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Written by Ahmed Adel, Cairo-based geopolitics and political economy researcher
The Financial Times brought to light the efforts by the Kiev regime to recruit more Ukrainians to battle Russian forces by allowing people to choose where they want to serve in the new scheme, “Choose Your Own Adventure.” The scheme’s introduction shows that Ukraine’s manpower shortage is becoming increasingly problematic and desperate.
“Outmanned and outgunned by Russian forces on the battlefield, Ukraine’s army urgently needs fresh fighters, as more Western military aid is expected to arrive in the coming weeks. But the queues of patriotic volunteers who lined up outside recruitment centres” at the start of the conflict “have long since disappeared,” writes FT in an article published on May 7.
The British newspaper pointed out that the new recruitment strategy is an attempt to make military service “sound more exciting” as it allows “men to choose their own unit and even their precise role.” This recruitment strategy was forced due to common knowledge of the problems the military is facing, from corruption and lack of ammunition to incompetent commanders, lack of training, and inability of frontline troops to go on leave. These issues have contributed to low volunteer numbers.
“Everyone will Fight – choose your own unit now,” reads an outdoor propaganda board recruiting for the Da Vinci Wolf Battalion, which FT omits was originally created as the paramilitary wing of the neo-Nazi organisation Right Sector.
Another said, “Join the best team!” in reference to the Achilles drone unit, part of the elite 92nd assault brigade.
“The idea is that by giving them a sense of control, Ukrainians can be persuaded to sign up for more prestigious and possibly better equipped units. Or that they will take specialized roles in the rear, in support of the frontline deployments,” FT explained, admitting that “the implicit message of some brigades is that if Ukrainians do not volunteer now they run the risk of being conscripted later into standard infantry formations under weaker commanders.”
The mobilisation in Ukraine comes amid an increasingly desperate situation on the front, with Russia’s breach of heavily fortified areas in Donbass earlier this year and methodical advance into the Kharkov region raising fears in Kiev, Washington and Europe. NATO leaders assert that the front line may be close to collapse, provoking increasingly alarming threats of escalation by the Western bloc, especially France.
It is recalled that the Washington Post cited a Ukrainian lawmaker last month, who spoke on condition of anonymity, saying that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s statement in February on the military death count was downplayed not to frighten citizens amid recruitment problems. At the time, Zelensky, too much mockery like the current advertising campaign, claimed that only 31,000 military personnel have been killed since 2022.
“I don’t think it’s an emergency right now. We do need more people, but we need to balance … We see so many deaths and so many wounded. If they go, [troops] want to know how long they will be there,” the legislator said.
The paper also noted that Ukraine likely will not consider launching an offensive this year due to severe troop shortages and superior Russian firepower.
The Ukrainian parliament adopted on April 11 a bill to mobilise civilians to reinforce Ukrainian forces depleted by two years of military conflict with Russia. Zelensky signed the law on April 16, and the law says that all people subject to military service must report to the enlistment committees to clarify their registration details within 60 days of the announcement of mobilisation, which comes into force on May 18. The new law also obliges people subject to military service to carry military identification cards and to present them when requested by military enlistment centres, the police and border guards.
In another article last month, a Ukrainian soldier told The Washington Post that the companies in his battalion were staffed at 35% of normal levels, meaning that they are probably operating at an even lower level all these weeks later. Ukrainians are fully aware that the war against Russia is futile and are unmotivated to fight, even if the Kiev regime introduces a “choose your own adventure” scheme, which makes the strong possibility of death or permanent disfigurement sound like a vacation to an exotic location.
The Ukrainian military wants to conscript as many as 500,000 soldiers to fight Russian forces. But this will prove impossible unless people are forcibly recruited, meaning they will be unmotivated and, more importantly, not positively affect Kiev’s declining precision capabilities. Ukrainians understand that going to war with Russia is effectively asking for a death sentence.
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it is a pity that young people can be tricked into fighting for the globalist’s ambitions trading their lives for visions of disneyland or whatever.
crocus orc hunt 2.0 is coming…heheheh
i see many military-aged ukrainian men every time i go shopping and i live more than 8000km from kiev. i suppose that they chose their own adventure with a little bit of financial assitance from the canadian tax-payer.
freeland will gift them all with citizenship and train them to march in lockstep under the right sector black and red as long as they stay in the country to vote and out of harms way in ukraine.
voting isn’t real hasn’t been for a long time. they will just be placed in critical positions of power like all western terror states whose population is held hostage by pdfile cannibaals.
i see them walking past the cashiers at walmart with canned goods stuffed in their pockets.
well, don’t take too long now. time is money.
the adventure of a llfetime.
“choose your own adventure”?! more like, pick your own grave.
do they get to pick them? i thought they just collapsed a trench wall over them on the spot.
after taking their id so they could continue collecting their 50 bucks a month of course.