According to two Russian soldiers interviewed by a pro-invasion blogger, if you wear a Russian military uniform on the metro in Moscow people distance themselves and give you dirty looks.
According to two Russian soldiers interviewed by a pro-invasion blogger, if you wear a Russian military uniform on the metro in Moscow people distance themselves and give you dirty looks.
At this point I had some sympathy.
And then he lost my sympathy.
It’s like certain problems we have in the US, just with different players.
When “law abiding” is placed before basic ethics, problems like these arise. It’s also, sometimes (maybe not here) a smokescreen people use to justify their unethical behavior.
Yeah, draft dodging means maybe losing your freedom and the ability to provide for your children, which is a shit situation to be put in.
But the choice is between poverty and fucking murder. Your choice sucks, but you choose to be a monster. I spare my sympathy for those who choose to be not-murderers.
But at the same time, they are absolutely being fed propaganda and don’t have an accurate view of what is going on in Ukraine.
I wanted to say they know how things are in reality, but suddenly remembered teacher in my school. Yep, some of them are completely brainwashed. Mostly those who will not be drafted. Either by being too old or having non-draftable sex(it would be funny if I’ll get banned for this).
As Ekaterina Schulman says: this is unusual war. War is what Yong do, but this one is war of Old/Elders.
I read an interview of locals from an Ukrainian village that got invaded - the Russians rolled in and asked the locals “where are the Nazis? Lead us to them!”, and were surprised that the locals just asked them to leave, instead of cheering for their "liberation ".
So the propaganda certainly reached the military, at least.
You mean in early days? Haven’t served myself(and hopefully won’t), but what I know is in Russian army your only sources of information are your commander and your peers whoose only sources of information is same commander and you. This sounds like an excellent ground for propaganda.
But:
A lot of people were from poor regions.
They are in the middle of nowhere.
Draft dodging is probably worse in Russia.
Would you rather kill your own children, or kill someone else’s children? At least they aren’t shooting refugees for refusing to rape each other, that’s the Saudis…
Ain’t the world a nice place?
I mean, I can have sympathy for any soldier that’s being forced to be a soldier. But the reality is, that sympathy dries up pretty quickly when it comes out that while being a soldier they’re rapists and war criminals. At certain point ‘just following orders’ is no longer a valid excuse… and you reach that point long before raping civilian women or PoWs. or… you know… you’re own troops while in a combat situation…
If a fascist hands you a gun and tells you to murder a bunch of people so that he can get wealthier and more powerful, you shoot him and ask those people for asylum. Anything else makes you a fascist too.
It’s also not a defence. They don’t have to follow orders.
They can just turn up get recruited and then surrender to Ukraine at the earliest safe opportunity if they want to. Plenty others have.
It is not patriotic to fight a unjust war, it is not patriotic to just do what you’re told without thinking.
Ehh, fatality is high. It’s better to not be drafted in first place.