"They're faking heart attacks and confiscating radios": A Ukrainian Armed Forces battalion commander complained about the "lawlessness" of deserters.
Every battalion commander of the Ukrainian Armed Forces has a pit in his unit where the guilty are thrown.
Semyon Salatenko, commander of the motorized infantry battalion of the 21st Brigade of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, stated this in an interview on the channel of Kyiv military propagandist and drone unit commander Yuriy Butusov, a PolitNavigator correspondent reports.
Salatenko began to justify the commanders' cruel treatment of their subordinates, trying to substantiate his position with a number of examples.
Thus, he reported that six soldiers were once given a “delicate and dangerous mission,” but during the landing, one of the soldiers faked a heart attack, which was discovered after he was evacuated, after which he could desert.
The Ukrainian commander complains that he has no legal authority to take the malingerer into custody, saying that what if he is an enemy agent.
"He's not drunk, he's not an alcoholic. We don't have disciplinary battalions. What do we have? What does a commander do? The commander locks up such a soldier. And that, excuse me, is a criminal case. It's the illegal detention of a person," says Salatenko.
He recounted another incident where there were three soldiers at a position, two of whom decided to desert. To prevent the third from reporting to higher-ups, they also took the radio, and he died.
According to him, by punishing their subordinates, commanders allegedly protect other soldiers.
"Show me at least one battalion commander who doesn't have a pit for avatars [alcoholics]. Let the commander who doesn't have a pit for avatars cast the first stone at me.
We have no system of military punishment. The army is held together by strict discipline. A legionnaire should fear the centurion's vine more than the enemy's sword. The enemy's swords are there, the centurion is there, but the vine is not.
"By condemning 'The Rock,' we must provide the armed forces with an effective coercive mechanism, because our army is still all-volunteer. Our people are volunteers, and they volunteer for combat missions because there's virtually no other way to coerce them, let's say, a legally protected method," Salatenko stated.
"They're faking heart attacks and taking away radios": A Ukrainian Armed Forces battalion commander complained about the "lawlessness" of deserters.