In audio intercepts from the front lines in Ukraine, Russian soldiers speak in shorthand of 200s to mean dead, 300s to mean wounded. The urge to flee has become common enough that they also talk of 500s — people who refuse to fight.
As the war grinds into its second winter, a growing number of Russian soldiers want out, as suggested in secret recordings obtained by The Associated Press of Russian soldiers calling home from the battlefields of the Kharkiv, Luhansk and Donetsk regions in Ukraine.
The calls offer a rare glimpse of the war as it looked through Russian eyes — a point of view that seldom makes its way into Western media, largely because Russia has made it a crime to speak honestly about the conflict in Ukraine. They also show clearly how the war has progressed, from the professional soldiers who initially powered Vladimir Putin’s full-scale invasion to men from all walks of life compelled to serve in grueling conditions.
“There’s no f------ ‘dying the death of the brave’ here,” one soldier told his brother from the front in Ukraine’s Kharkiv region. “You just die like a f------ earthworm.”
Seems like every generation has to learn the Old Lie again and again.
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/46560/dulce-et-decorum-est
I can’t help but think most soldiers realize it’s a load of bullshit when they’re choking on their own blood.
Russia must be a wonderful place to wake up in the morning… what an amazingly joyful, wonderful place it must be… that must be why so many intelligent people have fled for the nearest border…
Russia, the land of earthworms
I see nothing has changed then since early 2022.
If this was obtained and released by Ukraine, it is a type of propaganda. It might be true, but it’s definitely designed to further erode the spirit of any Russian listener and bolster the Ukrainian side.
Here’s Vietnam propaganda trying to get US soldiers to give up: https://people.duke.edu/~ng46/collections/propaganda/vietnam-to-us/LEAFLET North Vietnam Whats in Washingtons War 1 600h.jpg
I remember reading when the war first started that Russia has the numbers to continually onslaught for a long time. If they’re pulling prisoners, the old and young, etc., is that really true anymore?
They’ve been pulling undesirables in hopes of wearing down Ukraine with them, a general mobilization of the population has not happened yet I believe.
It’s the ol’ meat avalanche tactic once again, and Russia’s leadership is once again forgetting that logistics and hardware win wars… and they’re quickly running on fumes…
Here are a bunch of quotes from All Quiet On the Western Front
https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/2662852-im-westen-nichts-neues
I couldn’t finish that book, way too depressing. Also I kept wanting to scream at all those kids to just go home and stop fighting over fucking nothing.
Do any soldiers want in? I bet both sides are tired
“It’s war, no one’s happy. If those same spies were in our camps…”
Lord Tywin Lannister
But seriously, yes, I’m sure they have low morale. But it’s frontline peer conflict. I’m sure the GRU has plenty of intercepted calls from Ukrainian conscripts saying and feeling very similarly.
Maybe that can’t be extrapolated across the board for the UA, but certainly enough for a similar propaganda/psyop release.
Unlikely. The Ukrainians are literally fighting for their homes and their lives. While I’m sure they’re sick of warfare, it doesn’t follow that their morale would at all be similar.
An army can have good overall morale, and still have frontline soldiers complaining on the phone, especially conscripts.
That’s my point. Selective release of intercepted calls of soldiers complaining, or otherwise expressing negative feelings isn’t unique to armies with poor morale.
The Ukrainians are still humans. They aren’t zealots, or robots. Humans have complex feelings, and they communicate those feelings, sometimes in ways that can be intercepted by enemy surveillance.
A lot of them don’t want to fight. There are plenty of Ukrainian men, who abandoned their families and just ran away across the border.
Citation needed.
Every society has its cowards
Nah. Ukrainians are relying on conscription just like Russians are.
Many of them don’t want to die in a war they have a very good chance of losing.
Russia has already lost the war i.e. their stated objectives.
The only remaining question is whether Ukrainian regains all it’s territory and secured an agreement, or if it stalemates e.g. 2014 - Feb. 2022.
Russia has already lost the war i.e. their stated objectives.
I mean one of these stated objectives was “denazifying Ukraine,” so even entertaining some of these stated objectives is to buy in to propagandized notions. The first phase was definitely a disaster for Russia, the prolonging of the border conflict changes things though. WW1 was expected to be quick before it became the “never again” meat grinder it did. Russia’s objective is to keep Ukraine out of EU and NATO, if not win territory, and if they can prolong the war enough to achieve that then they would have something to show for the effort, whether or not they gain territory. Maybe they can’t do this but that’s the current state of things at least.
