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'All of it is a lie:' A former serving member of the Russian military publicly criticizes invasion [1]
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Date: 2022-08-23
Filatyev’s account has (apparently) not yet been fully translated into English, but major portions have been summarized on Twitter (see thread below). In those portions translated Filatyev details the dismal state of readiness he experienced in the Feodosia VDV airborne during the months in the run-up to the war. Western reports have since documented outright refusal of airborne units to fight, primarily because of reported deficiencies in their command and equipment.
x 1/ A 34-year-old former Russian paratrooper, Pavel Filatyev, has published a remarkable in-depth account of his experiences of the Ukraine war. He served with the Feodosia-based 56th Guards Air Assault Regiment and fought in southern Ukraine for two months. A 🧵 follows. pic.twitter.com/upGQAejb12 — ChrisO (@ChrisO_wiki) August 17, 2022
According to reporting by Sophia Ankel for Business Insider, other portions of Filatyev’s memorandum detail instances of Russian soldiers shooting themselves in the foot to escape further combat assignments. He also describes widespread theft and looting by Russian soldiers of Ukrainian homes.
Ankel also reports that after publishing his denunciation of the Russian military Filatyev was kidnapped and interrogated by Russian Special Ops agents in Moscow. He says he was accused of selling ‘secret data to the Americans’ about the war. According to the report, Filatyev was given the impression that his interlocuters were not concerned about his actual views of the war but were more intent on exposing him as an extremist or terrorist. After being held for 16 hours, he was released, whereupon he fled the country and is now at an undisclosed location in Europe
On Tuesday CNN released a video interview with Filatyev taken at that location. As reported by CNN’s Matthew Chance, Rob Picheta and Katharina Krebs, Filatyev is believed to be the “first serving member of the Russian military to publicly criticize the invasion of Ukraine and leave the country.” In the interview Filatyev describes the war as it is presented to the Russian people as a complete “lie.”
“We understood that we were dragged into a serious conflict where we are simply destroying towns and not actually liberating anyone,” Filatyev told CNN’s Matthew Chance. CNN is not disclosing the location of the interview for the security of the interviewee. “Many understood that we do not see the reason that our government is trying to explain to us. That all of it is a lie,” he said. “We are just destroying peaceful lives. This fact immensely influenced our morale. That feeling that we are not doing anything good.” [***] According to Filatyev, the soldiers and their commanders did not know what they were expected to do in Ukraine. He added that they soon became disillusioned with the government’s reasoning for its invasion after arriving in Kherson and facing resistance from locals who did not want to be “liberated.”
According to the report, Filatyev also confirmed that “all” of his unit’s weapons were from the “Afghanistan” era, i.e., nearly half a century old. Asked whether he had witnessed widely documented Russian atrocities against Ukrainian civilians, he denied witnessing any. He expresses feelings of guilt at being used by his government as an “instrument for political games.” CNN’s interview of Filatyev is below.
Filatyev doesn’t believe he will be able to return to Russia.
“I will either be put in prison … or they will just silence me by taking me out. There were a lot of cases like that in the past,” he said.
Unfortunately, he’s probably right.
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[1] Url:
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2022/8/23/2118301/--All-of-it-is-a-lie-Former-member-of-Russian-military-publicly-criticizes-invasion
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