this pair of cute husky puppies may look sweet as they cuddle up to groups of soldiers, but these images help prove an open secret russia's president does not want the world to know the shots were posted on social media by russian troops from military unit 46108, the 5th tank brigade, based in buryatia, which lies between lake baikal and mongolia in the far east of siberia a keen eyed blogger has used them to help prove these soldiers have been fighting and dying very far away from there in eastern ukraine   something vladimir putin has always denied they back up the account of a 20 year old tankist who claims he was hurt fighting in a civil war which has torn ukraine apart, according to blogger aric toler a russian soldier in the 5th tank brigade with two siberian huskies, apparently at the kusminsky military base near the ukrainian border this helps bolster claims of direct russian involvement in the civil war  the dogs all have exactly the same markings, helping to provide a common thread between all the images  the brigade's stay at the base over the winter was likely in preparation for crossing the ukrainian border and joining the fight on the separatist rebel side  this is because the shots of the siberian huskies, unmistakably the same ones given the identical patterns on their fur, provide a common thread linking images which all purport to show the brigade members at the kuzminsky military base in russia near the ukrainian border on march 2 the tankist in question, dorzhi batomunkuyev, gave an explosive interview to russian independent newspaper novaya gazeta in which he claimed to have sustained injuries fighting against government forces in ukraine his brigade's stay at kuzminsky over the winter, in preparation for crossing the border and joining the fight on the separatist rebel side, was a key part of the young soldier's account in the background of the photographs with the dogs various elements of the camp   including tents, military equipment and trenches   are visible, helping to confirm its existence and the specific military units stationed there the photographs themselves are also geotagged as being taken at the base which, along with the common thread of the two huskies and satellite imagery showing military hardware stationed in the area, makes it safe to say that members of the 5th tank brigade, and other russian tank brigades, were stationed at the kuzminsky base in the background of the photographs  various elements of the camp   including tents, military equipment and trenches   are visible, helping to confirm its existence and the specific military units stationed there  a number of images of russian tanks with their marking obscured were posted on social network vk  a russian tank with the identification number on its hull covered over can be seen in the background here  the ploy was most likely done to make it harder to identify the tanks as russian when they rolled into ukraine  according to toler all of this gives credibility to batomunkuyev's more revealing claims that he was hurt on february 19 when being fired upon by ukrainian soldiers in the deadly 'debaltseve pocket' near the strategic transport hub seized by rebel forces a despatch from separatist fighters on february 19 describes how the road between debaltseve artemivsk in the area of lohvynove became a 'road of death' for ukrainian soldiers   though russian fighter batomunkuyev escaped with his life this satellite shot shows a build up of military vehicles around the kuzminsky base  he is apparently far from home recovering from serious injuries in rostov near the ukrainian border after being transferred from a burn recovery unit in a donetsk the photographs of tanks on the kuzminsky training ground show numerous examples of the identification numbers on their hulls being obscured   exactly the kind of ploy which would make them harder to identify as russian when they most likely rolled into ukraine toler writes: 'geotagged locations on vk [a russian social network] are often unreliable, but there is a common thread that links many soldiers together to confirm that they were at the same place at roughly the same time: two siberian husky puppies 'it is quite rare to have a common identifying feature that is unique to a specific date and time when conducting geolocation, but this is such a case 'and yes, much like some camouflage patterns on uniforms and tanks, the fur patterns of the puppies match perfectly in each photograph' 'the cumulative effect of all of these details is hard to dispute members of the 5th tank brigade  were indisputably at the kuzminsky training ground throughout the winter, starting in november, but it is difficult to determine how many of the 5th tank brigade fought in ukraine 'regardless, one of these tankists was in a burn unit in ukraine from battlefield injuries, and nearly all of the verifiable details provided in his interview can be confirmed through open source data 'it would have taken either an inconceivably talented conspirator or a cosmic coincidence for this interview not to be considered key evidence of russian military involvement in ukraine after the adoption of the february 15 minsk ceasefire accords'
russian 5th tank brigade ukraine dorzhi batomunkuyev debaltseve ukrainian vladimir putin's
shots posted on social media by russian troops from 5th tank brigade . back up the account of tankist who claims he was hurt in ukraine civil war . dorzhi batomunkuyev claimed to have suffered burns near  debaltseve . husky shots place soldiers at military base on ukrainian border over winter . provide common thread linking images, according to keen eyed blogger . help to undermine vladimir putin's denials of russian involvement in war 