There’s been more information coming out about how the conflict may have been resolved in Spring 2022 if Ukraine had agreed not to join EU and NATO, but were pressured by Western allies not to engage with these negotiations and instead rely on the support and supply of weapons. Whether that potential Spring 2022 negotiation would have been in Ukrainian’s best interest I can’t say, probably not at the time, but the price paid for the war effort in human lives increases with every day of the conflict. Western politicians are becoming less supportive now, what happens if tides shift and Ukraine eventually negotiates with Russia but on far worse terms? This stuff is still all up in the air, I’m just not overly optimistic about this big Ukrainian victory that the western viewpoint is sort of leading to, it’s too much like a story arc we all love to hear. It’s likely it will end like any war does, people wondering how it could have led up to what it did and how pointless it was in the grand scheme of what it became.
Russia has already lost the war
Sorry you think this is a fact.
The only remaining question is whether Ukrainian regains all it’s territory and secured an agreement
I hope you’re not including Crimea in this. Nobody realistically believes Ukraine has a chance of taking Crimea without foreign troops assisting them in combat.
Two weeks old account and spreading russian propaganda. Name a more iconic duo… I’ll wait.
You’re the only one spreading propaganda, lol. I’m trying to bring you back down to earth, but I can see you’re too far gone for that.
Remember this conversation when Ukraine surrenders. You are being manipulated without even realizing it.
We both know there’s no point returning to this conversation later. By then you’ll be already using another account to spread your bullshit, because you’re just too obvious.
I can’t speak to Ukrainian sentiment as a whole and can imagine that many see the value in defending the country, but I know there’s a lot who have escaped conscription and that it isn’t talked about much. When I provide things for refugees vs draft dodgers it’s a much different vibe. Refugees it’s like drop off at the Ukrainian church or association, but draft dodgers it’s like tell the contact what you have, they take a few days, then take it from the end of your driveway.
The real question is, though: how far down your throat is that Putin-faced dildo of yours?
Sorry you’re upset that I’m sharing a realistic take on the war instead of buying into the same propaganda you did.
Most people like you get so angry because you don’t want to admit you’re being manipulated.
So what are Russia’s victory conditions?
Why are you asking me that? I’ve only been talking about Ukraine’s victory conditions which they cannot meet. “Nobody realistically believes Ukraine has a chance of taking Crimea without foreign troops assisting them in combat. Ukrainians are relying on conscription just like Russians are. Many of them don’t want to die in a war they have a very good chance of losing.”
If instead you’re trying to say what Russia’s victory conditions are, then just say it instead of asking me lol.
Awww, it’s almost self-aware, too? 🥹
More than you, lol.
That’s okay. The future will be a learning experience for you.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
The calls offer a rare glimpse of the war as it looked through Russian eyes — a point of view that seldom makes its way into Western media, largely because Russia has made it a crime to speak honestly about the conflict in Ukraine.
They also show clearly how the war has progressed, from the professional soldiers who initially powered Vladimir Putin’s full-scale invasion to men from all walks of life compelled to serve in grueling conditions.
“As long as we are needed here, we will carry out our task,” a soldier named Artyom told AP from eastern Ukraine at the end of May, where he’d been stationed for eight months without break.
In the spring, as the Professor’s brothers drove down a road outside their hometown in Russia, a car made a U-turn into the side of their vehicle, sending it spinning as a semi bore down on them.
Called up for military service from a small town in Russia’s far east, he soon found himself in eastern Ukraine’s Donetsk province, on the southern approach to Bakhmut.
In September, Andrei’s mother told AP her son was home, keeping himself busy with his family and collecting pine cones from the taiga.
The original article contains 3,277 words, the summary contains 201 words. Saved 94%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
Maybe it’s just me, but I’m not seeing how any of the people listed “couldn’t avoid mobilization.” Militaries around the world hire from the poor and desperate, but the story makes no indication that people are forced into service.
Russia has drafted 300.000 men (according to official numbers; unofficial estimates are higher), starting in September 2022.
Forcefully.
Do you understand how mandatory military service works? Around the world, it’s almost entirely training unless people volunteer to enter combat. It’s incredibly unpleasant to avoid mandatory military service in countries that require it (South Korea, Singapore, Russia, etc.) but it’s by no means impossible.
Uhm, you might have missed the point.
The 300.000 men are not those on regular mandatory conscription, these are mobilized troops taken from those who already served their conscription.
Conscription didn’t stop, and it counts separately. Also, some of the conscripted soldiers reported being thrown to the border of Ukraine, into Belgorod oblast - not quite the frontline, but very close.
And yes, being a male born in Russia I very well understand how military service works.
“There’s no f------ ‘dying the death of the brave’ here,” one soldier told his brother from the front in Ukraine’s Kharkiv region. “You just die like a f------ earthworm.”
Wow, secret phone calls in English, who would have thunk, eh?
I guess you would have wanted the raw voltage fluctuations of the microphone he spoke into? Or the vibration of the diaphragm?
Did you know that simply learning multiple languages can set you up with a job for the rest of your life?
It’s crazy, I know.
Least stupid ruzzia supporter
