‘It won’t be quick’: Foreign fighters help in Ukraine’s battle to take back the south

The moment Ukrainian forces bomb a bridge in Kherson 0:45 Odessa, Ukraine (CNN) — On the first day of the counter-offensive in southern Ukraine, Mark Ayres fired more than 2,000 rounds from his Soviet-designed PK machine gun during the fierce firefights with Russian forces.
The former British soldier is working with a Ukrainian Army reconnaissance unit in the battle to retake the southern region of Kherson, one of only three foreigners on the team. “The fighting was pretty intense, with a lot of shelling,” Ayres, 48, told CNN. “We fought very hard and we took the Russian positions that we had to take.” Ayres suffered a serious shrapnel wound to his left leg on the second day of the counteroffensive, as did four other wounded men from his unit. But despite the casualties on the front lines, he said Ukrainian forces are making slow but definite progress on the ground. “It won’t be fast; it’s a hard, slow fight, meter by meter, position by position, because we don’t have the resources to do a massive blitzkrieg, with masses of artillery and armor,” Ayres said. “So we have to do it smart and try to do it (with) as few casualties as possible.” British citizen Mark Ayres has been fighting alongside former US Marine Michael Zafer Ronin in the Ukraine. So far, the Ukrainians claim to have taken a small handful of settlements in the Kherson region during the offensive, gains that UK intelligence experts say were likely achieved through a “degree of tactical surprise”. Ayres, originally from London, has been fighting alongside former US Marine Michael Zafer Ronin, who was also injured last week at the start of the counter-offensive, suffering shrapnel wounds to the head, stomach and hand. The two met fighting alongside Kurdish fighters in Syria. They are now recovering in hospitals in the city of Odessa, on Ukraine’s beleaguered Black Sea coast. Zafer Ronin, 34, of Kansas, said the Ukrainian military’s morale on the front lines remains “pretty high,” but opposing Russian forces appear to be “somewhat unprofessional and disorganized.” Zafer Ronin said that the morale of the Ukrainian military at the front remains “quite high.” The two men arrived at the beginning of the war as volunteers, and later enlisted as paid soldiers for the Ukrainian Army on three-year contracts. Ayres said that he joined the fight because he was “inspired” by the spirit of the Ukrainian people. “I was (between) the good and the bad,” Ayres said. “It was an unprovoked attack on a sovereign country.” He has no sympathy “at all” for the Russian soldiers, he added. His main challenge on the battlefield is being outgunned and outnumbered by his Russian counterparts. Frontline units are well supplied with small arms and ammunition, but lack heavy weapons such as artillery and tanks, Ayres said. A limited number of US and NATO-supplied weapons such as HIMARS, Howitzers and Javelin anti-tank missile systems have proven useful in this fight, but they are not enough to match the firepower of their opponents. “We’re constantly getting clobbered with artillery, so that’s what makes it so much more difficult, the artillery, and the armor they have, is superior to ours,” Ayres said. “Our attacks are more surgical, but more limited.” On Saturday, a report by the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) said that, according to Ukrainian officials, the offensive was “an intentionally methodical operation to degrade Russian forces and logistics, rather than one aimed at to immediately recover large swathes of territory”. “In my country I am nothing” Ayres has a white beard and his Ukrainian comrades nicknamed him “grandfather”. But he has already earned the trust of his younger teammates. “As soon as they see you in battle and they know you’re here to stay, and they know you’re a capable soldier, you earn their respect right away,” Ayres said. Ayres spent his teenage years as a Royal Green Jacket, an infantry regiment in the British Army, and now he feels this battle has given him renewed purpose. Ayres suffered a serious shrapnel wound to his left leg on the second day of the counter-offensive. “In my country I am nothing, I am just an old man who rents a room,” said Ayres. “Whereas now I’m a soldier, doing something good, fighting.” His son is proud of what he does, he adds. For these two wounded foreign fighters, their next goal is not to fly home to safety, but only to get back to the front lines to rejoin the fight as soon as they can. “Once everything heals up in my body, probably in three or four weeks, I should be back there,” Zafer Ronin said. “Of course I’m going back,” Ayres added. “Because I’m a soldier.”