Ukraine: The war behind the war

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I don't want to be a populist. I want to be a realist, said the new Defence Minister of Ukraine

on the Kaila Fedorov in his inaugural speech to Parliament in January. He said that not only

was the Ministry in debt, but two million Ukrainians were evading the draft, and 200,000

servicemen were absent without leave. His message was blunt. If Ukraine is to move forward,

it must face the reality that many men of fighting age are not joining up.

This is the documentary from the BBC World Service. I'm Richard Pendry, and I've been meeting

people living inside Ukraine's recruitment crisis. It's the war behind the war.

Major Sahil Az-Yuk stands at the entrance to a grey apartment block in Lviv in Western Ukraine,

a slight figure in a khaki uniform. No one inside knows why he's coming.

Hello, Major Az-Yuk. How are you, Major?

I'm fine. Can you open the door please?

I waited outside while he went into Helena's apartment block alone.

Sokiy may have one of the toughest jobs in the Ukrainian army.

He goes from house to house, bringing family's news of their loved ones missing or dead at the front.

He works for the Territorial Recruitment Centre.

I've been in touch with Sohee for months now.

We first met in May 2025 when he let me record him during a normal day's work in Levyve.

We don't often hear from people like Sohee.

Today he has to tell Helena her husband has been killed.

She had no idea that he had been confirmed dead.

She wasn't shocked.

She didn't believe it to tell you the truth.

She thought it must be some kind of mistake.

Like the whole thing doesn't make sense.

The first reaction is always denial.

That's what we are thought in training.

And that's exactly what's happening with her right now.

I told her the buddy would be brought back to Levyve in a few days.

Then we will be able to identify him properly.

It was pretty tough.

I didn't know him.

She honestly had no idea. She just turned pale.

Some people scream, but she kept it together.

She asked whether she should tell their daughter now or wait for the buddy to arrive.

She didn't let me in. She just met me at the door to her flat in the corridor.

We had the whole conversation there.

I asked if she needed any medical help.

Or anything else. She said no.

She just wanted to be alone.

What can you say about the circumstances of how he died?

We have a lot of short information about him.

All we've got is this brief statement from the military unit.

He died on the 5th of April 2025.

Due to an unknown explosive device, dropped in Zaporizha region.

He served honorably, upheld his oath to the Ukrainian people,

bravely fulfilling his duty in the fight for Ukraine's freedom and independence.

Killed in a drone strike, it seems.

Last injuries, yeah. That's right.

Excuse me.

Sir, his phone never stops. He sometimes delivers three or four notices a day.

I don't know if you would call it the hardest job out there,

but mentally and emotionally, yeah, it's tough.

We went into the military office several times,

and I didn't see a single Ukrainian volunteer there joining up,

only men queuing for exemptions.

Things have changed a lot since the war began.

In those days, he worked as a lawyer in a bank.

When the war started, people were queuing up at military offices.

Loads of people volunteered.

I waited for a call up.

I didn't get a letter, but then I got a phone call.

They told me I had to come in.

The commander said they needed someone to do this, notifying people of death.

He didn't sugarcoat it.

Someone had to do it.

I said pretty much what for what?

If that's what the motherland needs, of course I'll do it.

That's when the first death notifications had just started coming in.

In my first weeks, I found that the calls were really difficult emotionally.

When I knew I had to do one, my heart would start pounding,

and my hands would begin to shake.

When Siobhi phones the families to tell them he's coming,

he just says he has a sealed letter that he must deliver by hand.

All contact after that is face to face.

He says it's better that way, and that's how he was trained.

Later, he goes with the families to the mortuary and then the funeral.

He's been to many, many hundreds of funerals.

He often stays in touch with the families for weeks.

He might get them financial support if the soldier is missing.

And tens of thousands of men are missing.

Some of them have been killed in No Man's land in places so dangerous

that their bodies can't be recovered.

Others have been taken prisoner.

Yet more are in the territories of Eastern Ukraine occupied by Russia.

Their family's greatest fear is that an officer like Sohi may come knock him.

We're on the road again, looking for another apartment.

The next notification will be about a missing soldier.

Maybe I will have a bit of applause before I go in.

I'm preparing myself to get the words right.

No more. No, what is wrong?

He'll try again later.

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Life in Le Viv looks pretty normal.

The city, close to the Polish border, is far behind the front lines.

You don't see bombed and smashed buildings on the scale of some other cities in Ukraine.

