Russian-Ukrainian War (2022- )

[Full Metal Junkie]

And they know this, I’m sure they’re told this.

They don't know this. They're not told this. You should hear what sort of nonsense resides in their heads. You'd be surprised to learn what 26 years of systemic repression of journalism by Putin does to a cultural zeitgeist.

There is a controversial Canadian-produced 2024 documentary called Russians at War. Ukrainians despise it because it humanizes the Russians and shows Russian propaganda narratives. It's composed of interviews with Russian soldiers and follows them around for a day in their lives on the frontlines. It also gives you a glimpse of what's going through their heads (i.e. the propaganda narratives that Ukrainians hate).

And no, they don't have any clue about the things you're talking about.

 

[afransen]

I see rumours that the banning of Telegram (in favour of Kremlin-monitored messaging apps) and the disabling of mobile internet near gov't sites in Moscow and St Petersburg is in preparation for unrest around the planned announcement of general mobilization/draft. Russia is having a hard time recruiting enough manpower to replace their heavy casualty rate with voluntary enlistment.

 

[Full Metal Junkie]

I see rumours that the banning of Telegram (in favour of Kremlin-monitored messaging apps) and the disabling of mobile internet near gov't sites in Moscow and St Petersburg is in preparation for unrest around the planned announcement of general mobilization/draft. Russia is having a hard time recruiting enough manpower to replace their heavy casualty rate with voluntary enlistment.

In all honesty, the rumors of the next wave of mobilization have been swirling around since as early as January 2023. Any of those rumors have yet to come to fruition. Russia used the initial mobilization wave to plug gaps in their ranks following their stunning Kharkiv region defeat. They have then been able to recruit around 30K-35K dumbasses per month. A steady stream of recruits that has not changed or dried up recently. From their perspective they re winning the war, advancing on all fronts, everything is fine. Again, their perspective. That's what they report to Putin and what Putin sincerely relays to his countrymen in his addresses to the nation. So, from their perspective, there is no reason for them to mobilize right now. The initial mobilization was the biggest negative public opinion impact Putin has ever suffered as the president of Russia. He's not incentivized to repeat that.

To me, the whole Telegram ban and turning off mobile internet is just another step towards Russia's ultimate goal of achieving hermit kingdom status. Putin admires what level of information control DPRK and Islamic Republic exert over their populations. He wants to do the same in Russia. And he's been incrementally inching towards that goal for decades now.

 

[Towered]

I see rumours that the banning of Telegram (in favour of Kremlin-monitored messaging apps) and the disabling of mobile internet near gov't sites in Moscow and St Petersburg is in preparation for unrest around the planned announcement of general mobilization/draft. Russia is having a hard time recruiting enough manpower to replace their heavy casualty rate with voluntary enlistment.

By all means, let them keep repeating the same thing over and over that hasn't worked for 4 years...

 

[Full Metal Junkie]

While the rest of the world is only paying attention to the Hormuz Straight when it comes to oil trade, Ukraine is quietly doing its part to upend the whole thing. Over the last week they've had a number of successful deep strikes on Russian oil export infrastructure. They have reportedly shut down 40% of Russian oil exports, making it harder for Russia to take advantage of the higher oil prices. Here is a good Xitter thread on the topic by Clement Molin:

https://twitter.com/x/status/2036865760883032288

 

[Towered]

While the rest of the world is only paying attention to the Hormuz Straight when it comes to oil trade, Ukraine is quietly doing its part to upend the whole thing. Over the last week they've had a number of successful deep strikes on Russian oil export infrastructure. They have reportedly shut down 40% of Russian oil exports, making it harder for Russia to take advantage of the higher oil prices. Here is a good Xitter thread on the topic by Clement Molin:

https://twitter.com/x/status/2036865760883032288

Love it - keep smashing everything they have. Let's crater their oil exports.

 

[nightstreak]

While the rest of the world is only paying attention to the Hormuz Straight when it comes to oil trade, Ukraine is quietly doing its part to upend the whole thing. Over the last week they've had a number of successful deep strikes on Russian oil export infrastructure. They have reportedly shut down 40% of Russian oil exports, making it harder for Russia to take advantage of the higher oil prices. Here is a good Xitter thread on the topic by Clement Molin:

https://twitter.com/x/status/2036865760883032288

I know Ukraine's mind is elsewhere right now but in a post-war Ukraine, its most valuable contribution to ending future Russian aggression and state sponsored political disinformation and interference would be diving head first into solar cell and battery production. Ukraine is the world's fifth largest producer of gallium, has significant deposits of high-quality silica and graphite, and it has the largest deposits of lithium in Europe. Not only can Ukraine break its own dependence on oil, it could become a net exporter.

If European leaders grew some balls and called Putin on his bluff by patrolling Ukraine's western airspace, Ukraine could start producing these while still at war in the east, offsetting not only Europe's demand for oil based energy but world markets, all while enriching its economy. Without demand for oil, Russia is finished. They have no future prospects beyond a petro state.

