[NBC News] Russian officials on Monday denied allegations that an elite marine unit had suffered catastrophic losses during an "incomprehensible" assault in eastern Ukraine.
It's not officially true until the Russians deny it.
/\ Mod embedded Snark O'The Day
Officials responded to what pro-Russian military bloggers and Telegram channels said was an unsigned open letter from members of the 155th marine brigade of Russia’s Pacific Fleet.
The 155th was previously mauled fighting near Kiev. Estimated casualties were 600 killed and another 600 wounded. Brigade ~3,000.
"They don’t care about anything other than to show off themselves. They call people meat," said the scathing and unusual letter, which was addressed to Oleg Kozhemyako, the governor of Primorsky Krai, a Russian region in the country’s far east where the unit is based.
The attack on the town of Pavlovka in eastern Ukraine, near the Ukraine-Russian border and south of the city of Luhansk, left 300 Russians dead, wounded or missing, according to the letter, which has not been independently verified by NBC News, although Kozhemyako responded to the claims.
"We have contacted the commanders," he wrote. "Yes, there are losses. There are heavy battles going on. But the losses are not as big as they say in this appeal."
Russia’s Ministry of Defense, issuing an unusual denial to a specific complaint from its servicemen, said in response to the letter that the division had not suffered "significant losses."
Tis but a scratch when compared to the earlier 1,200 losses.
The letter and the responses to it are the latest signs of unrest among Russian soldiers as President Vladimir Putin’s forces fail to take and hold cities as morale plummets. An ongoing Ukrainian counteroffensive has recaptured towns and threatens to take the key city of Kherson.
The letter alleged that the unit was ordered to take Pavlovka, but instead, half the unit’s equipment was destroyed over four days.
Chief of the General Staff Gen. Valery Gerasimov and Lt. Gen. Rustam Muradov, commander of Russia’s eastern military district, were guilty of "hiding" the true number of losses, it added.
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