1/ Despite searing temperatures of up to 40°C (104°F), Russian fighter pilots in Ukraine and southern Russia are reportedly being issued with only 1 litre (36 oz) of water per day. In between sorties, they are said to be driving around nearby villages begging for water. ⬇️
2/ The Fighterbomber Telegram channel has published a despairing post complaining about a chronic shortage of drinking water for Russian pilots stationed at forward airfields. The author writes:
3/ "The guys have been fighting from forward airfields for several months and for several months everything has been bad with food.
You can say it doesn't exist.
If with dry rations everything was solved after a time, then with water everything turned out to be difficult.
4/ "It turns out that pilots are not allowed water.
None.
5/ "After the intervention of those who don't give a fuck, within a day the issue with rations was essentially resolved, and the water issue was partially resolved. A water standard has appeared.
One
Litre
Of
Water
Per day
Per person.
6/ "When not flying combat missions, pilots are forced to drive around the surrounding villages in search of water."
7/ It should be noted that the U.S. National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine has determined that an adequate daily fluid intake is about 3.7 litres (130 oz) of fluids a day. In very hot temperatures, more water is likely to be needed or dehydration will result.
8/ The channel appeals to Russian bottled water manufacturers to "deliver water to the nearest military airfield. Preliminary, this is Voronezh, Rostov, and any military airfield in Crimea. Wherever is more convenient for you.
9/ Water in one-and-a-half-litre bottles is more convenient, but we'll take any."
The south of Ukraine and Russia are currently experiencing very high temperatures and severe drought. The Kakhovka dam's destruction in June 2023 has cut off most of the water supply to Crimea.
10/ Ukrainian attacks on Russian supply chains are also likely to be a factor in causing shortages of food and water. Russian troops have recently filmed themselves having to drink nettle soup for lack of food supplies. /end
1/ A Russian military doctor has spoken frankly in an interview about the atrocious state of Russian military medicine and the lack of medical training given to soldiers. Most of the wounded die, he says, and doctors themselves are treated as 'slaves' by the Russian military. ⬇️
2/ The Russian Telegram channel Transformer has published a lengthy interview on the experiences of Dr. Alexander Moiseevich Z (a pseudonym). He volunteered for the army at the age of 62 in October 2022 and resigned in June 2024 when he reached the mandatory retirement age of 65.
3/ Alexander first workied as a military doctor in the 1970s, during the Soviet era. He says that things were very different then. The Soviet-style military system effectively persisted in Russia until the reforms of then-Defence Minister Anatoly Serdyukov were enacted in 2008.
1/ Colonel Anton Necherda, the commander of a Russian Army regiment, is reported to have been arrested for a string of brutal crimes against his own men including extortion, beating, torture and murder. His own deputy, a lieutenant colonel, was allegedly one of his victims. ⬇️
2/ Russian social media users have been complaining for over two years about "lawlessness" and "slaughter" in the 1428th Motorised Rifle Regiment, with regular reports of men being sent to their deaths in suicidal assaults and of violence and corruption among the officers.
3/ Relatives of men serving with the regiment have published many stories of abuse conducted under Necherda's command, and Russian social media is full of appeals for help to find missing members of the regiment.
1/ Russian soldiers face being sent to their deaths if they appeal publicly for volunteer aid, according to Russian warbloggers. Commanders regard it as reflecting badly on the Russian army, forcing aid appeals to be made anonymously. Even so, much of the aid is still stolen. ⬇️
2/ Both sides in the Ukraine war rely heavily on 'humanitarian aid' provided by volunteers and fundraisers, for everything from clothes and medicines to drones and trench equipment. However, whereas it's done openly in Ukraine, Russians have to do it secretly.
3/ 'Romanov Light' writes: "Most of the volunteers I know - delivering aid specifically to fighters (and not to high-ranking commanders "for sale") - are forced to hide which specific unit the aid is being transferred to."
1/ Russian warbloggers are advocating various ways of taking revenge on Ukraine, but Komsomolskaya Pravda journalist and propagandist Dmitry Steshin has proposed an option which even the warbloggers aren't sure about: nuking Chornobyl. ⬇️
2/ Responding to another channel's complaint that the West isn't taking Russia's nuclear threats seriously, Steshin suggests:
3/ "Why not use tactical nuclear weapons in the 30-kilometer Chernobyl "exclusion zone" to demonstrate Russian restraint? Seriously, use it as much as you want!"
1/ A Russian deserter has described how Russian evacuation teams loot bodies for items to trade for alcohol and leave the wounded to die. He had most of his teeth pulled out to force him to join a stormtrooper squad, after which he deserted and fled to Germany. ⬇️
2/ 34-year-old Anton Shirshin says he was forced by the Russian police to sign a military contract after he crashed his car and ended up with a 200,000 ruble ($2,500) debt which he couldn't pay off. Despite being rated unfit for service, he was told if he could walk he was fit.
3/ Shirshin was sent for a week of 'training', consisting of firing two clips from an automatic rifle, before he was sent to the front. His commander decided he would be more of a danger with a weapon to his own side than to the enemy and assigned him to evacuation duty instead.
1/ Foreign-made components in Russian Kilo-class submarines in the Black Sea Fleet have reportedly been systematically stripped out and replaced with Russian or Chinese components. However, this is said to have resulted in corruption and significant problems with reliability. ⬇️
2/ In the mid-2010s, Russia undertook a major project to upgrade the design of its Kilo-class submarines with new systems. 11 new Project 636.3 ("Improved Kilo II") boats were launched between 2013 and 2024, with another 5 currently either on order or under construction.
3/ According to the VChK-OGPU Telegram channel, the new systems incorporated foreign components, presumably imported from Western countries. This practice ceased in 2022 when technology sanctions were imposed following the full-scale invasion of Ukraine.