Russian Army Takes On-the-Job Training to a New Level

The ass-kicking Ukraine has been giving Russia is now Russia's best strategy for training its troops

Russia has finally reached a critical point. It has dramatically slowed the rate at which it is firing missiles and appears to be stockpiling for a winter offensive. There is also speculation that Russia has begun “ training” its troops. 

A report published by The Wall Street Journal on Wednesday claimed that Russian government officials had contacted allies to ask for the return of some military equipment and weapons that it had previously exported, possibly indicating that supplies for the Ukraine war are dwindling (Russia Switching War Strategy).

It has taken the enemy a while to catch on to the tactics of a modern army, but some suspect that the lull in air raids could signal a change in strategy. Across the lines from Russia’s conscripted army is one that is probably even less experienced than the Russians were in terms of military doctrine, and nonetheless, the Ukrainians have month-by-month acquired a deadly efficiency that has resulted in hundreds of thousands of dead and wounded Russians.

Russia’s failure to prepare its troops, however, has not been due to a lack of effort. After conscripting hundreds of thousands of civilians from society, it sent the green troops, many without even a week’s training and void of the most essential gear, to the 600-mile front. The rate of death was so great that Russia resorted to a form of “training” that served them well in the past. Situated just behind the front line, the great minds of the Russian general staff set up second and third “front lines” (barrier troops) designed to prevent the retreat of their green, unsupplied troops. 

How many retreating Russians were murdered by their fellow citizens as they raced for their lives to the rear, no one will ever know. But the “training tactic” seems to have worked, and the fear of death due to “friendly fire” helped stabilize the lines for a while. Discipline, however, began to break down after months of being traumatized by the daily din of war. The once-green civilians started to rebel. They began to fight back against their incompetent officers in small ways. 

Never a country to lose an opportunity to abuse its people, Russia’s lazy and corrupt officers came up with a splendid idea. In the rear, far from the frontlines, ditches were dug, and dozens of soldiers at a time, after being beaten, would be tossed into them. The soldiers were held in the ditches for days and days at a time. Open and subject to the elements, the prisoners were fed once a day. They were not allowed out to go to the bathroom but used the ditches as their latrines — right where they slept, ate, and fought for survival. 

A deserted soldier who trained at Prudboy this year and was identified in the report by the pseudonym “Sergei” told IStories and CIT that he knew of several misbehaving soldiers — mostly those who were in trouble for drinking alcohol — who were put in the pits.

They were beaten by military police, kept in the pits for up to a week, and had food brought to them only once a day, Sergei said, who noted that he saw two pits at Prudboy, according to the report (Misbehaving Russian Troops).

The pits have proven effective. The deserted soldier went on to say that when the “pit survivors” returned to the lines, they were broken men and boys. They no longer messed around and were afraid of everything. Surely, this is not the kind of training technique Fortune 500 companies will resort to, but it does seem after the war, another “great Russian invention” could be the latest in IPO-able ideas to come out of Russia — just like the many other great ideas. 

Russia is now beginning to pay attention to what has proven so successful for Ukrainian troops. 

Center for Naval Analyses (CNA) adviser Samuel Bendett, an expert on the Russian military and drone technology, wrote on Wednesday that Russia had learned “lessons” about Ukraine’s success in using drones and was attempting to emulate Kyiv in a series of posts on X, formerly Twitter.

“One of the key lessons the Russian military is taking from Ukraine is the need to train the FPV/quadcopter trainers who can then teach many others how to fly such drones,” Bendett wrote. “The Russian MOD is trying to standardize such training (Russia Switching War Strategy).”

While it seems highly unlikely that Russia will ever learn enough to become a modern, well-oiled military machine — Russians are incapable of working well together for longer than a few hours, and the larger the number expected to work together, the quicker it comes crashing down — I do fear that they will become insanely efficient in their use of drones. Playing a video game, whether online or offline, is still an individual effort. 

Plenty of Russians spend hours each day mastering their gaming skills. Moscow could enlist these young men and women with sizeable bonuses and the promise of work far from the front. 

Failing in every other aspect of the war, every living creature eventually adapts. Russia’s evolutionary path in this war has led it to the moment when it realizes that Ukraine’s best practice skills for waging war may be better than Moscow’s expressed hatred for its own citizens.