When Russia launched a full-scale offensive two years ago, the Russian forces faced much tougher resistance than expected. Outside the offices where soldiers signed up for war effort, there were long queues in several Ukrainian cities. Young and well-grown men as well as a good number of women signed up for war effort. The Ukrainians radiated patriotism and eagerness to defend their country. Happy residents of Kherson embrace a proud soldier after the liberation of Kherson in November 2022. Now the mood and situation are not as pleasant. Photo: BULENT KILIC / AFP Now the situation is completely different. In the trenches along the 1000 kilometer long front, there are thousands of exhausted soldiers. They long for a break and to finally see their families again. Outnumbered The Ukrainian soldier Dima says that when Russian soldiers stormed the position where his division was, they had to flee. – We were knocked down in our boots, says the soldier to the Associated Press news agency. Only he and two others in the department survived, he says. Dima is one of the soldiers fighting near the town of Avdiivka in eastern Ukraine, where heavy fighting has been going on. He says that for every Ukrainian they faced five Russian soldiers. The Ukrainian forces recently chose to evacuate the city due to the Russian superiority. Hiding to avoid having to fight The way the country’s soldiers have fought against far more soldiers from the neighboring country is impressive. But after two years, there is a change. A tired soldier sends a message to his family. He is in a bomb shelter near the front in Donetsk. The picture was taken on 29 February. Photo: Efrem Lukatsky / AP A number of Ukrainian men who should have signed up for war efforts are hiding. This is confirmed by men who stay in hiding to avoid being sent to war to The Guardian and the Associated Press. One of them is 42-year-old Andrii. Like the aforementioned Dima, he will not give his last name. The man is hiding in his home on the outskirts of the capital, Kyiv. He is troubled by a guilty conscience. – I feel ashamed as a man in a way… I don’t feel free, Andrii tells the Associated Press news agency. A 35-year-old who works in computers says he is hiding because he doesn’t want to kill. He tells the same news agency that he is saving money to get out of the country. In Ukraine, it is forbidden for men under the age of 60 to leave the country. The 35-year-old realizes that the situation has become worse. – I now feel that everyone wants to throw me into the “meat grinder”, he says. The Associated Press writes that several tens of thousands of Ukrainian men at home and abroad are not signing up for war effort. Paying to escape At a recruitment center in Kyiv, doctor Olga Yevchenko is the boss. She checks whether the men in question are healthy enough to participate in the war. She tells the Associated Press that some who are there against their will offer health personnel money to avoid being sent to the front. – If a young man is sent here and he is perfectly healthy, you always know how it will end, there is no going back, says the doctor. The picture shows the soldier Vladyslav saying goodbye to his girlfriend Anastasiya at the train station in Kramatorsk in Donetsk on 8 October last year. Photo: GENYA SAVILOV / AFP A 36-year-old man, Rustem Mineev, has been sent to the recruitment center by his employer. Since he works in the railway, he thought for a long time that he would avoid being sent to the war. – Of course, I’m very scared, says the man before the health check. It caused a stir when President Zelenskyj last year fired all managers of local recruitment offices. The reason was suspicion of corruption. It turns out that many men have paid under the table to avoid being sent to war. Others have paid to serve in a safe place far from the front line itself. – Everyone understands that the system is not fair, says member of parliament Volodomyr Ivchenko. He refers to the fact that men from poor backgrounds in the countryside are sent to the war, while many from resourceful families in the big cities have escaped. – We are not made of steel The defeat in Avdiivka has given Russia its first victory in several months and has led to a breakdown in the fighting morale of the Ukrainians, writes The Guardian. The newspaper has spoken to a 39-year-old commander who uses the nickname Titushko. He claims that it was a lack of ammunition that forced the Ukrainians to withdraw from the city. – In November we could fire 300 artillery shells in ten days, now we can only use ten a day. – Before, the Russians had to be on their toes all the time. Now we can only shoot at them in self-defense now and then, says the soldier. – We are not made of steel, says soldier Igor Ivantsev. He has been injured twice in four months. Because there are not enough new recruits, soldiers at the front do not get a break from hostilities. This means that tens of thousands are completely exhausted. Even injured soldiers are “patched up” before being sent out to fight again. A field chaplain blesses a soldier to boost morale. The photo was taken on Christmas Day last year at the front in Donetsk. Photo: THOMAS PETER / Reuters The soldier says that his body aches when he walks with the machine gun over his shoulder. The field doctors don’t want him to take a break. He says that of the 17 soldiers he originally fought with, most are dead. The rest are struggling with injuries. The soldier’s commander, Commander Dmytro, says he is exhausted and his soldiers are depleted. – We have no healthy people here, there is no place we can get new ones from, he says resignedly. When the war started, the soldiers were promised that two weeks of war effort would be followed by a week off. Later, the agreement became four weeks of war effort before four days off. Plan to mobilize more Politicians have been careful to order all men to war effort. The government wants as much of society as possible to function almost normally even though the country is at war. Therefore, there has been room for many men to continue in socially useful positions. The first recruitment center was opened 12 days before the full-scale invasion two years ago. The Klitschko brothers known from professional boxing and Ukrainian politics were responsible for the opening. Photo: GLEB GARANICH / Reuters But because there is a crying need for more soldiers at the front, plans are being made that could lead to a mass mobilization. The authorities claim that around 300,000 Ukrainians are participating in the war now, and that the need is a further 500,000. The average age of a combat soldier is 40 years. The authorities propose to lower the age for mobilization from 25 to 23 years. If the plan for full mobilization is pushed through after new rounds of debate in parliament, those who do not participate in the war may be punished. There is initially talk of freezing the bank accounts of men who did not fight, or preventing them from leaving Ukraine.
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Ukrainians hide to avoid war – news Urix – Foreign news and documentaries
