TRIBUNNEWS.COM – The Russian army celebrates killing one of Ukraine’s most respected commanders.
He is Dmytro Kotsyubaylo who died in a struggle to defend the City of Bakhmut, Eastern Ukraine on March 7, 2023.
Even though Dmytro Kotsyubaylo is only 27 years old, he is already a hero of Ukraine and a neo-Nazi and fascist commander.
Also read: Ukrainian Military Commanders Determined to Defend Bakhmut, Now Fighting Against Siege Efforts
The man known as ‘Da Vinci’ began while active in the EuroMaidan Revolution, also known as the Dignity Revolution in 2013-2014, when Ukrainians took to the streets to overthrow then-pro-Russian President Viktor Yanukovych.
It was then, shortly after Russia invaded the Ukrainian Donbass and annexed the Crimean Peninsula, that Kotsiubailo took up arms.
He became known in Ukraine for his role and courage in the seven-year war against Moscow-backed separatists in the East.
He was wounded by a Russian tank shell in combat in Donetsk Oblast that same year, but returned to the front after recovering just three months later.
“Eastern Ukraine is really her home,” Melaniya Podolyak, a Ukrainian activist and project coordinator of the Serhiy Prytula Foundation, who knows Kotsiubailo, told the Kyiv Independent.
He said Kotsiubailo almost never left the front line in the nine years of the ongoing war in Russia.
The young soldier is part of the First Assault Company in the 5th battalion of the Ukrainian Volunteer Corps (DUK), a military wing of the Right Sector – a Ukrainian nationalist movement.
For many years, the DUK was an autonomous volunteer formation independent of the Ukrainian military, taking part in some of the heaviest fighting in eastern Ukraine.
Also read: Russian Wagner Boss Suggests Treason in the Battle of Ukraine’s Bakhmut
In 2016, Kotsiubailo – then just 21 years old – became the commander of the 1st Assault Company, which had been operating under the name “Wolves of Da Vinci”.
“At that time, he was a year younger than me, but he had authority, and always went to war himself,” 28-year-old soldier Pavlo, who is called “Belarusian” because of his origins, told the Kyiv Independent.
He asked to remain anonymous, citing fears for the safety of his family, who still reside in dictator-ruled Belarus.