 

[Full Metal Junkie]

If European leaders grew some balls

You're speaking of a biological impossibility for Homo eupoliticus species.

called Putin on his bluff by patrolling Ukraine's western airspace

That would only make too much sense to do. Therefore, it will never be done.

 

[Towered]

Europeans haven't had balls for decades, oddly, given their otherwise very belligerent history.

 

[81-717]

Here is a uniquely Russian method of physical abuse and torture to get their recruits good and ready to sacrifice themselves to the Ukrainian drone gods: tree decorating.
trigger warning: scenes of torture, physical abuse, and unflattering male nudity

https://twitter.com/x/status/2036538327218700554

This is new low even by Russian standards. I've seen videos of one-two recruits being made into an example for others. I've seen them punish individual soldiers by tying them to a tree at the edge of a forward-facing tree line for the Ukrainian drone target practice.

I've never seen an entire tree alley decorated with Russian recruits like that before.

Glory to Ukraine for putting them out of their misery.

It's important to remember that most of those Russians are forcibly recruited against their will (under threat of torture, as noted in FMJ's post) and are therefore victims too, and deserve sympathy just like Ukrainians do. I'm sure the vast majority of them don't want to be involved in any of this anymore than Ukrainians do. All hatred & anger should be directed at those doing the torturing, and at the guy who started it all for no reason.

 

[Full Metal Junkie]

most of those Russians are forcibly recruited against their will

That's not quite right. Nobody forces them to sign the initial contract to serve. That part they do of their own free will. It's just that they don't know what they're signing up for. And the Russian system certainly creates a lot of false impressions and monetary incentives to abuse the system and sign people up through shady/grey schemes. Here are the most common victims of their recruitment:

1. People in poor financial standing. The man is delegated by his family to go and sign up to the army so that the signing bonus is used to pay off mortgage bills. It's that or the entire family becomes homeless. Similarly, people from impoverished rural regions of Russia take the bait of "extreme wealth" that comes with signing the contract (i.e. the ~$20K signing bonus)
2. Black widows. This is a newly emergent way of making money in Russia for women without any moral principles. They trick men into marrying them on the condition that they also sign up for an army contract to get the signing bonus. They then conspire with "zeroers" within the army to execute their newlywed husband and split the proceeds of the KIA payout. An easy way to make thousands of dollars.
3. Bring a friend scheme. For a couple of years now, recruiters pay a few hundred bucks to anyone who brings "a friend" into the recruitment center to sign the contract on the spot. There are now professional "friends" going around neighborhood bars befriending local alcoholics and getting them wasted, and then bringing them to recruitment centers to sign the contract on a dare.
4. False impression 1: Recruitment centers tout that the contract you're signing is only for 6 months, without telling you that there is a superseding mobilization law of September 2022 that nullifies any contract expiry dates. You get to go home when the war is over, not when your contract is up.
5. False impression 2: recruiters focusing on university students get them to sign a contract that "guarantees" they will serve as drone operators and will be stationed well away from the frontlines. If you read the fine print, there's no such guarantee.
6. False impression 3: recruits believe they will get to keep the money Russian army pays them. Between having to buy their own gear, their own food, their own clothing, their own drones, their own fuel for the army equipment they have to operate, they don't have a lot left. What's left gets extorted by "zeroers", lest you be zeroed by them on the spot. And if the army fails to collect your corpse from the battlefield and you're declared MIA, your family can say goodbye to the KIA payout. Let's just say Russian army has a strong preference to leave their dead on the battlefield as the result.

All that said, technically speaking, no one forces Russian recruits to sign up. There's a difference between being tricked and being forced. The end result is still the same though.

On the contrary, it's the Ukrainian side that has resorted to forced mobilization from the start of the war. Ukrainians refer to the process as "bussification". It's when a mini-bus full of jarheads dismounts in the middle of the street, grabs the first able-bodied man they get their hands on, beat the shit out of him, stuff him in the back of the bus, and ship him off to the frontlines. There is an argument that it's a necessary evil for Ukraine to even survive this war. There's also an argument that the resulting recruits are not that motivated to serve. In reality, over half of Ukrainian recruits go AWOL at the first opportunity as the result.

 

[81-717]

All that said, technically speaking, no one forces Russian recruits to sign up. There's a difference between being tricked and being forced. The end result is still the same though.

On the contrary, it's the Ukrainian side that has resorted to forced mobilization from the start of the war. Ukrainians refer to the process as "bussification". It's when a mini-bus full of jarheads dismounts in the middle of the street, grabs the first able-bodied man they get their hands on, beat the shit out of him, stuff him in the back of the bus, and ship him off to the frontlines.

Russia has always had forced conscription though (long before this war), which also involved grabbing people off the street (or even from their own homes), and did have at least a few waves of mobilization during this war, so I imagine there are a lot of conscripts on the frontlines, and that it's mostly young conscripts being subjected to the torture you described.

