Ethnic tensions among Russian military threaten their defences – ISW
Ethnic tensions between Ossetians and the Russian military are causing a rift in Russia's 42nd Guards Motorised Rifle Regiment that is defending against a Ukrainian counteroffensive in Zaporizhzhia Oblast.
Source: Institute for the Study of War (ISW)
Details: ISW reported that Arsen Temiraev, a conscript from the Republic of North Ossetia-Alania [a federal subject of the Russian Federation – ed.] who serves in the 70th Guards Motorised Rifle Regiment, posted a video on 25 September claiming that Russian soldiers from the 70th Regiment had battered Temiraev and two other soldiers from the 71st Guards Motorised Rifle Regiment.
Temiraev noted that the military police asked him about his ethnicity and said, "Russia is for Russians".
The injured Russian soldier also mentioned that the military police beat him and other soldiers because a local resident of the city of Tokmak in Zaporizhzhia Oblast reported that the soldiers had sexually abused children. Temiraev himself denied committing the crime.
Temiraev lamented that he thought that "Nazis were on the other [Ukrainian] side, [but] it turns out they [the Nazis] are among us".
Military analysts believe inter-ethnic tensions between Russian units operating on the front line and in the rear of Zaporizhzhia Oblast may threaten the integrity of Russian defences and unit cohesion amid recent Ukrainian gains in the area.
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