Hours after a battle in eastern Ukraine in August, a wounded and unarmed Russian soldier crawled through a nearly destroyed trench, seeking help from his captors, a unit of international volunteers led by an American.
Caspar Grosse, a German medic in that unit, said he saw the soldier plead for medical attention in a mix of broken English and Russian. It was dusk. A team member looked for bandages.
That is when, Mr. Grosse said, a fellow soldier hobbled over and fired his weapon into the Russian soldier’s torso. He slumped, still breathing. Another soldier fired — “just shot him in the head,” Mr. Grosse recalled in an interview.
Mr. Grosse said he was so upset by the episode that he confronted his commander. He said he spoke to The New York Times after what he regarded as unwarranted killings continued. It is highly unusual for a soldier to speak publicly about battlefield conduct, particularly involving men whom he still considers friends.
The shooting of the unarmed, wounded Russian soldier is one of several killings that have unsettled the Chosen Company, one of the best-known units of international troops fighting on behalf of Ukraine.
Mr. Grosse’s witness recollection is the only available evidence of the trench killing. But his accounts of other episodes are bolstered by his contemporaneous notes, video footage and text messages exchanged by members of the unit and reviewed by The Times.
Much respect to that German medic for coming forward. This is blatantly unacceptable, though some will idolize and immortalize actions like this akin to Speirs’ actions from Easy Company…
Reminds me of those Australian soldiers, too.
I’m not surprised they were German, to be honest. Children learn from a rather young age what the Nazis did and that it should never be allowed to happen again. Development of an ethical consciousness is an important part of upbringing. It’s definitely not “the enemy must be destroyed no matter what” like in the US.
(Too bad they can’t see the beam in their own eyes when it comes to support for apartheid Israel 🤷♂️)
To some, they can only see at a short-sighted, shallow level that, “Hamas attacked Israel” and think no further. The same folks who only thought so far as, “Al Qaeda attacked us on 9/11” and therefore gave a blank slate to anything thereafter…
I hope the UAF strictly discipline those who did this. They’ve disgraced their entire country.
Allegedly.
Mr. Grosse’s witness recollection is the only available evidence of the trench killing.
But his accounts of other episodes are bolstered by his contemporaneous notes, video footage and text messages exchanged by members of the unit and reviewed by The Times.
He is confirmed reliable witness for other episodes, so there is good reason to believe him here too.
But his accounts of other episodes are bolstered by his contemporaneous notes, video footage and text messages exchanged by members of the unit and reviewed by The Times.
What motive would he have to lie about this?
To destabilize support for Ukraine obviously.
While actively volunteering on the front line for Ukraine as a medic…?
How is that obvious?
Scope my history, I already said we need to look into this and maybe withdraw our support.
But you act as if militaries haven’t done shit like this before.
Who better to use as a propaganda outlet than a volunteer medic, surely they have no reason to lie?
Whoa, THAT was fast. Yes, Putin invades sovereign nation, destroy countless cities. Commits Bucha; his forces sledgehammer prisoners; his forces execute a man after he digs his own grave.
You: “I guess we should just withdraw all support.” ???
Talk about BoTh SiDeS false equivalence fallacy, Batman.
This article is designed for one purpose to make Ukraine look bad so that support will weaken. Russia is a walking atrocity in Ukraine.
Yeah, that’s what I said.
I totally didn’t say we need to look into this and not support people shooting surrendering prisoners.
Be better
Treating surrending Russians well helps Ukraine since it encourages more Russians to surrender.
This is unacceptable and anyone doing this should see the full weight of the law
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Oh, look. Racism.
This strikes me more as the raw hate of continuous war. If you’re american, read the later events of the civil war as it dragged on; the civility wore away and mass slaughter became the norm.
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Yes the Russian soldiers should be killed and removed from Ukraine. It is called war. A war they started.
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That is clearly not what I said but feel free to put words in my mouth. Russian soldiers have invaded this country and should be killed and removed from this country. I will add the word soldiers to my comment above so it is even clearer.
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A war they stared.
You are a liar. The soldiers did not start the war. Even if they enthusiastically participate in it, that does not excuse vigilantism.
Feel free to call me Russian, although I have a Ukrainian surname.
You misread. He said they stared the war, which seems correct
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I’m sorry but you’re not going to get a unit of foreign fighters together and not expect some onion layer of warcrime.
The good old New York Times has become a Russian Propaganda instrument.
Hold up there, this is shit that we should know about.
If the side we are supporting is going to allow the killing of surrendered soldiers, then maybe we need to not be supporting them anymore.
We will have to see how the Ukrainians handle this, but if people aren’t imprisoned for it, then why continue to support them?
I say this as someone who fully supports Ukraine and my comment history is my proof
This is one incident that we don’t have all the information about. You really going to sell out an entire country over one incident that isn’t immediately rectified during wartime where they have far more to worry about than prosecuting every crime immediately or else?
It sounds to me like the German Medic witness was working on someone else and caught the event out of the corner of their eye while busy. Otherwise, why weren’t they working on the prisoner (and hence in the way). So, the witness didn’t know the severity of the wounds, in an area that was low on med supplies (looking for bandages, with a medic in LOS?) and just assumed it was a hate motivated execution when it could just as well have been a mercy.
Edit: and this supposedly happened almost a year ago? How is this even news?
Hence me saying we have to see how they handle this, I will give you I should have said how they handle this if true.
But yeah, if they knew about it and didn’t handle it, then depending on how far up it went, we shouldn’t support them.
I’m not cool with supporting people who kill pow’s
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Oh, ok. I forgot that since Russia did band things that now we don’t care about anyone else doing them
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I never said abandon them over one instance.
I straight up said to see how Ukraine responds to the charges.
If they handle it correctly than keep on having their backs until Putin is sucking Stalin a dick in hell.
If instead they try to hide and obfuscate it, then maybe we should start looking at what else they are hiding.
If we don’t hold our allies accountable…
Well fuck I guess that actually falls apart since we aren’t holding Israel accountable either.
It’s in the interest of all living beings that justice is done, not just Russia.
