that claim, but still ukrainian troops have been gaining ground around the capital as the russian military says it s de-escalating. meantime u.s. intelligence now believes russia is seeking a victory of sorts by trying to take control of eastern ukraine by early may. a possible target date could be may 9 when russia celebrates victory over the naughties during world war ii. those ukrainian soldiers said it was a strong morale over the russian fighters, still life in kyiv become difficult as residents suffer acute shortages over weeks. cnn s christian amanpour reports. reporter: the first thing you notice approaching the front northeast of kyiv are the lines of villages waiting for humanitarian hand outs. they receive a bag of bread and basics to get them through these difficult days. the first week of the war a shell hit us near the greenhouse.
we barely survived, says this woman. we had help from strangers around us. they gave us bread and canned food. we wouldn t have managed otherwise. no one here knows when this war will end or whether russia still has designs on kyiv. the front line is about a mile away. for now an uneasy calm prevails ever since the ukrainian defenders stopped the russian advance here. it was february 28th, they say, day four of the war. they want to show us how they did it, but first we have to clamor over the bridge they downed to see the armored column they managed to take out. the riverbank is littered with their skeletons. this was a turkey shoot russian armored vehicles and tanks have come off the road to avoid the anti-tank mine only to find themselves unable to cross the bridge and unable to reverse in time. ukrainian soldiers tell us none of the soldiers inside survived. a little further up the road two tanks have been virtually
waged an eight yearlong assault against kyiv and soon they could be outflanked and surrounded. of this seems to explain the urgency among western nations to supply more lethal, more effective military aid to ukraine. sources telling cnn the u.s. is now helping with the transfer of soviet era tanks from the czech republic. armored vehicles are coming from australia and germany. britain sending long-range artillery. without that increased capability for ukrainian fighters experts believe the russians could wipeout the bulk of ukraine s military in a couple of days. putin looking to a schedule to have some kind of military victory by may 9, the same day russia celebrates victory over nazi germany. the next imnls are graphic, the true horror of russian aggression on full display. journalists report at least 20
smelted, blasted almost to smith renes. a veteran fighter proudly tells us this was his handiwork. we all here have one role to keep the enemy off our land, he says. first thing they did when they see the village they started to shell houses just like that. they didn t see us, didn t know we were here, so they just started to work on houses. so i took the tank in my sights and i fired a rocket and good-bye to him. the destroyed vehicles are stamped with an o. the ukrainian officers here tell us this identifies them as russian units that entered from belarus to the north. oleg is the officer who commanded this operation. as for now looking at previous fighting we ve had i can tell you that we are trained better, he tells me. we have stronger morale and spirit because we re at home. they are afraid, but they go because they re made to. he s been battle hardened ever since the first russian invasion in 2014. he says his side has enough