By “soldiers” do they also mean “forcibly conscripted men”?
“forcibly conscripted men”
Conscription isn’t voluntary… that’s the whole point of conscription.
For sure, conscription in of itself is criminal but like the USA during Vietnam, poor people,ethnic minorities and developmentally disabled men are disproportionately grabbed off the streets and litteraly forced into service.
The men in Moscow and St Petersburg seem to still have avoided such issiues this deep into the war.
Maybe conscription is the wrong word to use, and more like state sponsored cleansing of " undesirables." Certainly helped the state reduce spending on male prison populations…
Conscription is always a horrible thing… but conscription in Russia is batshit insane. I read Arkady Babchenko’s account of it (he was conscripted into the 1st Chechen War, and essentially a mercenary during the second one) and it’s as bad as you can imagine - recruits in USMC bootcamp don’t know how luxurious their lives are in comparison. It’s a carnival of corruption, extortion and unrestricted abuse - and that’s just the basic training.
After reading that, I was no longer surprised at the Russian military’s failure in Ukraine - I’d say the Russian military is in as bad a state now than they were during the ill-advised invasion of Finland in 1939.
There’s a Stanley Kubrick movie about this that takes place in WWI called Paths of Glory. It’s really haunting.
Russia’s morality is back in the 1910s.
You don’t even have to go that far back.
Enemy at the gates, Both movie (2001) and book (1973), give a graphic depiction of Stalin’s Not a step back command, Order No. 227, where soldiers were shot for refusing orders to die where they stand and not retreat in WW2.
There was no arrest, trail and formal execution as seen in Paths of Glory. The troops had the choice to be shot by the Germans in front of them or by the USSR Political Officers behind them.
Enemy at the Gates is a decent flick, but it’s pretty inaccurate. I wouldn’t be citing it as a source on what actually happened on the eastern front.
I was replying to a comet about a movie, so I replied with one. I also linked order 227, which is accurate.
If you have a link that you feel is more accurate please post it.
Enemy At The Gates is utter propagandistic and asinine bullcrap - you’ll get more historical accuracy from Mel Gibson’s crappy “historical” movies than that one.
Order No. 227 mostly only applied to high-level officers - in reality, the vast majority of retreating soldiers caught by barrier troops were merely returned to their units. There are records of these things - no matter what western historians assume.
You say there are records, but even right now Russia is intentionally keeping a lot of its dead soldiers go unrecorded (ie MIA instead of KIA) just so they can keep payouts lower and more easily downplay losses. Doesn’t mean the same happened in WW2, but how do we know it didn’t either?
The original Call of Duty (2003) featured a level about the battle of Stalingrad where you’re given a rifle but no ammo to start the level. That has always stuck with me.
Has Russia’s morality ever been above that? Apart from some minor glitches in the system seen as chaotic, its history goes from one dictator to another.
Russian history is one harsh leader after another. No wonder their such hard people.
Hot take that’s his best film. Not that the rest aren’t great(Barry Lyndon aside)
“We also have information that Russian commanders are threatening to execute entire units if they seek to retreat from Ukrainian artillery fire,” Kirby said.
Threatening hundreds of armed men doesn’t seem like a smart thing for a commander to do.
the sign of a modern cutting edge military totally in control of their own frontline
Wouldn’t be the first time. The soviets already did that in ww2, so there is a precedent for it.
Something’s got to give out eventually?
There’s no way those tactics are sustainable,
There has already been the mutiny of the Wagner mercs, I wounder how far away it is for the army proper.
