The deaths of 2 seasoned Russian drone operators in Ukraine have stirred a frenzy amongst pro-Kremlin army bloggers, who say the experts had been despatched to combat as common squaddies.In a video recorded prior to their deaths, each operators stated they had been assigned to a suicide challenge with an attack unit as punishment for disagreeing with their commander.The clip of the experts — Dmitry “Goodwin” Lysakovsky and Sergei “Ernest” Gritsai — was once printed posthumously, showing on Friday at the Telegram channel “North Wind.”The pictures has since circulated broadly on Russian Telegram channels, which recognized the warriors as participants of the 87th Rifle Regiment preventing close to Pokrovsk in Donetsk.Lysakovsky and Gritsai accused their new commander, Igor Puzyk, of disbanding their drone squad once they quarreled with him and filtering their group participants into infantry platoons.They additional alleged that Puzyk had facilitated drug trafficking in his unit and falsely reported battlefield positive aspects beneath his command.Lysakovsky recorded a separate video message by which he profusely criticized Puzyk and claimed that the commander was once being influenced by means of a soldier who stored ties with Ukrainian intelligence.”Lies is an absolute norm,” Lysakovsky stated, according to a translation by means of Estonian analyst WarTranslated.An excessively curious incident took place for Russians within the Pokrovsk route. Now we have all heard when Russians ship experts like UAV operators and tankmen into meat attacks. On this case, one operator recorded a video prior to his demise…1/ percent.twitter.com/b893g7mF3w— WarTranslated (Dmitri) (@wartranslated) September 13, 2024
“I am recording this in case I do not come again from attack, and simplest then this message can have any weight,” Lysakovsky added.
He later stated in every other video that he was once about to depart to “hurricane” together with his infantry unit and referred to as on Russian males no longer to sign up for the battle.”Your activity is to die right here in order that the regiment commander, reporting to the higher-ups, seems to be excellent,” he stated. “Those are his private serfs.”Those two movies that includes him had been additionally printed by means of “North Wind” on Friday.Previous Russian media experiences recommend that Lysakovsky was once well known even prior to the Ukraine battle, writing that he was once a attorney and financier who was once preventing for the Donetsk Other people’s Republic, a separatist faction in Ukraine, as early as 2014.He turned into the pinnacle of the DPR’s aerial reconnaissance unit by means of 2016, according to a document that 12 months by means of Kommersant, which stated he was once charged with company raiding in Moscow.As for Gritsai, Russian army bloggers who claimed to in my opinion know him reported that he was once a occupation officer.Of their joint video criticism, the 2 males stated they complied with their commander’s orders as a result of they’d taken an “oath to the Motherland.”Russian backlash and an authentic responseThe pictures sparked an outcry over the weekend amongst Russian army bloggers, lots of whom independently reported that the 2 males have been killed in fight.A part of the backlash stems from tests by means of on-the-ground pundits that Lysakovsky and Gritsai have been two of the most productive drone operators on the frontline.A number of posted screenshots of Russian textual content messages, by which Lysakovsky requested for assist with shifting out of his unit.”There aren’t any provides, no maps, no plans of minefields. Not anything,” Lysakovsky wrote in a message dated September 10.Dozens of Russian commentators have blasted the cases of the deaths, with some calling for a ban on assigning experts like snipers or drone operators to infantry attacks.”The actual fact of repurposing an efficient UAV reconnaissance workforce into attack infantry within the present stipulations is, to position it mildly, sabotage,” wrote Russian pro-Kremlin journalist Alexander Kots.The Russian Protection Ministry showed the deaths of Gritsei and Lysakovsky on Sunday, writing that it will examine their dying.The probe could be run beneath the “private keep watch over” of Viktor Goremykin, a deputy protection minister, and Valery Gerasimov, the executive of Russia’s military, the ministry stated in its observation.Probably the most furor has calmed because the announcement. On the other hand, a number of distinguished bloggers persevered expressing fear over what they are saying is a emerging incidence of Russian commanders losing treasured experts on frontal attacks.Political commentator Svyatoslav Golikov wrote that the issue had develop into “systematic” within the army because of manpower shortages at the battlefield.”This actual factor will likely be taken care of out. However simplest as it raised a fuss,” wrote the Telegram channel Two Majors.The Russian Protection Ministry didn’t in an instant reply to a request for remark despatched out of doors common trade hours by means of Trade Insider.Pokrovsk, town close to which Lysakovsky and Gritsai had been deployed, has been a point of interest and a supply of a lot bloodshed on Ukraine’s japanese entrance.Russian troops had been pushing arduous to take the logistics hub in fresh months, nearing the outskirts of town after weeks of gradual advance.
