Translated material
How can he look into the eyes of widows
Anti-war Russians have long been accustomed to the lies of the authorities, to their cynicism and attitude towards citizens as expendable material. The Z-community is also used to this, but is still capable of surprise. About the indignation of pro-war bloggers and how they discovered a liar in place of the main voice of power - in a new column by writer and Z-community researcher Ivan Filippov.
In any situation, with a slight smile - no matter what the main speaker of the government says, it will be a lie
Much has been said and written about the fact that Russians are lured into war primarily by huge money and benefits. The other day, journalist Dmitry Kolezev published a photograph of an advertising billboard from Yekaterinburg, on which new contract soldiers are promised a “one-time payment of 2.1 million rubles” and a “monthly payment of 210 thousand rubles.” In addition, on the same day it became known that Putin signed a law exempting participants in the special operation from paying overdue loans up to 10 million rubles for those who signed contracts after December 1, 2024. Which, by the way, aroused the rage of the military already at war, for whom no one is going to forgive their debts and who very often fight “for their own.”
Many Z-channels have written about this blatant injustice, but the warring author of the channel “Tupi4ok Designer” most accurately formulated the general indignation: “And for a long time they will drive a dick across the lips of those who voluntarily, without payments, without lifting, entered the country and gave time to wash their pants , which the military leadership shit themselves in ’22?” (Hereinafter, the authors’ spelling and punctuation are preserved.)
But this is about money, and I wrote about it in some detail in the last column. Today I want to talk about something else. About deception and cynicism.
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It is not enough to promise a civilian a lot of money to make him risk his life. The state, through the voices of its official representatives, promises contract soldiers that they will be taught everything and everything - meaning all the necessary equipment - will be given on the spot. However, they often do not tell new contract workers that the contracts they sign are essentially unlimited. Z-channels have not only already written kilometers of texts on both topics, but there are already very popular memes on both of them.
So, about “they will teach you everything.”
“Hundreds of people every day sign contracts and go to a special military operation. First, they take training courses, they are prepared carefully,” presidential press secretary Dmitry Peskov said in an interview with RIA Novosti. This is how Peskov commented on the latest rumors about a possible new wave of mobilization.
Probably, if you ask the question who is the main liar of the Russian Federation, then, surprisingly, the answer will not be Putin, but Dmitry Peskov. It’s just that, due to his profession, Peskov communicates with journalists more often and, accordingly, lies on a daily basis with a short break for vacation. So, speaking about the “training courses” that contract soldiers allegedly undergo, Peskov, of course, lied. And this lie can easily be illustrated by two stories that major Z-channels wrote about last week.
“Gorynych” told readers about the death of the administrator of the military channel “Russian Chton Z”: “An absolutely senseless death. The stripes, who by law are required to remain in training for at least 2 weeks at the training ground, 5 days later, without even being transferred to a combat unit according to the papers, sent the guys on a mission in the Petrovka area, Toretsk direction. The group was met with strong drone resistance and mortar fire. 4/10 people are 300, the rest are tentatively 200, including our Friend.”
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From signing the contract to death - five days.
Or here’s another story published by military expert Vladislav Shurygin on his Ramzai channel:
“Private Ilya Titorenko was buried in the military memorial cemetery in Mytishchi. He was posthumously awarded the Order of Courage for the feat he accomplished in his first battle, which turned out to be his last. <...> One of the main [questions] is how it happened that a man who had never served in the army for a day before signed a contract on October 14, 2024 and died in his first battle on October 26 - TWELVE DAYS later, of which three days he spent traveling?
And there are countless such stories. Not all of them are covered in the same detail in military channels, but the fact that new contract soldiers often die during the first 30 days of service is the norm.
Do these examples indicate that those who came to “liberate the people of Donbass” for crazy millions are being trained to fight properly? The question is rhetorical. The state really needs people in the war, and in order to ensure their flow, it is ready not only to pay, but also to lie. To lie is vile and cynical, dooming your citizens to a quick and often painful death.
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But I am a person who, in principle, is opposed to war and considers the invasion of Ukraine to be a terrible crime. No wonder I write about deception and cynicism. Surprisingly different. Z-authors also write about this, who, in the third year of the war, unexpectedly discovered that the press secretary of the Commander-in-Chief was telling a lie:
“It’s a shame to listen to Mr. Peskov. This is especially special: Mr. Peskov obviously does not know that to say that new contract soldiers are “carefully prepared” is to spread nothing more than a fake. <…> It is clear that Mr. Peskov has no time to study the issue. And how can you study it if the Ministry of Defense [Ministry of Defense] is almost a champion in fakes about the Ministry of Defense. But there are other sources of information! For example, social networks, in which there are already dozens, if not hundreds of stories like this one, which tells about a 48-year-old man, who had not served a day in the army before, who died in his first battle <...> Where is the “thorough preparation”?”
How can Mr. Peskov say what he says after such stories? How can he look into the eyes of the widows, mothers and children of those people about whom he speaks with satisfaction, who sign contracts in the hundreds every day and who two weeks later are sent without preparation into unprepared and unprovided “meat” assaults - senseless and merciless?
This is the text of the rather prominent and very pro-war Z-channel Verum Regnum. And to the questions asked by the author, by the way, there is a simple answer: Mr. Peskov, if necessary, will calmly look into the faces of the widows, mothers and children of the victims “in the Northern Military District,” maybe even with a slight smile. And Peskov will certainly continue to say what he says. In the same confident voice with which on February 17, 2022, he called the data on Russia’s attack on Ukraine “another fake.”
The author's opinion may not coincide with the opinion of the editors.
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Author: Ivan Filippov Photo: Sefa Karacan / Anadolu / Reuters