Why Russian Officers Are Reportedly Killing Own Wounded In Ukraine

Multiple reports have emerged from captured soldiers and on intercepted cellphone calls of Russian officers killing their own troops rather than sending them for medical treatment. 

The motivation is to scare survivors into continuing to fight, that a shortage of troops leaves few to tend the wounded, that sending wounded to the rear interferes with the deadline pressures the officers feel - and because doing so saves money which more senior officers can pocket. The ruthless efficiency does not appear to have bolstered morale. JL

Will Stewart and colleagues report in MailOnline:

Russian commanders are slaughtering their own wounded soldiers instead of retrieving them from the battlefield for treatment. A lieutenant-colonel was accused of personally shooting dead multiple troops as they lay injured. Captured troops recalled one commander asking a soldier if he could walk after suffering an injury, and when the man replied he could not, the officer killed him instantly. 'He was on the ground. He was asked if he could walk, he could not, so he was shot dead with a gun.'

Russian commanders are slaughtering their own wounded soldiers instead of retrieving them from the battlefield for treatment, Putin's own troops have said.

A lieutenant-colonel was accused of personally shooting dead multiple troops as they lay injured.

It comes as investigations in the horror town of Bucha have revealed 650 civilians were shot rather than hit by shelling in what police say proves they were executed by Russian thugs.

But their barbarity is not directed only towards the Ukrainians, as Russians spoke out about the brutal killings of their own forces within the ranks.

Captured troops recalled one commander asking a soldier if he could walk after suffering an injury, and when the man replied he could not, the officer killed him instantly.

The chilling account comes from young army intelligence troops captured by the Ukrainians.

They are shown speaking in a video clip made by Ukrainian journalist Volodymyr Zolkin who has chronicled Russian captives for Open Media Ukraine.

One soldier told how commanders had 'finished off their wounded'.

Asked by Zolkin what he meant, the captured Russian said: 'Just like that…a wounded soldier is lying on the ground, and a battalion's commander shoots him dead from a gun.'

He explained: 'It was a young man, he was wounded.

'He was on the ground. He was asked if he could walk, so he was shot dead with a gun.'

A second soldier said on the video: 'The most important thing - this wasn't a single case. The Lieutenant-Colonel was walking around….'

A third soldier then says: 'He shot four or five like this.'

The second soldier says: 'They were all young men.'

The third added: 'They could have been rescued, given help, taken out of there. He simply shot them dead.'

“Everyone was panicking and wanted to leave, but there was no way,” Ushakov told the reporter. “The only option to go there was as ‘300’ [wounded]. Some people couldn’t take it and killed themselves… Two guys killed themselves, because they couldn’t [cope], there was no other way out. Mentally, they couldn’t deal with what was going on there.”

Ushakov referred to the term “Cargo 300”, used by the Russian military to refer to wounded soldiers returning from Ukraine. He also shared a story he heard about a soldier who, after witnessing the bloodshed in Ukraine, simply walked away and killed himself.

The captured soldier also explained that the desperation felt by the Russian forces was compounded by a severe shortage of rations, saying that on some days three soldiers would only have to share a single dry ration.

There was no clarity from the video where in Ukraine the alleged shooting of wounded soldiers by their commander took place.

Nor was it clear from the exchanges where the men had been captured, or in which unit they served.

The video came as Ukraine has accused Russia of failing to take back its dead.

Some corpses are loaded in white body bags on refrigerated train wagons.

Putin's spokesman Dmitry Peskov told Ostorozhno Media that the Kremlin has 'no information' on either the bodies of the dead soldiers nor the wounded in Ukraine.

He was told: 'People from all over the country write in social networks that they cannot even get the bodies [of the dead soldiers in Ukraine]. The captives are in trouble too…

'What will we do with our dead and will we exchange captives?'

He replied: 'We do not have this information. It is with the Ministry of Defence.'

Elsewhere today, Ukrainian troops have reached the Russian border after successfully pushing Putin's forces away from the country's second-city of Kharkiv.