The heavy cost of a long war for Russia’s ‘best of the best’ - BBC Newsnight 

"What is your goal?" "To stop NATO from expanding." "And how will you accomplish this?" "By giving NATO enormous incentive to expand." ''And now Finland joined NATO and we have a 1270 km long border with NATO''' Great job, Vladdy. Absolutely great. You remain a master strategist.

Sadly these men won't be remembered. This isn't a Great Patriotic War. They are dying for no reason.

An unjustified war. Wasting lives of people for no good reasons. This is so heartbreaking !!!

This is absolutely first class reporting. Bravo to Mark and the team.

0:18 "Is really close from here to the enemy positions" enemy positions = hospitals, kindergardens, schools, civilians

Marching down the red square is a bit different than attacking an independent nation with millions of highly motivated people willing to die for their country being decisively more and more supplied by the best Western equipment Slava Ukraini

Young lives lost because of one man’s greed and the people who blindly followed him 😞

Not the “Great Patriotic War” … the War of Shame” invading another country

If Russians are upset by the losses, they can always go home any time. Nobody is stopping them from leaving.

Putin Feb 2022: _"Kyiv in threeeee daaayyyys!"_ Putin April 2023: We must protect mother russia from total annhilation 😅

This is great journalism. It’s finally nice to understand how actual Russians are seeing this war.

This is a great follow up to the original BBC report on the 331st. Keep up the good work.

No honor guard ? I sorry for their losses but there no honor in taking someone else's home country or life or liberty

The more of "the-best-of-the-best" are eliminated, the more of Moscow's hubris is humbled by a defeat, the more lasting peace in Europe and elsewhere in the world will be.

I have followed this series since your first installment .. it is excellent work.

God bless Ukraine. Slava Ukraine. Support from Malaysia.

Incredible work, BBC! This is the very rare type of work that makes me think that good journalism isn't dead

"He was so young and bla bla bla" let's be honest, he was occupant who invaded foreign independent state

They fight and die for one man’s ideology, not for the Russian people.

They are actually the worst of the worst.

An observation: One man's hero is another man's villian. In war there is only death and suffering for everyone.

a fantastic piece on a very interesting topic. thanks, bbc!

The stories written about the Russian military, all victims of Putin's atrocious unprovoked war, will not be flattering. The deliberate targetting of civilians, torture, and murder of Ukraine civilians will never be forgotten.

Many thanks for this interesting documentary!❤

Thank you for covering the human side of this terrible conflict.

Thanks for the indepth report on a Russian fighting group. Amazing how one town can suffer so much loss and not speak up.

As cruel as it sounds? I genuinely don’t feel sad for the families in Russia. Had these men died back at home in some cataclysm? Sure, I’d feel something. But the level of inhumanity, level of destruction and lack of empathy coming from the country supersedes any sad emotion. Leave Ukraine. Slava Ukraine. Edit: I’m Latvian. My country has had countless offenses against us by the Soviet Union. Mass deportation and exterminations. When we gained independence, Russia took a chunk of our territory away from us and let us go. The modern Russian state still threatens us with nuclear annihilation and uses Latvia to launder money. Ukraine is a country that has had the most extreme atrocities occur due to Russian hands, historically and recently. How many times does a country have to exterminate people before we can safely say that they are doing it yet again? In my historical, cultural narrative? It’s literally been Russian domination and subjection, deportation, extermination, Russification. For like the past 70 years. Even before then. If all these countries around me have scars similar if not worse that my country’s? Am I really dehumanizing if I don’t feel bad for the people who are acting inhuman themselves? Genuinely. *EDIT TWO: I DO NOT LOOK FOR VIOLENCE AGAINST RUSSIAN PEOPLE. I DO NOT HOLD ANY HATE TOWARDS THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE. BUT I DISREGARD SADNESS FOR RUSSIAN FAMILIES THAT HAVE HAD SONS KILL UKRAINIAN CITIZENS. SORRY MOM. YOUR SON WAS A WAR CRIMINAL!*

Excellent reporting. So sad that so many people are dying for pure ego...

I love them writing those words in the missile, as if they are the ones who have been offended or something. Really? Aren't you marching into someone else's land? People are insane, the stories they tell themselves are astounding...

