- Russian soldiers are showing up on the front lines in crutches, the UK Defense Ministry said.
- It’s likely a sign that Russia’s military medical system is “overburdened,” the ministry said.
- Several videos of Russian soldiers in crutches and casts have gone viral in Ukraine.
Repeated frontline sightings of Russian soldiers on crutches suggest Moscow’s injured troops are returning to combat from a medical system struggling to keep up, the UK’s Defense Ministry said.
Citing open-source reports, the ministry wrote in an intelligence update on Sunday that it’s “highly likely injured Russian personnel are being returned to combat duties in Ukraine with unhealed wounds, often on crutches.”
It specifically named the 20th Combined Arms Army, which the intelligence update said had likely formed “assault groups” of wounded soldiers.
“There is a realistic possibility Russian commanders are directing this activity to retain personnel who would otherwise become lost in the overburdened medical system,” the ministry wrote.
The update pointed to Ukraine’s estimate that 830,000 Russian soldiers have been wounded or killed in the war so far, with about 400,000 requiring treatment at medical facilities outside the war zone.
“The injured soldiers have likely been returned to their units after being discharged from forward medical facilities, prematurely, at the behest of their commanders,” the British ministry wrote. “This reduces the pressure on the overburdened military medical system and increases unit’s ability to track and use wounded servicemen for operational tasks.”
“The lack of proper medical attention in facilities away from the front line necessitates the transfer of the administrative and medical burden back to troops’ units,” it added.
The UK’s assessment comes as pro-Ukraine Telegram channels posted clips last month of Russian men in military uniforms moving on crutches through a forested area near Pokrovsk. Several others were filmed complaining about the deployment.
In mid-January, Ukrainian sources posted drone footage of two men walking on crutches in an open field that was also said to be near Pokrovsk. The drone dropped several munitions on both men, appearing to incapacitate them.
However, it’s visually unclear what initial injury either man sustained before the drone attack. Neither is it clear whether they were assaulting Ukrainian forces or moving between Russian positions.
The footage has gained traction in Russia, too. Military blogger Svyatoslav Golikov, for example, criticized the reported practice of sending wounded troops to fight, calling it an “entire wild disgrace” in a post in late January.
“In particularly egregious cases, obvious cripples can even be sent to assault, but more often they are sent to fortify newly recaptured positions,” he wrote.
Golikov wrote that it’s possible the two men in the drone video were seen without weapons or equipment because Russian soldiers are often told to find their own supplies on the front line.
The criticism also follows recent backlash on Russian social media toward the treatment of the war’s wounded, after a video that went viral in mid-January showed a man in military fatigues assaulting two injured Russians with a baton and a stun gun.
Local authorities in Kyzyl, a city in the Russian region of Tuva, told Moscow-based news agency Interfax that they were investigating the incident.
The Russian Defense Ministry did not respond to a comment request sent outside regular business hours by Business Insider.
Signs of strain in Russia’s troop supply are significant, because the war now increasingly hinges on whether Moscow or Kyiv can outlast each other in terms of gear and soldiers.
To enlist recruits, the Kremlin has been raising sign-up bonuses and benefits for newcomers, with some Russian regions seeing cash incentives almost on par with the US military’s.
Russia is already set to spend almost a third of its federal budget on defense in 2025, or 13.5 trillion rubles (worth $135 billion, at press time), as its economy grows isolated by Western-led sanctions.
