The Russians on the front lines are rebelling, fighting inside, and lost in the chaos of a reeling offensive.
Recently mobilized soldiers have refused orders to face "certain death" by taking part in "human wave" attacks that are said to destroy entire units at once.
Some appeal directly to Putin in a desperate video, while others speak out against the Kremlin officials sent to quell the rebellion.
There are increasing reports of combatants being locked up in basements because they refused to be targeted.
Meanwhile, the Russian military has created new units to round up "lost" soldiers who desert, flee or fight to find their teams. Soldiers from at least 16 different regions have recorded video messages since early February accusing commanders of using them in "human wave" attacks, according to Russian news agency Verstka.
Military observers say the tactic of sending "human waves" of poorly trained and armed fighters into the line of fire to overwhelm the opposition has become an increasingly common tactic.
The Ukrainian military reports a staggering number of Russian casualties, from 600 to he 1,000 per day. It is widely believed that Russia's long-awaited offensive has stalled in the bitter struggle to capture the small town of Bakhmut.
One of the most prominent calls for help from soldiers in recent times came from a group of men conscripted from the Irkutsk region of eastern Siberia. The man discovered that he and his companions had been sent to the occupied Donetsk region, ostensibly as a patrol unit, but they joined the now-infamous human wave attack outside Avdiuka. .
“We are simply sent to the slaughter. The commander tells us to the face that we are expendable soldiers and our only chance to go home is to be wounded in battle,” the soldier said. rice field.
"Commander, our lives don't matter. I'm asking for your help. We have no one else to turn to.”
Ruslan Leviev, head of the investigative Conflict Intelligence Team that has been tracing Russian troops since 2014, said:
“We don't know how much of this discontent is left unpublicised but those videos most likely speak to the use of 'human wave attacks' widely reported by the Ukrainian army.”
Soldiers often hide their faces behind balaclavas and rarely speak to reporters, fearing that publicity would backfire against them or their families.
In another widely shared video, filmed in darkness, a Russian says:
“Vladimir Vladimirovich [Putin], this is a plea from men mobilised from the Irkutsk region. We're asking you to look into the illegal and criminal orders of our commanders and take action,” the man says, asking Putin to stop sending former civilians like him to their deaths. He says the unit of his predecessors who made a similar appeal was “almost completely wiped out”.
After four pleas from the 1,439th regiment, the men's female relatives recorded a desperate video last week asking Putin, “our only hope”, to “save our men”. “The commanders have abandoned them and told them not to leave their positions. Our men have been without food and water for several days, but they are surviving under constant fire,” said the woman. said.
In response, Russia's Defense Ministry released a video showing a masked soldier from Irkutsk saying he was ready for duty.
People from the exiled Irkutsk media company, Baikal, managed to find the man's relatives after posting a desperate plea on a local social media group, which has since been deleted.
One of the men's wives described him as a "patriot who respected Putin and thought he was doing everything right in Ukraine," according to the appeal.