The entire thing is very sad IMO. It's even sadder that this is in the Russian media -- this is not how the family's situation should be promoted or portrayed. It kind of reminds me of Palestinian families being proud of their sons being suicide bombers because they got large payments from Iran which allowed them to buy all sorts of stuff.
The funny thing is, due to the sanctions and the factories closing down, they won't be able to manufacture the 30-40 thousand Ladas that they will need for the parents of all the soldiers killed.
Problem solved. They just lower the number of deceased soldiers that they adknowledge down to about 3500. We know they can do it- because they already are. ‘It’s as Tall as a Person’: Russians Reveal Their Secret Dump of Dead Soldiers in Donetsk Russian authorities in Ukraine’s occupied city of Donetsk are tossing the bodies of their dead soldiers in a secret dump “by the thousands” and charging their loved ones money to find them. https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/tall-person-russians-reveal-secret-102227444.html
Putin Has a Problem: Is Russia’s New Ukraine Offensive Already Failing? https://www.19fortyfive.com/2022/07...ussias-new-ukraine-offensive-already-failing/
It is messy. The generals are having to do more and more frontline duty but Vlad is giving them less and less credit but touts the Wagner Group. I read a report that said that in the Chechen War the Russians had a general who became very popular and ultimately Vlad saw him as a threat to his power and now he is worrying about the the same thing. He does not want any Putin-alternative rumors and candidates surfacing so he has even denigrated some of the few generals who have performed. The point being that morale is bad at the top too, not just among the troops. I also read an interesting interview a couple months back with a top - or longtime member anyway- Wagner Grouper who had left Ukraine and hung his hat up. They may be shit-bums but they are highly experienced and dedicated and trained mercenaries- having some standards for survival that must be met. He said Russia was just piling more and more clowns into some of the Wagner-led units and it was dangerous for the long time Wagner groupers because the soldiers were not trainable or qualified so the Wagner members had to work with people who did not have their back. That has not been their style. They are closely knit cut-throats and commandos. Not clown show managers. They may get big bucks but they still want to be able to get out alive. This is incompatible with Vlad's goal which is to use these shadow groups just because their dead do not count as Russian troop dead. Messy.
They are just cannon fodder for Putin... Russia’s strategy of using minorities as cannon fodder can backfire, says Ukraine’s General Staff Russian military commands sends non-ethnically Russian soldiers into the riskiest attacks, which is leading to growing discontent among Russia’s minority groups, Ukraine’s General Staff reported on July 19. https://english.nv.ua/nation/russia...es-as-cannon-fodder-russia-news-50257377.html