It's similar to the American militia's experience in the Revolutionary War. Shitty and unmotivated militia can be used as a stop-gap in your line. You don't tell them to do anything but garrison a well defended position, put them next to highly motivated and disciplined troops, don't make it an obvious place to attack, and they'll actually do okay.
They aren't good troops, but you can typically use them in a pinch if you're careful. They may be motivated by the idea of glory in the battle if they do well. It's a good story to come home with.
Don't over expose them, don't give them complex orders, and allow them to retreat from battle slowly as a kind of skirmishing force, and you'll be fine.
The only real worse troops you can get is actually mercenaries. Your poorly motivated troops will flee at the first sign of trouble. Mercenaries, even good ones, can betray you during battle. You gotta be super careful with them. Machiavelli actually goes on and on about how fucking terrible mercenaries are. I think that's a personal bias from his particular era and region for warfare (feudal Italy... yeah, he's probably right). But mercenary forces can be highly competent and professional, and even more motivated that local forces if they are really good (the Swiss, the Hessians, the Prussians generally). Mercenaries are also the people who sacked Rome for years after not getting paid and forced the Pope to flee for his life, so you can see just how bad mercenaries can actually be.
Conscripts can work if used properly, and the worst they will do is break. Medium risk, low reward troops. Mercenaries can actually fucking turn on you, even if you paid them, even if they are professional. High risk, high reward troops.
Actual cannon fodder troops? Genuine troop formations designed to absorb heavy fire during the initial stages of an attack? They're actually all basically elite units. Light Infantry skirmishers that force the enemy to fire to early or expose their position (or sew disorganization by killing enemy officers), expert saboteurs who existed to blow up enemy fortifications, highly disciplined heavy infantry that are conditioned to resist artillery barrages, or even inspire incorrectly timed cavalry charges. The most extreme example are the Caroleans who were Sweedish crack infantry. They were extremely well-equipped, well-disciplined, professional soldiers who were designed to simply take heavy fire from enemy formations, engage at 50 yards, then re-engage at close range with swords and bayonets. This rush of crack infantry would regularly result in the breaking of enemy formations. The formations cannon and rear could then be attacked (either by advancing Caroleans or supporting cavalry), while the remainder of the regular troops made a slower advance on a disorganized enemy that would immediately try to redeploy and re-arrange units in the chaos, causing the whole formation to collapse into a route. This allowed the Sweedish Empire to punch well above their weight class against the French, Spanish, Poles, and Russians.
So yes, poorly trained and unmotivated troops can do well enough to survive and garrison positions if properly supported. But it's only the case if your enemy doesn't know how bad they are, and if you're a very competent commander. Otherwise, you do what the British did and just beat them into becoming disciplined. The whole Russian idea of shooting people who retreat didn't really serve any purpose except to scare other Russians from retreating, and keep the Germans on their toes.
Very rarely, and mostly as filler.
It's similar to the American militia's experience in the Revolutionary War. Shitty and unmotivated militia can be used as a stop-gap in your line. You don't tell them to do anything but garrison a well defended position, put them next to highly motivated and disciplined troops, don't make it an obvious place to attack, and they'll actually do okay.
They aren't good troops, but you can typically use them in a pinch if you're careful. They may be motivated by the idea of glory in the battle if they do well. It's a good story to come home with.
Don't over expose them, don't give them complex orders, and allow them to retreat from battle slowly as a kind of skirmishing force, and you'll be fine.
The only real worse troops you can get is actually mercenaries. Your poorly motivated troops will flee at the first sign of trouble. Mercenaries, even good ones, can betray you during battle. You gotta be super careful with them. Machiavelli actually goes on and on about how fucking terrible mercenaries are. I think that's a personal bias from his particular era and region for warfare (feudal Italy... yeah, he's probably right). But mercenary forces can be highly competent and professional, and even more motivated that local forces if they are really good (the Swiss, the Hessians, the Prussians generally). Mercenaries are also the people who sacked Rome for years after not getting paid and forced the Pope to flee for his life, so you can see just how bad mercenaries can actually be.
Conscripts can work if used properly, and the worst they will do is break. Medium risk, low reward troops. Mercenaries can actually fucking turn on you, even if you paid them, even if they are professional. High risk, high reward troops.
Actual cannon fodder troops? Genuine troop formations designed to absorb heavy fire during the initial stages of an attack? They're actually all basically elite units. Light Infantry skirmishers that force the enemy to fire to early or expose their position (or sew disorganization by killing enemy officers), expert saboteurs who existed to blow up enemy fortifications, highly disciplined heavy infantry that are conditioned to resist artillery barrages, or even inspire incorrectly timed cavalry charges. The most extreme example are the Caroleans who were Sweedish crack infantry. They were extremely well-equipped, well-disciplined, professional soldiers who were designed to simply take heavy fire from enemy formations, engage at 50 yards, then re-engage at close range with swords and bayonets. This rush of crack infantry would regularly result in the breaking of enemy formations. The formations cannon and rear could then be attacked (either by advancing Caroleans or supporting cavalry), while the remainder of the regular troops made a slower advance on a disorganized enemy that would immediately try to redeploy and re-arrange units in the chaos, causing the whole formation to collapse into a route. This allowed the Sweedish Empire to punch well above their weight class against the French, Spanish, Poles, and Russians.
So yes, poorly trained and unmotivated troops can do well enough to survive and garrison positions if properly supported. But it's only the case if your enemy doesn't know how bad they are, and if you're a very competent commander. Otherwise, you do what the British did and just beat them into becoming disciplined. The whole Russian idea of shooting people who retreat didn't really serve any purpose except to scare other Russians from retreating, and keep the Germans on their toes.
No problem.