For weeks, Ukraine’s Honor Company held back Russian forces on the road to Bakhmut.

The two sides traded fire with artillery, machine guns and rifles in trenches and fields that recalled scenes from the destroyed landscapes of northern France and Belgium during World War I. The Ukrainians staked out front-line positions in dugouts along a line of trees, under constant threat from artillery assaults. Hundreds of Russian rounds sliced through tree trunks and left nearby fields covered in craters.