to build a Trump Hotel in Toronto, Canada. (New York Times)

• The former mayor of Krasnodar, Russia, now head of the Kherson Oblast occupation administration, called on everyone to pitch in to make a registry of “sacred” Soviet WWII memorials in their neighborhoods and to get to work fixing them up in time for Russia’s annual mega-propaganda commemoration of Russian victory over Nazi germany on May 9th. He called upon government officials, youth and social movements, every enterprise, and every school to take part in identifying and repairing these relics.
• International Atomic Energy AgencyDirector Grossi visited the on March 29. Mr Grossi spent several hours at the ZNPP to observe how the situation at the plant has changed since his first visit, talk to nuclear engineers at the plant, and act as a guarantor for IAEA personnel rotation.  He told reporters that ”it is obvious that military activity is increasing in this whole region” and called for the observance of every possible measure to safeguard the ZNPP.
• It is generally thought that russian mobniks aren’t well-trained before being sent to the meat grinder in their country’s war of aggression.  However, it is clear that Moscow security forces are well-trained in detention, filtration, interrogation, torture and murder. (Perhaps it is just part of the culture?)  The New York Times interviewed the former director of the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant who described the “pits” set up near the plant where Ukrainian plant employees were “interrogated, bullied and beaten.” Russia has now taken complete control of the plant where they are working to connect it with their country’s energy grid. Read why the first visit of UN monitors in September 2022 was one of the worst days of the plant’s occupation.
• Ukrainian forces continued striking Russian positions and concentration areas in southern Ukraine on March 29. Ukrainian forces conducted a HIMARS strike against an electrical substation at a railway depot in occupied Melitopol, Zaporizhia Oblast. Geolocated footage posted on March 29 shows smoke rising near the railway depot in Melitopol following the strike. Geolocated footage posted on March 28 additionally shows Ukrainian forces striking Russian positions near Oleshky, east bank of Kherson Oblast.