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Aug 19, 2024 31 tweets 8 min read Read on X
1/ Russian conscripts are now fighting, dying and being captured in large numbers in Ukraine's Kursk offensive. As this is the first time that conscripts have been a significant factor in the war, let's look at who the conscripts are and why so many have surrendered. ⬇️ Image
2/ Russia's armed forces are currently made up of four principal groupings: professional ("contract") soldiers, who join voluntarily; mobilised soldiers ("mobiks"), recruited compulsorily; convicts, who sign up in exchange for a pardon; and conscripts, who serve for one year.
3/ Mobiks differ from conscripts in that they are principally older men (and sometimes women) in Russia's reserves who have previously served in the armed forces as contract soldiers or as conscripts. There were estimated to be around 2 million people in this category.
4/ All males from 18-30 are subject to conscription, with all three parts of the Russian armed forces (army, navy and air force) taking conscripts. Exceptions are made for health and other reasons. Evading conscription is punishable with up to 18 months of imprisonment. Image
5/ Conscription is very undesirable (for reasons which we'll cover shortly). As many as 70% of those eligible for conscription buy their way out of it by bribing a doctor or recruiting officer. The 'fee' was reportedly between $5,000-$10,000 in 2007. Image
6/ This drastically skews the demographics of conscription, with the armed forces being left with the poorest and least healthy men to serve as conscripts. This leaves the Russian military with chronic problems of fitness and efficiency.
7/ In 2007, the Russian Air Force reported that 30 percent of the 11,000 men it conscripted annually were "mentally unstable," 10 percent suffered from alcohol and drug abuse, and 15 percent were ill or malnourished. Image
8/ Conscripts are paid a pittance – those currently fighting in Kursk are reportedly being paid $0.75 a day – and as the lowest-ranking soldiers, they are ruthlessly exploited by those above them. This includes older soldiers (dyedi or 'grandfathers') and officers.
9/ For decades, conscripts have been subject to extreme and often lethal forms of hazing and abuse, known as 'dedovshchina' (literally 'reign of the grandfathers'). In 2006, at least 292 Russian soldiers were killed by dedovshchina. 341 soldiers died by suicide in 2007. Image
10/ This has occasionally led to lethal retaliation. In October 2019, 20-year-old conscript Ramil Shamsutdinov shot 10 of his colleagues, killing 8 of them, after being forced to stay awake for days at a time and suffering other forms of abuse. Such torture is frequent. Image
11/ One video shows a young soldier stripped, beaten and then repeatedly pushed, face down, into a toilet. Later, he is show with new iron burns over his back. His tormentors urinate on him. In 2005, a conscript had to have his legs and genitals amputated after being tortured.
12/ Other forms of abuse include doing unpaid labour, being made to sell blood to earn money for the abusers, or being forced into prostitution. Conscripts in St Petersburg were forced by the dyedi to perform sexual services for influential middle-aged clients or face torture. Image
13/ Conscripts receive little or no military training, making them of little use as a fighting force. The mothers of conscripts in the Kursk region have complained that instead of getting any training, their sons were simply used as labour – carrying shells or digging trenches.
14/ A fairly common form of corruption among officers is to use conscripts as unpaid labour to build or maintain their dachas (holiday homes), or hiring them out to businessmen work in building sites, fields or factories – for which the conscripts get no compensation. Image
15/ Russian law forbids conscripts from fighting abroad, but officers have found ways around this. During the Ukraine war, officers have forced conscripts to sign contracts against their wishes by beating them until they gave in.
16/ One officer recalled what he was told by another officer who forcibly recruited conscripts: "Our officers 'reeled in' guys who were conscripted. The officer says before lights out, we have to 'give birth to a contract soldier', and asks who wants to sign a contract.
17/ Nobody wants to, and the guys start swinging until somebody gives up and signs it."

Similarly, conscripts in the Kursk region have reportedly been threatened with being sent to a penal battalion for 7 years unless they sign a contract.
18/ Even without the abuse, conscripts face terrible living conditions. In the Russian Navy's training centre located in Lomonosov, Leningrad Region, conscripts reportedly faced worse conditions than convicts and had to live in abandoned barracks buildings.
19/ "The guys were shoved into an abandoned part where there is no canteen. Imported food is disgusting. There is no hot water. There is mould, dampness and one dryer for 180 people in the barracks."
20/ "Drying socks on radiators is not allowed, everyone wears wet clothes and gets sick. At the same time, there are no medicines, and the paramedic gives only soda and salt to gargle."
21/ Engineering conscripts in Volgograd faced similar conditions: "There are no elementary medicines in the unit's medical centre, and what parents bring must be hidden from the officers (if it is not taken away immediately after receiving the package)."
22/ The collapse of Russia's defences in Kursk is no surprise, as something very similar happened in the Graivoron district of the Belgorod region when the Russian Volunteer Corps briefly invaded in May 2023. It was guarded only by 23 conscripts with one officer and one mobik.
23/ The defenders were routed almost immediately. According to the conscripts, they were not even given brushes and liquids to clean their rifles, radios and other equipment. Those serving on the border were given rifles but no ammunition.
24/ Their mothers said that in six months of service, the conscripts only went to the firing range once or twice, while their commanders submitted false reports about daily training. The men were assigned to military professions that did not correspond to their training.
25/ One conscript was made a medic, although he "didn't even know what aspirin and No-Spa [drotaverine] were for". Others were given old grenade launchers and mortars but no training to fire them. Some were not even trained to use their rifles.
26/ Some of the conscripts were not even given food or water by the army. One conscript told his girlfriend that "they were eating earth there. I laughed and then realised it was no joke." Volunteers and parents brought them fresh clothes and food, which they cooked themselves.
Image
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27/ The conscripts said they were treated badly by their commanders, who made parents feed them as well the conscripts. According to a girlfriend, the officers "drink and get violent", and take out their frustrations on the conscripts under their command.
28/ The men were in place for months, despite repeatedly having been promised they would be rotated out or withdrawn. This didn't happen, despite appeals to the authorities by their mothers. Many became ill and some contracted pneumonia in the cold, damp dugouts. Image
29/ Not surprisingly, morale was low even before the attack. One mother says: "At first the boys had an adventure. Then there was the expectation that they would be relieved, they were promised. And now there is devastation. They feel betrayed and abandoned."
30/ Given that these issues were publicised by Russian outlets, the Ukrainians certainly know about them. It's no surprise that when they attacked in Kursk, resistance appears to have collapsed quickly and conscripts surrendered in large numbers. /end

