Defence procurement bungles and wins

[ElwoodBlues1]

I read a while ago that by law in Russia conscripts can't be sent to war outside Russia. They're supposed to be a kind of Home Guard. Yes, I know that's somewhat farcical as whatever Putin says goes therefore the law is just a veneer. But the law exists because it reduces the risk of discontent amongst parents who fear their kids will be sent off to die in some stupid war.

Conscripts were apparently told they were required for manoeuvres and before setting off they were required to sign documents. Those documents "upgraded" them to volunteers. Volunteers are paid more but can lawfully be sent off to fight. There's debate about whether Putin was kept in the dark over this strategy to send conscripts to fight.

It must have been a shock to the conscripts to find themselves in lethal combat with little training. No wonder morale has collapsed.

Yep, no doubt Putin tricked a lot of his troops thinking it was a training exercise, then threw them in vs a battle hardened Ukraine military that have so far whipped their rusky behinds. The use of Drones by the Ukrainian military has been a real eye opener for me on how modern battles are now fought, seems the Russians are still doing it by numbers from the WW2 playbook and have been poorly led as well by their commanders who have now decided to sit back and just level cities with rockets/artillery etc rather than engage Ukrainian ground forces.
Been talk of Russian tank crews selling their equipment for Ukrainian passports and citizenship.