How Russia’s Elite Paratroopers Were Erased in a Single Bridge Battle скачать в хорошем качестве

How Russia’s Elite Paratroopers Were Erased in a Single Bridge Battle

February 24th, 2022 — 10:12 a.m. The sky above Hostomel, a quiet suburb northwest of Kyiv, shimmered with silver dots. For a moment, people thought it was snow. Then, the air filled with the sound — a low, rolling roar like thunder breaking over the horizon. They weren’t clouds. They were parachutes. Hundreds of them. The 31st Guards Air Assault Brigade, elite Russian paratroopers from Ulyanovsk — veterans of Chechnya, Georgia, Syria — were dropping from the sky in the first hours of the invasion. Their mission: seize Antonov Airport at Hostomel, hold it, and open the gates for a massive airlift that would bring thousands of troops directly to the capital. On paper, it was perfect. Take the airfield, fly in reinforcements, crush Kyiv before nightfall. In Moscow, it was supposed to be the “Day One Victory.” In reality — it was a death sentence. Below them, Ukrainian National Guard troops from the 4th Rapid Reaction Brigade — just a few hundred men — were already waiting. They had been tipped off by intercepted radio chatter. And as the first Mi-8 transport helicopters roared into view, the Ukrainians opened fire. Stingers screamed through the air. Two Russian choppers erupted in flame, spiraling into the Dnieper floodplain. Those who managed to jump landed under heavy fire, their parachutes glowing orange in the blaze of tracer rounds. Colonel Sergey Karasev, leading the paratrooper assault, shouted into his radio: “Airfield secured within the hour!” But the airfield wasn’t secured. It was surrounded. The paratroopers, armed for speed not endurance, found themselves pinned down among hangars and runways as Ukrainian artillery began to fall — guided by drones, precise, relentless. By noon, the sky that was supposed to bring victory had turned into a killing ground.