In the conflict in Ukraine, Russian forces had a series of failures in September, with their retreat from a large part of the north-east of the country in the face of a lightning counter-offensive by the Ukrainians in the Kharkiv region.
Kyiv's troops also regained ground, but more slowly, in the south.
A Ukrainian soldier reports his surprise at the moment of the Ukrainian counter-offensive: "We attacked, we captured a position, we occupied it and we fortified it. Three days later, the front advanced and they (the Russian soldiers) started to leave en masse. We were ready to fight, so to imagine that they were going to leave the whole front, we had not foreseen it".
Ukrainian soldiers are busy restarting equipment abandoned by the enemy.
"It's the new generation of Russian Ural vehicles that they had prepared for the invasion... Well now they will work for us", explains this Ukrainian soldier.
>> To read also: with its counter-offensive in the East, "Ukraine wants to prove that victory is possible"
The rout of the Russian army can be seen everywhere.
These men, who had just arrived to secure the territory, discovered the old Russian positions.
The adversary lines have broken up.
Here are only posters of Lenin, a pin-up girl and Soviet-style newspapers with no bad news left.
The story of this tactical success is partly due to the ruse used by the Ukrainian command a few weeks before the counter-offensive.
This is revealed by Andriy Malakhov, an officer of the Ukrainian special forces.
He was shot and wounded during the operation: "I led the assault, my main maneuver was the diversion, south of Balaklia. In fact, the biggest breakthrough was from the west, but the intelligence spread everywhere the information that the attack would take place in the South."
>> To read also: hide this Ukrainian counter-offensive that the Russian media cannot see
A success all the more rare since his troops, he said, were three times outnumbered by the enemy during the attack.
The summary of the
France 24 week invites you to come back to the news that marked the week
I subscribe
Take international news everywhere with you!
Download the France 24 app