If Russian soldiers have anything to sing about they usually do it in foot-stomping Cossack choirs belting out the words to Kalinka.

Lieutenant Vitaly Efremov decided to take a more modern approach: he made a rap video, released online, complaining about the rotten state of his barracks.

The clip hit a nerve with the top brass, which decided to post him to Siberia, where he can exercise his musical talents in the windswept tundra. He can probably consider himself lucky that he did not sing Elvis Presley’s Jail House Rock or the Pretenders’ Back on the Chain Gang.

The lieutenant modelled his video on Stan by Eminem, in which the rapper sends a letter to a frustrated fan. The Russian letter is to Anatoly Serdyakov, the Defence Minister, and is set against a backdrop of military decay: a crowded barrack room with peeling wallpaper, a scabrous bathroom, erratic shower water and broken equipment.

Just as Stan complains that Eminem does not reply to his post, so the lieutenant’s e-mail moans about a lack of response from the Minister. The video said that no progress had been made on granting cheap credits to professional soldiers, such as Lieutenant Efremov, who want to buy their own home. The Russian Army has shrunk from a Soviet-era level of 4 million to 1.2 million, with conscript service cut from 18 months to a year. It is increasingly dependent on professionals who sign up for fixed-term contracts, but they are more demanding, insisting on better conditions, wages and pensions.

The officer has been derided on Russian blogs as a bit of a whiner, but his point is at the heart of the malaise in the Armed Forces. The leadership is committed to investing some of its oil revenues in modernising the military, but even the apparently successful war against Georgia exposed shortcomings in equipment. Bullying is rife: every year there are hundreds of suicides and desertions. Improving old Soviet Army installations is very low on Moscow’s agenda when it wants to develop a high-tech fighting force.

A Letter to the Minister of Defence was posted on RuTube, the Russian version of YouTube. It attracted hundreds of comments, most of which told the lieutenant to buck up. One pointed out that his barracks near St Petersburg had been spruced up and the Minister had gone to inspect the place.

The lieutenant is deeply unhappy about his transfer because he will be unable to afford the nine-hour air journey from his new base in Ussuriysk to his family in St Petersburg. Even this gripe was deemed as too negative by the bloggers, most of them serving soldiers. “What’s he on about? The Far East Military District has the highest priority, the latest tanks, the most modern fighter aircraft,” one said. “Belt up, lieutenant!”

Russia’s generals, plainly worried that more dissident views may emerge on the internet, probably had another Eminem hit in mind when it came to Lieutenant Efremov’s punishment: Lose Yourself.

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