 

[nightstreak]

It's important to remember that most of those Russians are forcibly recruited against their will (under threat of torture, as noted in FMJ's post) and are therefore victims too, and deserve sympathy just like Ukrainians do. I'm sure the vast majority of them don't want to be involved in any of this anymore than Ukrainians do. All hatred & anger should be directed at those doing the torturing, and at the guy who started it all for no reason.

There's a distinction between not wanting to go to war because they don't want to kill Ukranians and not wanting to go to war because they're afraid of going to war. Russian society has been conditioned for decades — centuries even — to hate Ukrainians. It didn't start with Putin.

The stereotype exists for a reason. Long before the war in my past career, I worked with many Slavics and as hard as I try and as much of a benefit of the doubt I gave each new arrival, I cannot think of one exception where the Russian simply hated the Ukranians on site because they were Ukrainian. This wasn't an ultra macho environment where people get into fights, it was an office environment where any new Russian arrival brought tension. It was naked racism and one of the reasons I needed to get out of there even though I'm not slavic myself. With every rule there are exceptions and the rules revealed themselves pretty quickly.

It's about time that the Russian bully ran himself into a brick wall and now the wall is punching back. Future Russian generations will be better off if this lesson is learned now.

 

[Full Metal Junkie]

so I imagine there are a lot of conscripts on the frontlines, and that it's mostly young conscripts being subjected to the torture you described.

Yeah, I forgot to mention conscripts. Again, the devil is in the details here.

Modern day Russians have an extreme aversion to using conscripts in conflict zones. This stems from their use by USSR in Afghanistan (1979-1989, 15K-25K dead), and by Russia in the First Chechen War (1994-1996, 5K-15K dead). A few thousand dead 18-year-old boys left a bitter taste in Russians' mouths.

So now there is an overtly spoken contract between Putin and Russians: conscripts are not going to be used in wars. Only the "professional contracted soldiers" are to be used for actual warfighting. That was the case with Russian invasion of Georgia in 2008, Russia's "covert" invasion of Ukraine in 2014, Russia's intervention in Syria in 2015, Russia's Vagner group mercenary activities in Africa, etc. These conflicts were all fought by "professionals" who signed a voluntary contract to serve and fight. Modern day Russians have zero problems with such an arrangement.

So ever since the start of the 2022 invasion of Ukraine, the Russian government have been walking on eggshells when it comes to conscripts. And it is fair to say that conscripts have never been intentionally deployed to Ukraine throughout this war (with a few exceptions of logistical f-ups that saw a couple of them killed on the territory of Ukraine in the early days of the invasion, and we are literally talking about 2-3 people). Every single case of a conscript getting killed in Ukraine creates a public opinion sh!tstorm that the Russian government has to address and rectify.

That said, it's not like conscripts are not being killed in this war anyway. While they are never deployed to the territory of Ukraine, they are actively used for rear resupply logistics and to "defend Russian borders" while the rest of the contracted army is in Ukraine. This means that:
1. Conscripts are stationed along the northern Russia-Ukraine border on the territory of Russia-proper. They don't assault Ukrainian positions, but they get hit by Ukrainian drone fire nonetheless. Some of them get killed. Their parents get a "sorry for your loss" letter and not a single ruble of a payout. Because technically the conscript was not involved in the actual war, he just died during his regular military training.
2. Conscripts are hazed, harassed, and pressured into signing the contract from the very first day of conscription. Some of them cave in. As soon as they sign the contract, off to the frontlines with them. But by that time, they are technically no longer conscripts, they are volunteer "professional soldiers".

Russia has always had forced conscription though [...] and did have at least a few waves of mobilization during this war,

Don't conflate conscription and mobilization. Since Soviet times Russia has always had conscription waves twice a year. That involves grabbing a bunch of 18-yr-olds and making them serve for a year. Russia has continued with that process throughout the war, but as outlined above, none of these conscripts are being sent to the war directly.

Russia had a single wave of mobilization since the start of the war (September 2022). They raised about 300K men this way from their reserves. Reserves being someone who went through conscription years before. The men they raised through that wave of mobilization were in the 40 to 55 year-old range though. Again, anything to avoid the optics of sending young boys to die.

And after that initial wave of mobilization, they have relied solely on their recruiting campaign to replace losses.

 

[81-717]

There's a distinction between not wanting to go to war because they don't want to kill Ukranians and not wanting to go to war because they're afraid of going to war.

Both could be true at the same time, and both are valid (some members on here were/are military, but I assume the majority are not, for various reasons, including the latter one). If one has to choose between being tortured to death vs. being put out of their misery on the battlefield by their opponents, it's best to just put oneself out of one's own misery, to have some semblance of control.

Russian society has been conditioned for decades — centuries even — to hate Ukrainians. It didn't start with Putin.

Decades maybe, but centuries seems highly doubtful. I know there used to be a time when they were considered "brotherhood", and I'm pretty sure it wasn't centuries ago, if not until 2014 then at least until 1990 or so.