‘Wanted: Soldiers to fight Russia’... Inside Ukraine’s youth recruitment drive for war

KYIV: You’ll receive a generous salary, a bumper bonus and an interest-free loan to buy a home. The challenge? You’ll have to fight on the frontlines of Europe’s deadliest conflict since World War II.

It’s a tough sell to young people with their whole lives ahead of them.

Two months after Ukraine launched a national drive to recruit young people to fight in its tired and aged armed forces for a year, fewer than 500 have signed contracts, according to Pavlo Palisa, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s military adviser.

Palisa stressed it was early days for the scheme, which was initially confined to six brigades before expansion to 24. The numbers so far provide scant respite for Ukraine’s defence forces, which are outnumbered by Russia after three years of war that has killed and injured hundreds of thousands.

Pavlo Broshkov, among the few hundred young people to take up the offer so far, said he viewed military service as his duty and wanted to help spare his six-month-old daughter Polina the horrors he had faced growing up during the conflict.

“I don’t want my child to even hear the word ‘war’ in the future,” said the 20-year-old, among seven young recruits interviewed who are being sent to fight with frontline units in about two months. “I simply don’t want her to know what it means.”

As a new father dreaming of buying an apartment for his family, Broshkov was also attracted by the financial terms of the recruitment scheme, which was launched in February targeting 18 to 24-year-olds who are prepared to fill fighting roles.

Broshkov’s 18-year-old wife understands the need to defend the country but can’t stop agonizing over the danger.

“Death is chasing my husband now and it can catch up with him at any time,” said Kristina Broshkova.

The young recruits are preparing to head to the front at a time when Russian forces continue assaults along multiple fronts even as the U.S. administration of President Donald Trump seeks a negotiated ceasefire.

Zelenskyy said in January that Ukraine had 980,000 people in arms, while last year the Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered the size of the Russian armed forces to be increased by 180,000 to 1.5 million active service personnel.

A Ukrainian draft has been in place for most adult men after the full-scale Russian invasion of 2022, and Kyiv reduced the age of those required by law to join up from 27 to 25 last year in a bid to invigorate their forces.

The youth recruitment scheme marks a departure from the forced mobilization, which was hampered by public mistrust, and is part of a broader drive to make the military more professional and sustainable,

officials say.