23132

Ukraine just sacked, what, a dozen officials on corruption charges related to the war? This is the country fighting for its existence and much more unified in a grand patriotic defense compared to Russia. And yet, corruption is clearly still a problem at the upper echelons from a country that has been working for at least the last 8 years to deal with that corruption(to varying degrees). Compared to Putin’s Russia which is built on corruption and siphoning as much personal gain from the system as possible somehow just immediately stopped all that corruption as soon as the war started? War is one of the most profitable opportunities if you have no morals and are in the right position. You know who is in all the right positions in Russia? People with no fucking morals because that’s who Putin put there.

23133

Source?

23134

This, all this. And the rest of your post too. Spot on. Thank you. So easy to see what Russia should be on paper and not understand why it isn’t that. It’s because of the corruption. And they have nothing compelling them to fix that.

Even if the building is about to collapse on them the termites are going to keep on chewing that wood.

23135

Every week, sometimes every day, there are stories of the newly mobilised equipping themselves (or being equipped by their families) with helmets, body armour, night vision goggles etc etc. In general this stuff is Russian-made, by military suppliers, but somehow is only available on Russian ebay. This is the same pattern as before the war; supply officers sell the best stuff and issue whatever’s left.

Why don’t their superiors stop them? Because their superiors are getting a percentage, and shooting these officers - who they appointed (almost certainly after money changed hands) - would both destroy their own incomes and be an implicit admission of guilt.

You can’t just turn off corruption.

And also, by the way, it’s pretty annoying to present factual information and have you announce that those facts can’t be true, just because they make no sense in your head.

23136

For the small stuff, it’s the regularly posted videos on Russian social media by soldiers or their families. How is modern body armour, exclusively made for the Russian army, in such short supply in the army but freely available for purchase online? It’s a mystery.

23137

I don’t admit I know everything here, but I’m pretty confident that corruption isn’t what it was, Perun says that while some Russian units where utter shit, others performed well, particularly in Kherson where Ukrainian units got absolutely smashed against the paratroopers.

I think its unwise to continue to belive that corruption will be a huge problem for Russia going forward.

23138

Correct.

Also correct. Sadly we see this all over the world. Corruption really is a disease, and people will keep stealing even when the government is collapsing, or when everyone around them is starving, or indeed when there is a war on, even if their stealing makes them that much more likely to lose.

I think that also speaks against @Enidigm’s idea that much would change if Putin wasn’t around. Certainly the system would remain exactly the same, it might just be different people getting paid.

And really, if the people had the power to do anything about that, they would’ve done so a long time ago.

The whole thing about endemic corruption is that it is basically an entire state, and an entire economy repurposed to rob and suppress whatever decent and honest folks remain at the bottom.

It’s the exact of opposite of what we would want a state or an economy to do.

23139

And I’ve seen I don’t know how many videos of captured Russian armor getting tested and it’s just a freaking joke. It doesn’t protect from anything.

I think the closer you get to actually being in combat the more you’ll see adaptation. The guys whose lives are on the line and are set on surviving will absolutely change. But the corruption doesn’t stop there. The officers all the way up are corrupt. The government is corrupt. Hell, all the guys who are involved in the military logistics chain who aren’t anywhere near the front have no real reason not to skim off the top.

23140

This is a war of choice and not a necessity for Russia as a country, even if for Putin is quite likely a war of survival. Corruption is so rampant in the Russian system, that I don’t think it is possible to root it out in less than a generation. It pre-dates Kleptocracy, Communism, and probably Peter the Great.

Evidently, there is still plenty of corruption in Ukraine despite genuine efforts to weed it out since independence.

Seriously, you don’t think the Russian officials and officers are selling equipment.? Why do you think there are all the stories of Russian conscripts being forced to buy their own socks, coats etc. As long as you keep sufficient money to bribe the inspectors, I’m not sure it is even that dangerous.

