“I have a chance to kill some Russians.” Interviews with foreign volunteers in Ukraine

On February 27, Ukrainian President Zelensky announced the formation of the International Legion of Defense of Ukraine and invited foreign nationals to come to Ukraine and join the fight against Russia. Foreign nationals, many with no prior military experience or training, heeded Zelensky’s call and poured into Ukraine. Months of reports of heavy casualties among the undertrained and often underarmed International Legion volunteers followed.

On July 1, the International Legion issued a statement on their social media accounts:

“Going forward, media enquires and requests for interviews regarding the Legion and with legionnaires must go through the Legion’s Communications Director, “Mockingjay” on Signal or Telegram only. We also remind all journalists that interviews and any communication with legionnaires are only legitimate if they are approved by the Legion’s press office, and that legionnaires are under strict orders not to talk to the press.”

The true number of foreign volunteers fighting in Ukraine is unknown. In March, the Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign Affairs claimed more than 20,000 came from 52 countries, but many of the volunteers who came have already left. The total number of volunteer groups, both officially registered with the Ukrainian Armed Forces and operating unofficially, is also unknown.

After contacting the International Legion’s spokesperson, we received an offer to interview four British, American, and French volunteers under supervision at their media center in Kharkiv. While we weren’t able to make the appointment, we managed to interview ten other foreign volunteers in Ukraine on the condition of anonymity for themselves and the volunteer groups to which they belong.

The names used in this article are aliases. Nearly all of the volunteers we spoke to said there were severe issues with training, supplies, and communication. They said there’d been little progress on the Ukrainian side, and that morale was low. 

“When Zelensky asked volunteers to come, I felt I couldn’t sit in France and do nothing,” said Bastien, a French national who came to Ukraine in May. “But I have been on the frontlines for more than a month. My body is tired. My spirit is tired. I just need to breathe.” Bastien initially planned to join the International Legion, but after meeting with the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense in Lviv, he was instead placed into a battalion within the Ukrainian Army.

“I had four years’ experience serving in the French army,” Bastien said. “I was in Iraq. The Ukrainians were very interested in my experience, so they put me in a special forces battalion. I’m the only foreigner in my group.” Bastien signed an indefinite contract. “I’ll be here until the end of the war.”

Bastien has been in the Kharkiv area since shortly after he arrived, and said the frontline fighting has been frustrating. “There are maybe three Russian soldiers for every one Ukrainian soldier,” he said. “That plus the Russian artillery and cluster munitions have really slowed us down. We are basically just trying to hold our position.” 

Tamaz, a Georgian volunteer with six years’ previous experience fighting in the Georgian Army, was also recruited directly into the one of the Ukrainian Army’s special forces units. Tamaz has been on the frontlines in the Kharkiv region for the last month. He bought his own body armor and helmet. “The armor finally came in the mail,” he said. “And now, I’ll be broke until I get paid again.”

Tamaz says the war wasn’t what he thought it would be. “I don’t want to die here,” he said. “I got a dog before I left Georgia, and I keep thinking about how badly I want to see her again.” Like Bastien, the French volunteer, Tamaz also signed an indefinite contract.

Fewer Foreigners on the Front

Bastien says few of the foreign volunteer groups are actually fighting on the frontlines. “I see foreign groups sometimes, but they’re never on the front. They’re more in the backlines,” he said. 

“The foreigners were being used as meatshields in the beginning,” said Sam, a 23 year-old volunteer from the UK. Sam had no previous military experience before coming to Ukraine in late March. He wasn’t accepted by the International Legion when he applied to join. “I think by the time I came, they realized sending a bunch of guys with no military experience into battle against the Russians was a pretty shit idea,” he said. 

Sam recently joined a different volunteer combat group unaffiliated with the International Legion. “I’ve been training, but I haven’t seen combat,” he said. “My group is ‘reassessing.’” Volunteers from five different organizations said similar things about their groups stepping back from active combat in recent weeks, often to the dismay of volunteers who came to Ukraine eager to fight against Russian soldiers. 

“Very few units are willing to push the lines forward again,” said Shaun, a 30 year-old veteran of the Canadian Army who came to Ukraine in June. “Most are burned out or wiped out. Scared or tired. I’m with a unit of volunteers who are very eager to fight. We’re all chomping at the bit. But reigns are getting yanked hard by the Ukrainian troops not wanting to disturb things too much. I think it means the Ukrainian military is burning out. There has been a loss of momentum. What started as a rest and reset turned into a static line.”

Shaun came later than many volunteers and said he was warned about the lack of organization among the military and volunteer groups. “But that doesn’t mean it wasn’t mind-blowing when I got here and saw it myself,” he said. “Units that need anti-armor weapons don’t have them, while units that don’t need them do have them. The level of clusterfuck here is extreme.”

“I suppose it’s not the story people want to hear, but the gap between how the war is shown in the media and the reality of the place is kind of ridiculous,” said Sam, the 23 year-old volunteer from the UK. “The lack of training and organization…I was working in a hospital for a while, which was frustrating, because outside of shrapnel injuries, most of the injuries were related to friendly fire.”

“Probably more than half the injuries are friendly fire,” confirmed Steve, an American who has been volunteering as a military and medical trainer since February. Steve was appalled by the mishandling of military aid that has been donated to Ukraine. “I fought in the Middle East and Africa, and I’ve never seen this level of corruption.

The corruption and aid theft affects Ukrainian soldiers exponentially more than foreign volunteers. Soldiers from every Ukrainian Army unit we spoke to reported that many men aren’t given body armor. Units are dealing with a lack of vehicles, weapons, and ammunition. “We’re better off than the Ukrainians, because we can supply most of our own stuff,” said Shaun, the Canadian volunteer. “We buy our own gas, our own rations. My group is purchasing our weapons from large volunteer group. That volunteer group, which is not from a Western country, stole the weapons that it’s selling to us and other groups from the military aid coming into Ukraine.”