https://www.politico.eu/article/russia-ukraine-war-over-20000-wagner-troops-were-killed-prigozhin/
Earlier, Yevgeny Prigozhin had said Wagner’s troops would not go back to fighting in Ukraine.
They chose to go to Ukraine, to rape and torture and kill Ukrainians. When such monsters die, the only responsse is 'Good.'
I will never cheer for dead foot soldiers on any side, they are but puppets of their masters. Sometimes by force, sometimes by brainwashing, most often by both.
weren't lots of them prisoners, promised freedom for a few months of "work" ?
then sent in as doomed cannon fodder by wagner.
Is that better? Assuming they committed the crimes they were convicted for they are agreeing to avoid the consequences of immoral acts by agreeing to perform more immoral acts?
They are not foot soldiers defending their country, they're mercenaries who kill for money. They are invaders and occupiers whose sadism & crimes against humanity is known.
Your emotions w.r.t them are your lookout. I. for one, will always cheer the death of monsters in human form.
Many of them were convicts promised freedom in return for signing up, and a modest life insurance for their families if they died. If nothing else, then some of these men were as much victims of the war as the Ukrainians.
They are/were victims of the same perpetrators who launched an illegal war as Ukraine. But they are/ were not victims of war, because war is not being committed on them. Rather they are siding with their own oppessors in committing war & war crimes on Ukranians who already are the brunt of Russia's war,
This makes them victims of Russian govt and co-oppressors of Ukrainians with the Russian govt.
That's on you. I will cheer the death of every oppressor, because that means one more tool of oppression has died. That's my call.
Young men sent to war to die in a political scheme concocted by crooks are also 'victims of war'. War is not being committed on them? They may not have had a say - forced by threat off violence or the destitution of their loved ones. Of the original 500 convicts enlisted, only two were still alive after a few months, an abysmal survival rate of under 1%!
It is easier for us to see them all as the evil enemy, but that is too simple. If you cannot find pity for the cannon fodder of the war, then you are interpreting the events through an unapologetically political lens rather than a humanitarian one.
Pity instruments of invasion, occupation, torture, rape,and murder? Hell, no.
Tell me, do you pity the Germans who fought & died in WW2 for Nazi Germany too?
Absolutely! Do you not? There were definitely tragic stories there, of men who died before their time who did not sympathize with nazi Germany, and did not want to go to war if they hadn't been drafted. They would have rather lived their peaceful lives with their girlfriends. I'm not saying you nessecarily should pity them, just that you not doing so reflects a political view of the people involved. You reduce humans to us, the worthy humans, and them, the sub-humans. everyone on my side are principally victims, everyone on the other side are principally perpetrators. We are worthy of connecting, they are not.
It's an easy view to fall into, and you are not alone in thinking that way. It is only getting more common as the world gets increasingly wound up in war and war mentality.
I can warmly recommend the YouTube documentary 'the great war' made between 2014 and 2019 about war and it's toll on humanity.
It keeps surprising me how many troops this mercenary group has. Like 60,000 out of action and they still had enough troops left to be theathening enough to be serious trouble for Moscow and they have troops in Africa.
Not much work around there and the market only decreases + most men came through obligatory service so they believe they know-how + employer DGAF if you are an ex-con or a neo-nazi + you earn in a month what you may not do in a year + shooting hardly armed brown people was pretty safe + and with mobilization there is a promise you'd be better treated, equipped and trained there if you sign contract with them. They previously hired from ex-Yugoslavia countries since there are many sympathizers and not the best economics in EU too; and Ukraine is probably the only post-CIS state they don't have a recruitment campaign in. The only limit I see is funding, and they deal in oil and food catering for government for that. I see their numbers get reported pretty conservatively while they are a big deal to actually be concerned about. Yet it took only 9 years to proclaim it as such.
How much defense does Russia even have at this point? They seem to be banking on their nukes to defend them.
Well, that's a question mostly Russia itself and maybe US/UK intelligence can tell you.
Also, there is the question of quality. I am sure Russia has a quantity of troops left, but given that they have to scrape the barrel with prisoners and people forced into service, I am not very sure about the quality. Lack of time for training, lack of experience, lack of proper selection. And that's all before we're at the state of the equipment.
If you don't want to trust Wagner (and I don't blame you) this part of the article has another relevant fact:
U.S. intelligence said in February that Wagner had at that point suffered 30,000 casualties in Ukraine, including 9,000 deaths.