Internet hazing breakdown games

Nobody can agree what drove a Russian soldier to murder eight fellow servicemen last month, but there’s no shortage of theories

Conscript Ramil Shamsutdinov killed eight fellow soldiers in Russia’s Zabaikalsky region last month, after they allegedly threatened to rape him. According to the website Baza, the 20-year-old draftee has testified that his money was seized and officers took turns beating him, when he arrived at base 54160 in Gorny, a closed military city. “That same day [October 25], they promised to turn me out [gang rape him]. That’s what they said. They threatened, like, rape. That same day, a lieutenant told me that it would all go down after guard duty,” Shamsutdinov said. Russia’s Defense Ministry says Baza’s information is “an absolute lie” and an attempt to influence an ongoing investigation. In response, Baza published a statement from Shamsutdinov’s father, Salim, who said his son claims “many young men” have already been abused at the base. “Maybe he meant this, or maybe not. I don’t know,” the father said. Meduza takes a look at the various reports about this deadly incident.

The day of the killings

On the evening of October 25, after a changing of the guard at his military base, private Ramil Shamsutdinov started shooting at other servicemen, instead of unloading his weapon. He fired two magazines of ammunition. According to the newspaper Kommersant, the victims included Captain Evseyev, Senior Lieutenant Pyankov, Sergeant Kovalev, Corporal Andreyev, and privates Bogomolov, Nikishin, Kuropov, and Pokotilo. Another two soldiers were wounded. Shamsutdinov says he surrendered voluntarily, but he was badly beaten afterwards.

The soldier’s father says the reason for the mass killing was military hazing. “What could have driven him to this? It’s obvious: it was dedovshchina [hazing], constant, prolonged abuse. They drove him to this state,” Salim Shamsutdinov told the website RBC. In an interview with Interfax, he said the killings were a response to violence. Citing messages sent from the base to Russia’s higher command, Kommersantsays the military base in question has a history of hazing that could have led to the murders. Sources told the newspaper that investigators are reviewing the possibility that Shamsutdinov was targeted because of his ethnicity. According to RBC’s sources, however, a military commission could not confirm reports of hazing, beatings, and other physical violence. The commission concluded that the shooting was the result of Shamsutdinov’s conflict with one of the base’s officers. Officially, meanwhile, Russia’s Defense Ministry says the soldier responsible for the killings suffered a nervous breakdown caused by personal circumstances unrelated to military service.

One of the victims was an officer named in other soldiers’ complaints. Unofficial reports naming the men killed by Shamsutdinov mention a Senior Lieutenant Pyankov. Former soldiers who served at the Zabaikalsky base say a man with the same name — Danil (or Daniil) Pyankov — bullied his subordinates. The website 72.ru spoke to a woman who says her son faced abuse when he served at base 54160 between 2014 and 2015. An unnamed defense official also told 72.ru that Pyankov and other commanders “demanded the same thing from Shamsutdinov that they did from the others.”

Shamsutdinov’s state-appointed defense attorney, Lev Akulenko, says his client says Pyankov tried to dunk his head in a toilet bowl, and he ordered other soldiers to do it, when he couldn’t manage it. Valentina Mordova, the chairman of the Zabaikalsky branch of the Committee of Soldiers’ Mothers, told the website Daily Storm about this same incident. A source told Kommersant that Shamsutdinov planned to kill just one officer, and the others “were caught in the gunfire.”

Ramil Shamsutdinov was previously reprimanded for his handling of weapons, says RBC, citing a copy of his psychological evaluation from July 2019. Records say he was disciplined for pointing firearms at fellow soldiers. Base psychologists indicated in their report that Shamsutdinov responded poorly to criticism and was impolite and shrewd when speaking to others.

The chairman of the Officers of Russia’s presidium has blamed the shooting spree on computer games, and the head of the Committee of Soldiers’ Mothers says the Internet is responsible. “It’s as if this soldier mixed up virtual reality with real life,” Sergey Lipovoi said on November 5. When commenting on the murders, Committee of Soldiers’ Mothers chairwoman Flera Salikhovskaya announced, “The Internet must be shut down,” leading her own group to disavow her remarks, saying that she was dismissed from her post on November 2 (though Salikhovskaya insists that she still serves as chairwoman).

After the killings, Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu “chewed out” several commanders, and the military is reportedly thinking about closing base 54160. Sources told RBC that the defense minister “harshly beyond all reason” criticized the commanders’ personnel work, and explained that it would have been impossible for Shamsutdinov to get guard duty if senior officers had properly followed orders. RBC’s source says the commanders responsible for this negligence now face dishonorable discharge. Irina Braun, the head of a soldiers’ mothers group in Russia’s Khanty-Mansiysk Autonomous Okrug, told the news agency TASS that the entire military base might be disbanded. The Defense Ministry has not commented on this report, but spokespeople did previously deny another claim by Braun that at least seven soldiers being hospitalized with nervous breakdowns, after Shamsutdinov’s shooting spree.

Shamsutdinov’s new lawyer wants the charges reduced. Said-Magomed Chapanov told TASS that his client’s actions should be qualified as voluntary manslaughter, the maximum penalty for which is five years in prison. Currently, Shamsutdinov faces multiple first-degree murder charges, which could send him to prison for the rest of his life. Chapanov says Shamsutdinov is testifying truthfully and is “fully remorseful about his actions.” According to the soldier’s father, however, the only thing his son regrets is that two conscripts were caught in his gunfire. “He said he didn’t notice them,” Salim Shamsutdinov told reporters.

Story by Alexander Baklanov

Translation by Kevin Rothrock