Reservists from DPR are being told they are volunteers rather than mobilised, therefore can be thrown to the very frontline despite being in reserve. This is evidenced from a call between two Russian men, both presumably serving in Donbas, intercepted by Ukrainian GUR.

(R1)=Russian man (R2)=Russian man

(R1):On the internet there’s fuss about wives, women of Donetsk blocking some military unit. It’s a f*cking mess.

 

(R2): We had that today! We had that today!

 

(R1):You did?

 

(R2): It’s the 115th Kharkiv *regiment*, I don’t know if the talk was about that, but we’ve had something going on today. It’s the 115th, which has students… Pushilin’s order came out that the students should be let go. Started letting go of students, their mothers and girlfriends came over and started protesting – “Scumbags, the mobilisation is illegal! Are you out of your f*cking mind? Where have you taken our children?!”. So there was some fuss today, their command spoke about it. Their deputy battalion commander comes over here occasionally to replace radios, so they hang out at our opposition. It was him who talked about it… I don’t know if that’s what they wrote about on the internet, but I know they had some sh*t going down there. It’s a complete mess, you see? “…” Same as when we were in Mariupol and were told… when they threw us to the very front, and the boys started rioting – “why the f*ck we, the reservists, are going to the front, and especially in the first line?” And they said to us – “you are not reservists, you are volunteers. Everyone who came here came as volunteers”.

 

(R1):They’re taking us for fools, the Russians at the airport are also saying there’s plenty of self-shootings and no one wants to come here…