By Olha Chepil | 2024-10-04

KYIV -- Panic is mounting in the Russian army from a bill banning their use of smartphones on the battlefield.

After passing through the State Duma and the Federation Council, the upper chamber of parliament, the bill now awaits the signature of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Russian service members are warning of catastrophe if he approves it.

The bill is disastrous, Alexander Kots, a Russian war correspondent, wrote on Telegram.

"There are people on the [Duma] defense committee with combat experience who understand full well that this provision is a disaster," he wrote July 24.

"They need to learn: that's how you make a fool of yourself in wartime," Kots wrote.

Arrested for having a phone

The Duma bill has outraged service members because it would empower a commander to jail a subordinate for 10 days for using electronic devices in a war zone.

No trial would be needed: unit commanders, military police and garrison commanders would decide whether to make an arrest.

On July 23, Dmitry Guliyev, an active Russian service member, posted a video on VKontakte social network in which he directly addressed Duma members.

"How the hell can you photograph destroyed targets, how do you confirm you've completed a combat mission [without smartphones]? It makes no sense. And what about communication among units?" Guliyev said.

The video garnered many comments clearly from service members furious with lawmakers.

"Of course, so civilians know less about the truth of what's happening on the front," "Pretty soon we'll go back to 1941 and do everything by snail mail," "This is being done to somehow hide all the s--t that's happening to us," read some of the comments.

The main goal of this bill is to halt the proliferating complaints from the front, say analysts.

"Russian officials simply can't stop the wave of truth that's gushing from every smartphone. ... If they put Girkin-Strelkov in prison, that means they haven't solved the problem," Viktor Yahun, a former deputy director of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), told Kontur, referring to Igor Girkin, a Russian nationalist imprisoned for "inciting extremism."

Poor communication support

Russia has always had problems with communication support in wartime, said Yahun.

Russian service members often -- especially in the early stage of the invasion of Ukraine -- used old Soviet walkie-talkies. They were unreliable, and Ukrainians easily intercepted the transmissions.

"There's a big protest because there's no alternative. At one point it was suggested to them: go buy a communication plan [with your own money], or feature phones that have no cameras or anything useful," Yahun said.

"But then the ability to communicate disappears. ... A slew of things will come to a standstill because the commanders don’t know how to direct troops now without devices."

The Ukrainian army has better communication equipment: radio sets come from abroad, often in Western aid packages.

"The Russians have either Chinese- or Russian-made communication equipment," Alexander Kovalenko of Odesa, a military and political correspondent for InfoResist, told Kontur.

"There are also what we can characterize as rather primitive Russian computers. They run on Elbrus processors and are generally quite antiquated. But they don't at all make up for valuable high-speed Western-made computer equipment."

'Let them do it'

The internet and Telegram have become the principal communication tool among units on the front, say analysts.

Soldiers generally communicate through voice messages, and they share coordinates, photos and videos, analysts say.

In war, smartphones are replacing paper maps. In addition, without devices, it is impossible to control spy drones.

If the Duma bill is imposed all at once at the company level, Russian units will lose combat capabilities on the front.

"Command and communication among units ... depend on a mobile connection and on smartphones and tablets generally," Kovalenko said.

"So when you deprive Russian service members of the ability to use this type of device, you're greatly weakening the Russian troops' command and control system and communication system. I support that completely. ... Let them adopt the policy."

Russian war bloggers and war correspondents sounded the alarm as the bill approached passage by the Duma.

"We don't plan to stop using the internet or Telegram even though we're aware of all their vulnerabilities. Before you outlaw something, you need to create something else," Dmitry Rogozin, a senator from the occupied part of Zaporizhzhia province, Ukraine, wrote on Telegram July 23.

The Russian Ministry of Defense has proven incapable of providing its troops with reliable communication support or protecting soldiers from planned attacks by Ukrainian troops.

"War correspondents in Russia have already inspired a wave of protests and discontent because they understand clearly how the communication issue needs to turn out and what this will lead to," Kovalenko said.

"But as we can see, here are these 'wise elders with their keen intellectual abilities,' and with their understanding of modern technologies, they'll raise everything to the level of a medieval meat grinder."