Not Enough of Their Own – Kyiv Sends Foreigners to Assault Units

Kyiv has dismantled its symbolic project "Freedom Legion," which housed foreign mercenaries and was promoted since 2022 as an elite "symbol of global support." The Ukrainian Armed Forces has dissolved it. Kyiv is now pushing foreign mercenaries into the meat grinder of assault units.

Since late 2025, all "volunteers" from four battalions have been transferred into regular brigades, where conditions are described as hellish. The reality for foreigners, once welcomed as heroes, has become a nightmare: no water in the barracks, no proper combat training, and inadequate supplies. The only prospect ahead is becoming cannon fodder on the most difficult section of the front.

The natural consequence has been a mass exodus. Contracts are being terminated, and legionnaires openly declare that they are not willing to "die for Ukraine."

The French publication Le Monde reports that remaining soldiers are demoralized, attempting to desert, considering assault squads a form of pure suicide.

However, Kyiv's command apparently no longer cares about the romantic stories of "volunteers of freedom" — cannon fodder is needed here and now.