Toy soldiers Fresh out of high school, Russian teens are joining the army and heading to the front lines in Ukraine. Many are dying on their first mission. — Meduza
meduza.io
For the past two and a half years, Russian children have been constantly exposed to propaganda narratives about the Kremlin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, both in school and through the media. Now, a generation shaped by the war is graduating high school and heading straight to the front lines. Many young men, at barely 18, are signing contracts with the army and being sent into battle after just two weeks of training. In the last two months alone, at least 13 of these young soldiers have died in combat, many on their very first mission. To find out what compels these young men to enlist, the independent outlet Holod spoke with the families of some of the youngest soldiers to lose their lives in Russia’s war. Meduza shares an English-language adaptation of the outlet’s reporting.

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For the past two and a half years, Russian children have been constantly exposed to propaganda narratives about the Kremlin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, both in school and through the media. Now, a generation shaped by the war is graduating high school and heading straight to the front lines.

Many young men, at barely 18, are signing contracts with the army and being sent into battle after just two weeks of training. In the last two months alone, at least 13 of these young soldiers have died in combat, many on their very first mission. To find out what compels these young men to enlist, journalists spoke with the families of some of the youngest soldiers to lose their lives in Russia’s war.

  • RubberDuckEnglish
    5•21 days ago

    “Most of you will die, but that is a sacrifice we are willing to make”.

    The extra painful bit for russia, is that in the 6 opening months of the war they also fed a lot of their long time training battalions into the meatgrinder. So any modicum of quality in training they had has since been fertilizing Ukrainian soil.

    It will be a rude awakening for the russian boys at the front… I wonder how this generation will look back on this in 2 or 3 decades.