NATO countries such as the United States, Germany and Poland have agreed to send tanks to help Ukraine. Leaked documents show Russia offering troops “financial incentives” to destroy them, according to the NYT. Videos of the destroyed tanks will then be used to boost Russian confidence, according to documents. Something is loading.
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Russia is offering a bounty on troops to destroy tanks that were supplied to Ukraine by NATO nations, according to leaked US intelligence documents reviewed by The New York Times.
The documents, classified top secret according to the Times, said video footage of destroyed foreign tanks would then be used to boost the confidence of Russian soldiers and hamper morale in Ukraine and the West.
“Financial incentives would be offered for the capture and destruction of foreign tanks, and videos of destroyed tanks would be widely disseminated to reduce the confidence of Ukraine and the West and reassure Russian troops of their ability to defeat this new armament,” the document reads. said, according to the Times.
The document is part of a larger trove of information that has been leaked on social media over the past few days – some of which related to Russian and Ukrainian military activities, the Times reported. Experts noted, however, that some of the documents may have been altered for propaganda purposes.
Some of the leaked documents also showed that Ukraine could exhaust its air defenses by May, encouraging Russia to use bombers against Ukrainian forces.
Russia’s bounty strategy not only reflects declining troop morale amid a costly war, but also the country’s struggle to respond effectively to Ukraine’s tank force despite a greater number of armored vehicles.
According to the International Institute for Strategic Studies and Oryx, an open-source intelligence analysis platform, Russia has lost nearly half of its tank supply, more than 1,500 tanks, since the war began in last February.
A repeated misstep by Russia was to send a fleet of unprotected tanks into an ambush at Bucha and, later, at Vuhledar.
The United States, United Kingdom, Germany and Poland have agreed to send tanks to Ukraine.