There are sufferers with nerve harm, burns, breaks, even an amputated leg — and it appears nearly everybody’s inked legs and arms are noticed with shrapnel wounds.
Stepan Kaplunov lies on a mattress with a medieval-looking contraption shifting his leg backwards and forwards — each legs had been damaged in battle when a tank shell exploded subsequent to him.
Sporting a shaved head, beard and a sleeve of tattoos, he appears to be like like each different Ukrainian soldier within the room — besides that Kaplunov is definitely Russian. It is the one citizenship he holds.
Born in Ivanovo, about 150 miles northeast of Moscow, he grew up in Russia’s far north and later joined the Russian navy, serving a tour of responsibility in Syria. He confirmed us his identification papers to show his Russian start.
He described himself as an “opponent of the Russian authorities and the presidential regime,” and described Russian President Vladimir Putin as a “tyrant who’s pining to revive the USSR.”
But, Kaplunov says, he by no means felt compelled to behave on his opposition, till 2014, when Russia invaded Ukraine — seizing Crimea and a part of the Donbas area.
It moved me,” he advised CNN by means of a translator. “I am not going to say that 100% of my motivation is precisely justice. There is a predisposition in folks, individuals who like journey, threat taking. I had been a soldier earlier than and needed to use my abilities, and I had sympathy for Ukraine, I assumed Ukraine was proper and deserved to be helped.”
So, he crossed the border, and joined up with the Azov Battalion — then a ragtag militia of Ukraine’s most hardcore fighters, lots of whom had been ultra-nationalists, and white supremacists.
Kaplunov says he was drawn to the battalion as a result of it was the best one for foreigners to hitch and he knew folks in it already, versus far-right ideology.
“I did not have a lot of a selection,” he stated. “Possibly I might have gone to a different battalion or a daily Ukrainian navy unit, however I solely had acquaintances in Azov, so I went there.”
Fears of seize
Azov has since folded into the common Ukrainian navy and tried to distance itself from its extremist origins, although Russia nonetheless views the battalion as a band of neo-Nazis.
Kaplunov, who says he left Azov after two years, and bounced round different models of the Ukrainian navy, proudly sports activities a “Born to Kill” tattoo on his left arm, and the German phrase “Sieg Oder Tod,” which means, “victory or dying,” a battle cry broadly used all through historical past, but additionally linked to the Third Reich.
“That is my motto in life. I preferred the way in which it sounded and the way in which it was written,” he stated.
CNN has contacted the Ukrainian Ministry of Protection and the Azov Battalion for remark.
When Russia launched a full-scale invasion on Ukraine in February, Kaplunov says he discovered himself defending a village within the japanese suburbs of Kyiv with a rifle and a rocket launcher. Helmet-cam video he offered to CNN reveals shut calls, injured colleagues and burnt-out Russian tanks. Finally his luck ran out, and he was hit with a tank shell.
“I do not forget that I used to be very badly concussed, and my ears had been bleeding. Plus, I had concussion of all inner organs and a shrapnel wound in my eye. So after I got here to my senses after a couple of seconds, I couldn’t see something,” he recalled. “I attempted to crawl away and needed to blow myself up with a grenade to keep away from being taken prisoner.”
Kaplunov says he would quite have died than have been captured as a result of he feared if he was caught, he would have been killed, tortured or imprisoned. A regulation handed this month by the Russian parliament on state treason explicitly bars Russian residents from preventing in any navy battle in opposition to Russia — punishable by as much as 20 years behind bars. It additionally outlaws the show of Nazi emblems.
‘I needn’t show something’
In 2019, a preferred pro-Russian weblog claimed that Kaplunov had a tattoo of Hitler’s deputy, Heinrich Himmler on his arm, and a swastika on his chest. CNN discovered the declare after assembly with Kaplunov twice. Neither of his arms present a Himmler tattoo, and on a subsequent video name, he denied having a swastika or another Nazi imagery on his chest, although he refused to show it.
“I do not wish to pull my shirt off. However I haven’t got this tattoo,” he stated. “I needn’t show something to anybody.”
He brazenly describes himself as a “Ukrainian nationalist” however says he has by no means held neo-Nazi or white supremacist views.
His case illustrates the complicated realities of this struggle, and the ideological and propaganda struggle being waged in parallel to the real-life battlefield.
Russia has sought to justify and provoke public assist for its “particular navy operation” by magnifying a small minority of far-right extremists in Ukraine. Ukrainian officers routinely accuse Russians of being racists and neo-Nazis bent on wiping out the Ukrainian folks. In April, the Ukrainian Defence Ministry tweeted: “The Russian Nazis declared a struggle of extermination on Ukraine.”
Kaplunov’s resolution to struggle in opposition to his personal nation value him some associates again in Russia. He says others quietly supported him. He has additionally earned the ire of the Russian state. His title was revealed by the Russian authorities’s official newspaper on an inventory of greater than 200 folks suspected by the federal government of terrorism, or extremist actions.
His mother and father are nonetheless in Russia, and Kaplunov says they have been visited by Russian safety companies, however he is by no means frightened about their security.
“Russia, after all, is a rustic of a sure lawlessness, however nonetheless some norms and rights are revered there. So my mother and father don’t have any issues in any respect,” he stated.
Ukraine is his residence now, and he sees his future right here, although Kaplunov nonetheless does not have a Ukrainian passport, nor does he really feel significantly Ukrainian. He is nonetheless Russian.
“I really like Ukraine very a lot,” he stated. “However I nonetheless have mother and father and grandparents. All Russian.”
To Vlad Pachka, his Ukrainian comrade within the mattress subsequent to his on the rehab centre, it does not matter.
“Even though in his nation he’s thought-about a legal, a mercenary, there may be all the time a mattress for him in my home, he’ll all the time be fed, as a result of he’s defending my residence,” Pachka stated.
Kaplunov is aware of he’ll probably by no means be capable of return to Russia, nor can he return to the entrance traces anytime quickly. His accidents are in depth. Each his legs had been damaged, he cannot stroll with out crutches, his hand is disfigured, and is eyes are very delicate to mild.
His restoration will take months, if not longer. However he says when he will get again to full well being, he’s going straight again to struggle.
