‘The single-use soldier’ – how the Russian army is running out of cannon-fodder recruits in Ukraine

A Ukrainian serviceman during drills at the border with Belarus. Photo: Viacheslav Ratynskyi

Natalya Vasilyeva
© Telegraph Media Group Limited

Russia is running out of “single-use soldiers” and can no longer rely on “human wave” attacks in eastern Ukraine that have helped in its recent offensives, British military intelligence has concluded.

Anecdotal evidence suggests Russia is cutting back on human wave-style assaults, a barbaric tactic that requires large numbers of untrained soldiers, as its recruitment of convicts in Russian prisons has plummeted.