In the historic market square with its red roofed medieval buildings and cobblestone streets,

you would hardly think there was a war on.

People sit out at cafe tables.

The shops are open.

That's a little boy that you can hear busking for pennies.

There's a woman in a high-vis jacket dancing along.

But this normality is skin deep.

Some statues are sandbagged in case of air raids.

And you don't see many men of military age.

You might imagine they're all away in the army.

But perhaps not everyone is.

Good afternoon. We're checking military records.

Sergey isn't the only soldier from the recruitment office driving around Le Viv.

His colleagues in an unmarked car patrol day and night.

Andrii Noster learned his people skills working in luxury hotels before the war.

Nowadays, he carries a gun and looks for draft dodges on the streets.

I'm recording on my body camera.

Can I see your military records? Is everything in order?

Did you refresh your data?

Do you have the reserve plus app?

This is a British journalist who's come to see how we carry out mobilization.

We look for guys age 25 to 60.

If we spot someone, we stop, get out and talk to them.

Check their documents.

Sometimes they may look a certain age, but the papers tell us something else.

These patrols are known on social media for being rough.

Sometimes violent with the men they pick up.

People post videos of them grabbing men and forcing them into buses.

Then it's straight on to basic training.

There's even a new word for it, busification.

But my trip was arranged with the Ukrainian army and I didn't see anything like that.

I mean sure on social media, YouTube, whatever.

There's loads of stuff out there.

Some of it is completely made up.

Fake, staged, edited.

Often by Russia, according to the recruitment office.

Still, the videos have their impact locally.

In January, somebody even fired shots at a patrol from a passing car at a muddy crossroads on the outskirts of Lviv.

This kind of thing seeps into society and makes it really hard for us to do our job.

Even something simple like checking documents can escalate into rage.

Body cameras are there to protect you.

Things can get tense, people can get aggressive.

The camera is your defense.

Another thing, some people want to offer us money legally to resolve the situation.

We inform the person about the law on our body cameras.

This also protects us.

It shows that our actions are in accordance with the Ukrainian law.

When the patrol does get a recruit to cooperate, that's not the end of the story.

According to the Security, Defense and Intelligence Committee and Parliament,

four out of every five men who are drafted run away during basic training.

Four out of every five.

The runnerways disappear back into their hometowns and villages.

What is four?

Well, so I can see their faces.

If someone turns up, I can see who it is when they arrive.

The fence you see isn't high, so you can see over the top.

So you can spot a car if one is outside.

There are many reasons to fear a knock at the door here.

The controller lives in the kind of house you see a lot,

with a garden of vegetables and flowers surrounded by a solid metal fence with a door.

He's cut and opening, a little window in the top, so he can check who's coming.

He's hardly been outside for a year and a half for fear of the draft.

The callers in his 50s and used to be an odd job man,

traveling around the city, fixing things for people.

Now, he wiles away his days, pottering around the house and garden.

I don't go out on the balcony unless I need a smoke,

and I don't smoke first thing only after breakfast.

Smoke, do a bit of this and that, then smoke again, do something else.

Mikola wants Ukraine to win the war.

He just doesn't want to fight it.

Lots of his friends, he says, feel the same way.

Some take a chance by working as taxi drivers,

but most keep off the streets.

A lot of people have friends or acquaintances who got caught and taken into the army.

And well, let's just say, they didn't come back.

And the reason they didn't come back is, how shall I put it?

The command, the high ups above the sergeants and above the lieutenant,

across all units, everywhere that people are fighting.

It's not, let's say, up to the job.

And that's what people are most afraid of, I think.

Mikola and his wife will call her Julia, have one son.

He was 17 when the Russians launched their full scale invasion in February 2022.

At that time, boys weren't allowed to leave the country once they'd reached 18.

So, Julia took him to Italy to keep him safe, and then she came home.

She works as an estate agent, showing clients properties around town,

while Mikola hides out at home.

They both miss their son terribly.

The photos, wait, I need to find them.

That was the 26th of July 2022, the war had begun.

The two of us celebrated his 18th birthday in Italy, my son.

He celebrated his 18th without anything.

You might say, without friends, without parents, without a home.

He's still away in Italy, making pizzas in a restaurant.

Although he's too young to serve in the army under current rules,

who knows when that might change?

Julia and Mikola aren't willing to take the chance and bring him back.

Why did we make that decision?

Because we were afraid that something terrible might happen,

so we decided not to wait.

Our first priority was to hide our child.

