'Wiped out': War in Ukraine has decimated a once feared Russian brigade - The Washington Post

The 200th was among the archetypal units to plunge into Ukraine connected Feb. 24, arsenic portion of a fearsome battle connected the metropolis of Kharkiv. By May, the portion was staggering backmost crossed the Russian borderline hopeless to regroup, according to interior brigade documents reviewed by The Washington Post and to antecedently undisclosed details provided by Ukrainian and Western subject and quality officials.

A papers detailing a mid-war inventory of its ranks shows that by precocious May, less than 900 soldiers were near successful two battalion tactical groups that, according to Western officials, had departed the brigade’s garrison successful Russia with much than 1,400. The brigade’s commandant was severely wounded. And immoderate of those inactive being counted arsenic portion of the portion were listed arsenic hospitalized, missing oregon “refuseniks” unwilling to fight, according to the document, portion of a trove of interior Russian subject files obtained by Ukraine’s information services and provided to The Post.

The brigade’s illness successful portion reflects the trouble of its duty successful the warfare and the valiant show of Ukraine’s military. But a person introspection of the 200th shows that its destiny was besides shaped by galore of the aforesaid forces that derailed Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invasion plans — endemic corruption, strategical miscalculations and a Kremlin nonaccomplishment to grasp the existent capabilities of its ain subject oregon those of its adversary.

After months of ceding territory and losing thousands of troops, Putin is present trying to salvage his grandiose aims with an full unit that resembles the 200th: severely depleted, importantly demoralized, and backfilled with inexperienced conscripts.

This reconstruction of the brigade’s decimation is based connected the papers trove, interviews with members of the portion and their families, arsenic good arsenic accounts from officers successful Ukraine’s subject units that faced the 200th successful battle. Most spoke connected the information of anonymity to sermon delicate quality or, successful the lawsuit of Russian soldiers, to support their ain security. The Russian Defense Ministry did not respond to requests for comment.

The grounds reveals a brigade successful crisis, according to officials and experts who examined the documents astatine The Post’s request.

“They are hardly astatine 60 percent strength, being forced to trust connected reinforcements that aren’t adjacent enough,” Pekka Toveri, erstwhile manager of Finland’s defence quality service, said successful an interview. “You person guys who are refusing to fight, guys who are missing. It each tells america that for Russia the warfare has gone terribly wrong.”

The war continued to get worse for the 200th.

The unit’s commandant sustained specified terrible caput injuries successful a onslaught that helium was near vomiting, disoriented and incapable to retrieve battlefield events, and would soon person to beryllium hospitalized, the interior brigade documents show. Many of the unit’s astir potent weapons, including mobile rocket launchers and tanks, were either destroyed oregon captured.

In the months since the May inventory, the brigade has sustained further losses successful engagements including a July firefight successful the northeastern colony of Hrakove, and it was among the Russian forces routed successful Ukraine’s September violative to recapture ample parts of the Kharkiv region.

All the while, the brigade was being degraded from within. The skilled troops and nonrecreational officers sent into conflict astatine the commencement of the warfare with state-of-the-art T-80BVM tanks person fixed mode to an assemblage of poorly trained conscripts pressed into work with paltry oregon outdated gear.

Some of the brigade’s ain soldiers described its information arsenic dire.

“The portion is successful a authorities of decay,” said a worker present serving successful the 200th aft being drafted nether mobilization orders that Putin issued successful September. He and others were initially issued “painted helmets from 1941 and vests without plates,” helium said successful an interrogation with The Post this month. “They are not adjacent grooming us. … They conscionable archer you, ‘You are a shooter now. Here you go, present is simply a instrumentality gun.’”

In a warfare that has been disastrous for overmuch of Russia’s military, the dismemberment of the 200th stands out. It entered the struggle with amended training, newer instrumentality and much acquisition — including anterior combat missions successful Ukraine — than astir different units. Now, fixed the magnitude of its losses, 1 European subject authoritative said, it “cannot beryllium considered a warring force.”

In peacetime, the 200th is garrisoned astatine spartan bases that prevarication wrong the Arctic Circle, little than 10 miles from Russia’s borderline with Norway. The determination successful the municipality of Pechenga, northwest of Murmansk, underscores its mission: to service arsenic a wedge betwixt the NATO powers to the westbound and the Barents Sea bases of Russia’s Northern Fleet.

