Ukraine’s raw recruits doubt peace with Russia is possible

Dmytro joined up the day he turned 18. When I met him, he was at boot camp for Ukraine‘s 3rd Assault Brigade, in a muddy stretch of wasteland in Kyiv near some abandoned buildings. About 20 young men, and one young woman, were learning how to handle a weapon and fight in a trench.

No-one’s mind was on this week’s joint US/Ukraine proposal for a 30-day ceasefire.

“I think that it will be impossible to have peace with Russia,” said Dmytro. He was dressed in black, a black woollen balaclava hiding half his face. Most of the others were in fatigues. One wore scarlet trainers.

The ceasefire suggestion, meanwhile, was circulating around the Kremlin, where it died. On Thursday, the Russian president’s foreign affairs adviser, Yuri Ushakov, described it as “nothing other than a temporary breather for Ukrainian troops”.

That’s exactly what Andriiy, another of the recruits, thought it would have been for the Russians.

“If it goes through it will just be a short peace for them to prepare for another attack,” he said.

At 32, Andriiy has spent the last three years of war getting fit and honing his IT skills. Like many Ukrainian soldiers, he is likely to end up piloting the drones that have transformed the battlefield. Trenches like the one they were training in still mark the front line, but increasingly soldiers on both sides are using drones to recce the other side’s armour and to drop munitions on military vehicles and formations of soldiers. These days you can take out a five million dollar tank with a drone that costs less than US $500.

The recruits said that the American decision to restore military aid and intelligence sharing was welcome; President Trump had suspended both after his disastrous meeting with President Zelenskyy in the Oval Office at the end of February. Still, they had little trust in the American leader.

“The Americans really helped us a lot,” said Andriy. “But Trump is a person who has no honour. He doesn’t care about our country. If he can stay president, it doesn’t matter to him what will happen to us or other people.”

“Trump is a person who has no honour. He doesn’t care about our country.”

• – Andriy

Ukrainian politicians have to be more circumspect, of course. This week they have been loudly and publicly thanking President Trump for military aid, while continuing efforts to manufacture their own weapons.

“We are very much dependent on the Americans while we are building up our own defence industry base,” said Yuriy Sak, an adviser to Ukraine’s Ministry of Strategic Industries. “But already 40% of the stuff used by our soldiers on the front lines is domestically produced.”

As the US appears to be a less reliable ally, Ukraine is seeking not only more European weapons, but more European investment in its own defence capability.

The word “Ukraina” means “borderlands”. Situated between Russia and Poland, Ukraine has been pulled between east and west throughout history. Political leaders come and go, but geography is immutable.

President Trump may think a durable peace between Russia and Ukraine can be imposed, but the raw recruits learning to duck and dive in the trenches know more history than he does.

Their parents and grandparents grew up in the Soviet Union, when Ukraine was an integral part of Russia’s communist empire. They grew up in a newly independent Ukraine, determined to reclaim its historical independence and identity. The way they see it, if Russia stops fighting, the war ends. if Ukraine stops fighting, there will be no more Ukraine.

“Russia is an imperialistic country, so wants to occupy other countries,” explained Dmytro. “For now, it’s Ukraine. In the next 10 years, it could be Kazakhstan, Mongolia, and later Lithuania and other countries.”

I asked if he thought he would see peace in his lifetime. He shrugged. “In my opinion I will be fighting with Russia forever,” he said.

Watch more:

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