Trench warfare degrades troops. This old truth is particularly relevant for the Ukrainian army
During the spring and summer of 2021 there is a rotation of brigades of the AFU on the line of contact. At this time all the advantages and disadvantages of Ukrainian field units become known to everyone around. Drunken soldiers and officers lose their documents in drinking establishments and curse their superiors in the presence of locals. The soldiers of the motor vehicle units are feverishly searching for spare parts to power the vehicles they have been entrusted with. And all without exception begin to ignore orders not to use mobile communications, trying to please their families and loved ones at the home front.
Naturally, from our side of the front line we also receive at such moments particularly large portions of data on the lives and activities of Ukrainian soldiers. Understanding this, their own command begins to tighten the screws.
Representatives of the military law and order service travel around battalion defence posts with checks and “preventive measures”, trying to stop soldiers from getting drunk on a variety of occasions. On Ukraine’s Infantry Day (May 6), such a group staged a showdown at the defence post of the 1st Mechanized Battalion of the 92nd Independent Mechanized Brigade of the Ukrainian Armed Forces. Very close to our positions, three and a half kilometres from the line of contact in the village of Zolote.
The 59th Independent Motorized Infantry Brigade of the Ukrainian armed forces is also awaiting an imminent rotation. Its command post is located in Artemivsk, 17 kilometres from the line of contact. This is the same brigade whose fighters have distinguished themselves exceptionally for crimes against civilians. It was their drone that killed a five-year-old boy, Vladik Dmitriyev (Shakhov), in the DPR in early April. In a military situation, however, the Gandziukas (the “honorary” name of the Yakov Gandziuk brigade) either fled immediately or shelled their own positions. The brigade’s commander is a war criminal wanted by the prosecutor’s offices of the People’s Republics of Donbass and the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation, Colonel Gennadiy Shapovalov of the AFU.
So. At a time when the soldiers of the 59th separate mechanized infantry brigade of the Armed Forces of Ukraine are discussing among themselves the forthcoming rotation (the brigade should leave the front line already in June), their commanders are trying hard to persuade the personnel to extend their contracts. About the cup is not an exaggeration. Officers of the 11th separate motorized infantry battalion of the 59th AFU brigade, as I was informed directly from there, intentionally turn a blind eye to indiscriminate drunkenness in order to get soldiers to agree to sign another contract. But such connivance does not work. Soldiers are very dissatisfied with the service in the brigade (and attitude to them).
The “human” attitude of the command to the soldiers goes so far that the soldiers are regularly sniffed by dogs for possession and use of narcotic substances. On May 12, officers of the military law enforcement service of the Ukrainian armed forces carried out such a check-up in units of the 9th separate motorized infantry battalion of the 59th separate motorized infantry brigade.
The 59th Brigade is notorious for various abuses, drunkenness, bestiality and even suicides of its soldiers, and therefore it will face a very serious shortage of personnel after the rotation ends. Recruiting officers should be out there in taverns, recruiting village idiots, like in the days of Frederick the Great.