The ports, which served arsenic a constituent of departure for the fictional submarine successful “The Hunt for Red October,” person existential value successful Russian strategical doctrine. The Northern Fleet forms the halfway of Russia’s “second strike” atomic capability, meaning that its subs are expected to maneuver into the Atlantic and unleash a final, cataclysmic barrage if the United States manages to sound retired Russia’s land-based rocket silos.

The 200th is portion of an interlocking strategy of defenses for the fleet and its bases, 1 that besides relies connected their distant location, layers of perimeter information and further units connected the Kola Peninsula.

Despite the stakes of this Arctic assignment, the 200th has repeatedly been tapped by the Kremlin for precedence missions. Officers were sent to Syria to assistance President Bashar al-Assad support his grip connected powerfulness and, according to Ukrainian officials and a report by the investigative outlet Bellingcat, the portion was clandestinely progressive successful Russia’s 2014 effort to prehend territory successful Ukraine’s eastbound Donbas region.

In January of this year, 2 heavy equipped battalion tactical groups from the 200th began boarding trains for the Ukraine border. Images online amusement flatbed obstruction cars carrying tanks crossed a snow-swept scenery and soldiers playing cards successful packed rider cabins.

The troops, similar others successful the invading force, were led to judge they were deploying to instrumentality portion successful drills, according to Ukrainian officials citing accounts of captured 200th soldiers. Only astatine 3 a.m. connected Feb. 24 were they told, “There volition beryllium shooting,” an authoritative said.

A convoy of astir 100 brigade vehicles began streaming crossed the borderline that morning. Photos taken by civilians amusement 1 of the unit’s tanks being utilized to acceptable up a roadblock connected the bluish outskirts of Kharkiv — an effort to enforce bid that soon proved futile.

By day’s end, aggregate units of the 200th had been ambushed oregon attacked, dozens of soldiers killed oregon wounded, and instrumentality including tanks and “Grad” mobile rocket launchers destroyed oregon abandoned connected roadsides, according to Ukrainian and Western accounts.

The devastation was owed successful portion to the 200th’s drafting 1 of the astir hard tasks of the invasion. “The beforehand they were assigned proved to beryllium good defended with precise motivated Ukrainians,” a elder European quality authoritative said.

The Ukrainian warfare program was organized supra each astir protecting Kyiv, the country’s capital, but it besides called for aggregate armored units, including the 92nd Mechanized Brigade, to absorption their firepower connected defending Ukraine’s second-largest metropolis — Kharkiv.

The punishment inflicted connected the 200th successful those aboriginal battles and dozens much that followed stay a constituent of martial pridefulness for elder Ukrainian officers. “What’s determination to cognize astir them?” Col. Gen. Oleksandr Syrsky, who aboriginal commanded the Kharkiv offensive, said precocious successful an interrogation erstwhile asked astir the 200th. “They tally distant precise well.”

The brigade was besides hobbled by problems that plagued different Russian units. It was debased connected nutrient and substance aft consuming oregon selling captious stores successful the weeks starring up to the invasion, officials said. Putin’s determination to support adjacent elder advisers successful the acheronian near commanders scant clip to hole troops, fto unsocial coordinate onslaught plans with different units.

Stunned by Ukraine’s resistance, the 200th spent the ensuing weeks fending disconnected further attacks portion digging into antiaircraft positions northbound of Kharkiv, officials said. It was during this agelong that the brigade commander, Col. Denis Kurilo, 44, was severely injured successful a onslaught that Western officials said obliterated his vehicle. Ukrainian officials initially reported that the onslaught occurred successful precocious March and that Kurilo had been killed. But interior brigade records notation to a “combat wounded dated April 22” that yet required him to beryllium hospitalized.

Only hints of the carnage were made nationalist backmost astatine brigade headquarters. In mid-March, the politician of Russia’s Murmansk region, which encompasses the 200th’s garrison, announced online that 3 soldiers and 1 serviceman had been killed successful Ukraine, calling them “real heroes.”

But these were lone a tiny fraction of the existent casualties.

The interior brigade records see a elaborate number of surviving unit successful May aft they had retreated crossed the Russian borderline into the Belgorod region. The authenticity of the documents was confirmed by Western information officials.

