This is not about a Kingston Trio folk song from the 1960s, though I admit that the melody is now stuck in my head. I’ll be humming it for the next couple of days, unless someone plays “All I Want For Christmas Is You” again.

But this is about real soldiers — missing ones.

The independent news source Novaya Gazeta Europe reports that 1,010 soldiers — 858 professionals, 150 draftees from the 2022 mobilization, and two conscripts — have deserted from a single division, based in the Volgograd region, that has been deployed in Ukraine since the start of the war nearly three years ago. [Novaya Gazeta Europe, November 19, 2024.]

The original source of the information is IStories, another independent news outlet, which in turn cited a document sent to Russian regional authorities in the spring of this year by the command of the 20th Guards Motor Rifle Division of the Russian Ground Forces. IStories wrote:

“Over 1,000 men have abandoned just one division, while there are at least two dozen divisions involved in the war of Ukraine.” [Id.]

This, IStories says, could indicate a huge number of missing troops.

One soldier was quoted as saying that many of the men had gone AWOL early in the war, when they realized it was going to last “longer than two weeks,” as they said they had been promised by their commanding officers. [Id.]

Naturally, no official figures concerning deserters — in fact, no negative data concerning anything — are disclosed by the Russian authorities. During the first six months following the February 24, 2022, invasion, professional soldiers were able to terminate their contracts with the Russian Ministry of Defense — though many were coerced or threatened into staying. Since September 2022, however, all such contracts have been open-ended.

*. *. *

Aside from the question of why this is happening — why the Russian troops are deserting in such unusually large numbers — there is another question that is driving me crazy:

Where the hell are they??!!!

Seriously, where and how do 1,000 or more Russian soldiers hide in Ukraine? Have they been taken prisoner? And if so, why haven’t the Ukrainian authorities publicized it? Did they manage to sneak into other countries bordering Ukraine? And, being Russian — being the enemy — wouldn’t that also have been reported? Have they formed a commune in the Carpathian Mountains? Joined Donald Trump’s transition team? Or Elon Musk’s SpaceX program?

Surely they wouldn’t have returned to Russia to face arrest.

It’s a mystery, for certain. And if anyone has the answer, I’d really like to know where all those soldiers have gone.

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
11/20/24