Well. This is all sorts of interesting:
Thousands of steelworkers fanned out on Thursday through the city of Mariupol, establishing control over the streets and banishing the pro-Kremlin militants who until recently had seemed to be consolidating their grip on power, dealing a setback to Russia and possibly reversing the momentum in eastern Ukraine.
By late Thursday, miners and steelworkers had deployed in at least five cities, including the regional capital, Donetsk. They had not, however, become the dominant force there that they were in Mariupol, the region’s second-largest city and the site last week of a bloody confrontation between Ukrainian troops and pro-Russian militants.
While it was still far too early to say the tide had turned in eastern Ukraine, the day’s events were a blow to separatists who recently seized control here and in a dozen or so other cities and who held a referendum on independence on Sunday.
They work for a rich Ukrainian industrialist who until now had stood on the sidelines despite speaking for Ukrainian unity.
I'd long noted that Ukraine's security forces faced a handicap in the situation where they'd need to use deadly force when confronted by far larger mobs of civilians intent on laying hands on them to capture the troops or their equipment. Using deadly force would be a propaganda victory for Putin's forces.
But large numbers of steelworkers able to take care of themselves while not being outnumbered by Putin's mob of pretend patriots seem to have made more progress in a day than the government "anti-terrorist" operations have from the beginning of the faux uprisings.
Yet the focal point of Ukrainian security operations, Slovyansk, seems likely to remain a security force problem because the industrialist does not have any factories in that area to mobilize their manpower.
Putin's nightmare at this point is that the east votes in large numbers and exposes the Putin lies that the region's people are desperate for Russian rescue.
UPDATE: Fighting continues around Slovyansk:
Reports from eastern Ukraine say government forces and separatist rebels were engaged in combat early on May 16, with government forces firing artillery at separatist positions on the outskirts of Slovyansk.
A rebel spokesman said fighting that began on May 15 was continuing in the early morning hours of May 16 on the approaches to Slovyansk near the villages of Andreyevka and Semyonovka, and at the towns of Krasny Liman and Mount Karagun.
Mortar rounds and heavy machine guns were being used in the overnight battle.
Note that the picture of an armored personnel carrier is not one of the paratrooper models I've seen a lot from fighting out there, indicating units of the 25th airborne brigade, notwithstanding reports that the unit was disbanded. Could this be the Kharkov-based mechanized infantry brigade (92nd) in action? Or has the 93rd from Dnepropetrovsk been brought east?
Of course, Slovyansk is important enough to fight for, apparently (see the update).