One leafage includes a array that lists 892 servicemen inactive “present” and attached to the 2 battalion tactical groups that had deployed from Pechenga successful the run-up to the war. Officials with European information services that intimately show the 200th said those 2 units had started retired with a combined 1,400 to 1,600 soldiers.

One authoritative described the harm that specified losses would person done to the unit’s effectiveness and morale arsenic “catastrophic.”

Among those remaining, the array lists 21 arsenic hospitalized, six arsenic missing and 9 arsenic “refuseniks.” It besides shows that the brigade was awaiting 138 reinforcements, though it does not bespeak their grooming oregon background.

Wording astatine the apical of the papers indicates that it was to beryllium approved connected May 28 by Kurilo, suggesting that helium was inactive with the portion contempt his recent injury. A aesculapian record successful the trove, however, indicates that helium was suffering terrible symptoms from a “craniocerebral injury,” including nausea, vomiting, representation nonaccomplishment and “short-term disorientation.” It says helium near the portion connected July 11 to beryllium treated astatine Burdenko subject infirmary successful Moscow and was released successful precocious August. The aesculapian record also says his duties were temporarily assigned to different officer.

Kurilo, whose passport and subject résumé besides look successful the trove, could not beryllium reached for comment. On Wednesday, a pistillate identifying herself arsenic his woman answered a fig associated with Kurilo. She said helium had not served with the 200th for astir fractional a year, a play that would correspond with the commencement of his hospitalization. She said helium has since been transferred to different subject portion and is unreachable.

The avatar for Kurilo’s WhatsApp relationship is simply a “Z” motion utilized by Russian forces successful Ukraine, on with Russian words meaning “for victory.”

For each the seeming exactitude of the brigade’s rotation telephone record, definite categories are conspicuously missing. It does not accidental however galore soldiers had initially been portion of the 2 battalion tactical groups, and makes nary notation of those wounded oregon killed to that constituent successful combat.

Toveri, the erstwhile Finland quality chief, said the grounds appears to correspond an effort by commanders to instrumentality banal of their unit without accounting for the causes of its attrition.

“They conscionable did caller bookkeeping,” Toveri said, adding that doing truthful would beryllium accordant with a Russian subject civilization seen arsenic much calloused than its Western counterparts astir casualties. “They had been astatine warfare for 3 months and don’t notation immoderate killed successful action,” Toveri said. “Let bygones beryllium bygones.”

The losses created a two-front situation for the 200th: It was scrambling to find reinforcements backmost successful Murmansk, adjacent arsenic the breached battalions successful Belgorod were being ordered to instrumentality to Ukraine.

In a motion of increasing desperation, the brigade successful June began forming what it called a “mixed unpaid battalion” including sailors pulled disconnected Northern Fleet ships, logistics specialists from depots and others often coerced into enactment contempt having small oregon nary acquisition oregon grooming successful crushed combat, according to Western officials.

The battalion remnants successful Belgorod tentatively crossed backmost into Ukraine successful precocious outpouring and took positions hugging the Russia border.

Ukrainian subject officials described the returning 200th force, though degraded, arsenic much nonrecreational than the Russian-backed separatists they had antecedently faced extracurricular Kharkiv.

The 200th soldiers were little prone to talking connected unfastened telephone lines, brought acold greater firepower and proved adept astatine targeting, said Taras Shevchenko, commandant of an artillery and reconnaissance unit in Ukraine’s 127th Separate Territorial Defense Brigade.

In aboriginal June, helium said, his portion encountered the 200th successful the colony of Velyki Prokhody, northbound of Kharkiv. The Ukrainians were caught disconnected defender by a flurry of strikes, including 1 that tore disconnected the 3rd level of a gathering being utilized arsenic a basal of operations, Shevchenko said, leaving him with a concussion.

After a bid of inconclusive exchanges, Shevchenko said, helium convinced Ukrainian artillery units to clasp their occurrence for respective days, hoping to make the content they were debased connected ammunition arsenic quadcopter drones were utilized to get a clearer hole connected Russian positions.

Amid the lull, surveillance images showed 200th troops letting down their guard.

“Nothing was attacking them, truthful they could safely sunbathe,” Shevchenko said. “They took outdoor showers. They were moving astir without assemblage armor, without helmets.”

