Hohos sweem to have run out of real estate, i.e. they abandon one more defensive line in Donbass, and the only thing between the Russian military and the Dnieper is open steppe, nowhere to run, nowhere to hide. All they can do now is try to attack Russian positions and Russians are just using Mongol tactics on them when they do. SRO at every hospital in the land...
There were no real Russian soldiers at Balikliya and those paratroopers you read about were just there to pull the reservists out safely.