The experience of Russian military service in Ukraine

Well worth reading ^^^

War is stupid.

The mothers of these soldiers are not happy.

Before this war, the Russians still had to deal with the physical and sometimes sexual abuse in their army. It's like if we took the very worst of Frat hazing culture, codified it into the military as a part of it's culture, then let units run wild with whatever abuse they felt like inflicting on their subordinates.

Dedovshchina is the informal practice of hazing and abuse of junior conscripts historically in the Soviet Armed Forces and today in the Russian armed forces, Internal Troops, and to a much lesser extent FSB, Border Guards, as well as the military forces of certain former Soviet Republics. It consists of brutalization by more senior conscripts, NCOs, and officers.

Many conscripts died from the abuse. Others were traumatized. They even pushed some of these teenage conscripts into prostitution while serving in order to make more money for superiors. The US military may be a lot of things, but we never sold our corn fed boys off to Johns. It's no wonder moral is historically low in the Russian military. Everyone leaves feeling like a whore or a thug.

The intercepted phone calls of Russian soldiers are often heartbreaking, but illuminating about the real conditions. This YouTube channel has numerous examples (and has the added benefit of a personable twink host).

Ukrainians in the comments are very angry about these tweets because they see it as attempts to humanize the people systematically destroying their country.

That Twitter has posted many more excerpts from the experiences of that one VDV soldier. It’s fascinating stuff.

[quote]At 04:00 on 24 February, Filatyev awoke to the sound of rocket artillery. "I hear a roar, a rumble, a vibration of the earth, I feel a sharp smell of gunpowder in the air, I look out of the body [of the truck], throwing back the awning, I see that the sky has become bright...

[quote]"To the right and left of our column the rocket artillery was working, powerful volleys of long-range guns were heard from somewhere behind us, the air felt anxious and buoyant, sleep vanished..."

[quote]"I could not understand what was happening, who was shooting at whom and from where. Tiredness vanished along with the lack of food, water and sleep ... I couldn't fully understand what was going on, are we firing at the advancing Ukrainians? Maybe on NATO?"

[quote]The Russian column passed through the town of Armyansk on the border between Crimea and Ukraine proper. Filatyev's truck, carrying a cargo of mortar rounds in crates, had no working brakes. Along the way it crashed once and endured other near-misses.

[quote]…we never sold our corn fed boys off to Johns.

More’s the pity.