REMARKABLE footage shows defiant Ukrainian defenders dodging a barrage of Russian shelling as they charge across fields to Kherson in cars.
Putin's battered troops have been throwing down their weapons and fleeing in the face of a rapid Ukrainian counterblitz that has seen Russia lose huge amounts of territory.
Ukrainian soldiers are now within striking distance of Kherson city – the only provincial capital captured since February 24 that is still in Russian control.
Zelensky's forces have been videoed storming towards the city in American-made Humvees as artillery fire pounds to the ground around them.
After avoiding shell holes and destroyed Russian vehicles, soldiers jumped out of the armoured cars and pressed on with their blitz.
Amid their stunning counteroffensive, Ukrainian defenders have managed to push Russia back by 12 miles in the south, according to British military intelligence.
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The Ministry of Defence today added: "Russian forces have typically broken contact and withdrawn.
"Russia faces a dilemma: withdrawal of combat forces across the Dnipro makes defence of the rest of Kherson Oblast more tenable; but the political imperative will be to remain and defend."
Meanwhile, other footage from the frontline shows Russian soldiers surrendering with a white flag flying from their tank.
In the clip, taken on the Kherson front, a Russian BMP-2 infantry fighting vehicle with several Russian soldiers inside can be seen driving down a hill.
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One soldier is on the turret, with a white flag flying on the barrel and another on the machine gun in front of him.
Clearly tense Ukrainian soldiers taking cover eye up the vehicle as it turns and drives along in front of them.
One of them then emerges with his gun trained on the tank as others also raise their weapons.
As it comes to a halt, the Ukrainians move towards it, all with their guns trained, as the Russian who was on the turret jumps off with his hands in the air.
It comes after a US official revealed Ukraine could retake Crimea – annexed by Russia in 2014 – if it continues to recapture territory at this pace.
The source told the Telegraph: "The recapture of Crimea by Ukraine is now a distinct possibility and can no longer be discounted.
"It is clear that Russia no longer has the ability or willpower to defend key positions, and if the Ukrainians succeed in their goal of recapturing Kherson, then there is a very real possibility that it will ultimately be able to recapture Crimea."
It follows a series of blasts at the Russian airbase in Crimea, with the latest just days ago.
Meanwhile, Ukraine is continuing to defiantly push back against Putin after he attempted to formally incorporate four parts of Ukraine into Russia.
Ukraine said it has retaken more settlements in Kherson – one of the four regions Putin "annexed" in a rambling speech last week in Europe's biggest land grab since World War Two.
President Volodymyr Zelensky said in a late Wednesday address that Novovoskresenske, Novohryhorivka and Petropavlivka to the northeast of Kherson city had been "liberated".
Russian troops have now been ordered to retreat as Ukraine's southern tank assault steamrollers their positions – and Zelensky vowed he "won't stop".
A Putin stooge confirmed an order "to regroup" as pro-Russian blogs revealed the frontline had collapsed.
Thousands of Russian troops face being encircled on the west bank of the Dnipro after the only bridges across the four-mile-wide river were blitzed with US and UK long-range rockets.
Moscow's RIA Novosti state media outlet quoted Kherson official Kirill Stremousov as saying troops were "conducting a regrouping in order to gather their strength and deliver a retaliatory blow”.
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Russian troops are expected to fall back to the Inhulets river, just a few miles east of the city.
If they are unable to halt Ukraine's advance, analysts warned Russian troops would loot dinghies and yachts from the city's marinas to escape at any cost.
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