This circulating a clip as brief as it is disturbing: what appears to be a fragmentation munition falls at a soldier’s feet, explodes practically beneath him and, against all logic, the man continues walking as if nothing had happened, “ignoring” the immediate impact of a detonation that, by pure physics, should have destroyed him or at least knocked him down and left him incapacitated.
The explanation points to a tactic that is not new.
What doesn’t fit. The most striking from the video It is not just that he remains standing, but the absence of the instinctive reaction that any body has to pain and shock, as if the nervous system were disconnected or anesthetized.
And here comes the detail that makes the scene even more disturbing: according to Canadian analyst Roythe scene suggests that it is a Russian soldier, and that what we see is not a typical Ukrainian attack, but a deliberate attempt to eliminate him by his own people, perhaps because he was trying to defect. In that reading, the explosion would not be bad luck, but rather a covert execution, with what appears to be una OFSP-0.5, launched with the intention of cutting his retreat short and erasing any uncomfortable history before he crosses a line or surrenders.
The “zombies” of Bakhmut. The image does not appear out of nowhere: it fits within a sensation that is repeated from the hardest moments of the siege at Bakhmutwhen Ukrainian fighters they described Russian attacks that seemed written by someone who doesn’t understand human survival. Waves of men advancing without coordination, without visible tactical logic, walking almost in a straight line towards enemy fire, with stories that spoke of soldiers who kept appearingalthough the first had already been killed, and with a strange passivity even under bombardment.
We talk about videos where soldiers were seen move slowlystaggering, as if they were stuck in a thick dream, unable to move away even as grenades fell around them. In that framework, the video soldier current seems like the extreme version of the same impression.
The drug hypothesis. For months, many Ukrainians have sustained an uncomfortable idea: that part of these attacks are not explained only by incompetence or desperation, but by soldiers “doped” envoyswith substances that reduce fear and disconnect prudence. The accusation appears in direct testimonies: men who seem euphoric or absent, who advance without understanding what they are doing, who do not retreat even if death is obvious, who react late or not at all.
Not only that. Suspicion persists because, from a military point of view, the temptation it’s too clear: If what you need is infantry who will walk toward fire, who will endure a corridor battered by artillery, who will not be slowed by anxiety, and who will execute orders in an environment where instinct would say “flight,” a stimulant or narcotic mixture can make a soldier a more manageable asset.
Pervitin, an early form of methamphetamine, which was widely used in Nazi Germany
The Nazi shadow. To understand why this idea is not science fiction, just look at the most famous historical precedent: Nazi Germany led drug use combat at an industrial level with Pervitina low-dose amphetamine similar to modern methamphetamine that was first popularized in civilian society and then became a military multiplier.
wanted something simple: reduce sleep, raise morale, reduce fear, increase aggression and sustain the execution of tasks without rest for days, just what is needed for rapid offensives and to maintain the rhythm when the body should collapse. And it wasn’t just the Nazis, also the allies.
Super soldiers. That logic fit like a key in the blitzkrieg lock: continuous movements, mechanized attacks, advance without pause, a sensation of permanent thrust that overwhelmed the enemy not only because of the power, but because of the ability to not stop.
He myth of the “super soldier” It wasn’t a futuristic helmet: it was a pill. And if that episode taught anything, it is that armies, when they believe they can gain an advantage or sustain performance, usually put immediate effectiveness before medium-term human cost.
Soldiers under the influence. The pattern of effects attributed to this type of stimulant is perfectly compatible with what appears in many stories of the war: less fear, more aggressiveness, less need to sleep, more resistance to fatigue and a certain ease in executing simple commands even in extreme conditions. The price is usually the psychological and physical toll: dependency, depression, impulsivity, loss of judgment, and a progressive degradation of the soldier as a functional person outside of the moment of combat.
On the front line, however, that bill is irrelevant to a short-term planner: if what you need is for someone to cross a field of fire today, you care little about what happens to them a month from now. That’s why video on networks It is so symbolic and striking: it seems to be the exact moment in which the body stops behaving like a human that preserves its life and begins to behave like a moving object that only obeys the forward vector.
The other side of the coin. However, there is an essential nuance: “zombie” behavior does not always involve drugs. It may simply be the ugliest version from reality: extreme coldlack of equipment, exhaustion, hungeraccumulated sleep, sustained stress and the confusion of a mind that shuts down. The early hypothermiafor example, fits brutally with many clips: slowness, clumsiness, difficulty processing stimuli, confused speech, lost gaze.
And in the Russian case there is also a historical tradition of war “fuel” much more mundane: alcohol as a tactical and psychological value, from vodka rations in World War II (used to combat the cold and to give courage before attacks) until modern episodes of indiscipline and documented drunkenness.
A sign of the times. In short, the video that has gone viral In networks it leaves that somewhat absurd feeling of “two options”: either it was a Terminator, or the soldier was under some type of altered state that nullified the immediate fear and pain.
If you also want, the most realistic, and perhaps most disturbing, answer is that the combination of an exhausted army, a war that requires constant advance, discipline hardened to the point of cruelty, and possibility of using substances to turn the body into a more obedient instrument.
Image | nara,X, Jan WelleSergeant Ian Forsyth RLC/MOD
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