- Drug use is widespread in the Russian forces fighting in Ukraine, news outlet Verstka reported.
- One soldier told the outlet that drug use is “like in Las Vegas.”
- Soldiers order a range of substances from dealers because they are bored, the report said.
Russian soldiers are getting hard drugs delivered to their trenches in Ukraine to escape boredom, according to the independent Russian news outlet Verstka.
Mephedrone, amphetamines, and alpha-PVP, known as “salt”, are among the substances that Russian soldiers on the frontline take, with effects including paranoia and hallucinations, the report said.
The outlet cited interviews with dozens of soldiers and residents in Russian-occupied territory in Ukraine.
“It’s like in Las Vegas,” one unnamed soldier told the outlet, according to a translation by The Times of London.
Another soldier, who is a regular drug user himself, told Verstka that everybody is aware of their comrades taking drugs in the trenches but that “nobody gives a damn.”
“The main thing is not to bother anyone. Just don’t leave the dugout,” he said.
The same soldier added that most soldiers do drugs “out of boredom.”
“War is when you’re constantly waiting for something, occasionally praying for it all to be over,” he said. “When I was smoking salt in the dugout, I didn’t give a fuck about a possible freakout. The boredom’s a lot worse.”
Access to the drugs is easy, according to Verstka, as they are either sold by locals, brought in by the men themselves, or found on the Telegram messaging app.
However, the drugs found online are not cheap due to the risk of delivery in the war zone, one soldier told the outlet. Three syringes of an illegal substance could cost about 15,000 rubles ($150), he said.
This is not the first time a report has outlined drug use among Russian troops.
In a report in May, the British think-thank Royal United Service Institute said that Russian soldiers often appear to be “under the influence of amphetamines or other narcotic substances” on the battlefield.
The drugs, often taken in liquid form, chemically lower the soldiers’ inhibitions, allowing them to continue advancing during battle even after being injured, the report said.
Mick Ryan, a retired Major General in the Australian Army and a military strategist, told Insider’s Erin Snodgrass that several countries have a history of supplying their soldiers with performance-enhancing drugs.
“This is nothing new, sending troops forward under the influence of drugs, it’s actually pretty common in military history,” Ryan said.
Source: I N S I D E R
