Dozens of mobilized soldiers have staged an extraordinary mutiny against Vladimir Putin amid growing unrest over the splashy Ukraine invasion.
In footage taken inside a military camp, a uniformed conscript receives a standing ovation from his peers after suggesting soldiers overthrow their leaders.
The unnamed reservist spoke of the lack of respect soldiers have for Putin and his commanders and berated an unseen official for using threats to get people to join the cause.
He mocked a policy in his region – the Republic of Tuva in Siberia – of giving a ram to each family of those mobilized.
‘You give our families, children, a manky ram [sheep] and some groceries,” he said, adding disparagingly, “What’s this?”
In his heroic speech – for which he could be punished in Putin’s Russia – the reservist said his top bosses ‘threatened us’ when they were appointed.
‘They told us that if we didn’t go there [to Ukraine] they wanted to put us in jail,’ he said in his native Tuvan language. They would not help our families; they would stop all payments… There are not enough walkie-talkies for our team… How will we communicate [in the war zone]?’
He also joined a chorus of voices on the front lines complaining about the lack of adequate gear and equipment.
In the vision, the reservist said his group had not been given enough walkie-talkies and not enough socks before being sent 3,200 miles to fight for Putin.
“These stockings issued to us are of no use. We have already bought enough ourselves.’ He ridiculed a foreign guitar issued by the army when they are not provided with sufficient weapons.
‘They give us one [imported] guitar,’ he said to cheers from other conscripts. “Should we shoot a guitar on the battlefield?”
His outburst is all the more significant as his region is also home to heavily criticized Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, whom Putin has consistently refused to fire despite strong calls for his head over the failed military campaign.
The reservist asked bluntly: “If there is no one like us, who do you want to have authority over? Who are you going to make all your speeches to? To applause from the crowd, he said: ‘You no longer look like a source of power in our eyes. Maybe we should all get together and decide that you are of no use”.
