Disturbing visuals compiled by the Daily Mail expose the cruel conditions faced by Russian soldiers on the Ukrainian frontlines under Putin’s command.
The graphic footage reveals commanders subjecting their troops to beatings and electrocution, starving them, forcing them to crawl through muddy terrain, tying them naked to trees in freezing temperatures, and even compelling them to engage in deadly fights.
Additional clips depict wounded soldiers on crutches being forced back to battle. Other videos show troops taking refuge in Ukrainian trenches, surviving on stolen potatoes due to a lack of supplies from their own side.
Commanders are reportedly sending their forces into so-called “meat storm” assaults, akin to suicide charges, where soldiers are ordered to attack Ukrainian defenses until their ammunition is exhausted.
Those who attempt to escape or defy orders face severe repercussions.
One video shows two naked men lying in a pit as their commander screams at them and fires bullets into the ground nearby. ‘Lay there for a few more days until you understand how to follow orders,’ the commander shouts.
Another shows two men forced to crawl through mud while commanders kick dirt at them and strike them in the head. The commander is heard yelling ‘are you still going to be sick?’ while beating him.
In a Telegram message seen by the Daily Mail alongside the footage, an anonymous soldier wrote: ‘The 132nd brigade is a force to be reckoned with. They are completely off the rails. This is what they do to servicemen who undergo medical treatment. It is nothing but humiliation, beatings and abuse.’
The footage emerged as Russia faced its deadliest day in the war this year on Tuesday, with 1,700 killed or wounded in 24 hours, according to Ukraine’s general staff.
One video shows two naked men lying in a pit as their commander screams at them and fires bullets into the ground nearby
In one video two men reportedly undergoing medical treatment are forced to crawl through mud while commanders kick dirt at them and strike them in the head
One clip shows a middle-aged soldier chained by the neck inside a box while his commander taunts him with food
Another video shows half-naked men chained to a tree before being forced to bark like dogs
One clip shows a middle-aged soldier chained by the neck inside a box while his commander taunts him with food.
‘Are you hungry?’ the commander asks, before flinging a plate of meat and bread at his head and pouring water over him.
‘Eat, you dog. You’re going to die there, you know,’ the commander jeers while hitting the man.
Another video shows half-naked men chained to a tree. ‘These are our dogs who ran away from us,’ a commander is heard saying, ‘but we caught them’. He then forces the two soldiers to bark like dogs before urinating on them.
In another clip, reportedly from the 132nd Brigade, two terrified soldiers are duct-taped to a tree. One has a bucket placed over his head, which a commander repeatedly kicks.
The commander shouts ‘why did you refuse orders,’ while repeatedly hitting the man. He then turns to the other man, an elderly soldier, and says you’re going to be shot, before urinating on the younger man.
One video shows a middle-aged soldier being beaten while accused of theft. Commanders write ‘I’m a thief’ across his chest in black marker and force him, dressed like a clown, to dance as they jeer.
In a different disturbing clip, a man screams and writhes on the floor as he is repeatedly electrocuted by laughing soldiers.
The abuse is both physical and psychological. Anonymous photos sent on one Telegram channel seen by the Mail show a Russian army booklet titled ‘Branding of personnel’.
Inside the booklet are photographs of Russian army recruits with what appear to be Nazi-style number tattoos on their chests, stripping the men of their identities.
A message from an anonymous source alongside the photos claims the men belong to the 60th brigade of the Russian Ground Forces.
Russian military expert Keir Giles said these displays of abuse demonstrate deeper systemic issues within the country.
‘The Russian army reflects the society from which it’s drawn. And that’s a society in which violence, extortion, and corruption are endemic,’ he told the Daily Mail.
‘We shouldn’t be surprised when these behaviours are carried forward and displayed, whether it’s against the people that the Russian army conquers, or to their own people, because the social structure within Russia has always been built upon anybody that has even a tiny amount of power exploiting it to the greatest extent possible.’
‘When explaining this to Nato forces, we often say: you have no difficulty imagining that North Koreans or the Taliban behave differently from European militaries. That is the category to place the Russian armed forces in.’
Giles explained that in the earlier part of this century, the Russian army attempted to modernise and get rid of ‘dedovshchina’, which is an extreme form of hazing and abusing recruits.
‘They tried to abolish the system whereby the reign of terror of the senior conscripts over the juniors led to a significant number of fatalities and general misery. They never really succeeded,’ he said.
Over the past four years, Putin’s forces have seen more than 1.25million soldiers killed or injured on the frontlines, more than the total sustained by the United States during the whole of the Second World War.
And Russia is losing more troops than it can replace, with forces suffering nearly 40,000 casualties each month, according to Western officials.
Despite this, recruitment reaches only around 35,000 troops monthly, with army commanders turning to brutal methods to force men into service.
Reports suggest poverty-stricken men are being taken from small towns and deprived regions and forced into service, including homeless people, ethnic minorities and prisoners being sent into deadly combat.
Exiled news outlet Vyorstka reported last year that Russian police officers are being offered between £98 and £975 per detainee they recruit to fight in Ukraine.
