Odessa prepares for an imminent attack. Barricades line the streets and even children weave camouflage fabric
At this point, everyone assumes that Odessa will be attacked at any moment. “The Russians are going to come, for sure,” Lieutenant Olexiy told us yesterday while the anti-aircraft alarms sounded in the port, the main port in the country and a strategic point, an object of desire for Putin’s troops. There two Russian ships were seen in the distance in the morning.
Anti-aircraft alarms sounded – three long, sharp blasts – and both military and civilians jumped as they heard planes flying around for the first time in days. Everyone was busy putting up barricades there and in other parts of the city, sandbags that line the streets and with which it is hoped to contain the advance of an enemy that seems to be knocking on doors.
The threat of an imminent attack is causing the population to flee en masse. At noon, hundreds of people milled around the station waiting for the 2:15 p.m. train to Lviv. On the platforms, the stoicism of those waiting soon turned into impatience, a few shoves and many cries as they boarded the cars.
Before the departure of the train we have been able to see tense situations and also very emotional farewells, with women pressing their hands to the windows to say goodbye, of young men who, resigned, put their wives and children on the wagon. Also there was Gurharadep Singh, a 31-year-old Hindu student who had been living in Odessa for six months. “The situation is now very, very complicated,” he told us before leaving.
And yet, many choose to stay, to resist in this city where you can see Ukrainian flags on every corner, in every shop but where, at the same time, a good number of pro-Russian sympathizers also live. By late afternoon, in a heavy blizzard, the only building with lights on was a school where volunteers work tirelessly preparing food packages for soldiers, weaving camouflage fabric for barricades and armored vehicles. and fill sandbags. Here there are very young children, even seven years old and also elderly, guarded by soldiers and security guards.
Here everyone shares the same analysis of the situation. The Russians intended to attack from many points at the same time, with a kind of coup that would bring about the rapid fall of the country. But the move has gone wrong and they have bogged down in practically all the cities, where they have found that the Ukrainians have raised an urban war. Now a change of strategy is expected and they would be looking for a major attack in Odessa, much easier than Kiev and that would close the entrance and exit to the sea of the Ukrainian government. The city is already preparing for an imminent coup.
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