The Ukrainian army is shrinking to nothing. Subjected to heavy losses after almost three years of Russian invasion, the blue and yellow forces saw their ranks thinning little by little. The cause is desertions which continue to increase. In November, the Associated Press, citing the Ukrainian prosecutor general’s office, reported that more than 100,000 soldiers have been accused of desertion since February 2022. “Prosecutors have opened 60,000 cases against soldiers who abandoned their positions in 2024.” , specifies Financial Times.
In a long survey by the British daily, we learned that the number of Ukrainian deserters, over the first ten months of this year, is “almost twice as high” as in 2022 and 2023 combined. If men of military age are prohibited from leaving Ukraine, they take advantage of their travel to training camps abroad to vanish into thin air. “About twelve people flee on average each month from military training in Poland,” said a Polish security official interviewed by the weekly.
At the end of October, hundreds of infantrymen serving in the 123rd Ukrainian brigade abandoned their positions in the eastern town of Vuhledarn (Donestk Oblast). They returned to their homes in the Mykolaiv region where some staged a rare public protest, demanding better preparation and better weapons. “We have arrived [à Vuhledar] with only automatic rifles. They said there would be 150 tanks, there were 20… And nothing to cover us,” explained an officer of the 123rd Brigade, who spoke in the Financial Times under condition of anonymity. If convicted, the deserters face up to twelve years in prison. Some members of the 123rd Brigade have since returned to the front, others have gone into hiding or been placed in pre-trial detention after being arrested, according to local authorities.
A difficult context for Ukraine
The increase in desertions is part of a difficult context for the Ukrainian army which sees the Russian steamroller conquering territories at a faster pace than ever since 2022. In November 2024, the Ministry of Defense claimed the capture of several villages on the outskirts of the town of Kurakhove, which seems to be the real objective of these troops. “The pincers are closing in on Kurakhove,” insisted a senior Russian army official in mid-November. at the RBK economic agencytaken up by our colleagues from International Mail.
On the ground, the men in Ukrainian fatigues are exhausted and have no opportunity to rotate or rest. Enough to frighten those who might have wanted to participate in the war effect. On the other hand, in Russia, officials had said that by 2023, the Defense Ministry was recruiting at a rate of 1,600 soldiers per day. But the figures cited publicly this year place this rate at around 1,000 per day, recalled Euronews last September.
How to increase the ranks of Ukrainian troops? Volodymyr Zelensky refuses to request human aid from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). On Sunday, December 1, he justified this choice following a meeting with the spokesperson for European diplomacy, Kaja Kallas, and the President of the European Council, Antonio Costa, both visiting kyiv on the first day of their mandate: “If I asked the question of the need for foreign troops, whether from NATO or elsewhere, half of our allies would immediately stop supporting us,” he stressed. However, the president and warlord can count on Ukrainian volunteers living in Europe.
700 Ukrainian volunteers recruited in Europe
In total, there were 700 who registered at the beginning of November to join the Ukrainian Legion, a new formation of the army which was then supposed to be deployed against Russian troops on the front, detailed on Tuesday November 12 , the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense. Ironically, some had fled their country illegally, precisely for fear of being mobilized. In order to facilitate the enlistment of these soldiers across Europe, kyiv announced, at the beginning of October, the opening of a first recruitment office in the Polish city of Lublin. Applicants applied from several countries, including Poland, the Czech Republic, Germany and Ireland. The first recruits signed their contract in the Lublin recruitment center before immediately leaving for a training center in Poland, the ministry added, without specifying how many people had signed up.
The volunteers will receive 35 days of basic military training, with the participation of Polish and Ukrainian instructors, after which they will undergo specialized training at NATO bases in Europe, said Petro Gorkoucha, Ukrainian lieutenant-colonel. kyiv recently announced plans to mobilize 160,000 people between November and February. At the start of the year, kyiv estimated that around 300,000 Ukrainians of fighting age lived in Poland.
Among the other solutions, a senior official in the Washington administration, quoted by the weekly Newsweeksaid kyiv should consider lowering the mobilization age to just 18, in order to quickly send more troops into its army. Lowering the conscription age is very controversial even though it was already reduced to 25 years (compared to 27) last April. The mobilization is a heated subject in Ukraine, where the enlistment system, considered unfair by many Ukrainians, has been at the center of a number of corruption scandals.