2/ A report from the independent Russian news outlet Govorit NeMoskva highlights the problems being faced by all categories of soldiers, including professional contract soldiers, mobilised men, volunteers and those serving with mercenary groups.
Under Russian government decrees, those who fought in the Donbas conflict from 2014 or in the full-scale invasion from February 2022 onwards are entitled to combat veteran status, and to the various state benefits which are thus granted.
3/ On 1 August 2023, the Ministry of Defence was instructed to create a commission to determine who should be awarded a veterans' card. However, the order to create the commisison was only signed by Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu on 17 September.
Russian social media is filled with complaints from ex-combatants who say that the authorities are failing to help veterans. Ex-Wagnerites and combatants from the Donetsk and Luhansk 'People's Republics' (DNR/LNR) appear to be among the worst affected.
4/ Ivan Abramov, for instance, writes on VK: "I am one of those who defended the right of people to speak their native language, their history, faith, and culture.
When I fought, my state needed me, but as soon as I became unable to fight, I immediately became an unnecessary hero. They will only remember me on certain anniversaries and give me unnecessary cards."
5/ "Although this doesn’t happen to me either, since I went voluntarily, bypassing the military registration and enlistment offices and summonses on the day of mobilisation. I am a civilian who took the initiative that no one asked for.
Now, having been wounded in war, I receive a general disability pension and have to beg to raise money for quality rehabilitation."
11/ Relatives of other Wagnerites say that MOD offices are deliberately obstructing registrations. Nastya Zimina complains that "they refuse to issue a combat veteran's certificate, citing the order of the Ministry of Defence: to refuse contract soldiers of PMCs."
Sergey Konforovich writes sarcastically that "PMCs are an empty phrase for the state, and more specifically for certain officials. If the CHEF were alive, something would be moving."
12/ Another ex-Wagnerite, Leonid, says that "they don't like us here. As soon as they find out that you are a Wagner employee, they treat us like animals, and they probably have special orders to treat us that way."
This doesn't only apply to Wagnerites, but also to official Russian MOD formations. Inna Blagorodova's husband was a member of BARS, Russia's Combat Army Reserve. He was seriously injured in September 2022 and treated in hospital until December.
15/ They found that they had "absolutely nothing in their accounts", another volunteer says. "We were later told that the bank had lost the information of dozens of men in our battalion. I had a few thousand rubles in my account."
"We all withdrew whatever we could and divided it up among us so the guys could get home. That’s the way we treated one another."
18/ Similarly, Pavel Bushmakin from the Kirov region fought as a volunteer in the DNR in 2014-2015 but is now encountering bureaucratic obstacles to getting any veterans' benefits.
He says: "Before leaving, I took a certificate from the Vostok battalion; now the military registration and enlistment office does not recognize it and requires an extract from the orders and other documents."
19/ Like many other soldiers, Alexsandr has found that the Ministry of Defence will not pay him compensation for a condition acquired during service. Although he received a medical diagnosis, the MOD claimed he had developed it after his service and refused compensation.
Such problems are not new, however. Veterans of the Afghan and Chechen campaigns in the 1980s and 1990s experienced similar issues, highlighting the fact that neglecting veterans seems to be long-standing Russian MOD policy.
20/ The Defenders of the Fatherland Fund, a personal initiative of Vladimir Putin, is the focus of many complaints. Angry ex-soldiers and their relatives complain regularly on its VK page that its activity is for public relations only and that they are receiving no help.
Ellada Belostotskaya complains on VK that "[our] own country has forgotten its heroes, 👎 the guys cannot pay for their treatment, the dead are completely forgotten. It is not clear for what purpose this fund was created."
21/ Ruska Merengov, who says he has more than 20 shrapnel fragments in his body, has posted his own dissatisfaction in the form of a poem:
"Thank you, my homeland,
for abandoning me, for
fighting,
killing fascists,
like our grandfathers,"
/end
ChrisO_wiki
Loukas (They/Them) 🏳️⚧️