https://www.reddit.com/r/(...)otilaana_ukrainassa/==============================================================
Dan Carlin had a good story about what kind of military culture russia has. It's a soldier's job to follow orders to his brigade, even when they don't make sense.
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Carlin recounts one military entry that talked about a platoon of soldiers, many of whom had lived on the vast prairies in Russia and had little experience with large bodies of water and did not know how to swim, encounter a large Russian river, Carlin calls it the White Sturgeon.
The commander was ordered to cross it and begin fighting the Germans on the other side. Never mind that the soldiers might be better off behind this natural obstacle. But an order is an order. The commander orders a troop to cross the river. The man objects, having no such experience and not knowing how to swim. He will surely die.
The commander points the gun at him and tells him its better to drown a soldier than show insubordination. The man is forced into the water. He is taken by the current and drowned. As are all the others he orders in.
Better to lose men and follow an order than risk looking like you are defying high command, who fear that it will look like they have not been following high command, and so on and so on all the way to the very top.
The commander calls to his comrade major, who is, of course, outraged at having lost so many men - and without having heard a single shot. The commander states that they all drowned. At this the comrade major threatens to shoot him on the spot, just like this very commander had threatened to that first poor bastard who drowned. The commander explains that he lost all the men trying to cross the river that the major had ordered him to do - despite the commander stating that they had nothing with which to cross the river!
The major is furious at this block head who just destroyed an entire company of men. The major feels partly responsible and must call the colonel and report the loss.
The colonel is shouting at the major. He had given the major five hours to get his company across the river.
When told of the losses the men have encountered, the colonel is relieved. "If there were no losses our heads would roll," he states (the belief being that at least the died attempting to fight. Better that than not dying and looking like cowards to Stalin).
The colonel just wishes to know how the men died as he had not heard any weapons firing.
At this the major explains that the cucumbers, what the general soldiers was called, were all 'slant eyes' from the steppes who didn't know how to swim and who went in and drowned. The colonel is incensed. He states that HIS company has been dragging around pontoons all over the place for days! He would have given the major as many pontoons as he would have needed to get the whole company across the river safely.
The major explains that it's little use now since so few are left.
The colonel explains that they have to cross anyway because what counts is not how many died but that the order was carried out.