In an article published by the Moscow Times newspaper, veterans who notably fought in Russia denounce the offensive led by President Putin in Ukraine. Among them is Vitaly Votanovsky. After retiring from the Russian Air Force at the rank of lieutenant colonel, he began to engage in political activism to counter Kremlin propaganda.
The man has already been detained several times for having photographed the graves of dead soldiers, but he is determined to continue his fight in the face of a war that seems to be lost in advance. “Putin with his own hands destroyed the country’s military mobilization resources and now this idiot has gone to war with the whole world”Votanovsky told the Moscow Times. “He created circumstances in which we cannot win“.
Censorship and fines
The former lieutenant-colonel is targeted by censorship laws because of his publicly expressed criticism, particularly of the Russian mobilization decreed by Vladimir Putin on September 21.
Nikolai Prokudin, a 61-year-old veteran and staunch opponent of the war in Ukraine, denounces the fact that a large majority of Russians are being fooled by propaganda. Last year he co-signed a petition against a “war escalation” in Ukraine with another veteran, Sergei Gulyaev, who served as a Soviet intelligence officer in Afghanistan. While the signatures of many veterans who originally supported the petition were later removed from it, Gulyaev did not remove his name.
Like the rest of the population, veterans put themselves at risk when they criticize the conflict in Ukraine. Several veterans have already been fined for speaking out. In May, a court in Russia’s northern Vologda region convicted retired Captain Nikolai Smyshlyaev, 64, of “discrediting the Russian military” by posting anti-war photos on VKontakte, Russian Facebook. He was then forced to pay a fine of 30,000 rubles ($496).
Chechnya war veteran and former police officer Igor Knyazkov, meanwhile, has been accused of harming the Russian military because he posted a photo with the slogan “No war” as his profile picture on the same social network.
Incompetence of the Russian elite
Most veterans interviewed by the Moscow Times newspaper denounced the war as unfair and against the interests of the Russian people. All agree that their leaders are incompetent and that they will be responsible for the Russian defeat. “Neither Putin nor Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu ever served in the army,” they point out.