Chechen troops in Ukraine loyal to Ramzan Kadyrov have claimed a reputation as the most brutal in Putin’s war, but a new report says they are suffering heavy losses and working hard to cover them up.
According to an investigation by Russia’s independent news agency IStories, the official figure for 13 Chechen soldiers killed in Ukraine has dropped significantly; A source in the Chechen Ministry of Health told the publication that the real number of dead of the so-called Kadyrovites at least coincides with that of the Dagestani troops killed in Ukraine, which is a total of 123.
A source involved in sending the bodies of Chechen fighters home told IStories that Chechen battalions receive wounds and deaths every day.
One will never understand that by watching the chronicles on social networks of Kadyrov, who seeks to cultivate the image of Chechen troops as both fearsome fighters and compassionate rescuers, with images and videos shared on Telegram and the social networking site VK, which they often seem outright staged, showing soldiers greeted with open arms by elderly villagers and firing weapons at invisible targets.
The only mistake Putin dies for us
Kadyrov’s troops have also been accused of some of Russia’s most heinous war crimes in Ukraine’s invasion, with many survivors of the Bucha massacre identifying soldiers who indiscriminately killed and tortured civilians as members of Chechen battalions.
But Kadyrov’s PR campaign sometimes has the opposite effect in a spectacular way, such as when the leader of the strong leader appeared in a video in mid-March, allegedly informed by his men in a basement in the Kyiv region, only for Ukrainian journalists to use telephone data to prove that he was in fact in Belarus, followed even by the Kremlin and a source in the Chechen government, confirming that he was not in fact in Kyiv. Or now the famous photo of Kadyrov, who is supposed to be on his knees and praying in Ukraine – in front of a gas station owned by a company that is not present in the country.
The story continues
The Security Service of Ukraine said at the time that the “clown and coward” Kadyrov was simply trying to intimidate Ukrainian troops by suggesting that he had come to join the war.
One of Russia’s most heinous war crimes in Ukraine was worse than we thought
Behind the scenes, Kadyrov’s image campaign is said to have masked his own dysfunction, such as when he was puzzled by Russia’s decision to withdraw from Kyiv. When Russia’s defense ministry decided in mid-March to withdraw troops from the region after an unsuccessful attempt to seize the capital, Kadyrov rushed in, angry that his men were too prestigious to be relocated to Mariupol, according to IStories. He allegedly clashed with both the leadership of the Russian Ministry of Defense and the National Guard, retaliating by ordering his men to return to Chechnya to rest for a while, sources told reporters. newspaper.
And in his latest attempt to flaunt Chechen military prowess on social media, Kadyrov proudly said on Thursday that his men had “liberated” the village of Svetlichnoye in the Luhansk region, a village already controlled by Russian proxies in the Luhansk people. Republic since 2014
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