Russian troops have been forced to use shovels in hand-to-hand combat in Ukraine due to ammunition shortages as Vladimir Putin increasingly loses his grip on the war.
In the latest update from the UK Ministry of Defense on the situation in Ukraine, it emerged that Russian mobilized reservists said they had been ordered to attack a Ukrainian concrete strongpoint armed only with “firearms and shovels”.
The Department of Defense said the shovels like the MPL 50 were also likely the tools used for hand-to-hand combat.
A standard MPL 50 shovel has a mythological reputation in Russia for being particularly lethal.
The design of the shovel has not changed much since its first introduction in 1869. It is small and only 50 cm long.
The Defense Ministry’s latest update on the situation in Ukraine revealed that Russian mobilized reservists said they had been ordered to attack a Ukrainian concrete strongpoint armed only with “firearms and shovels.” The Department of Defense said the shovels like the MPL 50 were also probably the tools used for hand-to-hand combat (file image)
A standard MPL 50 shovel has a mythological reputation in Russia for being particularly lethal. The design of the shovel has not changed much since its first introduction in 1869. It is small and only 50 cm long (file image)
It was used by the military as a close combat weapon, for entrenchment, as well as an ax and hammer in the Russian Empire, then the Soviet Union, and then the successor states since its invention.
Soviet Spetsnaz units reportedly trained with the MPL 50 shovel for hand-to-hand combat.
The Defense Department said the use of the shovel as a weapon “highlights the brutal and low-tech combat that has come to characterize much of the war.”
It added that one of the Russian reservists described that he was “neither physically nor psychologically” prepared for the action.
In addition, it said there is an increase in hand-to-hand combat in Ukraine.
It said this is likely because Putin continues to push for attacks by his infantry, even though they are short on ammunition.
The MoD update came as the founder of Russia’s Wagner mercenary force said his troops tightening their hold on the Ukrainian city of Bakhmut had run out of ammunition and that if they were forced to withdraw the entire front would collapse.
“If Wagner withdraws from Bakhmut now, the whole front will collapse,” Yevgeny Prigozhin said in a video published this weekend. “The situation will not be favorable for all military formations protecting Russian interests.”
Reuters could not independently verify where and when the video was shot. The images were published on a Telegram channel that spreads Prigozhin news and joined the Wagner Group.
The video was not published on Prigozhin’s usual press service channel.
Prigozhin said on Friday his units “practically surrounded” Bakhmut, where fighting has intensified over the past week with Russian forces attacking from almost all sides.
But on Sunday he complained that most of the ammunition promised to his troops by Moscow in February had not yet been shipped.
“For now, we are trying to find out the reason: is it ordinary bureaucracy or betrayal,” Prigozhin said on his usual press service Telegram channel.
The mercenary chief regularly criticizes Russia’s defense chiefs and top generals. Last month, he accused Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and others of “treason” for withholding ammunition supplies from his militias.
In a nearly four-minute video published on Saturday on the Wagner Orchestra Telegram channel, Prigozhin said his troops feared Moscow would designate them as a possible scapegoat if Russia lost the war.
“If we withdraw, we will forever go down in history as people who took the most important step to lose the war,” Prigozhin said.
“This is exactly the problem with ammunition hunger.”
Seemingly speaking from a bunker, Prigozhin said in the video that his troops would wonder if they were being “trapped” to be beaten by the top of the country or maybe even someone “higher up.”
Ukrainian soldiers in a trench under Russian shelling on the frontline near Bakhmut, Donetsk region, Ukraine, Sunday, March 5
Despite regularly boasting that it had one of the most advanced militaries in the world before invading Ukraine, Russia’s true capabilities have been exposed through years of war in which Moscow’s armies suffered tens of thousands of casualties.
Russian failures are partly due to its antiquated equipment coming into contact with more modern Western-supplied weapons in the hands of Kiev’s troops.
Thousands of Soviet-era Russian tanks and other armored vehicles have been destroyed, but melee weapons, such as the US-made Javelin missile system, the HIMAR missile system, or by explosives dropped by drones.
Meanwhile, even some of Russia’s most advanced paratroopers who were sent to Ukraine in the early days of the war to capture key targets have since reported getting rusty rifles and a lack of other vital equipment.
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