February wrap-up: PMC Ukraine, Zelensky's Ides of May, Croatian Arms Dealers, Ukraine's new 'defence agreements'

Fears of a new offensive, violent mobilization, military corruption, Zelensky fears a parliamentary coup, the new 'OlyaUA' meme, will Ukrainian soldier reconquer Scotland?

War

Problems with manpower are a popular topic. Bogdan Krotevich, an Azov commander, claimed in a February 22 interview that Ukraine lacks the sufficient amount of troops to halt a second Russian offensive, a statement which was echoed by the mayors of northern Ukrainian towns.

David Arakhamiya, the leader of the ruling Servant of the People party, echoed Krotevych’s sentiment regarding the danger of a new Russian offensive, but stated that problems with western military aid must be made up for by mobilizing more men. He justified that with reference to the fact that there is a personnel deficit of up to 40% in Ukrainian frontline units, which he explained as being caused by rotation, not losses. The mayor of Kharkov, Igor Terekhov, made a similar statement about fears of a new Russian offensive several days previously.

On this topic, a new meme has emerged in Ukrainian social media: OlyaUA in Poland. It emerged after a real comment by a user with this name and photo, who commented ‘WHY AREN’T YOU AT THE FRONT YOU ABOMINATION?’ on a tik tok video that wasn’t sufficiently patriotic. Now, thousands of Tik Tok users have renamed themselves to this username and with the same patriotic profile picture, and ironically spam comment sections with ‘WHY AREN’T YOU AT THE FRONT’ and ‘WHY AREN’T YOU IN A TRENCH’, ‘WHY AREN’T YOU SPEAKING THE STATE LANGUAGE’, ‘YOU ARE JUST A DRAFT DODGER WHILE I HOLD THE FRONT IN EUROPE’. The idea is to make fun of overly patriotic Ukrainians, often young women, who comfortably live in the EU and condemn Ukrainian men who try to escape mobilization or are otherwise insufficiently patriotic.

Mobilization

Mobilization remains as popular ever. In February 23, a Kharkovite and a Kievan attacked a soldier in Kiev, beating him with a brick and stealing his wallet and phone. There were precedents for such events in the Kiev of 2023. In far west Ukraine, mobilization officers abducted and beat a man with partial paralysis. After a month where he was severed from all communication, he was sent to the frontline. In Mukachevo, another west Ukrainian town, a video emerged of mobilization officers dragging a screaming man into a car. His intense resistance led to them giving up, kicking the lying man fiercely as a parting gift.

https://t.me/stranaua/145700

On the 4th of March, Aleksey Bezhevets, the advisor on the matters of mobilization to the Minister of Defence, made the following remarkable statement:

"The Russians will move much closer very soon if there is no one to stop them." He called the lack of personnel and weapons a "tragedy." And many Ukrainians trying to avoid mobilization are "just dust in the wind."

Plenty of dust is forgotten in Ukraine. Four Colombian private military contractors were killed by a Russian missile strike on a frontline town on February 23. The strike itself was described as bloodless by the Ukrainian military, and the families of the Colombians killed only found out through social media.

Despite relative deadlock in parliament over the mobilization law (over 4000 amendments have been proposed), new experiments are constantly emerging, with or without parliamentary approval. The national bank has stated its willingness to access citizens’ bank cards, hinting at the government’s proposal to restrict the credit capacities of draft dodgers. A new law has been proposed that would drastically increase the amount of CCTV cameras across Ukraine, ostensibly with the aim of ‘reaching the level of developed countries’.

Another remarkable development has been the appearance on Canadian permanent residency applications for Ukrainians of the demand for applicants to submit official documentation of all their prior military experience. Government sources stated to Ukrainian publication ‘Strana’ that the practice had begun prior to the New Year. Naturally, this was a desire emerging from the Ukrainian government communicated to its Canadian partners. I will keep readers informed on updates regarding potential mobilization of Ukrainian abroadю

The central Ukrainian region of Zhytomyr was overrun on February 23 with masked army officers who claimed to be conducting ‘anti-diversionary operations’, though local media found it more likely that they were putting the town under lockdown to conduct mobilization more effectively. The creation of blockposts in Kiev was explained by reference to supposed ‘anti-diversionary and training activities’ on February 8, though the mobilization office also released photos where they detained smiling Kievans at these blockposts, though the photos were soon deleted. It was soon officially confirmed that the blockposts were being used to conscript people.

The scene in Zhytomyr region

Nor has the mobilization process been free of corruption, to put it mildly. A recent court case has revealed an entire network of corrupt mobilization officers in Odessa, who now demand 10,000 USD from men wishing to evade mobilization - the price has doubled compared to 12 months ago.