Dozens of injured Russian soldiers decided to riot over “inadequate medical care” earlier this month, according to the UK intelligence.
The Ministry of Defence (MoD) shared reports from independent Russian outlet, Astra news, this morning, after it claimed troops rebelled in the south central Russian region of Novosibirsk, around 3,500 km from the frontline.
The soldiers were reportedly protesting over “mistreatment from their unit commander”.
Allegedly, these troops “did not want to return to the frontlines without adequate medical treatment”, the MoD wrote in its latest update on X.
Dozens of them smashed windows and damaged the barracks in revolt on November 14. Ten of them subsequently fled the compound.
The UK intelligence officers explained that this poor treatment for soldiers may come down to a supply issue.
“Shortages of armoured vehicles and the persistent Uncrewed Aerial Vehicle threat result in significant delays to evacuation of wounded Russian soldiers,” the MoD explained.
“This almost certainly increases the likelihood of more serious injuries and higher rates of mortality for those who are eventually evacuated through the medical system.”
The Ukrainian General Staff estimates that Russia has suffered more than 700,000 casualties since invading Ukraine in February 2022, around 500,000 of whom are wounded Russian service personnel.
The MoD said: “It is almost certain this scale of casualties continues to strain the Russian Military Medical System at all levels of medical care, causing significant logistic problems and resulting in a shortage of medical personnel.
“These problems will likely persist for at least the next three months.”
Vladimir Putin has been heavily criticised for his treatment of his soldiers ever since the war began in 2022.
PM Keir Starmer previously said the Russian president was using his own citizens like “bits of meat to fling into the meat grinder”.
While this has allowed Russian forces to advance rapidly on the frontline in recent months, Putin has also had to turn to North Korea to recruit more troops to bolster his army.
Doing so pushed the US (and the UK) to finally give Kyiv permission to use long-range their missiles to target sites within Russia.
Putin subsequently lowered his country’s threshold for using nuclear weapons and threatened to bomb the UK.