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Against the backdrop of the continued escalation of the conflict between Ukraine and Russia, the Ukrainian army is facing unprecedented pressure and challenges. In 2024, in the first four months alone, Ukraine registered more than 10,500 cases of voluntarily leaving service units and 7,300 cases of evading military service, totaling nearly 20,000.

In just four months, nearly 20,000 deserters appeared, and the speed of escape was even comparable to the speed of conscription.

This phenomenon not only reflects serious problems within the Ukrainian army, but also reveals the vulnerability of the entire country under the pressure of war.

Ukrainian soldiers

Why are they all running away?

According to the Russian Satellite News Agency, the text of the bill published on the Ukrainian Parliament website shows that Ukraine's pre-trial investigation agency is currently reviewing about 19,000 criminal cases of Ukrainian soldiers evading service and leaving military units on their own.

The Ukrainian parliament means that if these people voluntarily return to their service units, they can be exempted from criminal responsibility.

Obviously, Ukraine is unwilling to take too strict measures against these deserters. Although criminal charges have been brought, it is still relatively tolerant. After all, there is a real shortage of people. Even deserters are better than newly captured able-bodied men.

This has been Ukraine's general attitude in dealing with deserters over the past two years. Although there are supervision teams, as long as you escape, they will not really hold on to you. The consequence of this is that the desertion phenomenon has further spread.

Of course, this is not the main reason.

The fundamental reason was that they were unable to win the battle. Their weapons and equipment were obviously inferior to those of the Russian army, and they were always suppressed. The rare victories they achieved were all achieved by piling up heads. They simply couldn't win.

Ukrainian soldiers

Soldiers are exhausted

Another reason that cannot be ignored is that the protracted and cruel nature of the war has exhausted the soldiers physically and mentally. Ukraine has been in a state of war since February 2022, and the soldiers have been in a high-pressure environment for a long time, and psychological and physical fatigue is inevitable.

Originally, the soldiers on the front line should have been given some buffer time through rotation and other means, but due to the unfavorable war situation and the conscription work being not smooth, it was difficult to carry out rotation. Once a rotation was carried out, the front line might collapse. Therefore, many veterans were arranged to fight on the front line as long as they were not dead. Some even continued to fight on the front line even though they were disabled.

If you can't get a rotation, then you can only find a way to "rotate" yourself.

As more people escaped, the conscription policy became stricter, because the gap in manpower that needed to be filled was too large. Many people lost their combat effectiveness every day, and some people escaped, so the only way was to find ways to capture more able-bodied men.

However, after the able-bodied men were forcibly captured and sent to the battlefield, it was difficult for them to form effective combat power. They were either killed in battle, wounded, or became new deserters. This cycle continued over and over again, and they were always trapped in a vicious circle.

Zelensky encourages soldiers

Ukraine can't

The Ukrainian government has taken some steps to address the problem of desertion. In addition to passing a new law to exempt deserters from criminal liability if they voluntarily return to their service units, the Ukrainian government is also working to attract more women to join the army and lower the conscription age.

However, these measures are only temporary solutions and do not address the root cause. Although the policy of exempting criminal responsibility may attract some deserters to return in the short term, in the long run it may weaken the deterrent effect of the law and cause more soldiers to choose to evade service.

Although attracting women and lowering the conscription age can alleviate the problem of insufficient manpower to a certain extent, it cannot fundamentally solve the problem of soldiers evading service.

Ultimately, it is because they cannot win the war, no one is willing to go to the front, and they cannot recruit enough high-quality soldiers, which leads to the continuous weakening of combat effectiveness. The more they cannot win the war, the greater the losses, and the more people are scared away. The Ukrainian government is unable to get Ukraine out of this cycle.