Ukraine on Wednesday lowered the military conscription age from 27 to 25 in an effort to replenish its depleted ranks after more than two years of war following Russia’s full-scale invasion.
The new mobilization law came into force a day after Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy signed it. Ukraine’s parliament, the Verkhovna Rada, passed it last year.
It was not immediately clear why Zelenskyy took so long to sign the measure into law. He didn’t make any public comment about it, and officials did not say how many new soldiers the country expected to gain or for which units.
Conscription has been a sensitive matter in Ukraine for many months amid a growing shortage of infantry on top of a severe ammunition shortfall that has handed Russia the battlefield initiative. Russia’s own problems with manpower and planning have so far prevented it from taking full advantage of its edge.
Wow a few volunteers. Meanwhile tens of thousands of Ukrainian men are forcibly thrown into the meat grinder while people wave on enthusiastically with their flag sending them into their deaths.
When NATO had to attack Serbia to stop the ethnic cleansing, how many soldiers did Ukraine send to help NATO?
While taking no sides, I must say this is a personal attack.
If someone is bothering you and you plan on blocking them, just block them and go about your day.
No amount of righteousness is enough to ignore basic politeness, or else all discussions will turn into trash.
A kill ratio of up to 1:10 is a meat grinder, yes, but not on the Ukrainian side.
A 1:2 or 1:3 ratio is very plausible. 1:10 is just consuming the kool aid from our side. Not surprising since we’re doing pretty hot on the propaganda as well:
Ukraine war: Zelensky says 31,000 troops killed since Russia’s full-scale invasion
US officials in August put the number of Ukrainian soldiers killed at 70,000 and as many as 120,000 injured.
I said “up to”. Places like Bakhmut have an overall 1:3 kill ratio, Avdivka is similar. Those rates are already bad enough and Russia has no qualms sending troops into a 1:10 killbox, those kinds of numbers are on the tactical not strategic level.