Lack of motivation, desertion, corruption… the Ukrainian army’s battle to recruit – rts.ch

In Ukraine, Okean Elzy is one of the most popular music groups. This rock group, which has always preferred to sing in Ukrainian and not in Russian, has been accompanying anti-Kremlin demonstrations for decades now, using patriotic songs.

So, when there are shows, tickets are sold at a high price. However, on Friday evening October 11, tickets were on sale again, after the first of four concerts organized in the Ukrainian capital. At issue were police and military recruitment officers positioned outside the kyiv Sports Palace, who were checking spectators to see if any men trying to escape military service were among them.

On this occasion, the authorities therefore carried out identity checks and demanded the presentation of military documents. Several individuals not registered on official lists were arrested, as evidenced by several videos posted on social networks.

A game of hide and seek against a backdrop of corruption

For several weeks, this type of controls has intensified in Ukraine, becoming more frequent and more rigorous. Thus, while checks were taking place at the kyiv Sports Palace, similar operations were organized at the same time throughout the country.

In Cherkasy (center), officers intervened after a show by comedian Anton Tymoshenko while in Brovary, in the suburbs of the capital, checks were carried out after a concert by the group 100lytsia. According to the New York Timesother verification actions also took place in Kharkiv, Dnipro and other major cities of the country.

These measures, although largely unpopular, should ultimately make it possible to mobilize 160,000 additional soldiers to meet “85% of the needs of the Ukrainian brigades”, according to a communication made by President Volodymyr Zelensky at the end of October. But after almost three years of fighting, tens of thousands of deaths and hundreds of thousands of wounded, it is becoming difficult to find volunteers or simply people sufficiently motivated to fight.

“I will not serve, I will not serve (…) It’s hell there. I know it (…) two of my friends died, less than two months after their deployment (.. .) Here, no one wants to go to the front All these apartments are full of people hiding”: in an edifying testimony. for Le FigaroOleksandr, 39, tells how he sold his taxi for $6,000 to obtain false incapacity certificates from an intermediary.

Quoted by the French daily, a recruitment agent and other interlocutors who all requested anonymity speak of thousands of cases of this kind, for sums ranging from 5,000 to 25,000 dollars. They all point to the corruption which plagues the administration and which is very difficult for the government to control.

However, violent actions took place, with multiple arrests resulting. At the beginning of October, Ukrainian media revealed the involvement of several dozen prosecutors from the Khmelnytskyï region (west) in a vast network selling disability certificates. A case which led to the resignation of Prosecutor General Andriy Kostin, as recalled The World.

Shortly before, the National Bureau of Investigation (DBR) announced that it had discovered “nearly six million dollars” in various currencies, as well as jewelry and other valuables, in the apartment of the head of the commission medical office of the Khmelnytsky region (west), responsible for assessing the suitability of men for mobilization.

The manager, identified by the media as Tetiana Kroupa, and her son, director of the regional branch of the state pension fund, were placed in pre-trial detention, DBR spokesperson Oleg told AFP at the time. Slobodian. Investigators discovered false disability documents and lists of non-responsible people with “fictitious” medical diagnoses in the official’s office, the DBR said.

The Ukrainian state is therefore not remaining idle. The intermediary contacted by Oleksandr, for example, was also arrested and the latter therefore remains waiting to find out what will happen to him, always trying at all costs not to be spotted.

But in the opinion of many specialists, the country does not have the institutions and control capacities necessary to drastically reduce this type of situation, as corruption is too deep within the state apparatus.

Desertion, an increasingly frequent choice

But beyond people trying to escape mobilization, many soldiers also seek to leave the Ukrainian army after having been integrated into it. The number of desertions has thus increased significantly since the start of the conflict.

According to statistics revealed at the beginning of October by the Attorney General’s Office, 15,559 desertions were thus notified for the first eight months of 2024, compared to 3,342 in 2022 and 7,883 in 2023. If the latter continued to occur at the same rate, they could pass the 20,000 mark by the end of December. The number of deserters could thus have multiplied by more than five between 2022 and 2024.

The attorney general’s office also mentions the significant growth in “unauthorized abandonment of units”, which refers to soldiers who have left their post without authorization, although they remain localized. Here again, the number of procedures increased considerably, going from 6,641 in 2022 to 17,658 in 2023, then reaching almost 30,000 during the first eight months of 2024.

Taken together, the number of individuals who abandoned their posts without authorization and those who decided to desert would represent approximately 45,000 men, the equivalent of 15 Ukrainian brigades, calculates Le Figaro.

Interviewed by the weekly MarianneUlrich Bounat, geopolitical analyst specializing in Central and Eastern Europe, judges that the latest Ukrainian disappointments are, among other things, linked to this phenomenon. “Part of the Ukrainian decline can be explained by the lack of numbers within the troops. Sometimes, on the front, the ratio is ten Russian soldiers for a single Ukrainian soldier (….) Furthermore, the lack of formation is more and more glaring On the front, near Pokrovsk (east), we saw that troops withdrew in disorder. The government spoke of poor synchronization, but I think there is. also some of the soldiers who deserted under the power of fire Russian,” he analyzes.

Questioned Friday by theAssociated PressOleksandr Kovalenko, a military analyst based in kyiv, describes a “critical” problem, which should only “get worse” as Ukraine enters its third year of war.

AP was also able to speak with soldiers who had chosen to desert. All explain the nightmare of a war where they are constantly at a disadvantage on the battlefield, with little chance of emerging unscathed. “The best way to explain it is to imagine that you are under fire from the Russians and you receive 50 shells, while on our side there is only one. You see your friends being torn apart and you realize it could happen to you at any time, and meanwhile, 10 kilometers away, on the radio, people are telling you, ‘get ready, everything will be fine,'” one of them said.

To combat the phenomenon of massive desertion, which could be even more significant than official figures suggest, the Ukrainian Parliament has recently considered decriminalizing it, in order to be able to quickly reintegrate soldiers who have left the battlefield. An option which makes many say that such an action will only increase the number of deserters.

All this at a time when Washington is pressing the Ukrainian government to mobilize from the age of 18, while currently, men are only called to serve from the age of 25. A measure which would certainly again be extremely unpopular and dangerous for demographic reasons, as RTS already explained it. But a measure which could nevertheless be essential to contain the Russian invader.

Tristan Duke