The expansion of the recruitment of soldiers for war and the strategy for doing so has widened the gap between the head of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, Valery Zaluzhni, and the president, Volodymyr Zelensky. General Zaluzhni challenged the Ukrainian leader this Tuesday by criticizing the Government's strategy to expand call-up conditions to combat Russian aggression. “I am not satisfied with the work of the [oficinas de reclutamiento]”, Zaluzhni launched at a rare press conference in kyiv. Russia's war against Ukraine has become a battle of attrition and as it enters the third year of fighting, few volunteers want to go to the front lines, while several waves of forced conscription have been launched in Russia.
Zaluzhni has once again been very critical this Tuesday of the situation for Ukraine. “I made a mistake when I thought that for Russia it would be a factor in stopping the casualties we caused them,” said the head of the Armed Forces. This is the second public friction between the head of the army and Zelensky. A few weeks ago, in The Economist, Zaluzhni admitted that the situation on the front has stagnated, that it is very difficult for Ukraine to advance and that the counteroffensive has collapsed. He also criticized the pace of recruitment as being too slow. The Government categorically disavowed his words. Last week, in addition, Zelensky stressed that Zaluzhni — whose popularity has skyrocketed in recent months, while the president's has fallen after the collapse of the counteroffensive in which Kiev and its allies had placed enormous hopes — is also responsible for the results on the battlefield.
The new public disagreement between two of the main figures in the Ukrainian leadership occurs when Zelensky's Executive has presented in the Rada (Ukrainian Parliament) a decree for war with which it seeks to expand the number of soldiers in the army. The proposed regulation, which will be debated and amended, expands the conditions and characteristics of men who can be called up – women only enlist voluntarily – and reduces the minimum age to do so from 27 to 25.
Last week, at the annual press conference in which he reviews the situation in the country, Zelensky assured that the army had requested up to half a million more recruits for mobilization, but stressed that the number and conditions still need to be debated. However, Zaluzhni assured this Tuesday that the figure only represents a general plan that would be covered gradually. “I cannot say how much: it is a military secret,” the head of the Armed Forces settled in the conference broadcast on television. It will be, he said, a “figure that includes compensation for losses, the formation of new units and the replacement of possible losses next year.” The head of the Armed Forces also said that he leaves the idea of also recruiting Ukrainians abroad in the hands of the Government, as the Ministry of Defense has considered doing.
For Ukraine, increasing military personnel is a priority. kyiv has not made public the information on how many people make up its forces – which are made up of several bodies – but specialized analysts estimated that figure at one million at the beginning of the large-scale war. Since then, the Ukrainian army has suffered casualties. Unlike what happened during the first stages of the invasion, not many are enlisting now. In most cities far from the battlefront, war doesn't feel the same. In addition, several cases of corruption detected in recruitment chiefs in several regions, who received bribes in exchange for exemptions from the service, have sown indignation that does not help to swell the ranks.
On the Donbas front, in eastern Ukraine, the vast majority of soldiers have not taken leave to return home for months. Many are exhausted. “It gets very hard, the physical and mental fatigue is sometimes overwhelming,” admits Kostya, a tank driver, in a coffee kiosk filled with military personnel, a few kilometers from the Bakhmut front, one of the most active.
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Russia, meanwhile, has castled itself, concluding robust defenses and continues launching waves of soldiers in attacks against the Ukrainian line and pushing to try to gain a few meters. Ukrainian analysts and military officials say Moscow uses its own soldiers as bait. Ukraine defends that only with new weapons sent by its allies, more powerful and technologically superior, will it be able to achieve a turning point in the battle. But the EU, which hopes to approve a special €50 billion aid package to keep Ukraine afloat and help the country meet current expenses, is struggling with its own problems producing ammunition at the pace Ukraine needs. Furthermore, until now, the weapons that the Member States have sent to Ukraine have very narrowly covered the needs. The United States is a similar case. Washington now has 50 billion euros blocked (part of which could go to defense spending) due to its internal struggles (especially by the Republicans).
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