We decided quickly.

We didn't think about it too much,

so I just got up and left, grabbed what I could,

our son, our dog, and off we went.

We lived there for nine months.

My son stayed.

I came home.

I just couldn't be so far away.

So that's how it is.

We are here, and my son is in Italy,

in a foreign country, living far from home.

He wants to come back, but he can't.

I can't say that I've got used to it,

because I miss my child.

But my soul is more at ease, because I know he's working there.

My child is alive there, and safe.

I don't worry that someone might grab him,

force him to sign something, and just send him off to his death.

I've got two sons.

Ten and thirteen.

They know in general terms what I do,

but I don't tell them the details.

Of course not, that would be traumatic for them.

Sergey says he can't always hide from his boys

how upsetting his workers.

One day, he told me he was helping them with their homework,

when he started shaking so much that he couldn't carry on.

I can talk more with my dad, talk things through,

talk about the tough moments.

All my mates and acquaintances know what I do.

Often they are surprised that I'm still doing it.

They can't get their heads around how I manage this long.

Sergey is looking for another address.

Another soldier is being confirmed as missing.

His mother works in a nursery.

Hello, Anna Mechalivna.

Hello.

Anna Mechalivna.

Good day.

This is Major Lazuki Serhii Viktorovich.

I've got a sealed envelope from Unit 3057 of the National Guard.

It's in your name.

I need to deliver it to you.

I roughly know the area, Shepchenko Street.

Could you tell me more exactly please?

Bazar, you know?

Yes.

So, Bazar, you have to leave the story,

and then you have to go back to the right,

to the other side, to the right,

and then you have to go to the end there.

Good.

I will be with you shortly.

Sergey went in to meet Hanna in the nursery.

He sat a long time with her in the garden.

I feel that my emotions have become frozen.

They are blocked.

My mind is probably protecting me from emotional overload.

But when it blocks my emotions,

it feels like all my emotions are blocked.

Not just the bad, but the good too.

I haven't loved properly in ages.

It's hard to feel joy.

It's more like just getting through life.

If 100% is the full range of emotions,

I feel about 10%.

The rest is frozen.

I expect two notifications tomorrow.

All across Ukraine, there are families that will never be whole again.

And people like Sergey who have to break the news.

There are three other recruitment centers just in the Veeve.

That's three more men like Sergey in one city alone.

Maybe it's wrong to say this,

but I'm someone who really wants this war to end.

I really want that.

Though I know that even when it ends,

I will still have a lot of work.

We will need to find all those missing

to return their bodies,

maybe from occupied areas or even Russia,

because there are so many of them.

That will go on for years.

The last time I spoke to Sergey was a few weeks ago in February.

I phoned him from London on a bitterly cold day in Veeve,

just as he and Ukraine were facing the fifth year of war.

Every year, it feels like this year, it must end.

But it doesn't.

Then another year comes, and again, it doesn't end.

That's psychologically very hard.

If you know the end date, you can endure it.

But when you don't know how long you'll be serving,

or how long the war will last,

that's extremely difficult.

And the whole country lives in this state.

What will it be like when the war does end?

How will families like Halinas

who've lost their loved ones forever?

And Hannah, whose son is missing an action,

lives as neighbors with families like Mikola and Julia,

whose son now lives abroad.

What kind of future will they share?

I have friends who avoid military service.

Some are close friends from childhood, people I love.

I don't approve of their actions,

but I don't want to argue with them either.

Sometimes I just say, let's not talk about this.

We won't change each other's minds.

On one side, I believe people should find the courage to serve.

On the other, these are people I care about.

When it's all over,

so he says he'd like to train as a mediator,

he resolves conflicts,

and he's definitely giving up the 9-5 job at the bank.

I've already started thinking about life after the war.

Maybe I'll open a little cafe

or some other kind of small business.

In civilian life, I help banks make money here.

I help families through the worst moments of their lives.

Of course, this job has affected my life,

certainly my attitude to life and death.

When you deal with death every week,

your whole view on it changes.

I've stopped fearing it,

not completely, but mostly.

Time has become much more precious

because you realize that life can stop at any moment,

even if I live into old age.

My years matter much more to me now.

Thanks for listening to the documentary

from the BBC World Service.

I'm Richard Pendry.

The producer was Monaco Whitlock.

Dimitri Hordevoi was the producer in Le Viv.

Neil Churchill was the sound designer

and Penny Murphy is the series editor.

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