Ukraine is racking up victories and now getting some nice war prizes as well: Following Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s announcement on Sunday that the Kharkiv Oblast city of Izyum had been liberated, images and videos shared online show just how quickly Russian forces retreated from the battlefield.
Video footage and photographs shared over the last week show Ukrainian soldiers posing in front of abandoned Russian howitzers and military vehicles, all of which appear functional and largely undamaged. It indicates that Russian troops did not expect the Ukrainians to gain as much territory as they did and so quickly.
The Ukrainian president used his nightly address on Sunday to confirm that Ukrainian troops had taken full control over the strategic city of Izyum, which was previously under Russian control. He also announced that his forces had “liberated hundreds” of cities and villages, including Balaklia and Kupiansk, two other important cities in the northeast region.
During the address, Zelenskyy noted the speed at which the Russians retreated.
“The enemies said that they got lost, that they were going to an exercise. You taught them a lot,” he said. “The ability to quickly get dressed and get out of our land, and the understanding that, by abandoning equipment and weapons, it can be done much faster and easier.”
What the Videos and Images Show
One Telegram post showed photographs of abandoned Russian Mstsa-S howitzers as well as a 2S3 Akatsiya howitzer abandoned on the roads of Izyum.
“Our military in Izyum today received another batch of Lend-Lease from Rashists,” the Pravda Gerashchenko Telegram post reads in Russian.
“Organized retreated’ so that half of the equipment was abandoned,” the post continues, per Google Translate.
Additional photographs and videos were shared by the popular war-tracking Ukraine Weapons Tracker Twitter account.
“The Ukrainian 25th Airborne Brigade captured two Msta-SM2 152mm self-propelled howitzers in #Kharkiv Oblast, along with another logistics vehicle; one of the SPG was already seen,” a post reads, which includes photographs of Ukrainian soldiers holding their weapons and standing in front of the abandoned Russian vehicles.
#Ukraine: The Ukrainian 25th Airborne Brigade captured two Msta-SM2 152mm self-propelled howitzers in #Kharkiv Oblast, along with another logistics vehicle; one of the SPG was already seen.https://t.co/yJFKWRlJvB pic.twitter.com/0QYqNzDbuA
— ?? Ukraine Weapons Tracker (@UAWeapons) September 12, 2022
Another video also shared by Ukraine Weapons Tracker shows a Russian Msta-SM2 152mm self-propelled howitzer that was captured by the Ukrainian forces during the ongoing Kharkiv counter-offensive.
#Ukraine: A very modern Russian Msta-SM2 152mm self-propelled howitzer was captured by the Ukrainian army during the ongoing #Kharkiv counter-offensive. This is a upgraded Msta-S with an automatic fire control systems, higher rate of fire and ability to use digital maps. pic.twitter.com/CdvAxk5HRV
— ?? Ukraine Weapons Tracker (@UAWeapons) September 8, 2022
“A very modern Russian Msta-SM2 152mm self-propelled howitzer was captured by the Ukrainian army during the ongoing #Kharkiv counter-offensive,” the post reads.
Russia’s Most Powerful Howitzers
The “very modern” comment in the Ukraine Weapons Tracker post may be construed as mockery and sarcasm, as is common in online posts about the war, but Ukraine Weapons Tracker was being literal. While Russian forces remain dependent on many Soviet-era machines, the Msta-SM2 152mm seen in the video is an updated and improved version of the howitzer which includes an updated cannon and has a longer range of fire.
The updated version also featured automatic fire control systems with an improved rate of fire and digital mapping.
The 2S3 Akatsiya, a tank first developed in 1968 that has seen at least six variants developed since that time, was also seen in the videos and photographs. The howitzer was updated in the mid-1970s, then again in the late 1980s, and again in 2000. While it is by no means the most modern piece of equipment still in use by the Russian military, it remains powerful enough for the Russian military to use. By 2007, more than 1,000 2S3 howitzers were in active service, and another thousand were in storage. The Russian Navy also had more than 400 in active service at that time. The tanks have been widely used throughout the Russian invasion of Ukraine this year, too.
Over the years the howitzer has been greatly modernized. In May of 2021, the most recent updated versions of the tanks were delivered by Ultransmash. The howitzers were updated to the 2S3M2configuration, which saw the vehicles fitted with modern communication equipment.
Newer versions of the tank can also fire the 152mm Krasnopol laser-guided artillery shell, which is designed to strike targets with greater precision.
As Russia struggles to replenish the more than 2,000 tanks lost in the Ukraine war so far, as well as the more than 5,000 military vehicles overall, abandoning howitzers like these is particularly problematic. As Russian troops retreat over the Russian border, the Kremlin and Russia’s top military officers must now devise a plan to regain ground in the northeast – as well as in Donbas – while also facing continued bombardment by the more advanced HIMARS rocket systems still being gifted to Ukraine by the United States.
Jack Buckby is a British author, counter-extremism researcher, and journalist based in New York. Reporting on the U.K., Europe, and the U.S., he works to analyze and understand left-wing and right-wing radicalization, and reports on Western governments’ approaches to the pressing issues of today. His books and research papers explore these themes and propose pragmatic solutions to our increasingly polarized society.