Heavy casualties of Russian servicemen prove that real “Best of the Best” are Ukrainian warriors!

"It is well that war is so terrible, otherwise we should grow too fond of it." Robert E. Lee

Mark Urban is one of the few BBC journalists I can watch theses days. I remember his Newsnight Gulf War reports from 1990.

7:40 "Just like there are stories about the great patriotic war, I hope there will be stories written about our guys" I do not envy how she will feel when she realises that her wish will come true, but in the opposite way as she imagines it.

The guy falling at 3:01 🤣"The best of the best"

They died in service to a criminal regime... I think worst of the worst is more accurate

Lol it’s also funny how the Russian soldier was bragging about being properly outfitted. When I deployed to combat I didn’t once have to brag about the kit they sent me with because I knew they were going to give me whatever I wanted. Hell, I ended up getting way more shit than I needed, it was kind of a headache to keep up with. I deployed 3 times and wore a different camo pattern each time and I had 3 entire issues of desert/ACU/ and multi cam gear.

This series is excellent.

Thank you, BBC. We don't see much from "the other side". We pray that the Russians will go back home and fix their own country's problems. Ukraine was doing just fine before Putin ordered this horrific war. Long live Ukraine and glory to the heroes! Much love and respect from America. We stand with you now and always. 🇺🇦💙💛💪💪💪💗✌✌

I am not touched by crocodile’s tears. These families have zero reflection capabilities on what their men died for, and they will raise the next generation to be as amorphous as their dads. Crying and nice pictures will not erase the fact that they were accomplice in a colonial invasion of a sovereign state… they have nobody to blame but themselves, if ever they develop a sense of responsibility. Slava Ukraini.

14 MIGs on the way from Poland 💙💛

Awesome piece...

They need to make a deal before this continues to get out of hand

Great format, I hope, it continues.

More of this kind of serious and informative journalism 👏

Well done BBC I have been waiting a long time for part 3. Excellent work.

As explained by Battle Order in his RU-vid video "The Weakness of Russian VDV Airborne Force Structure", a big reason why the VDV have gotten chewed up in Ukraine is because they are often misused as conventional mechanized infantry, a task in which the VDV's thinly-armored BMDs and undersized infantry units are poorly suited for.

There is a lot to do in Kostomar (at the cemetery).

Hmmmmm.........................seems even the best of the best can't best Ukraine. Russia really believed the Ukranians were weak and infeeior....................boy, were they wrong!!!

I wasn't expecting a Part 3, and some sick part of me is looking forward to Part 4

Sadly, this is their punishment for not being as brave as the ones who rebelled.

4:44 that dude died like a hero while stealing a washing machine.

At 3:00, dude slips on dry concrete. Best of the best 😂

Russian woman "God, how many more death notification shall we receive?" God "umm leave Ukraine" 😂

Excellent report. Good to see one of these instead of the click-baits.

This will never be mended

03:01 that guy slipping just made me crack up a bit lmaooo

What’s amazing .. is that this didn’t have to be …. But You chose it … you’ll live in it for years.

The 331st Fertilizer Regiment . . . mindless serfs dying for nothing.

Anybody thinking they are just doing their duty please remember one thing. The soldiers that input coordinates into a missile system knowing it is being aimed at a civilian target are every bit as complicit as pootin himself.

Interesting analysis

God bless Ukraine 🇺🇦 🇺🇦🇺🇦❤️❤️❤️🙏🙏🙏

Amazing series,bbc. Keep it up!