Ukrainian forces took vantage by unleashing a 40-minute barrage involving mortars, tanks and Soviet-era artillery pieces, past launched a follow-on onslaught the adjacent time aft nightfall.

“They didn’t cognize wherever to run,” Shevchenko said. After the colony was liberated, helium said, helium spoke with residents who estimated that astir 100 Russian troops had died arsenic a effect of the two-day engagement, though determination are nary authoritative numbers. He said the strikes dismantled vehicles that could person evacuated the wounded. “The locals said that galore died during the night,” Shevchenko said. “They conscionable bled to death, due to the fact that those who were injured — they couldn’t evacuate them.”

In that 1 sequence, the 200th had shown that it could beryllium some lethally effectual and fatally undisciplined. The erratic show is diagnostic of a portion that Western information officials picture arsenic 1 of Russia’s higher-performing brigades but nevertheless plagued by systemic rot and dysfunction.

Attached to the elite Northern Fleet, 200th troops get peculiar cogwheel and grooming for Arctic conditions and are often archetypal successful enactment for Russia’s astir precocious equipment. In 2017, the brigade was the archetypal successful Russia’s equipped services to person caller T-80BVM tanks rolling disconnected assembly lines.

And yet Westerners who ventured to Pechenga earlier Russia restricted question picture the basal arsenic a grim garrison wherever officers neglected troops’ morale and soldiers could look clueless astir the brigade’s individuality and mission.

Thomas Nilsen, exertion of the Barents Observer — a Norwegian quality tract that intimately follows the 200th — described an brushwood respective years agone with soldiers astatine a barroom adjacent the basal who were oblivious to their proximity to NATO, until helium pulled up a representation connected his telephone to amusement them.

In 2020, 3 servicemen died — including 1 by termination and different by choking connected vomit — and respective were injured successful incidents that raised concerns astir brigade conditions and safety, according to an probe by the Russian quality outlet Sever.Realii. One worker was blinded and different reportedly mislaid a manus portion grooming with a miniature drone equipped with high-power explosives.

That aforesaid year, a warrant serviceman successful the 200th posted videos connected societal media accusing superiors of neglect and corruption. One showed scenes of squalor successful apartments reserved for officers, with rusted appliances, mold creeping up walls, and piles of trash stuffed into unoccupied units.

“This is however ensigns and officers of the Russian service live!” the warrant officer, Mikhail Balenko, said connected the video, describing the compound with an expletive. “The brigade commandant does not adjacent travel here. He doesn’t attraction however his subordinates live.”

In different video, Balenko accused commanders of stealing supplies, bribing subject inspectors and selling substance meant for brigade vehicles. Balenko did not respond to attempts to scope him for comment.

The warfare appears to person exacerbated these problems of morale and cohesion.

Dozens of soldiers successful Pechenga refused to deploy during the archetypal months of the invasion, according to officials from Western information services. It’s unclear what happened to them.

Ukrainian commanders described battles successful which 200th soldiers wouldn’t combat oregon defied orders. In mid-July, a Ukrainian reconnaissance portion captured audio of a Russian vessel commandant successful Hrakove screaming astatine subordinates.

“Should I amusement you however to termination Ukrainians? I’ll get successful the vessel myself,” the commandant shouted, soon earlier the vessel was destroyed by a Javelin missile, according to Oleksandr, a reconnaissance scout successful Ukraine’s 92nd Mechanized Brigade, who spoke connected the information that his surname not beryllium published to support his security.

By the extremity of that battle, dozens of Russian troops had been killed oregon wounded and 12 tanks had been destroyed, Oleksandr said, adding that further intercepts indicated that galore soldiers had astatine 1 constituent oregon different refused to usage their weapons.

The brigade documents besides hint astatine interior turmoil. One acceptable of files lists transgression referrals made to Russian subject prosecutors regarding 4 200th soldiers — a elder lieutenant, 2 corporals and a private.

Two were accused of the “illegal merchantability of explosives,” and 2 others of “unauthorized abandonment of subject unit.” The documents bespeak that prosecutors declined to proceed with charges against the soldiers, though nary reasons are cited. The soldiers’ surnames look successful the records, but attempts to scope them were unsuccessful.

Accurate casualty counts for the 200th stay elusive. No figures person been released by the brigade, and lone a fistful of worker deaths person been acknowledged successful nationalist statements from the Murmansk government.

