Battle of Trostianets

Battle context

The Russian crossing of the Russia–Ukraine and Belarus–Ukraine borders on 24 February 2022 opened the northern front of the full-scale invasion, with forces entering the oblasts of Kyiv, Chernihiv, Sumy, and Zhytomyr. The stated operational objective of the northern thrust was the capture of Kyiv, the Ukrainian capital and seat of government. Securing Kyiv would have decapitated Ukrainian state authority and potentially ended organized resistance at the outset of the campaign. The northern advance therefore represented the most strategically consequential axis of the initial invasion, with Russian forces under Aleksandr Chaiko operating against a substantially smaller Ukrainian force.