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EXCLUSIVE footage shows the top secret Ukrainian army HQ where Brits have trained 14,000 troops to take on Putin’s invaders.
Never before seen video of Sun man Paul Sims lifts the lid on the camp’s operations, just a few miles from the frontline in Kharkiv.
The Sun’s Paul Sims goes behind the scenes at Ukraine’s top secret training camp in Kharkhiv
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Peter Jordan
The frontline of the Ukraine war, where Kyiv’s brave troops face off against Putin’s invadersIn our exclusive video, Paul goes behind the scenes to reveal the “killhouse” exercises putting soldiers “through their paces” in preparation for meatgrinder battles.
He meets the heroic Brit soldier, Dan Ridley, who set up the Trident Defence Initiative over two years ago.
Dramatic footage shows Kyiv‘s troops armed and in combat gear, storming makeshift houses and studying drone warfare.
Below Paul gives his raw account of the operation which has ramped up in recent weeks to deal with Putin’s fresh invasion only miles away.
At a secret frontline base where Brits and US have trained 14,000 troops to blitz Vladimir Putin‘s troops, British ex-soldier Dan Ridley casts his eye over the latest Ukrainian recruits.
From a raised wooden platform overlooking a maze of rooms he watches them move swiftly from door to door.
The kill house below – hastily built from sheets of woodchip – is rudimentary in the extreme.
But so too is everything here.
The wooden huts nearby, where troops are undergoing combat medical training, have laid dormant for more than 15 years and are crumbling.
It is a wonder they are still standing.
But by the end of this week, Dan, 28, and his team of instructors at Trident Defense Initiative (TDI), will have trained over 14,000 Ukrainian soldiers since the start of the war.
The Sun was yesterday given exclusive access to the British-run HQ which is located just a few miles from the frontline in Ukraine’s second largest city of Kharkiv.
Some of the recruits are here on an intensive three-week medical course that would normally be taught across four months in peacetime.
But time is of the essence – more so now than ever, amid the relentless bombardment of the region and the advancing Russian troops.
There is a step change in the air – or as Dan puts it: “It feels like Russia‘s getting its s*** together.”
We walk through the woods amid the distant dull thuds of outgoing artillery as he tells me: “This training is vital for the war effort – more so now than ever.
“The border towns of Vovchansk and Lyptsi on the outskirts of Kharkiv are being levelled to the ground.
“Ukraine has stifled the push for now, it’s definitely slowed, but this is only the start of a Summer offensive and there is more to come.
“We know the importance of what we’re doing and the responsibility we have. That hasn’t really changed.
“We are the only official training centre – and the largest – linked to the Ukrainian military. We now have about 40 instructors in total.
“Don’t get me wrong, that’s not arrogance – it’s actually a shame.
“There should be more people like us but everyone that came at the start of the war was doing it for money.
“You don’t get paid doing this. We get no funding from the government.
“I met the Ukrainian ministry of defence, I met the generals, I’ve met everyone. I knew they would never fund it.
“We now have private direct donors from America and I’ve got a good budget now.
“Not enough, but better than I’ve ever had. We get to build places like this as a result.
“I’ve been working with the heads of the region and the military commanders here for two years straight now.
“I submit numbers and the courses open and they send soldiers by order.”
Putin's fresh invasion in Kharkiv
UKRAINE'S second largest city of Kharkiv was blitzed from the air on May 10 as advancing enemy troops were pegged back.
They fired missiles, drones and glider bombs towards the border towns of Vovchansk, Lyptsi and beyond.
The relentless daily bombardment from the skies was stepped up as Ukraine’s warriors repelled a series of ground offensives.
In a town 15 miles from the frontline, the residents of a quiet residential street were among the latest casualties of Russia’s onslaught.
We found Vasyl Lutsenko, 67, at the base of a tree overlooking the charred remains of the home he and wife Olena have shared for the last 24 years.
Their property was hit by an Iranian-made Shahed-136 kamikaze drone shortly after 2am and burned to the ground.
It hit their Summer kitchen before the flames spread instantly to the main house and the neighbours next door.
The timber frames were still smouldering as we arrived yesterday amid piles of brickwork and masonry, twisted metal and their charred possessions.
