comment: >
  
  “Shit don’t always be like it is, but sometime it do.” 
  -Niccolò Machiavelli, 1519
context: I'm wondering if this is just a propaganda stunt by the Kremlin to recruit more prisoners, by trying to show they're keeping their word.  
  I suspect that not all prisoners who joined the army will be treated this well, and many won't even survive the war to enjoy any freedom. >
  
  Most are getting recruited into Wagner, which has spent a lot of the recent months fighting in WW1 style conditions in Backhmut and taking heavy casualties, so you're probably right in that the survival chances of these prisoners is very low. Especially if the rumours of the Wagner forces using the prisoners as glorified meat shields are anything to go by. >
  
  You could be right. The BBC had this quote “Wagner soldiers openly advance under fire towards us even if they're littering the land with their bodies, even if out of 60 people in their platoon only 20 are left. It's very difficult to hold against such an invasion. We weren't prepared for that, and we're learning now," Commander Skala says.” >
  
  They've killed so many that they're getting tired of killing them. >
  
  I remember seeing an interview with a Ukrainian soldier who was recounting a time that he killed a Russian who stormed their position while riding a bicycle with an AK in a basket. He had other stories of men acting like they were in a movie and getting gunned down while acting like idiots. He said they killed soldiers one after another who were trying to climb a ladder. It's like they didn't even understand what was happening. 
  They laughed for a bit about it all, then everyone got really sad. You could see it in their eyes. War is awful. All the time. >
  
  That that is the "best" outcome for those Ukrainian soldiers is fucking sad. >
  
  War is hell. >
  
  War isn't Hell. War is war, and Hell is Hell. And of the two, war is a lot worse. - Abraham Lincoln, Paris, 1867