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More from @ChrisO_wiki

May 28
1/ This graph from @JonBruner tells an important story: America's current dominance in science only began after the mid-1930s, when persecuted scientists began fleeing universities in Germany and then elsewhere in occupied Europe. Image
2/ Note especially the complete lack of German Nobel Prizes in physics between around 1933 and the 1950s. Hitler specifically persecuted "Jewish physics", prompting Einstein and others to flee to the US (enabling the US to build the atomic bomb, so it was very consequential).
3/ The current anti-science movement in the US has a similar hatred of entire fields, especially climate science and medical science. The whole government-funded scientific enterprise is being systematically defunded, but those fields seem to be particularly singled out.
Read 6 tweets
May 26
1/ While the Ukrainians welcome home their exchanged prisoners of war, Russian warbloggers criticise their own POWs for not having died fighting and call for them to be interrogated and/or prosecuted for surrendering. ⬇️
2/ The exchange of 1000 Ukrainian POWs for 1000 Russians has prompted some remarkably sour reflections from Russian warbloggers, who appear to consider the released Russian POWs to be little more than deserters or traitors.
3/ 'Sladkov+' acknowledges the need to publicly show the return of POWs, but says that "there is no need for pomp. Captivity is not the primary act of valour during the Special Military Operation. The wounded can be greeted like this from hospitals."
Read 13 tweets
May 25
1/ An announcement that Russia's new BT-3F is entering testing has been met with hostility by Russian warbloggers, who accuse its makers of ignoring lessons from the Ukraine war. "Just copy the Bradley," one urges. ⬇️
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3/ Its makers Rostec say that "the BT-3F floating armored personnel carrier, created on the basis of the BMP-3 , has entered the state testing stage."
Read 17 tweets
May 23
1/ North Korean "hobbits" are "passionately fond of chocolate, foreign films and pictures of naked women," have trouble telling Russians and Ukrainians apart, and have a habit of stealing and vandalising things, according to a Russian warblogger. ⬇️ Image
2/ Using a euphemismistic analogy to avoid Russian censors, "Platon Mamadov" writes:
3/ "A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away, there lived hobbits. One day they had a big fight among themselves, right up to the civil war. As a result of which the Northern and Southern Hobbitons were formed, divided in half by a carefully guarded border.
Read 19 tweets
May 19
1/ The huge reported scale of corruption in the Russian military wouldn't be possible without the active support and involvement of senior officers. An appeal to Putin from one Russian soldier highlights how even generals are likely to be profiting from the war in Ukraine. ⬇️
2/ One of the most important principles of modern Russian society is the concept of 'krysha', literally meaning 'roof' – a term borrowed from the Russian mafia to refer to protection from powerful individuals to enable criminal immunity for allies. It also works in the military. Image
3/ A Russian soldier has recorded an appeal to Putin describing the corruption he saw in the 139th Separate Assault Battalion, a Transbaikalia-based unit which has fought in the Donbas in Ukraine. He had previously been with the 19th Regiment of the 29th Combined Arms Army.
Read 17 tweets
May 19
1/ Russians in pre-trial detention – not even having been convicted of a crime – say they are being tortured and forced to choose between sexual assault and signing a military contract. At the front, they were told they were animals and were wiped out in their first assault. ⬇️ The sign reads: "Human life – a fascinating journey through your destiny"
2/ In September 2024, the Russian State Duma adopted a new law allowing the Ministry of Defence to recruit from the 60,000-strong population of pre-trial detainees. As many as 40% were expected to sign up. This has expanded the pool from which the Russian military can recruit.
3/ Tens of thousands of convicts were recruited from 2022 onwards under the auspices of the Wagner Group and later, after Wagner was dismantled, directly by the Russian Ministry of Defence. However, perhaps predictably, detainees say they are being forced to sign up. Image
Read 34 tweets

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