Thread by @ChrisO_wiki

1/ Wounded Russian soldiers and their relatives say they are being sent back into battle without being treated, and in some cases are not paid injury compensation or even their regular salaries. It's been blamed on a shortage of frontline manpower. Some are choosing to flee. ⬇️

2/ Radio Free Europe reports on several such cases. Nikolai from the 27th Separate Guards Motor Rifle Brigade has been sent back to the front line despite being unable to walk without painkillers due to his legs being damaged by shrapnel. His mother is appealing to prosecutors.

3/ Nikolai, a former prisoner who signed a contract with the Russian Ministry of Defence, was not even given treatment after being wounded twice, and was told it was "not the [right] time" to send him to a hospital.

4/ His mother Irina says: "They said: "There are no people [left to fight], can't you see?" And he couldn't even see – his eyesight was not very good, and after the second wound he lost it altogether, and he could no longer hear because of the contusion.

5/ "But that's not the worst thing – he has shrapnel in both legs, he can't walk without screaming. How can someone like that not even be sent to hospital? How can you send him to an assault?

6/ "It's literally like cows in a slaughterhouse – you can't see or hear anything, we don't care – the main thing is to report to our superiors that so many heads were stolen. Is that how it works? I still can't get it into my head."

7/ She believes that he was not given any surgery to remove the shrapnel "so that there were no open wounds, so they could send him to the front line as soon as possible." After his second wounding, he only spent a night at a treatment centre before returning to the front line.

8/ "Now he has shrapnel in both legs, and they don't even give him painkillers – they gave him a handful in the first days, and that's all. Then he had another contusion – he could not hear at all, and now we can only write to each other. He is disabled, completely disabled."

9/ Kostya, another man from the same brigade, was wounded by shrapnel on the same day as Nikolai – his unit has been reported to be engaged in intense fighting near Bakhmut. Like Nikolai, he was sent straight back to the battle despite his injuries.

10/ His wife Ekaterina says they "had terrible losses that day, six men for every 10. It's not surprising, because they have nothing to fight with." He husband told her that they "just don't have any ammunition."

11/ "They come with only automatic rifles and half-empty magazines. There's not enough ammunition for half a minute [of firing]. The fact that they came back – a quarter of those who left – is a great miracle.

12/ "The survivors were all wounded, both those recruited from the [prison] colonies and those who had served there together. They didn't let anyone go for treatment - they bandaged them up and threw them back. Oh, yes, they gave them ointments. Ointments! For shrapnel wounds!

13/ "So they treat everyone like that, whether you're free or from the colony. There's no-one to fight. Half of them died, the wiser ones ran away. Recently, I heard they ran away again, because they were planned to be sent to the assault again without ammunition."

14/ There have been several other reports recently about the 27th Brigade suffering heavy casualties and sending its men back to the front line with untreated wounds. It appears that the brigade has severe shortages of manpower and ammunition.

https://twitter.com/ChrisO_wiki/status/1704384862243692835

15/ Another soldier, Igor, left the Trans-Baikal Territory in August 2022 to fight as a volunteer armoured vehicle mechanic-driver in Ukraine. He now regrets it after being badly wounded and denied compensation or salary.

16/ "I fought there for three months without any communication at all, then I was wounded, and only in the hospital I learnt that my family didn't even receive payment. Why did I go [to volunteer]? I bought their fucking adverts – they promised me 200,000 ($2,083) a month.

17/ But we have no work in our village, I have four mouths at home, they want to eat. How they didn't starve to death, I don't know, they borrowed from neighbours. My wife says [the authorities] didn't even bring firewood, even though they promised "help for military families".

18/ "Instead of hospital treatment, I had to rush to the village military enlistment office to find out where the payments were."

The result of my work was a shrapnel wound in the hand, a broken arm, and a family starving without money.

19/ "And instead of treatment, I have to run around the offices to get my earnings. They look at me like wolves, as if I was taking someone else's money from them. They only gave me 14 days for "hospitalisation" with a broken arm.

20/ "And so – plastered – they sent me back to the front line. I refused, as I had not received compensation yet, and in fact, there was no treatment either. But did anyone question me? They stuck me on a board, threatened me with prison, fuck!"

21/ He has not received any compensation for his injuries and has been unable to get help from the military or the regional authorities. "You are also entitled to money for being wounded, aren't you? Three million rubles, I was told. But that money doesn't exist either!

22/ "This is the biggest fuck ever! I was only given a medal "For Distinction in Combat". But what the fuck did I need it for!", he says. "Of course, I have already regretted a hundred times that I decided to earn like this. It's worse than gambling [machines]."

Source:
sibreal.org/a/oskolki-na-p…