The roof is no more and all that remains of the lives they created here is a wasteland of treasured memories.
Bearded Vasyl manages a smile as he mentions Boris Johnson and says he and Olena, 58, are lucky to be alive. He is already talking about rebuilding.
But it is too much for Olena who suddenly breaks down and shakes her head as a tear rolls down her cheek.
The Lutsenko home is the latest to be struck by the indiscriminate attacks that have increased daily over the last three weeks.
Extraordinary video footage taken by firefighters hours earlier showed their two-bedroom home engulfed by flames.
Vasyl and Olena escaped via their bedroom window after it was blown in by the power of the blast.
Olena was in her slippers but is now wearing a pair of trainers donated by a neighbour.
Vasyl says: “The world needs to understand that we cannot stop Vladimir Putin on our own.
“The whole world needs to end Putin. He won’t stop. You will have the war in London and around your home if he is not stopped.
“Today, we have great news. We are alive and I suspect this dumbf*** Putin will be dead soon.
“He’s a d***head.”
Next door, Oleksii Yakhno, 71, is surveying the devastating damage to the home he and wife Olga, 68, have lived in for the last 51 years.
Oleksii was asleep in a back bedroom and his wife was on a sofa bed in the kitchen when the drone struck.
Olga cried out to her husband to save the family car, a purple 13 series Lada, as the ceilings caved in.
He did as he was told and ran out in his pants, diving into the front seat as the flames tore through the garage.
His grandson, Pavlo, watched from his apartment block nearby and raced to their home.
Tearful Oleksii tells me: “My wife saw the neighbour’s summer kitchen hit by the drone.
“It caught fire immediately and my wife told me to go and save our car.
“I went off – even in my underwear – ran into the garage and started the engine.
“Over the last few years I’ve been saving money so that my daughter’s can pay for my funeral when I’m dead, but it’s all gone.
“We’ve been here since 1973. Everything that we have is gone.”
His eyes fill with tears as he says: “I don’t have any feelings – just that I have lost the roof over my head.
“The home and everything we owned is gone – I just don’t know what to do.
“Maybe I would be better off dead. It’s very, very bad. What can I do now? I have lived my entire life here.”
Olga said: “The windows shattered and there is glass everywhere.
“You see everything with your eyes. The house is completely destroyed. We’ve got nothing left.”
It is Olga’s birthday next week and they were preparing to celebrate.
For now, they are simply trying to pick up the pieces of their broken lives.
Local Mayor Ihor Terekhov told The Sun: “Four Shaheds were fired at the city overnight.
“People are left with nothing right now. We will definitely help them and do our best to rebuild their lives.
“The Russian aggressor is carrying out crimes every day against the Ukrainian nation.”
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InstagramHeroic Dan, originally of Croydon, south London, does not court the limelight.
He doesn’t have a TikTok account, is not all over social media and questions the motives of others who are now long gone from the frontline.
He tells me we are the first to visit his newest training base which has been his HQ for three months now.
There were other bases, of course, but they were destroyed by Russian warheads.
In one attack, dramatic CCTV showed the moment five S-300 surface-to-air rockets wiped out the airfield he was using in October 2022.
It caught the attention of Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky who heaped praise on Dan and his team.
Zelensky said: “Neither rain nor even Russian missiles get in their way.”
It did little to deter Dan who has remained steadfast in his promise to protect Ukraine from Russia’s invasion.
He was originally a private for four years in the 2nd Battalion of The Princess of Wales’s Royal Regiment.
After leaving the Armed Forces he travelled to Ukraine and joined the country’s marines – along with fellow Brits Shaun Pinner and Aiden Aslin.
Shaun and Aiden were later captured by the Russians during the fall of Mariupol in April 2022 and sentenced to death.
They were dramatically released months later as part of a prisoner swap brokered by Russian former Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich.
The Sun's defence editor Jerome Starkey gives his take
THE British-run HQ in Ukraine isn’t the only military operation helping to train and support the Armed Forces of Ukraine.
Back in the UK, monumental efforts are also underway to help ensure Ukraine’s territorial integrity.
Operation Interflex serves as part of the foreign involvement in the Russian invasion of Ukraine and is supported by contingents from international partners.