23141

What happens to the armor they are supposed to get? In 2021, a Russian captain was convicted of stealing at least 56 sets of body armor, which can easily be sold on Avito, a Russian competitor to eBay. According to one news report, new equipment is sold online and soldiers are routinely issued with secondhand uniforms and other gear. A year ago a 6B45 protective vest was worth as much as $250 when sold online.

According to the UK’s Defence Intelligence, some new conscripts are now being forced to buy their own body armor. Except that, thanks to the inevitable law of supply and demand, prices have now gone up and the same protective vest will now cost you $640 online. Which increases the incentive for anyone in the supply chain to steal them.

Clearly it is cheaper to supply troops with replicas than the real thing. Whatever happened to those 300,000 sets of body armor? You might ask the same about the 1.5 million army uniforms which Russian media recently reported missing.

23142

Well, up to the warstart, I think corruption was truly enigmatic, much worse than even myself believed. If it had not been so, I think Russia would have had a far easier time…

However going forward, I think its naive to think corruption will remain at scale, and I’m confident Russia will send men into the fray without flak armor, they have proven their ability to take massive casualties without care.

Most western armies would have been destroyed by now taking such casualties.

23143

The reasons why it’s not so easy to just get rid of corruption have been spelled out by posters in this thread today. You call it naive but you don’t say anything about how Russia goes about cleaning house, just that they will.

So, if it’s naive to think corruption will continue to pose a problem for Russia, please explain how they will go about successfully removing it during the conflict. If you’re going to call posters out as naive, you can at least explain how they are wrong in their assessment or predictions.

23144

Putin’s entire power structure is fundamentally based on corruption.

23145

Who is going to fix the corruption? It doesn’t just go away because war, war makes it worse. I realize it’s difficult for us in the west to actually comprehend a truly corrupt system, but it’s what Russia has. Everyone is in on it, so who is going to clean it up?

23146

I think it’s an easier argument that Russia can withstand the ongoing corruption to be successful enough to win the war than to argue that corruption will be stopped.

At the very least going into the Winter there was wide spread stories of Russian recruits needing to buy their own kit in aftermarket prices due to misappropriation of govt gear and I haven’t seen anything to suggest that this has been fixed

23147

Janster you are fortunate to live in one of the least corrupt countries on earth. . I’m guessing you’ve never bribed anybody in your life. It was eye opening to me to move from Silicon Valley, where the local government is one of the least corrupt in the US, to Hawaii, which is in the top 10 most corrupt states. A former police chief, District Attorney, and many of their subordinates are in jail, and roughly 1/4 of the department of planning and permits, are facing charges

Still, I don’t flash a wad of cash when I’m stopped by a cop, or go to a city or state office, but I’ve felt pressured to bribe an official, and so have most of my friends. In contrast, folks that I’ve talked to grew up in Mexico, Turkey, Romania, Russia, and Vietnam, bribing is as natural as breathing. It is like Eskimo having many different words to describes snow, most of these countries have different words to describe different forums of corruption and bribery. Russia is the most corrupt country in Europe and ranks 136 out o 180th in world.

What is your logic for this changing?

23148

I’m guessing some variant of “Russia needs for it to change, therefore it will”.

23149

Yep, they certainly could still brute force their way through all of this.

23150

I mean, I guess we will see in the spring.

Right now, I don’t think Ukraine or Russia are doing any huge moves. We will see a push in the spring, and it will be a real test of Russia’s progress in becoming more operational.

23151

To be clear, I don’t expect Russia to “win” but I also still struggle to envision a real endpoint for this war, so who knows.

And you’re right, spring will tell us a lot as both sides attempt offensives. Not sure if Ukraine will be fielding any of its new tanks by then, but they’ll have a bunch of new IFVs and SP arty by then, so we’ll get a good sense for how prepared they are for mobile warfare. On the Russian side we’ll see how they are adapting and if they can manage any sort of organized offensive that doesn’t just look like a meat grinder slowly pushing forward.