Russian military casualties are rarely frequently acknowledged in Russia, but the BBC reports that at least 39 members of the elite 331st regiment have perished.
There are units that stand out in all conflicts and others that become symbols of failure. The 331st Guards Parachute Regiment had great aspirations of being the former, but today depicts Russia’s strategy for a rapid war disintegrating. Col Sergei Sukharev, the brigade’s commander, was killed in Ukraine on March 13 and received the Hero of the Russian Federation medal posthumously. Deputy Defense Minister Gen Yuri Sadovenko remarked at his burial that the colonel “lived for the future, for the future of our people, a future free of Nazism.”
