A series of new rules of military discipline have been put in place within the Russian army, with the recent appointment of Valery Gerasimov as commander of Russian troops in Ukraine. Ban on using phones and tablets, personal vehicles, but also obligation to shave…
Most of these protocols were announced a few weeks after a Ukrainian drone attack on a military building where hundreds of Russian soldiers were gathered on New Year’s Eve. This strike, during which 89 soldiers were killed – one of the biggest losses suffered and admitted by the Russians since the beginning of the conflict – would have been facilitated by the geolocation of the telephones of the soldiers, who would have massively used the cellular network to contact their families on New Year’s Eve.
The ban on the use of the telephone has already been announced several times in the Russian ranks, but remains very rarely respected. And remains highly contested, the phones being used in particular to pilot reconnaissance drones.
“An absurd idea”
Another ban, new this one: the wearing of a beard, an “elementary condition of military discipline”, enlightened, Wednesday, January 18, Viktor Sobolev, a former retired lieutenant and member of the Russian Parliament, in an interview with the RBC media, spotted by Reuters. “A soldier is seen by civilians, he must look exemplary. If he walks ungroomed and unshaven, this does not compliment him either as a person or as a soldier,” the Duma deputy added , which defended the obligation to shave.
The rumor gave rise to numerous protests on the ground. “It would be an absurd idea, it would add nothing good and bring nothing more in terms of military discipline,” the pro-Russian leader of the Donetsk region, Denis Pushilin, immediately estimated in a video message. – even bearer of a beard. He also claimed to have “contacted our commander’s office, and clarified that”. “No one will come to inspect the troops with such brilliant ideas,” he assured in the recorded message.
If they may seem anecdotal, these new rules give food for thought to the most virulent criticism of the Russian general staff. Chechnya’s President Ramzan Kadyrov – who also leads voluntary armed groups operating alongside the Wagner militia – and Wagner leader Yevgeny Prigozhin were quick to react. Ramzan Kadyrov sees beard ban as an attack on independent groups of Chechen Muslim ‘volunteer’ soldiers, and therefore Islamophobia, reports the independent newspaper The Moscow Times. Yevgueni Prigojine, whose forces in Ukraine operate largely independently of the Russian high command, called the remarks of the deputy Sobolev “absurd” and “archaic 1960s”.