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.”
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…