Russian soldiers surrendering en masse suggest desperation: expert

Dara Massicot, a Russian military expert at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, told the publication: “My instinct when I saw those videos was that those soldiers were not combat-experienced troops who had fought inside Ukraine.”

Most of the videos seen by the Post appear to have been shot by Ukrainian soldiers and then shared on social media, the outlet said. Business Insider could not independently verify the footage.

Massicot told the Post: “It’s been a long time since I’ve seen a video of Russian soldiers surrendering en masse like this.”

The station said images it verified showed Ukraine had captured at least 247 Russian soldiers in the region. By comparison, before the Kursk invasion, Russian President Vladimir Putin said Ukraine had 1,348 Russian troops.

Mathieu Boulègue, another Russian military expert, told the Post that the apparent number of Russian troops surrendering was surprisingly high: “I didn’t expect so many easy surrenders.”

“But it also shows how fragile the war narrative is in Russia, and it also shows how desperate these soldiers probably are who would rather be with Ukraine in Ukrainian prisons or cells than fight for Russia,” Boulègue, a fellow non-resident senior fellow at the Center for European Policy Analysis, said.

Ukraine said it had captured 102 soldiers in a single day, in what would be the largest group it had captured since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Officials also told Financial Times that the total number of captured Russian soldiers was in the “hundreds”.

A deputy to the Ukrainian commander who was previously involved in the raid said the BBC that the soldiers who guarded Russia’s borders “mainly children did their compulsory service”.

Western intelligence, defense analysts, Ukrainian soldiers and captured Russian troops have also indicated that Russian soldiers are poorly trained.

Rainer Saks, a security expert from Estonia, said ERR that the Ukrainian invasion of Kursk was successful “mainly because the Russian military command and political leadership were completely unprepared for this kind of event.”

Some of the troops in the videos reviewed by The Post said they were recruits. Putin had promised that these soldiers would not be involved in combat.

Ukraine says it has taken more than 483 square miles of Russian territory – which is more than the amount of territory Russia has captured in Ukraine since the beginning of the year.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said that Ukraine’s goal with the incursion is to create a “buffer zone” which can minimize Russia’s ability to attack Ukraine.

Also, war analysts BI said that Ukraine probably also wanted to expand Russia’s forces and provide new motivation for its troops and allies.