A correspondent identifying as a soldier in the 116th Separate Mechanized Brigade reported aggressive internal screening of personnel by moral-psychological support officers.

The account was published by Maxim Golosnoy after asking for the correspondent’s consent to share the message. The serviceman claimed that personnel are being intensely vetted for their political views, questioned about government corruption, and pressured to reveal personal mobile device activity.

I serve in the 116th Separate Mechanized Brigade. I do not know what exactly happened, but right now they are actively sifting through our personnel. That means looking for the disloyal. The moral-psychological support officers have been exhausting us. They constantly pull everyone in for talks, probing our attitudes toward the authorities, politics, and so forth. They literally hold interrogations, on topics that have nothing to do with service. They grilled me like that for half an hour, trying to find out what I think about the latest corruption scandals. The worst part is that they also poke into phones, demanding to see who you follow on social networks and which bloggers you read. They also want us to snitch on each other like rats. They ask who says what about the authorities, what the moods are, who is dissatisfied with what. If you happen to hear anything, do not forget to report your fellow soldier. They have completely lost their minds. It would be better if they asked what we actually lack and what real problems we have.

When confirming permission to share the message, the author also shared personal assumptions regarding why such screening measures might have been initiated across units.

In my opinion, they are hunting for the disloyal because dissatisfaction is piling up. That is certainly a fact. Apparently they started fearing certain actions from individual soldiers. For instance, things might be even worse in some other unit, and now they have started searching for so-called mutineers across all units.