Still, determination person been different clues to the war’s toll connected subject families successful Murmansk. In precocious August, the regional legislature passed a instrumentality providing escaped meals to schoolchildren whose parents were serving successful Ukraine oregon had been killed oregon wounded, and announced that 1,274 students qualified.

The 200th’s engagement successful the siege of Kharkiv concluded successful September erstwhile it was routed adjacent Kupiansk successful the Ukrainian offensive, said Col. Pavlo Fedosenko, commandant of Ukraine’s 92nd Mechanized Brigade, the portion that delivered the stroke and has faced disconnected against the 200th much than immoderate other.

Afterward, lone fragments of a azygous battalion were left, composed of a hodgepodge of soldiers that bore small resemblance to the skilled units that had acceptable retired for Ukraine 7 months earlier, Fedosenko said.

Most of the unit’s officers had been killed oregon injured, Fedosenko said, and astir 70 percent of its instrumentality — including astir 32 tanks and 100 vehicles — had been destroyed oregon captured.

“Nothing of that brigade is left,” helium said successful a caller interrogation with The Post. “It’s wholly wiped out.”

Western information officials provided akin assessments. Because truthful galore of its declaration soldiers and elder members of its serviceman cadre were lost, “it volition instrumentality years to rebuild the 200th,” said a elder European quality official.

On Sept. 17, Kurilo near bid of the brigade to go lawman main of different centrifugal firearm division, according to a transcript of an bid by Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu that was successful the papers trove.

Remnants of the 200th aboriginal surfaced successful the Luhansk region, wherever intercepted communications provided to The Post by a Ukrainian subject authoritative showed Russian officers raging astir insubordination. In 1 exchange, a regimental commandant berates a subordinate implicit soldiers abandoning their positions.

“I americium f-----g bushed aft 1 and a fractional months of these people,” the commandant said. He goes connected to picture platoons melting distant and his efforts to resistance soldiers backmost into battle. In 1 case, “there were 30 radical leaving their positions, and present it is f-----g implicit 60, 75, possibly the full platoon,” helium said. After listing akin problems successful different units, helium said, “What the f--- are you doing? Are you going to assemble the battalion oregon not?”

At slightest 20 of the 200th’s troops were wounded successful caller skirmishes successful Luhansk, the Ukrainian quality authoritative said. A information expanse provided by the authoritative lists the wounded soldiers’ names and commencement dates; their ages scope from the debased 20s to the aboriginal 50s.

Contacted by The Post, 1 of those soldiers acknowledged that helium was astatine location recuperating, but declined to sermon his deployment oregon injuries successful detail. He described himself arsenic “a civilian person. I person a family, kids. I ne'er adjacent had a thought astir needing to spell fight” earlier being swept up by Putin’s mobilization.

“When I was successful the hospital, determination were guys from Moscow, conscionable elemental guys, immoderate worked successful car repairs oregon immoderate different places,” helium said. “They were conscionable pulled retired of their civilian lives and sent to ‘take villages.’” Many were reassured that “we are going to beryllium successful the rear, not connected the beforehand line,” helium said. “But it turned retired to beryllium the opposite.”

The soldier, who could look situation if caught speaking astir the war, was 1 of a tattered radical of astir 500 conscripts who were sent to Ukraine successful October as portion of yet another attempt to replenish the 200th there, according to Western information officials. The conscripts’ departure from the Kola Peninsula capped a singular hollowing retired of a portion that is expected to support Russia’s borderline with Norway, a NATO country, and with Finland, present seeking to articulation the alliance.

In August and September, Russia moved a squadron of bombers susceptible of carrying atomic weapons to an aerial basal adjacent Finland, according to outer images and a study successful the Israeli press. Western officials said they interpreted that arsenic a motion Russia is apt to trust much than ever connected atomic deterrence successful the Kola Peninsula fixed the reduced authorities of the 200th and different units.

“In the Murmansk portion we present person our borders bare,” the wounded worker said. “They are each bare now. No 1 is near there.”

Miller reported from Helsinki, Oslo and London; Ilyushina from Riga, Latvia; Belton from London; Khurshudyan from Kharkiv and Kyiv; and Sonne from Washington. Serhiy Morgunov successful Kyiv contributed to this report.