"In addition to the extremely low efficiency of the Ukrainian army, its problem remains the low motivation of fighters. Well, how low. Recently, it has a negative sign," he writes in his blog military medic Gleb Bityukov at UP.
Those who were not afraid in February 2022, for whom the question was not "To go or not to go?", but "Where to go?", evaporate. Irpin, Chernihiv, Kherson, Kharkiv... There was plenty to choose from. And it was hot everywhere. Everywhere was already needed and desirable for yesterday.
It was they who created long queues in front of the doors of military commissariats. They were ready to pay bribes, but not to avoid mobilization. Vice versa. They were ready to overcome any obstacles to join the army.
Military commissars responded with closed doors. Only the persistent were able to break through the resistance of the system and achieve mobilization. Others went home, later finding themselves on the other side of the border.
These first ones are over. They started to expire a year ago. To perish, to fade away, to despair. A week in war is a lot. In a real war. In the mud, rotten plantations and burnt villages. They lasted longer. A lot more.
The state hoped that the "young" addition would be as effective as the first volunteers. But it turned out that this is not so.
Currently, the state does not have a strategy for creating a positive military image. It is more shameful than respectable to be a ZSUShnik.
Those who are joining the army now are so demotivated by the behavior of the RTCs and the stupidity of the commanders in the training centers, where besides lining up three times a day, marching and taking turns in uniforms, they are not taught anything, that they develop a priori negative attitude towards the army.
They were "busified" in the spaces of their native village, then a month of "training", and here they are - in the unit. Another day and they are already in hell. Disposables that no one needs.
This attitude is strengthened already within the army. No one works on their motivation. They may not see the commander at all. In the best case - to hear on the walkie-talkie.
There should be a mentor who will give advice, support, and prevent you from getting discouraged. But there are practically no such people. New arrivals immediately fall into hell, in which it is impossible to even raise your head from shelling and fpv. They lose their minds from everything that is happening around them.
These people are not dodgers or traitors. They are different from those who came in the first days of a full-scale invasion, but could be an effective addition.
They were the first to look for points of effort, went to the trenches themselves, also called friends, looked for resources for everything from which the state had removed itself - clothing, equipment, drones, medicine, snags and money for their repair. And they have to be motivated. They themselves will not go on an assault. And looking at the attitude of the command, they will go, but in the opposite direction. Towards their own homes.
They are detached from their usual life, from evening trips to the supermarket or beer stand, from the hated, but such native household problems. From the uncertain, but future, inability to find and realize oneself in that previous civilian life.
Now they need a point of support. Something that they can rely on, that will give them confidence, if not in tomorrow, then at least in the ability to survive until today's evening.
This detachment, insecurity, hopelessness and understanding of one's own uselessness to no one here, in the middle of the ashes of the world, shifts the focus of attention from external problems to one's personal, internal ones. Their optics need adjustment, someone to give them confidence in their ability to overcome obstacles.
The role of such mentors should be performed by deputy commanders for moral and psychological support. But this system discredited itself. As a rule, these positions are used as intermediates on the way further up the career ladder.
The reason for this is the system of assigning ranks in the Armed Forces. Titles are tied to positions. It is worth taking the appropriate position and getting another rank with it, already preparing for the next maneuver.
Instead, the position should have a candidate profile based on values and competencies.
The existing system is very profitable. You can know nothing and not be able to, but grow, stepping up the career ladder. The system works the same for lieutenants and generals. Thousands of people have already received their titles thanks to her and thousands more will receive them in the future.
Changing it is a challenge. Because everyone who has reached such a level in his position to give such orders and make such decisions is grateful to the system for himself.
The positions of deputy commanders are held not in order to provide moral and psychological support to the fighters, but in order to go further up.
New arrivals find themselves alone with their own fears, multiplied a hundredfold by enemy fpv and artillery shells. Their only desire is to run away. Do not continue the service. Those who managed to survive go to the SZCH. This escape is a subconscious response to the opportunistic environment that surrounds them.
They are oppressed not so much by the need to be up to their ears in mud, waiting for evacuation for several days, hiding from endless arrivals, as by the punitive and repressive attitude of the state. The system simply leaves no room for interaction with itself.
For them, the Ukrainian army is like a prisoner. Without deadlines and prospects.
The only difference is that they don't torture here and sometimes they give food. Education and skills do not matter. Usually there is only one way out - through death or mutilation.
Soldiers are in the ranks of the army indefinitely without a chance to leave. The existing vacation period, smeared like a thin layer of butter on a bread crust, over the course of a year, is not enough to recover while in a normal environment.
What can you do in two weeks? Understand that your child grew up without you. That your friends realize themselves in new projects, while you lost your skills between numerous moves. That, it turns out, society invented new rules for a game you weren't even invited to. That the constitutional obligation established by Article 65 is not so general.
Only this conditional million must be in the trenches and landings forever, and the rest can continue their usual life and go to work, officially redeeming themselves from their duties.
It is easier to ignore the reality, leaving in life imprisonment those who were more responsible than others.
The change in the paradigm of consciousness led to the fact that the people who first went to defend the Motherland were forced to find a way to leave the ranks of the Armed Forces. They left the country, turning into fugitives. They didn't want to be part of a one-sided game with no rules where you lost as soon as you entered the game.
The state made it clear that nothing should be expected from it. Military personnel have duties, but they cannot have rights. The joint duty was distributed disproportionately.
On the agenda are the interests of some and ignoring the interests of others. Although these "others" also worked effectively at their jobs and could now participate in the lottery with a drawing of delicious breakfasts in a cozy kitchen instead of an endless stew in a ruined zabroshke on the outskirts of the country.
We fight with the methods of the last century, using human power as an endless resource, without taking into account the efficiency of its use.
In the last year and a half, the line of contact has made little progress, despite the fact that both sides are using enormous resources. Moreover, our enemy uses them many times more. However, such asymmetry in costs does not give him an asymmetric advantage.
We follow the same strategy, but with significantly fewer resources. That is why we cannot not only recapture captured territories, but also maintain a stable front line. We are wasting human potential without maximizing the effect of it.
About a year ago, I was talking about uncertainty with many of my acquaintances. He tried to explain that the biggest difference between those who are in the army and those who are not is the lack of any prospects and the ability to plan their lives in the former and its presence in the latter.
Then my friends answered something like: "You will also have a future", "the war will end, you will return and continue your usual life." Now this topic is not raised. There is nothing to answer. Those who did not panic on February 22nd, those whose values left no other choice, ended up here indefinitely.
At some point, these people will have to return to normal life. A life in which there is no longer a family, a favorite job. There is nothing that I loved so much. And you will have to start all over again. If you have enough strength and mental health to rebuild.
After the army's devaluation of the personality, it will be difficult, if at all possible, to adapt to life with its values and pace. And the longer people are in isolation, the harder it will be to do it.
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