Reviving Stalin’s Empire - December 1st 2023

December 1st 2023

Yuriy recounts the harrowing experiences of Russian soldiers in the face of wartime captivity and the fear of surrender. As he reveals the dark reality of the Russian army, he exposes the brutal choices faced by soldiers in a war torn between loyalty and survival.

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TRANSCRIPT: (Podbean app users can enjoy closed captions)

It's December 1st. 

During Second, world War being captured by the enemy was considered a crime in the Soviet army. The families of wars who fell into the hands of the Nazis. We are sent to prison or exile to the cold North of deserts of Central Asia. After the war, thousands of Soviet soldiers released from captivity, went from German camps to Soviet ones to serve prison terms for being captured.

In Russia, a similar law also applies today. Russian soldiers are afraid to surrender even in very poor conditions for them because this will mean obstruction for their families at home and a very possible prison term for themselves after the war or after the exchange of prisoners. Putin dreamed of reviving Stalin's empire, so he started with the most understandable thing for him, the Gulag. And that's not all. He revived from those times. In Stalin's army there were special detachments that never fought with enemy, but we are located in the near rear of Soviet troops, literally behind the soldiers. We were supposed to open fire on war Soviet soldiers who tried to escape or simply retreat. There was even an official order of Soviet government known as no step back in which even an attempt to retreat from the enemy was equal to treason and punishable by death. 

Almost the same is happening with the Russians now in the Donetsk region the so-called 'meat waves' continue- endless attempts by the Russians to break through the fortifications of a Ukrainian army with live force. In these waves, hundreds of Russians are killed daily. They run at fortifications made of concrete and steel, at guns and tanks, having only rifles, and sometimes a few grenades with them. It's suicide, but they keep doing it day after day. So they run in groups of 7-10 people across open terrain and see how their comrades fall next to them, killed or seriously wounded. 

Very few try to throw down their weapons and surrender- everyone is afraid that Putin will punish them for this. They are afraid of Putin more than of the guns and mortars. 

But sometimes some of them try to return to via trenches, escape from a guaranteed death and save themselves among their own and do you know what happens to these Russians? They are fired upon from their positions. They are not allowed to reach the trenches. They're not allowed to be saved. They are actually left with a very simple choice: either die from bullets and shells of Ukrainians, or be killed by their own so-called comrades. 

Sometimes real battles break out at Russian positions when several fighters try to return to the trenches at once realizing futility of trying to storm the concrete fortifications and deciding to return. Of course, all of them die- none of us unlucky enough to be part of a meat wave are allowed back by the Russians. I don't know exactly how many Russians have already been killed by the fellow soldiers, but I think the number is already in the thousands.

The Russian army is a huge criminal gang that is allowed by its state to commit. Any violence, murders, torture, rape, robbery. And Russia does not even hide this. The advertisement of service in the Army directly promises future soldiers the opportunity to commit almost any crime without punishment. But the fact that a soldier can become a victim of this very crime without punishment from his own, so-called comrades, this fact is omitted by the advertisement. The Russians learn about this already in the trenches and often, literally a few minutes before they are death