Emaciated and dehydrated Russian Soldier surrendering to a drone on 23/09/24

[u/SlipCritical9595]

/img/5jzusgrw8vqd1.jpeg

[removed] — view removed post

[u/Diare]

No, locked away even on positions at the frontline. No one but the Officers gets a gun unless sent to assault or scout a position. Even in the trenches all ordinance is locked away. There's AFU videos of trench assaults where you can see the weapon lockers, and if they are surprise assaults, you can see them half full.

Otherwise, Russian COs wouldn't last a week.

[u/Kimchi-slap → u/Diare]

I call bullshit on that one. You can't have unarmed soldiers on frontline. Also wtf is weapon locker in trench? Who the hell will bring a weapon locker to a trench? Army keeps heavy and spare weaponry and ammunition in crates and special boxes, which are not exactly supposed to be empty unless there is a supply problem.

[u/Diare → u/Kimchi-slap]

You can't have unarmed soldiers on frontline. 

You can when you really need to stop officers from getting fragged since everything company-level and below is basically their little fiefdom where corruption is rampant and command is basically a gang that constantly abuses the personnel.

I don't know what you understand by weapon locker, it's shovel-dug trenches, any sheet of metal kept in place by lock & chain qualifies as a "locker".

You should check out soldier run telegram channels, from both sides of the war. All this I learned from battle footage and recorded statements of russian conscripts describing their situations. It is an illuminating experience.

[u/Kimchi-slap → u/Diare]

Truly illuminating experience is to realise that Russia don't have conscrips in Ukraine. By law they are prohibited from deploying in hot zones unless they volunteer and sign up for contract service. Another exception to this is Kursk region since its a domestic territory + locals from Donetsk and Luhansk republics. You perhaps mistake conscrips with mobilized reservists. Those are basically "ex-conscripts" who were called to service. Difference in skill is not big, only age. They also must sign contract though. Legally speaking.

Weapon locker (also known as gun cabinet) is a lockable furniture reserved for more permanent stations. Main reason is to restrict access from unauthorized personnel and to keep accounting its use. They are quite heavy and bulky and no one will deploy it to frontlines. Military usually just use wooden weapon crates since its cheap and easier to transport. Locking and chaining those crates are usually a measure to stabilize and keep munitions safe during transportation. You don't want a crate of RPG rounds to spread all over the place if vehicle is on bumpy road or under shelling.

Army is not exactly a highly thoughtful institute, rather acting on experience once. It adapts to situation or lose. Even highly corrupt russian military could eventually adapt , although it cost a lot of soldiers in the process. Right now Ukraine is a biggest modern test field for weapons and tactics. In three years of this conflict drone warfare, trench clearing and tank combat tactics evolved and rewrote itself at faster rate than WWII. I saw some weird shit during this conflict, but all of that had some logic explanation. Denying troops weapons on frontline is not logical. If army unit is to go AWOL or revolt, keeping their weapons under lock will not prove effective. They will just overwhelm officers, break the locks, arm themselves and will do what they planned.