Led by the British Army’s 11th Security Force Assistance Brigade, Operation Interlex began in July 2022.
Approximately 1,050 British military personnel were placed on standby to assist with training, carried out at several sites across the UK.
By November 2023, over 30,000 Ukrainians had received training.
But the reason this training isn’t happening in Ukraine is “two-fold,” The Sun’s Jerome Starkey explains.
“If Britain were to send soldiers to Ukraine, it risks triggering a NATO Article 5 conflict,” he said.
“If British soldiers are killed in an active war by Russia, that probably would be considered an act of war against the United Kingdom.
“This, in theory, should see all of the NATO allies come together.”
The second reason for training in the UK is to avoid the high risk of casualties caused by Russian missiles on the front line.
“Russian missiles can reach every inch of Ukrainian territory and they have struck all of Ukraine’s major cities,” Jerome said.
“Training in Ukraine is dangerous, but we have the opportunity to do so here.”
He added: “In an ideal world, these soldiers would get more training but that has to be weighed up and balanced with the need to get soldiers to the frontlines.”
Peter Jordan
Peter Jordan
Peter JordanAs for Dan, he was on leave in Bucha on the outskirts of Kyiv when Russian attack choppers flew over his apartment block on the first day of the war.
He set up a medical centre in the basement of his apartment block as soldiers went door-to-door.
He became known by grateful locals as the ‘Britishski Doctor’.
But after 16 days, amid a slaughter of the innocents, he drove out with 14 others in a convoy of three cars through three Russian checkpoints.
Exhausted Dan broke down in tears when he reached the first Ukrainian checkpoint.
He identified himself as Ukrainian military and headed to Sumy before his four years in the Ukrainian military came to an end.
Dan then set up TDI and recruited fellow Brits, US Marines, Canadians and Australians to provide a bespoke training programme for troops.
His deputy Chris Edwards, 42, left his wife and four kids behind in Portsmouth, Hants., to join him and has remained loyally by his side ever since.
Together, they now train infantry soldiers, combat medics, engineers, drone pilots and snipers.
There is even a ‘classroom’ where troops are taught about the Geneva Convention.
Dan’s makeshift office, tucked away close by within a concrete building, bears the hallmarks of the last two years of war.
Shrapnel from one of the S-300 warheads that struck his former airfield HQ sits proudly on the end of his desk.
Ukraine has stifled the push for now, it’s definitely slowed, but this is only the start of a Summer offensive and there is more to come
Dan RidleyAnother piece of metal – this time from a Shaded-136 kamikaze drone – rests on a ledge behind his head.
He won’t admit it openly, but they are reminders of the dangers that exist for him and his team on a daily basis.
It goes some way to explaining why he is at pains when we meet to gain assurances that nothing contained in this report will identify where he is.
But he is also keen to point out that he is not offering basic training for squaddies.
He says: “We’re offering them combat preparation as opposed to training.
“Training can take six months to a year, making them into a soldier.
“Combat preparation is done over a much smaller time-scale and it’s to prepare people directly for combat instead of drills and locker inspections.
“The soldiers we see have already been through their basic training and have been at their units for a few months.
“Not all of them have combat experience. A week before we had 50 patrol police, like beat coppers, and we ran them through a tactical infantry course.
“Now we’ve got a special police unit and some of them have combat experience.
“Some are veterans, some are new.
“The working day here is 9am to 4.30pm. We’re doing this every week in a controlled environment.
“They’re here to learn skills and get educated.”
Former US Marine Noah is among the instructors. We meet him digging a shallow shell scrape, known in the US as a Ranger Grave.
He says: “I never got to do anything as a marine because I joined up during peacetime.
“All I did was train, so I decided to come over here.
“I’m training with the guys first to understand the reality of how things are, but probably in the next month or so I’ll join a Ukrainian unit.
“I’ve got other western friends – Canadians, Americans, Brits – who are fighting and I know them personally.
“I figured this would be a good place to learn the reality of what guys are dealing with and get a better perspective.”
Dan is not interested in fighting on the frontline – he did that as a marine in the Ukrainian armed forces.
For now, he is only looking as far ahead as the next group of troops to come through his base.
Peter Jordan
Peter Jordan
Not known, clear with picture desk
English (US)