The Russian Ministry of Defense actively uses the formed "volunteer corps" for offensive actions in the war against Ukraine, despite the fact that, by characteristics, such formations are not suitable for such tasks, British intelligence wrote in the report of the Ministry of Defense of Great Britain, published on the social network H.
"The Russian Ministry of Defense is increasingly centralizing command and control mechanisms over informal pro-Russian forces, possibly with the aim of simplifying their use in offensive operations in Ukraine," the report states.
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In February 2023, the Russian Ministry of Defense created the so-called "volunteer corps" under unified command and control, "which gathered about 20 thousand reservists, mercenaries and ex-prisoners willing to fight. Since then, this formation has been actively used in offensive actions in Ukraine, although, analysts note, it is not suitable for such purposes.
"Russian formations are primarily light infantry units without integrated artillery or air support, making them more vulnerable than regular units. Accordingly, over the past 9 months, Russian "irregular military" units probably suffered proportionally greater losses than the forces of the regular units of the Russian army", the report also states.