Mobilization newsletter. Euro-atlantic serfdom

July 1-7

Sorry for the lag, I moved house last week. More content to come.

Numbers

On June 25, the ministry of defense first supported, then rejected the idea of giving men 3 more months to update their military details. The current deadline is July 17.

On June 27, Zelensky signed a law to register draftable man aged over 17 years old using the Central Election Commission, state tax and migration services. Previously, only those older than 18 were registered.

The secretary of the parliamentary defense committee Roman Kostenko announced on July 2 that it would be able to mobilize 200,000 more men by the end of the year, given existing mobilization numbers.

On the same day, head of the army Oleksandr Syrsky stated that the AFU’s biggest problem is ‘not enough motivated people’. According to Evhen Dyky, penguin-lover and ex-fighter in the rightwing Aidar Batallion fighter, Ukraine needs 500 thousand men to turn the tides of war. On July 4, a parliamentarian announced that there are 11 million men in Ukraine that can be mobilized, aged 25-59.

Unfortunately for those dreaming of astronomical figures, the parliament stated on July 1 that nine out of ten of all men who willingly go to the mobilization office have reasons that allow them not to serve. On June 25, the military announced that 2.2 million men had updated their military details since May 18 - but only 1.1 million are fit to serve. Not that this always allows them to escape, as I wrote here.

Protests

Some protests aren’t collective. On July 2, there was another case of a Ukrainian who tried to commit suicide in a mobilization office, this time in Zakarpattya. The local mobilization office relayed this to facebook. The recently-mobilized man asked to go to the bathroom, where he was found with his wrists slit. He is currently in hospital. I wrote about a similar case in the capital here.

On June 26, residents of a village in the western Chernivtsi region protested against blockposts set up by mobilization officers. The village is located 20 kilometres from the border with Romania, and the blockposts halt traffic to the border.

In videos released to social media, local women and men not subject to mobilization surround the mobilization officers. The officers, when asked why they are there, state:

We are here to control the movement of individuals in a certain direction

In response, locals yell

Go to hell!

What are you here to control? Our boys?

On June 30, the regional mobilization office confirmed that it would continue setting up blockposts. It cited the problem of individuals entering the region without being able to name what town they are heading too.

Blockposts are the bane of many in Ukraine. A woman was violently apprehended in the border region of Zakarpattya on July 3 for not stopping at a blockpost because her son was sick.

A paradox of ‘euro-integration’ - not only are men not allowed to head to the EU, but movement within the country is restricted. Instead of bursting into Fukuyama’s liberal utopia, Ukrainian euro-atlantic integration involves a detour into serfdom.

On July 4, residents of Ivano-Frankivsk (Bandera’s homeland) ganged up against mobilization officers because they were scaring off tourists and ruining local business. One of the mobilization officers cowering in his car appeared to be injured.

The following day, Evhen Dyky, a pro-government military influencer of nazi-penguin fame said he would have shot them all dead if he had been there. On July 5, criminal charges against the citizens were made.

Below, you can see the attack on the mobilization officers on the left, and the corpulent Mr. Dyky’s commentary on the right.