Victory Chronicles-DAY 855

According to a report from the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, there have been 148 combat engagements on the frontline in Ukraine, particularly in the Toretsk sector. The enemy has carried out one missile attack, 51 airstrikes using guided missiles, and more than 3,000 shots fired, including artillery strikes. 

Ukrainian troops have targeted enemy command posts, anti-aircraft missile systems, ammunition depots, and enemy manpower concentration, while the enemy has struck Ukrainian positions with air strikes and kamikaze drones. 

In the ongoing battle for Vovchansk in the Kharkiv sector, the Russian army has suffered significant losses, with 150 troops killed and several military systems destroyed. In the Kupyansk sector, four combat engagements have been registered in different areas, and two enemy attacks are ongoing. Ukrainian troops in the Liman sector have successfully repelled two enemy attacks.

Lithuania has made the decision to allocate a minimum of 0.25% of its GDP to support Ukraine’s security and defense. This announcement came from Lithuanian President, Gitanas Nausėda, who shared the news on Twitter. The decision was made during the country’s State Defense Council meeting. Nausėda emphasized that Lithuania will continue to stand firmly with Ukraine and support its quest for freedom. Before this, Lithuania had already increased its defense budget by allocating an additional 136 million euros, bringing the defense budget to over 3% of GDP. Lithuania is known to be one of the top spenders on defense within NATO relative to its economy. As part of a bilateral security agreement, Latvia had previously promised to provide military assistance to Ukraine worth 0.25% of its GDP per year.

Two rescuers in Kherson, Ukraine, were injured as a result of enemy shelling, according to reports. The attack occurred in a neighborhood where a garage cooperative caught fire due to another round of enemy shelling. When a firefighting unit arrived to extinguish the fire, they came under repeated fire. As a result, two rescuers sustained shrapnel wounds and were transported to a hospital in moderate condition. In addition to the injuries, a fire truck was also damaged during the attack. 

The fighters of “Astra” group of the International Legion of the Defence Intelligence of Ukraine are working in Kharkiv Oblast – they are destroying Russian occupants with the help of fpv drones, conducting reconnaissance and holding their positions. 

Ukraine’s pervasive shortage of critical air defense missiles is inhibiting Ukraine’s ability to protect its critical infrastructure against Russian strikes. Private Ukrainian energy enterprise DTEK Executive Director Dmytro Sakharuk told the Kyiv Post on June 26 that for every one interceptor missile that Ukraine possesses to defend against Russian strikes on the energy grid, Russia has five to six missiles to launch at Ukraine.

Sakharuk noted that if Russia were to launch 10 missiles at any target in Ukraine, Ukrainian forces would need to respond with at least 12 air defense missiles to adequately protect against the attack. 

Sakharuk emphasized that the stark difference in Ukraine’s necessary and actual ratios of Ukrainian air defense to attacking Russian missiles means that the shortage in interceptor missiles is making it impossible to cover energy grid units that Ukraine has repaired or is repairing. Russia’s air strike campaign against the Ukrainian energy grid has already imposed serious constraints on Ukraine’s power generation capacity, and Russian forces have been able to exploit air defense shortages caused by a lack of Western-provided air defense systems to maximize the damage to Ukraine’s energy capacity over the course of 2024.

42-year-old defender Yuriy Marchenko, with the call sign Vohnyk, died on February 20, 2024, near the village of Klishchiivka, Bakhmut direction, Donetsk Oblast. While repelling an enemy attack, he was fatally wounded as a result of a direct hit of a shell to his dugout.

Yuriy Oleksandrovych was born in the village of Strohanivka, Kherson Oblast, and lived in the city of Nikopol in Dnipropetrovs’k Oblast. He was an electrician by profession and worked at Interpipe Niko-Tube LLC. In his leisure time, he loved to read.

The man was called up for military service in the Armed Forces of Ukraine on October 18, 2023. He became a fighter of the 93rd separate mechanized brigade “Kholodnyi Yar.” He served in a fire support company. “Yuriy was an extremely kind person. He could not say no to anyone and always helped,” said Iryna, the deceased’s sister. The defender was buried on the Alley of Heroes at the cemetery in Nikopol. Yuriy is survived by his mother, sister and daughter. 

*Yuriy’s story on the Heroes Memorial – a platform for stories about the fallen defenders of Ukraine.

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