10 March, 14:19
When it comes to penal battalions, most people immediately recall World War II and the bloody tactics of the Red Army. However, the tradition of driving people—especially convicts—into so-called “meat battalions” actually originated in the Russian Empire during the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–1905.
🔴 “Hunter Teams” – the First Penal Units
The Russo-Japanese War was the first conflict in which the Russian army systematically used prisoners. The underdeveloped Russian Empire was fighting a far more technologically advanced enemy using its favorite method—burying it under the corpses of its own soldiers. But catastrophic losses at the front had to be replenished. At some point, it was decided to make up for these losses with those who could simply be forced to fight—convicts and prisoners.
Thus, the so-called "hunter teams" were formed—units recruited from deserters, convicts, and those subjected to disciplinary punishment. Officially, they were supposed to carry out reconnaissance missions, but in reality, they were sent en masse on “meat grinder assaults.”
These units were the predecessors of the penal battalions of World War II, where the principle remained the same—using people as disposable assets.
Since the status of such soldiers was outside the law, their weapons were worse than those of regular troops—if they had any at all. Their tactics? Frontal assault reconnaissance and deadly “meat grinder attacks.”
🔥 World War I and the Evolution of Penal Units
After Russia’s defeat in the Russo-Japanese War, the tradition of recruiting prisoners into “hunter teams” did not disappear. By World War I, the Russian army actively used “reconnaissance by combat”—throwing penal units and new recruits into enemy trenches to reveal defensive positions.
Soldiers were recklessly sacrificed by sending forward those deemed expendable, and the number of their deaths was used to gauge the strength of enemy fortifications. The losses were enormous, with highly questionable military effectiveness.
Nevertheless, this tactic later became officially institutionalized in the Red Army during World War II.
💀 World War II: Penal Battalions and Barrier Troops
During World War II, the USSR formalized the penal unit system, integrating it into the state structure:
🔹 Penal battalions (shtrafbats)—for officers and soldiers who had fallen out of favor with their commanders.
🔹 Penal companies—for ordinary soldiers sent into the most dangerous assaults.
🔹 Barrier troops—NKVD units that shot retreating Soviet soldiers.
A classic example was the Battle of Rzhev (1942–1943), where penal soldiers were driven unarmed toward German fortifications, used as human shields.
🤡 Aggression Against Ukraine: “Storm-Z” and Prison for Refusing to Fight
120 years after the Russo-Japanese War, neo-imperialist Russia has returned to its old methods:
🔹 In 2023, "Storm-Z" units emerged—penal squads of convicts thrown mercilessly into frontal assaults.
🔹 Soldiers who refuse to fight are thrown into pits, executed, or sent to makeshift dungeons.
❗ Russia – A Country That Glorifies Butchers
Russians take pride not only in their “great victories” but also in the immense human sacrifices that made those victories possible. And yet, none of them ever ask: who or what caused the deaths of millions in these "meat grinder assaults"?
On the contrary, generals who slaughtered countless soldiers with their inept tactics are glorified in songs, honored with numerous monuments, and have streets and squares named after them. In Russia, there is an entire cult of worshiping the butchers whose incompetence led to the deaths of so many. And this war will be no different.
Russia does not change—it always needs people to throw into the meat grinder. And what’s most astonishing is that despite their mass extermination in wars and the state’s blatant disregard for their lives, Moscow continues to supply the front with endless waves of obedient "cannon fodder"—herded to the slaughter like cattle, marching silently to die for the empire.