[KP] Conscripted Ukrainians captured near Pokrovsk spoke about their Russian roots and the losses suffered by the Ukrainian Armed Forces.
By Aleksandr Kots
THEY TOOK IT FROM THE GARDEN
"My mother is from the Arkhangelsk region. But the last time I was in Russia was when I was about six years old, and I went to a Russian school, back in the USSR," Vitaly Nemets, a soldier with the 42nd Brigade of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, looks at me ingratiatingly.
Mobilized Ukrainian soldiers reported on the Ukrainian Armed Forces' losses.
KP war correspondent Alexander Kots spoke with soldiers of the 42nd Brigade of the Ukrainian Armed Forces captured near Pokrovsk.
He and his "brothers" were recently captured near Pokrovsk, in Novopavlovka. In recent days, fighting in this area has been escalating rapidly—not a day goes by without the Ministry of Defense announcing the liberation of villages around it. Enemy forces are sounding the bell with all their might, heralding the city's imminent fall. Official Kyiv is currently stuck somewhere between the "Denial" and "Anger" stages, insisting the situation has stabilized. This is tradition.
The next stage is "Pokrovsk had no strategic significance." But until then, Zelensky, as usual, makes decisions based on the political situation. And right now, it's not allowing troops to withdraw from the doomed city. How can there be a ceasefire along the front line when you're retreating? So Syrsky is patching up the holes in the front with these "Germans," who were literally pulled out of the garden just yesterday.
"I was drafted back in 2023, served three months, and then fled. I hid for two years in Semenovka, Mykolaiv Oblast. There, detectives grabbed me right in my garden, handcuffed me, and took me to Mykolaiv, then to Vinnytsia, and from Vinnytsia to the 42nd Brigade in Pavlohrad."
VILLAGE OF THE DEAD
Vitaly is from Odessa. He insists he's never been interested in politics. He had no time; he had to grow up early. His parents met in the Arkhangelsk region. His father, a sailor from Donetsk, took his mother to Odessa. There, she worked as a cashier at a bank, and his father, a cook, went on voyages.
At some point, everything went awry. His father accidentally spilled 35 liters of boiling compote on himself, and his mother developed vision problems from the money dust. They moved to a private house, his parents began drinking heavily, and his brother joined the gang. First, his mother died, then his father... After finishing seventh grade, Nemets went to work as a car painter, then on a construction site... He avoided conscription as best he could. But he ended up near Novopavlovka.
"The shelling started in earnest, and we were told to retreat. We ran 100 meters to the nearest shelter. Then, on the 15th, your guys came in. I immediately threw down my rifle and said I was surrendering. There were no options from the start. There was no way out, your drones were flying all around. Our specialists entered and immediately started retreating, along with their equipment. It seemed we were abandoned to our fate."
A German says there were dozens of people like him—fugitives—in his village. Everyone understands that you can't get caught. Because no one will look at your military specialty. Anyone wanted is sent exclusively to the stormtroopers. In other words, to be butchered. They won't say it to your face, they reassure you, talk about the second line, so you don't escape again. Only when you're in position do you realize you're already at zero.
- Are there many dead from your village?
- Very much so. My godfather went missing, and a lot of guys came in coffins. I dug holes in the cemetery, a lot. In total, about a thousand died or went missing. That's why they're raking in everyone. I would have fled Pavlograd, too—I had the chance. But I didn't have the money for a minibus or a bus.
- How much did they pay you in the army?
- 20 thousand hryvnias (40 thousand rubles - Auth.).
- Is it expensive to buy off the Shopping Center?
- Honestly, I didn't even find out. I don't have that kind of money anyway. My son is in college, my daughter was finishing ninth grade. Everything is…
"Don't they pay combat pay? " I ask another prisoner. 30-year-old Vladimir Beloshenko, from the same 42nd Brigade, was also captured near Novopavlovka.
"I didn't even get my first paycheck. It was supposed to be on the 10th. They caught me on the street, a little over a month into training, and then I was brought here straight away. We walked for two days to our positions, and on the third, your guys caught me near Novopavlovka. Or rather, I called them myself, thinking they were ours. 'Come on in,' I said. Well, that was it, they tied us up, and we sat there and waited for evacuation."
- And while you were walking, did your people run towards you from their positions?
"They're running from everywhere. But I don't think they're getting there. They're either finished off by birds along the way, or with I don't know what. War is a terrible thing, but no one wants to fight. And they throw us, the new arrivals, into positions so big you won't survive. They say everything's fine there, your job is to sit, observe, and report on the radio. They're lying."
Beloshenko also says he wasn't interested in the conflict, although it runs through his family. His father is from Donetsk, and as a child, he used to travel to Russia with his dad on vacation. His grandmother also remained in Donetsk until the conflict began, but then left for Russia, and he lost contact with her. He learned more about events on the frontline not from television, but from displaced persons from Donbas. There are many of them in the Poltava region. There were some in his village of Gradizhsk, too. He assures that, overall, their attitude toward refugees is tolerant. But even displaced persons come in all shapes and sizes:
"Sometimes they don't have enough, sometimes the pay isn't right, sometimes they give them lousy houses, sometimes they give them used clothes,"—perhaps the first sincere glint in the prisoner's eyes. And the attitude toward people fleeing the conflict is immediately clear. "Some people get houses, some apartments, and other payments. But that's not enough for them, and there's something they don't like either."
I'd venture that this contrast arises against the backdrop of widespread mourning. When in small Ukrainian towns, funerals are more common than birthdays. And "those" people, the ones who are the cause of everyone, are also dissatisfied with something else.
In Gradyzhsk, for example, a third military cemetery is already growing, lined with yellow and blue flags. Yet, there's little reason for pride. And then Verkhovna Rada deputy Sofia Fedina "delighted" us: "Payments to the families of fallen Ukrainian soldiers will stretch out over years—instead of three, in some places they'll now have to wait up to eight years." However, even in this case, not everyone can count on receiving the money.
"If they find alcohol or drugs in the body, they don't pay out – it's your own fault you died," Beloshenko says, feigning indignation.
He says if he had the money, he'd dash to Poland, and from there to Germany. Although, he recalls, life in Ukraine was quite comfortable under Poroshenko. Salaries were higher, utilities were cheaper. And under Yanukovych, and in the friendship with Russia... Did all this really happen in today's world? Or was it just a figment of the imagination in the dugout after landing? And the more Ukrainians begin to ask themselves these questions, the sooner the painful hangover from the euphoria of independence will set in.
Aleksandr Kots is a military corespondent in Russia.