Methods of torture such as beating and electrical shocks are reportedly used to coerce men to sign.
‘These are people that come from the poorest levels of Russian society, the undiluted, unvarnished, unchanged Russia that in many respects hasn’t moved on,’ said Giles.
‘There are people coming into the armed forces who are seeing a toothbrush and a toilet for the first time in their lives.’
Meanwhile, wealthier Russians in major cities such as Moscow can avoid conscription through bribes or medical exemptions.
Giles said: ‘If you look at the proportion of people serving from remote villages, ethnic minorities, and the periphery compared to Moscow, the difference is stark.
‘Putin does not want to mobilise large numbers from cities, where people can exchange information and understand the real cost of the war. If casualties are concentrated in rural areas, that vulnerability is reduced.’
‘People get shanghaied into the army, whether it’s people from Russia or people who are duped into coming to Russia with the promise of work, whether from the subcontinent or Africa, and find themselves thrown into the front line. It’s an insatiable consumer of human bodies and needs to be fed.’
In a disturbing clip, a man screams and writhes on the floor as he is repeatedly electrocuted by laughing soldiers
A clip, reportedly from the 132nd Brigade, shows two terrified soldiers duct-taped to a tree
Another video shows a middle-aged soldier being beaten while accused of theft as commanders write ‘I’m a thief’ across his chest in black marker
In November, Kyiv said it had identified 1,426 fighters from 36 African countries serving in the Russian army, warning the true number could be higher.
Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha claimed they were being used as cannon fodder.
Videos circulating on social media also appear to show Russian troops using racist language, joking about African deaths, and forcing one recruit to blow himself up to destroy a Ukrainian bunker.
For many poor Russians, enlistment comes with the promise of life-changing payments of up to £40,000, which can lift entire regions out of poverty and incentivise recruitment.
However, many later find the conditions and risk of death are not worth the money.
Telegram messages and videos seen by the Daily Mail show police hunting down AWOL soldiers who have fled due to fear or psychological trauma, beating them and returning them to commanders.
Clips show bloodied men forced to state their regiment and explain their arrest. In one video, a man with an eye injury admits he failed to return to duty after hospital treatment. In another, a soldier begs his battalion for forgiveness under apparent duress.
Even those seriously injured are repeatedly sent back into combat. Footage shows men on crutches being issued weapons and sent to the frontline into a ‘meat storm’, including in a video reportedly from the 20th Army.
In one clip, a soldier says: ‘I fought five times, two severe injuries and a severe brain injury.’
He explains that he had been declared fit only for unarmed service.
‘Now they hang guns on me and take me to the frontline without any problems,’ he added.
In another video a soldier secretly films himself and his comrades, who all have severe injuries including broken legs and missing toes. At least one of the men is in his 60s.
‘They are sending us out on an assault straight from hospital. I don’t know what our “psycho” commander is thinking. We are being sent like meat to slaughter.’
‘We’ll have to make it through, I hope we make it out alive. And I hope they send “psycho” right out after us,’ the soldier says.
Another soldier who previously served in the 132nd brigade alleged in a Telegram video that he suffered multiple injuries but the army refused to treat him, leading him to spend his own money on treatment.
The man says he was given a Category V classification by doctors, meaning he was unfit for combat. Yet he was continuously sent back to the battlefield.
‘There are men without eyes being sent to fight. Men with broken arms, legs and ruptured intestines,’ he said in the video.
His infamous commander, Major General Sergey Naimushin, who was awarded the Star of Hero of Russia, was reportedly the one giving the order.
‘Naimushin would tell us “you will all die here”. He gave direct orders to send injured troops out to be killed,’ the soldier claims in the video.
The man, who escaped service and was AWOL at the time of the video, added: ‘I want nothing to do with this country anymore. To all the organisations out there, please help.’
Giles says the Russian army operates through a system in which men are treated as disposable, adding: ‘If your only purpose is to be a bullet sponge, it doesn’t matter if you’re walking, on crutches, or already injured, you’ll still fulfil your purpose.’
‘If you treat a human life as less valuable than the mine it’s going to blow up, then this is how it works. It is a consistent Russian pattern.’
Meanwhile, Russia’s military capability is under strain. By late 2026, the country is expected to face a critical shortage of usable Soviet-era armoured vehicles and weapons, according to the Royal United Services Institute, forcing greater reliance on limited new production.
Soldiers on the frontline are already bearing the brunt of these shortages, often being sent into battle unarmed or forced to improvise weapons.
In one video seen by the Daily Mail, soldiers from Russia’s 31st Regiment of the 25th Army shelter in a Ukrainian dugout in the dead of winter without adequate food or equipment.
‘This is how we live,’ one soldier says. ‘We found some rotten [coca] cola, and some potatoes that were lying right next to a corpse. Our guys sent us two cans of porridge and two packs of nuts. That’s it.’
‘We’re drinking water straight from a puddle. Thank God there’s Ukrainian coffee. Everything we have we’ve looted from [them].’
‘Everyone is starving. We have absolutely no strength left. There are no shifts, no rotations, I’ve been here a month. I can’t even wash myself.’
