Most of them have enlisted out of their own free will. There are plenty of prisoners as well, but – at least to my understanding – they amount less than the people who enlisted for the money. Also, many of the enlisted prisoners are in it voluntarily because of money and amnesty. And many are simply forced to sign the “voluntary” contract by torturing them until they do.
What I’ve been surprised with is that as long as you are alive, you almost always do receive your salary as a Russian soldier. And your relatives will indeed receive their compensation – assuming there’s evidence of you dying. There almost never is, and then you’re marked as AWOL, not as dead. And if you’re AWOL, your family receives no compensation. Ukraine has huge refrigerated warehouses full of Russian soldiers waiting to be sent home, because when they eventually reach the Russia, that country will either go bankrupt or has to say “we changed our mind. Although you sent your son to our war for money, we’re not actually going to pay”, which will seriously destabilise the Russia.
This is indeed also why the Russia’s economy is such a very important factor here. There’s no way they’ll be able to fill the required 30 000 new soldiers per month with prisoners alone. They don’t have that many hundred thousands of prisoners available for that. Send too many and you will have prison revolts.
Hm, cannot find that article anywhere. I found two articles that talk about refrigerated trains bringing bodies there, but they don’t tell about the actual morgue at all. They are here:
All articles I can find about the larger warehouse near Kyiv are from 2022. There are articles telling about swaps of Russian soldiers who have had influential relatives. In 2022 there has been a swap of 50 such soldiers – and the same amount of Ukrainians in the other direction.
Starting from summer 2024, there are suddenly several articles telling about swaps of hundreds of bodies at once, so at that point something has changed. Of course, with the Russia losing 1300 soldiers per day, and therefore about 400 of their soldiers dying per day, swaps of 200 to 600 dead bodies a few times per month are not that very many, really. Even if most of the Russian soldiers die in areas unreachable by Ukrainians, that still seems like a very low number. There is some amount of pressure inside the Russia for getting some of the bodies away from Ukraine, but none of the halfways recent articles tell anything about how many Russian bodies are currently in storage somewhere, waiting for repatriation to the Russia. Based on the amounts of a few hundred at a time, I’d say there must be many that the Russia does not accept. But no information on where in Ukraine they are physically located at the moment. Kind of understandable, because the Russian military could bomb the morgue to get rid of evidence, if they found out where it is.
It is weird that apparently no articles have been written on this subject in the last two years or so!
Most of them have enlisted out of their own free will. There are plenty of prisoners as well, but – at least to my understanding – they amount less than the people who enlisted for the money. Also, many of the enlisted prisoners are in it voluntarily because of money and amnesty. And many are simply forced to sign the “voluntary” contract by torturing them until they do.
What I’ve been surprised with is that as long as you are alive, you almost always do receive your salary as a Russian soldier. And your relatives will indeed receive their compensation – assuming there’s evidence of you dying. There almost never is, and then you’re marked as AWOL, not as dead. And if you’re AWOL, your family receives no compensation. Ukraine has huge refrigerated warehouses full of Russian soldiers waiting to be sent home, because when they eventually reach the Russia, that country will either go bankrupt or has to say “we changed our mind. Although you sent your son to our war for money, we’re not actually going to pay”, which will seriously destabilise the Russia.
This is indeed also why the Russia’s economy is such a very important factor here. There’s no way they’ll be able to fill the required 30 000 new soldiers per month with prisoners alone. They don’t have that many hundred thousands of prisoners available for that. Send too many and you will have prison revolts.
Source on the refrigerated warehouse? I’m super curious about that.
Hm, cannot find that article anywhere. I found two articles that talk about refrigerated trains bringing bodies there, but they don’t tell about the actual morgue at all. They are here:
https://glavcom.ua/country/society/jak-v-ukrajini-zberihajutsja-trupi-likvidovanikh-okupantiv-reportazh-iz-morhiv-871633.html
https://www.bbc.com/ukrainian/features-61567949
All articles I can find about the larger warehouse near Kyiv are from 2022. There are articles telling about swaps of Russian soldiers who have had influential relatives. In 2022 there has been a swap of 50 such soldiers – and the same amount of Ukrainians in the other direction.
Starting from summer 2024, there are suddenly several articles telling about swaps of hundreds of bodies at once, so at that point something has changed. Of course, with the Russia losing 1300 soldiers per day, and therefore about 400 of their soldiers dying per day, swaps of 200 to 600 dead bodies a few times per month are not that very many, really. Even if most of the Russian soldiers die in areas unreachable by Ukrainians, that still seems like a very low number. There is some amount of pressure inside the Russia for getting some of the bodies away from Ukraine, but none of the halfways recent articles tell anything about how many Russian bodies are currently in storage somewhere, waiting for repatriation to the Russia. Based on the amounts of a few hundred at a time, I’d say there must be many that the Russia does not accept. But no information on where in Ukraine they are physically located at the moment. Kind of understandable, because the Russian military could bomb the morgue to get rid of evidence, if they found out where it is.
It is weird that apparently no articles have been written on this subject in the last two years or so!