Russian conscripts have ‘no idea what to do in Ukraine’: Soldier’s wife

Stories keep popping up that suggest new Russian conscripts are being sent to the front lines in Ukraine without proper training.

In the face of continued and increasingly significant military failure in Ukraine, Russian President Vladimir Putin issued a partial mobilization order in late September, the country’s first since World War II. The stated aim was to commission 300,000 men, although the last figure given by officials was 220,000 before mobilization was complete.

Since the mobilization, a multitude of reports have surfaced suggesting that the conscripted soldiers faced great hardships, including poor living conditions in camps and allegations of inadequate training. On Sunday that Washington Post This trend was complemented by a new report on concerns raised by the wives of various Russian soldiers.

The report cites scores of women, including a St. Petersburg woman, identified only as “Yana,” who described herself as a pro-war advocate before her husband was drafted into combat. Yana told that post that she has heard allegations that men have to buy their own warm clothes and are sent to the front in Ukraine with insufficient training and left to fend for themselves without clear orders.

“They have no orders and no duties,” she said. “I spoke to my husband yesterday and he said they have no idea what to do. They were just abandoned and they lost all trust, all faith in the authorities.”

Another wife, 37-year-old Irina Sokolova, said the reports presented to Russian citizens on television about the war effort were inaccurate and did not reflect the problems she had heard about. She described a phone call from her husband in which he said, in tears, that state media experts were “lying on TV” about the invasion of Ukraine. Before the draft, her husband had assumed things were much better than they turned out to be.

“Of course, he had no idea how awful it would be there,” Sokolova said post. “We watch our federal TV stations and they say everything is perfect.”

Sokolova further claimed that her husband received no real military training before being sent to Ukraine. According to her statement, he was drafted on September 22nd and was sent to the front on September 26th.

In its most recent report on the war in Ukraine, the Institute for the Study of War found that around 1,500 Russian women with disabled children or more than three children had petitioned the Kremlin to exempt their husbands from military service.

news week turned to Russian officials for comment.