The footage, reportedly from November 2025, continues with soldiers describing how the wounded are dragged along without evacuation.
One man says of his comrade: ‘His arm is swollen. He’s running a fever. Give it a little longer, and sepsis will set in.’
He says that they are being sent into battle without adequate weapons, adding: ‘We don’t say a word, we just go along with it like mindless sheep. We even had to find our own gear.’
‘We improvised a demolition charge – explosives. We found Ukrainian blasting caps and detonators. They were semi-homemade, rigged with extra pins for dropping, or for… God knows what else just to ensure they’d explode.’
The soldiers plea to their commanders: ‘We keep pushing forward, we keep fighting. And we’re going to keep on fighting. But you b***** need to supply us! Supply us with food! With ammo! With everything we need! And evacuate the wounded!’
Footage shows men on crutches being issued weapons and sent to the frontline
In one video, soldiers from Russia’s 31st Regiment of the 25th Army shelter in a Ukrainian dugout in the dead of winter without adequate food or equipment
One graphic video shows two shirtless soldiers in a pit forced to fight to the death
In a BBC documentary released last month, several ex-Russian army soldiers revealed that commanders were executing their own troops.
One former soldier said he saw the bodies of 20 men lying in a pit after being shot, also known as being ‘zeroed’ in military slang.
‘Twenty lads were brought to us. They just took their bank cards and killed them,’ the former medic said in BBC documentary The Zero Line: Inside Russia’s War.
‘It’s not a problem to write off someone. You just make up a report.’
Another soldier said he witnessed four soldiers executed by a commander after they fled the front line.
He said: ‘The saddest thing is that I knew them. I remember one of them screaming “Don’t shoot, I’ll do anything!” but he [the commander] zeroed them anyway.’
One anonymous Telegram message sent by a soldier on the front alleges that commanders will deliberately send men to die in assaults as ‘punishment’.
He wrote: ‘In the absence of proper disciplinary practice and functioning laws, the main punishment at the front is being sent into “storm assaults”. Literally for everything.’
‘Caught with a smartphone – sent to assault, dead in three days. Detained by military police without a combat order – sent to assault, dead within a day. Didn’t extend your contract – assault. Didn’t sign a contract – assault.’
There are also disturbing reports of soldiers being forced to fight to the death by their sadistic commanders.
One graphic video seen by the Mail shows two shirtless soldiers in a pit as a commander is heard saying: ‘Here’s the deal. Whoever kills the other first gets to leave the pit.’
The terrified men begin to fight in the two-minute-long video, which ends when one appears to strangle the other to death.
A message alongside the video sent anonymously over Telegram claims the footage was taken of members of the 114th Guards Motor Rifle Brigade
To avoid being ‘zeroed’ or tortured, soldiers are in many cases forced to pay bribes to their superiors.
A New York Times report from June 2025 revealed that countless men were asked to pay money to avoid being sent on ‘meat storm’ missions.
In one video seen by the NYT, an 18-year-old soldier explained that – on the orders of his commander – he had collected 1.15million rubles (£11,000) in bribes from his comrades who were trying to avoid being sent on the next suicide mission.
However, the commander decided to send the soldier, named Said Murtazaliev, on the assault himself, he says in the video.
An investigation by independent Russian broadcaster Dozhd revealed commanders had ordered the teen to be executed as the only witness to the scheme.
High-level corruption is rampant, with officers exploiting the war for financial gain at the cost of countless soldiers’ lives.
There are also reports of commanders stealing mobile phones and bank cards off deceased soldiers, and transferring themselves huge sums of cash.
In a September Telegram message, a group calling themselves ‘the concerned mothers, sisters, and wives’ of Unit 46317 (242nd Regiment) pleaded for help locating their missing men.
Alongside 18 photos of the soldiers, the post read: ‘We’ve been searching for three months now. We started investigating and discovered that there are dozens of missing persons in the same area.’
‘These guys are being sent into assaults without proper training… armed with only an automatic rifle and two grenades, and then abandoned to die.’
The post alleges that a commander known as Altai kills wounded men, extorts money and transfers it to himself, gaining access to the soldier’s phones.
‘Everyone’s phones are immediately confiscated, as are their bank cards,’ it says.
In an interview with CNN released in February of this year, one African fighter said a Russian soldier forced him to hand over his bank card and pin at gunpoint.
The man said around £11,000 had been withdrawn, leaving his account bare.
One soldier, speaking to Independent Russian outlet Important Stories, said he was forced to hand over 100,000 rubles and his bank card upon arrival at his post in Donetsk.
When he told the soldiers he had no more money, he was threatened with execution.
‘One of the soldiers immediately started beating me, another stood nearby with a shovel, just watching. The commander was screwing a suppressor onto his rifle. He put the barrel to my head and said they’d “zero me out” if I didn’t hand over the money,’ he said.
Thousands of complaints have been lodged against Russian commanders for the severe torture and unlawful treatment of their own troops.
However, the allegations go largely ignored – and in some cases the complainants face punishment for speaking out.
