the more desperate someone is the worse things they're willing to do. this has been the predominant principal of moscovite rule since the 1500s at least. they enforce terrible living conditions on friend and foe alike in the hopes of creating an advantageous situation in which everyone will go along with what's going on to avoid it coming for them.

the greatest tool the people at the top of our hierarchical societies have to maintain the hierarchy is our apathy, and they keep us apathetic by torturing us into believing hope is a useless endeavor. our greatest strength is our solidarity. there's more of us, those without power in the hierarchy, than there are of them.

the frustration here is that these soldiers are kept too desperate to see the truth: they are starved by their commanders, not the Ukrainians, or the west, or whoever else their command structure is telling them. they could be fed if they took the option to desert or surrender. but it's more convenient for them to carve out a pocket for themselves within the hierarchy. "i wield more power than civilians so i get some food. i am better than Ukrainians so it's fine for me to kill them. my commander is above me, so it makes sense his food is better."

it's this style of thought that sees the rise of the worst forms of government across the world, and it has everything to do with that it's what works best for ~17-22 people, and one of them is the sickly potato shaped dickface in charge of russia