Funerals in Russia for soldiers who died in Ukraine during the war have been banned due to censorship: the provision was meant to “not create panic in families, as we explained here. However, after the erroneous predictions of a blitzkrieg, Russian television admits the difficulties on the ground in Ukraine. And that too through a service that shows the pictures of mutilated young Russian soldiers for the first time. A few days ago, Russian Deputy Defense Minister Aleksandr Fomin visited the veterans of the special military operation in Ukraine (as defined by Russian propaganda) stationed at the Vishnevsky Central Military Hospital in Moscow.
The only soldier who could stand up had an amputated arm. The other eight comrades, who were awarded the “Order of Bravery” for fighting at the front, sat in rows in wheelchairs, having lost all or part of their legs. The video of the ceremony, which took place on March 26, was sensationally broadcast on Pervyj Kanal (First Channel), Russia’s mostwatched TV, and opened up an unprecedented insight into the reality of the aftermath of the conflict in Ukraine. As seen in the pictures, the wounded Russian soldiers look decidedly unwell as they receive medals from Putin’s deputy defense minister after fighting during the invasion of Ukraine.
An exception in the wellarmed Russian media landscape, where the offensive can only be described as a “military special operation” in which there is no talk of dead or wounded, but only of “liberated cities” and “grateful civilians”. Reality is now finding its way onto the private screens of millions of Russian citizens. Changing the narrative, at least in part: Russian state television is preparing the ground for a war that could go on for a long time.
Can Russia lose the war? The three scenarios after the “withdrawal from Kyiv
