A-Infos (en) Italy, Umanita Nova #28-25 - The Army of the Voiceless. Ukrainian Deserters (ca, de, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

Although the mass desertion of Ukrainian Armed Forces personnel has 
already become one of the largest acts of civil disobedience in the 
country's history since 1991, almost complete silence reigns in foreign 
media. Since the end of last year, the number of criminal cases under 
Articles 407 (unauthorized desertion of a military unit or SZCh) and 408 
(desertion) of the Criminal Code of Ukraine has remained stable at 
approximately 17,000 per month. In the first eight months of 2025, 
142,711 criminal cases were registered under these articles, and from 
the beginning of the full-scale invasion to September 1, 2025, 265,843 
cases were registered in Ukraine.

To at least partially reduce this flow, on September 4, the Ukrainian 
Parliament passed in first reading Bill No. 13260, which restores 
criminal liability for SZCh. Previously, it was possible to avoid 
criminal prosecution by voluntarily returning to military service. This 
provision was extended several times until its expiration on August 30. 
Now, the bill proposes eliminating the court's power to apply mitigating 
measures. In his September interview with Sky News, the supreme butcher 
stated that Ukraine no longer sends its personnel for military training 
abroad, where many soldiers have disappeared from training camps and 
received protection.

The nature of this phenomenon is revealed by verified rumors, published 
exclusively by Assembly this summer. Here we quote a testimony from the 
Vinnytsia region about the fate of former deserters (SZCh) sent to the 
attack and certain death:

"Well, dear friends and brothers in misfortune, I found myself in this 
hell for the second time.
This time, I was caught not while fleeing to cross the border, but on 
the street. The police chased me, stopped me, and then took me to the 
Military Police Service[...].
Then it was pure hell, there's no other way to describe it.
They treated us worse than animals: smoking was allowed only under 
supervision during strict hours, there were no telephones[...]not to 
mention food or shelter[...].
Then, one morning, the army representatives arrive, they speak 
beautifully and invite you to serve the homeland: almost everyone 
refuses. Then a bus arrives and they send you to the distribution center.
Barracks, guards with automatic rifles along the entire perimeter, you 
go to the warehouse under escort and again the army representatives 
arrive, you refuse, but they take you anyway and They send you to the 
barracks to await deployment.
Formations meet almost every two hours, and you're scared, waiting for 
your brigade to be called, hoping to stay in the barracks for another 
day and escape this mess.
There are other guys around, their eyes darting, these eyes searching 
for a way out just like you, but the more you wander around the camp, 
the more this hope fades...
Everyone understands perfectly well that the brigades we're assigned to 
are Airborne Assault Forces, and we probably don't have long to live.

"Guys, you won't get basic military training, three or four days at most 
to get your act together and then off you go."
I don't know how to describe it in one word. I've heard so many stories 
about what's happening at the front, it's horrible...
I escaped, miraculously! I won't tell you how[...]but it worked. I 
realized I had no choice and that I had to take the risk.
I never made it to military unit 7020 (a (Reserve battalion in the 
Hajsyn district). I was in the village of Rakhny; you can't escape from 
there unless you try at night. Things have changed recently. Before, the 
boys said, you could call a taxi, go to the store, and leave[...].

One boy tried, and he was assigned to the 225th Assault Regiment[...].
What I want to say to those who are already in SZCh: guys, don't take 
unnecessary risks. You never know where you'll end up a second time and 
how it might end.

The fate of fugitives arrested while attempting to cross the border is 
particularly unfortunate. This interlocutor from Odessa was captured 
this summer right on the border with the Transnistrian Republic of 
Moldova, where two months later a Ukrainian border guard shot dead a 
civilian refugee:

"Where I was, there was a waist-high fence, then a barbed wire fence, 
and beyond that, a ditch[...]. I climbed over it, without throwing 
anything from above[...]I climbed up and then jumped down[...]but the 
border guards saw me. I ended up about 50 meters from where they were on 
duty[...]they shouted 'stop,' I ran, and fell into a ditch about five 
meters high and six meters wide. The result: a broken rib or a fracture, 
but I wasn't in the hospital, so I don't know for sure. They took me to 
the Military Police Department where I spent three days[...]I escaped 
and now I'm at home recovering for the next attempt."

In Ukrainian, "SZCh" can also be deciphered as "Courage, Boldness, Honor."

A mobilized fugitive living in Kharkov describes the social status of the

new army reinforcements:

"It's hard for the homeless now: the military recruitment offices are 
rounding them up too... I recently took a ride in a minibus. There were 
two drug addicts, two homeless people, a poor man who was talking to 
himself[...]. They try to gather such a contingent in places where 
they're not very visible, early in the morning, in courtyards, behind 
garages[...]. Only the problematic ones remain[...]the homeless are the 
most normal[...]they're rounding up absolutely everyone[...]. There are 
no more fighters available; Everything is hanging by a thin thread and 
could collapse at any moment, even if the actor[Zelensky]and his gang 
don't understand this[...]. There are only a few left who have been 
fighting since 2022. Everyone is looking for a way to get out of service 
under any pretext: 200,000 SZCh people. The youngest and those with arms 
and legs will try to escape. What remains are the poor souls and the 
homeless, people with diseases and problems, they are the only hope 
left, and they won't last long fighting[...]. It's just harder for them 
to escape, they have nowhere to go, and they are afraid. So they're left 
with the only thing they can do on leave: drinking."

The following account by a Kharkov warehouse worker about his colleague 
who returned to the city last year, after leaving the Zaporozhye front 
with his entire company and commander, also illustrates how the 
dispersion and passivity of fleeing Ukrainian soldiers prevented them 
from realizing their revolutionary potential, despite their enormous 
numbers and combat experience:

"They took him to the hospital in 1923. He stayed there for about a 
year. We thought it was the end for him.[...]Before the war, he bought a 
room in a communal apartment. He doesn't go anywhere, he doesn't work, 
and no one there is looking for him. He has enough money[...]for food. 
In the evenings, he runs to the supermarket and sits silently in his 
room. There is always a choice[...]".

Mass desertion from the army has deep roots in Ukrainian history, dating 
back to the settlement of the country's eastern regions in the 17th 
century. The vast steppe lands known as the Wild Fields were settled by 
Cossacks, settlers from central Russia, and Ukrainian peasants fleeing 
the oppression of Polish feudal lords. They were determined to obey no 
one but their elected atamans. For a time, they enjoyed autonomy and 
privileges from the Russian government. This legacy was vividly 
expressed during the social revolution of 1917-1918, which followed the 
collapse of the tsarist army. The dialectic of history partially 
reproduces the two previous phases of class struggle under new conditions.

The WSWS's description of the situation in the United States is clearly 
applicable to the current situation in Ukraine:

"The great danger is that there remains a gulf between the scale of 
these events and the level of popular awareness of what is happening. 
This must change. Trump's actions do not enjoy broad popular support. 
The American people as a whole want neither dictatorship nor fascism. 
The general sentiment is one of opposition, but this must be consciously 
and collectively mobilized."

As long as Ukrainian defectors remain an amorphous and silent mass, 
living from day to day and trusting no one but their closest friends, 
the wheel of death will continue to turn, while more and more people 
will be kidnapped in place of those who fled.

Assembly

https://umanitanova.org/lesercito-dei-senza-voce-disertori-ucraini/
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