US Aid Can't Buy Troops: Ukrainian Soldier Says 'No One' Willing to Join Army

The service member expressed pessimism over the Ukrainian military’s dire straits, noting the ubiquity of draft dodging in the country.

A Ukrainian soldier from the notorious Azov* battalion offered a frank analysis of the country’s war effort to a local news outlet this weekend.

“No one is willing to join the Armed Forces of Ukraine nowadays,” said the soldier, identified as “Niko,” to a local online news outlet. The soldier continues to fight on despite having lost one of his legs in combat, insisting that there is no one to replace him.

A shortage of personnel has wreaked havoc in the country’s armed forces in recent months, with fatigue contributing to a breakdown in discipline and effectiveness as troops are unable to be rotated. The dynamic was on display recently as Russia was able to liberate a village in the Donetsk People’s Republic reportedly almost unopposed.

The one-legged soldier added that “literally no one” is willing to go to Ukraine’s front lines. It has emerged in recent weeks that multiple Ukrainian troops have refused to take orders from the country’s new commander-in-chief Oleksandr Syrsky, who is viewed less favorably than former military head Valerii Zaluzhny.

Fighting-age Ukrainians “do whatever they come up with” to try to escape the draft, the soldier added, including “swimming across the Tisza River and drowning themselves in there.” Some 22 Ukrainians have reportedly died attempting to cross the river separating Ukraine from Romania.

A senior Ukrainian military commander recently criticized Ukrainians demonstrating sympathy with draft dodgers in a social media post, claiming that “some of our citizens, unfortunately, no longer realize that their actions and public statements have turned into a powerful weapon in the hands of the enemy.” The commander slammed “bloggers and the free media” for their “moral support of draft avoidance.”

*Azov battalion is a terrorist organization outlawed in Russia.