I've always been interested in military stuff, especially in weapons development, effects and especially comparison between the Russian/Chinese systems and Western made weapons... Given that I know more on the subject than an average man/woman, I was never concerned with Russian weapons and their military's capabilities.. But oh boy, even I and people like me, were flabergasted and stunned by the performance of the Russian military. They've massively under performed in every concievable metric and way the military can even potentially screw up.. From the "famed" FSB intelligence agency pre invasion preparation to the performance of every service of the Russian military (non existent Air force, confused and uneffective Army, laughable Navy) to political decisions of Putin, to a complete breakdown of what's usually been the Russian strong point - propaganda and taking control over the narrative. Again, I wasn't so surprised that the "celebrated and world beating" S-400 SAM system didn't work as advertised, but I wasn't prepared to see the level of mishaps in basic military procedures, especially the logistics. Russian military couldn't follow their troops with fuel, food and water. Their command and control system is abysmal. What can you say about the military whose generals come to the front line and give orders via regular mobile phone apps? What can you say about the Army that was left hungry on the third day of the invasion so they had to rob grocery stores to get supplies (with an additional gain of taking toillete bowls and sending them back home).? What can you say about the supposed 2nd most powerful Air Force in the world being unable of enforcing a complete air superiority over Ukraine after 14 months of fighting? What can you say about that same Air force that is incapable of detecting, tracking, engaging and finally destroying a single military convoy that is bringing thousands of tonnes of military assets from the Polish border all the way to the Eastern Ukraine.? All in all Russia doesn't have "the best of the best" cause these kind of units, although better trained than a platoon of Wagner jailbirds, are still low on morale since they don't know why and what for they are fighting.

Fascinating

This is an update aired months ago, I hope this Russia’s best of the best regiment was reduced to rubble.. Slava Ukraine 🇺🇦🇺🇦

It's time for Russia to pay, no wrong goes unpublished here on earth!! Slava Ukraine from Nairobi Kenya 🇰🇪🇺🇦🇺🇦

In the fullness of time, we hope the widows find out why their boys died.

In the part talking of Russian generals singing the highest praise a member of the role playing group stacked it so hard 😂

thanks a lot from Italy - excellent work, indeed

I wish Ukrain in peace the soonest; all Ukranians victory the soonest. No more shedding tears, and no more leaving families.

They were the best of the best... In goose-stepping across the square.

Good. Let there be more sunflower seeds

Great reporting! Nice to see different reporting styles instead of "basics"

the type of journalism we want thank you

Can someone tell me the music to this, it's so dark lol

00:27 what's being shown is not artillery but mortar's.

Murderers are known and revealed. Hope, all'll be done whenever they and theirs are. People, thanks for helping us💙💛🙏

Have people from Russia not realised they are fighting a pointless war?

Calling up the Volksstrum and fire brigade units rushing around the front to plug leaks, sounds like a winning strategy.......

3:00 I hate to be that one guy that falls in the middle of an event in front of people

Slava Ukraine 🇺🇦 from Greece 🇬🇷

They aren't victims. They're accomplices. Say it they way it is.

Nice investigation but at the end what does he mean when he talks of mutiny or people of the units hometown protesting?

The first to go in have the shortest life expectancy something every soldier knows even before starting training, its either total sucess or total disaster for spearhead units.

It’s really sad that a lot of people are dying, regardless of your stance on the war. I’m against the war, but it still makes me sad to know lots of people are dying.

The late Soviet Union was able to go down in history with a certain grace, sportingly admitting the state of affairs, avoiding burdening its reputation with serious crimes and not bringing its nations into misery. Putin's empire is not capable of this.

It is the famous saying, F*ck around and find out!

2:59 Slipped up there mate

Good job guys, this is a pretty unique perspective

I have no sympathy for the Russian fighters, or for their mothers who continue to support the war against Ukraine. To me this would be the same as feeling sorry for Nazi soldiers and their mothers when they were lost to the Allied forces. I don't feel sorry for aggressors who choose to follow orders to invade another's land and murder them, or those who enable them including their families. Maybe the mothers are ignorant of the reasons their sons are fighting, but I'm sure the sons are not, and even if they are then they should still not be fighting for something they don't understand. Too many actual children are being killed because of this senseless war for me to worry about the mothers of grown men who willingly fight for Putin's arrogance.

No more war please.

I’m not the only one who saw the guy fall over while running at 3:01 right 😅😅

Oh man, part 3 of the 331st.

Hooray for the in-depth work of the amazing people behind this piece of art ❤

I really wished they'd use the word 'mission' instead of 'task' in their translation. It makes for a much better understanding in English.

"lavish praise" as one of the "elites" slips mid demonstration 3:00 😆

One thing is clear, russia will never do a “special military operation” ever again 😂. This has been a slaughter fest

You are uploading this video twice?

Bravo BBC, nothing beats your in depth reporting, top notch.

02:16 scraping their fellow conscripts off the tarmac!