War in Ukraine: partisan fight against Russian troops

They blow up weapons caches, carry out bomb attacks and spray-paint messages on walls: partisan activity is increasing, especially in occupied southern Ukraine. How big is your influence on the war?

“The partisans of Cherson are following you, your movements, your dormitories, your weapons depots,” threatens a man in a video – his face is masked, his voice is electronically distorted. “We know how scared you are. We’ll keep slaughtering you like pigs.” In the darkened room behind him hangs the flag of the Ukrainian resistance movement. It shows the official logo of those who are called partisans in Ukraine: two interlocked right angles on a black background. “The partisan movement is quite active,” said Nataliya Humenyuk, spokeswoman for the Ukrainian army in the south of the country, on Ukrainian television in early August. “I think that in the near future you will see results that underscore that we are working together.”

Indications of this have been accumulating in recent weeks and months – particularly in southern Ukraine: according to Ukrainian information, there was an explosion in Melitopol at the headquarters of the Kremlin party “United Russia” at the end of July, and in Cherson the car of two police officers exploded are said to have worked for the Russian occupation authorities. In early August, the deputy head of administration of Nova Kakhovka in Kherson Oblast was shot dead near his home, according to Russian media.

These are just the latest incidents in a whole series of attacks and acts of sabotage that resistance fighters have been claiming for themselves in the occupied territories almost since the beginning of the war. And so-called partisans are also said to have been involved in the explosions at a Russian air force base in Crimea, an anonymous source told the New York Times.

Partisans set signs in Cherson

Armed resistance fighters who act underground against an occupying power are generally referred to as partisans. However, in current Ukrainian usage, the term has a broader meaning. Partisans have three basic tasks, the mayor of Melitopol, Ivan Fyodorov, explained in Ukrainian media: destroying weapons and supply lines of the Russian army, passing on information to the Ukrainian army and demoralizing the occupying powers. “We are already seeing results,” he adds.

The Ukrainian resistance operates in the dark, yet it has an official website in English and Ukrainian – created by the Ukrainian special forces to support those “who want to fight for the liberation of our country and freedom from the Russian occupiers”. By law, the Ukrainian special forces are tasked with coordinating the resistance and regularly provide information on the website about the actions of so-called partisans.

These are not just violent attacks. In Cherson, unknown persons have been spraying Ukrainian flags or a yellow ribbon in public places for weeks as a sign of resistance. In recent weeks they have marked places where the occupation authorities want to hold a referendum on the region’s secession from Ukraine with the letter “ї”. Leaflets keep popping up around town. It reads: “Do not accept a Russian passport, disrupt the referendum”, “Kherson is Ukraine” or “Time for revenge”.

More common, however, are small ribbons in Ukrainian colors that strangers distribute around the city and tie to railings or trees. More than 6,000 people have subscribed to the Yellow Belt movement’s Telegram channel, where photos of the actions are regularly shared. But the group’s support is even greater, says Maxim, a design student from Kherson. “It’s almost a lifestyle. Children also paint Ukrainian flags on the walls of buildings in the city.”

Civilians send tips to the army

Maxim’s resistance in Kherson began with the tearing down of Russian flags and protests. But he went further, observing movements of Russian troops and relaying them to Ukrainian forces. Ukraine makes this relatively easy for civilians like Maxim: they can use chatbots and an app to upload photos and provide the location coordinates of Russian military technology. So Maxim also became an informant.

Shortly after his message, he saw the column being fired upon. “I roared with joy all over the field,” says Maxim, who now lives in Kyiv. Others, like Sergej from Berdyansk, who actually has a different name, operate in small groups. He had two other contacts in the city with whom he passed information about the movement of Russian troops, he reports. Sergej is actually an artist, a man in his late fifties, with a knobbly nose and eyes enlarged by his thick glasses. “I’m inconspicuous, look at me,” he says. He was cycling through Berdyansk and observed the Russian soldiers. He has since fled the occupied city.

And Maxim also says that many of his acquaintances pass on information to the Ukrainian military. But some are more radical: “The Russians are now afraid to take to the streets in Cherson. They are only out and about in their armored vehicles.” Russian soldiers were repeatedly murdered by Ukrainian partisans. “In the beginning they killed with everything they could find – a knife, a rope. But the more Russians disappeared, the more weapons our partisans got,” says Maxim.

Arrests follow every attack

How many Russian soldiers were actually killed by Ukrainian resistance fighters cannot be verified independently. Nor how great their influence on the war actually is. The experts at the American “Institute for the Study of War” have been regularly mentioning partisan activities in their daily reports since the end of March. According to this, the Russian occupation authorities would have difficulties in gaining social control because of the ongoing resistance.

The partisan movement does not appear to be a spontaneous gathering of civilians. After the war began in 2014, Ukrainian special forces began training resistance fighters, Serhiy Kusan, head of the Ukrainian Center for Security and Cooperation, told the British Guardian. The fighters are legally part of the Ukrainian Defense Forces and their families have been evacuated from areas that could be occupied before or shortly after the invasion.

But both warring factions may have an interest in exaggerating the actions of saboteurs: Ukraine, to demoralize the Russian army and motivate its own people, and Russia, to justify the brutal crackdown on civilians in the occupied territories. Because every attack was followed by arrests, says Anna, a journalist from Cherson, who wishes to remain anonymous for her own protection: “They cordoned off the whole neighborhood and searched every house. In one day, they took 27 young men away.” Anna also reports on civil resistance, but also exchanges of gunfire in the city. “But who’s shooting – I have no idea,” she says.