The Documentary Podcast4 Maalis 2025

Assignment: Russia’s new war elite

Russians who sign up to fight in Ukraine earn big money in salaries and bonuses – and the Kremlin is even more generous to families of those killed in battle. Average compensation packages for a dead son or husband are worth about US$130,000. In less-wealthy Russian provinces, where most recruits are from, that’s enough to turn your life around. Reporter Arsenii Sokolov finds out how the relatives of the tens of thousands of men Russia has lost in the war are spending the money – and asks whether the pay-outs will help create a new “patriotic” middle class that supports Vladimir Putin.

He talks to a woman who’s used her “coffin money” to open a restaurant in memory of her dead son – and hears about a craze for ultra-expensive hair-dryers among wives and girlfriends of soldiers from Siberia.

Marrying soldiers has become so attractive that women on dating apps often search specifically for men in uniform.

But the compensation payouts are also fuelling furious court battles, when divorced or separated fathers who’ve played little role in child rearing suddenly reappear after their sons’ deaths and demand their share of the coffin money.

Besides the cash, there are many privileges offered to soldiers and their families, and to bereaved relatives of the fallen. Their children can go to university whatever their grades. And the Kremlin has started a programme called “Time of Heroes” that claims it will fast-track selected returning servicemen into elite positions in local politics and business. But can Putin’s attempt at social engineering really work? And will “deathonomics” – as one economist calls it – really boost the economy of the provinces that have suffered most from the huge death toll?

Tämä jakso on lisätty Podme-palveluun avoimen RSS-syötteen kautta eikä se ole Podmen omaa tuotantoa. Siksi jakso saattaa sisältää mainontaa.

Jaksot(2000)

Who's afraid of the AI job-snatchers?

There is a general fear that artificial intelligence could make huge swathes of workers redundant, but are those fears unjustified? Rob Young asks what history can tell us about big technological leap...

7 Syys 17min

Getting the homeless homed

We visit two projects exploring practical responses to homelessness and housing insecurity. Presenter Myra Anubi travels to Edinburgh to see the work of Social Bite, a charity creating small communiti...

6 Syys 23min

Ukraine's 'hell jumpers'

The rescuers who dodge drones and bombs to evacuate from frontline areas in Ukraine, known as the “kill zone”. More than four years after Russia’s full-scale invasion, thousands of civilians still liv...

5 Syys 29min

Nepal floods: 'It was like a tsunami'

Survivors of the floods in Nepal share their experiences of escape from the torrent of water that swept through valleys in the Himalayas, killing at least 1.300 people. “For me that river valley was w...

5 Syys 23min

Fred Hammond

Fred Hammond is one of the biggest names in Gospel music, with 15 Grammy awards, and a career that spans over 40 years, from playing bass in The Winans to more recently his Tiny Desk Concert. His song...

4 Syys 26min

A23a: Biography of an iceberg

Forty years ago, an iceberg broke away from the Antarctic ice shelf. But this was no ordinary iceberg. A colossal chunk of ice which covered an area twice the size of London, it was as deep as the Emp...

3 Syys 28min

Fighting the silent killer

Presenter Becky Green lost one of her twins to sepsis in 2018. It is a condition that, according to the World Health Organization, is implicated in one in five deaths worldwide - more than bowel, pros...

2 Syys 26min

Big surveillance, Flock and ICE

AI cameras, drones, licence plate readers, sound detection, Flock - the United States is monitored through a growing, high-tech, and increasingly interconnected surveillance network. In some cities, l...

1 Syys 26min