Why are Russian Soldiers Wearing Camouflage Tracksuits into Battle?
If you’ve been paying attention to some of the footage coming out of Ukraine, you probably have seen the photo of the Russian VDV paratroops that some Ukrainians allegedly trapped in an elevator. It looks like a scene straight out of the videogame Battlefield.
It really gives them a bit of Gopnik flair. A Gopnik, for those who don’t know, is your average sunflower seed spitting, plastic beer bottle drinking, tracksuit enthusiast that you’d find in a former Soviet Republic. But seriously, it looks like these soldiers are wearing knock-off Adidas tracksuits, so maybe Call of Duty isn’t that far off with their anime skins.
When Russian forces overtook Hostomel Airpot to the north of Kyiv they were wearing the same bands. You can clearly hear the CNN reporter say they are wearing orange and black armbands. It’s not just the VDV though. You can find it painted on Russian tanks from the Eastern Invasion. Even the Chechens coming into Kyiv are decked out with these orange and black three bar ribbons and patches.
So, why the ribbons? Well, the obvious answer is to distinguish between Russians and Ukrainians. It seems pretty obvious to both sides, that by using the same weapons and similar looking uniforms, the opportunities for fratricide are high, hence the yellow armbands used by Ukrainians. This is nothing new in terms of Russian doctrine. Reversible yellow and orange florescent armbands have been used by Russian direct action teams, FSB, SOBR, etc., for years. Beyond simple identification though, the ribbon has a much richer history.
Dating back to 1769, the ribbon first emerged as part of the Order of St. George, the highest military honor in Tzarist Russia. Although an individual award, in 1806, Georgian banners were introduced to mark distinction among Russian Imperial Guard regiments, also known as the Leib Guard. The orange and black colors are said to symbolize the fire and gunpowder of war, the death and resurrection of Saint George*, as well as the colors of the original Russian imperial coat of arms. However, there is an alternate theory that these colors are German in origin, being drawn from the heraldry of the House of Ascania, the family which Catherine the Great came from, since the original citation for the order describes yellow stripes instead of orange.
After the Bolshevik Revolution, the ribbon disappeared until the Second World War when it was integrated into the newly established guard units, whose badges and banners sported the black and orange colors in a similar fashion to the old Imperial Guard.
Later in the War, the ribbon was used as part of the Order of Glory, an award for bravery in the face of the enemy, which was only awarded to enlisted soldiers and junior officers. Most of these medals came out of World War II, but a few were also awarded for Soviet operations in support of the Korean War, the intervention in Hungary in 1956, and during border clashes with China in 1969.
More notably, the black and orange ribbon was part of the medal “For Victory Over Germany,” which was issued to almost all veterans who participated in the Eastern Front campaigns. From then on, the ribbon could occasionally be seen on postcards commemorating the war, but it wasn’t a large part of the Soviet patriotic zeitgeist.
It wasn’t until 2005 that the ribbons saw widespread prominence as part of the 60th anniversary of VE Day. The news agency RIA Novosti and the youth civic organization РООСПМ started handing them out as part of the commemoration. Along with the ribbon they used the slogan “We remember, we are proud!” (Мы помним, мы гордимся!)
The ribbons, they served a similar function to the yellow ribbons in the United States after the Invasion of Iraq. Some journalists have speculated that the small George ribbon was a response to the rise in prominence of orange ribbons in Ukraine during the 2004 Orange Revolution.
Because of its historical association with the Russian military, the orange and black ribbon became a symbol of Russian irredentism, the belief that Russia holds legitimate claims on lands lost after the fall of the Tzar and the USSR. As a result, it was adopted by Russian “Self Defense Forces” after the annexation of Crimea, as well as pro-Russian separatist forces in the Donbas.
This is why you’ve seen the orange and black adopted by Russian soldiers. Not because they’re trying to channel their inner Sasha Ivanic from “Behind Enemy Lines,” but because of its historic ties to Russian militarism and its use as a symbol of irredentist claims of the former Russian Empire.
Tomorrow I’ll be releasing a full video on my YouTube channel where we go even more in depth about the Ribbon of St. George.
*I’m not well versed in Russian Orthodox theology, but the only thing I can find on the resurrection of St. George is in Islamic theology. That during his martyrdom, he was resurrected three times. That being said, the original Russian text uses the word, “воскрешение,” which translates to resurrection.