On February 24th, 2022, as the world watched from a distance, Russian forces launched what was then a long-anticipated

invasion across the borders of Ukraine. The Kremlin expected Ukraine to fall in a little over 72 hours,

but the Russian military soon faltered in the wake of poor logistics and fierce Ukrainian resistance.

It didn't take long for the Russian advance to devolve into the most brutal and destructive conflict

on European soil since World War II.

Nearly a million casualties have been counted as of 2025.

The eastern countryside, once lush with green forests and fields,

has become a cratered landscape resembling the killing fields left by the First World War

over a century ago.

Urban warfare in several cities such as Maripal and Bakhmut has been compared to the bloody

street fighting that took place in Stalingrad 80 years ago.

The conflict has also become a frightening showcase of what modern warfare really is.

Everything is being recorded. The video's

going viral across social media. There was once a time when the most anybody heard about a war

was in the newspaper, vague descriptions of troop movements and losses. Now we can watch men

fight to the death in hand-to-hand combat with knives and small arms.

Soldiers can be watched taking shelter in trenches while small drones drop explosives on them from overhead.

Other men can be witnessed firing wildly in the air and running back and forth trying to dodge

incoming drones that will explode

and tear them apart on impact.

Some drones even appear to mercilessly taunt the men as they lay helplessly wounded on the

ground, raising their hands in a hopeless surrender.

...