We were out west, in the Ukrainian city of Lviv, meeting a senior law enforcement official in the back of a small cafe. The Ukrainian had no military background aside from the role he had been cast into in 2022, when Russia’s full-scale invasion began. Over cheesecake and “bumble,” espresso mixed with orange juice, he was unsure of the hypotheticals: Should American instructors teach Ukrainian police officers ambush raids or static defense, trenches or buildings? Every day, there was new battlefield intelligence and direction, he said. Plus, a new wave of police — detectives and criminologists — were coming.
It was my first day in Ukraine and I was getting a rare look into the country’s defenses amid a shortage of fighters for a war with no end in sight… and amid concern that U.S. military aid could diminish if former President Donald Trump was once again chosen by the American people to lead.
At midnight, I had walked across the Polish border in Medyka with a retired senior military official who had a background in intelligence operations. “Alex” did not want his real name to be used in this report because of security concerns. He was volunteering his time and highly unique expertise to train Ukrainian police officers. And he had offered to take me along.
When Russia’s opening salvo began in the winter of 2022, the border had been overwhelmed by people fleeing. But on that warm summer night, we alone walked down the glowing, cage-like aisles. A single question weighed on me as I my rolled my small suitcase between countries: how do you get people to care about a war that is not their own, 2.5 years in, when so many people are just worried about their own country?
Soon I would see an ever-expanding cemetery in Lviv, marked with mourners primping graves. I would hear some Ukrainians criticize President Volodymyr Zelensky, saying he should have capitalized on civilians’ urge to defend their country by mobilizing at the onset. Now men are said to be pulled off the streets and thrown into vans, often receiving insufficient training. Authorities are recruiting from prisons, as Russia’s Wagner Group once did. Abroad, Ukrainian embassies are no longer renewing passports for men of fighting age.
A senior Ukrainian intelligence official told me on the condition of anonymity that as U.S. military aid stalled for months earlier this year, Ukraine was forced to “fulfill a lack of munitions by people.” The official said the “biggest problem” will be the situation in November — and that without further U.S. support, Ukraine will pay a “huge” cost in casualties.
It was clear that the training Alex could provide was needed — as high levels of the Biden administration discuss potential contracts to train Ukrainians with U.S. defense contractors.
At the cafe that first day in Lviv, known as “little Paris,” Alex told the Ukrainian law enforcement official that if Trump were elected, munitions were reduced, and Russia took more territory, he could teach the police insurgent and guerilla operations behind enemy lines next year. The armed police were an ideal group to start training, he said.
“Hopefully we won’t get to that point,” the official said.
Ukraine needed to be thinking about partisan tactics months in advance, not in the moment when it would be too late, Alex told him. U.S. special forces understood this. A slow smile crept across the Ukrainian’s face as he said, “We can smell something burning in the kitchen.”
Was he concerned about Trump returning to the White House? Despite approving the sale of Javelins to Ukraine (on the condition that they not be used in the East’s conflict zone), Trump had recently said at the presidential debate that Americans shouldn’t be funding Ukraine’s defense, weeks before picking his running mate in J.D. Vance, a vocal opponent of aid to Ukraine. “Trump says a lot of things,” the official told me on the condition of anonymity since he did not have permission to speak. “He says one thing but it never happens, and it’s mostly lots of talk. It’s not something new.”
I asked him how Ukraine’s police officers were doing mentally. The official appeared startled by my question. “We don’t ask them, we order them,” he told me. It wasn’t important to know how officers were feeling to assess their capability — the men realized they would need to go to war sooner or later, he said.
I was going to be spending some days with the police. And at an open air market, a fellow law enforcement official insisted on buying me a gift. A rag doll. It was about 13 inches tall and the last thing I needed to carry around with me in a war zone. But he would not accept any version of “no.” So I thanked him and put the doll in my backpack. Why a doll? I wondered. Perhaps it’s because “Motanka” dolls have regained popularity since the war started. They have no face and are made simply with wound fabric and knots, meant to protect against evil. Mine wore green, which I was told symbolizes healing and rebirth. Comforting notions for the times we are living in.
That evening, my doll in its new home, Alex told me he faced a daunting task: to cram four months of military training into three weeks. These Ukrainian police officers also had an array of backgrounds: some had fought in places like Bakhmut and Avdiivka. Others had been administering parking tickets, and would go to the front for the first time. And some had been running away from the fighting due to a lack of training — a “little luxury” the Russians don’t have, as fellow troops often kill them for deserting.
The infantry numbers matter more than ever, military analyst Rob Lee told me, because Ukraine overextended itself in last summer’s offensive and brigades on the front line struggled to replace losses. “I think manpower is arguably the most significant factor, at least on the battlefield," he said. Rob was just leaving Ukraine as I was arriving. He said Russia appears to still be recruiting about 25,000 volunteers a month, “although they're giving out greater signing bonuses, which indicates that it may be becoming a little more difficult.”
Ukraine’s new mobilization is paying off on the battlefield but it’s unclear if the country can sustain the numbers, he said. If it can, “by the fall, the situation should get better.” If NATO members increase their capacity for artillery production, “in 2025, both the equipment and the manpower issues will become a greater constraint for Russia.”
As a group of us drove to the secret military grounds, we listened to Ukrainian pop and talked about The Vagina Monologues, which one interpreter was producing on the side for a theater. We passed a red and black UPA flag. “Russian blood makes black mud,” one of the guys said, referring to its colors and Ukraine’s famously dark, fertile soil. The flag was created by a Ukrainian paramilitary in 1942 to fight the Nazis and the Soviets. Like the Motanka doll, it had become popular again today.
Then we were at the training grounds, a sprawling array of bumpy roads and open and wooded areas. Shirts hung from clotheslines and boots dried under the sun. Puppies played in the grass. Last year, the base had worked with special units that included KORD, a rapid response police unit that rescues hostages, captures criminals, and participates in anti-terrorism operations. The current officers here had just dug a zig-zagged trench in the woods, which a wild black dog jumped across, the mounds of mud at its edges still soft.
On that first day in the woods, the air grew thick with men’s cigarette smoke. “Cigarettes can lead to detection,” Alex told them. He was teaching them how camouflage included sound, light, and scent. It was stuff they had never learned in the police — and relevant in a war largely fought from afar with drones and artillery. “If you’re easy to find, you’re prey,” Alex said. “And you’re easy to trail.” How far can you smell a human body? It depends on the time of year, he said.
Sitting on the ground between the tall trees and mosquitoes, the men who had already been to the front line took copious notes. Some who hadn’t occasionally nodded off against the trees. A few held their rifles with the muzzle pointing to the side, an indication of how little experience they had.
They were mostly in their 20s and 30s, arriving in shapes faroff from what U.S. infantry units would demand. But more importantly, they were men who had changed the face of Ukraine’s policing: during the Maidan revolution of 2014, its Berkut special forces killed 48 people and wounded dozens more. Russia would soon seize Crimea and infiltrate the Donbas, a hint of the brutal war to come. But Ukraine was turning toward the West, and it disbanded Berkut, letting new blood flow into its police ranks.
Part II of this report will be released later today.
Sasha, Thank you for sharing the story of these Ukrainian patriots. I hope they know so many Americans do have their back. Our front lines is nothing like theirs. Yet. I hope stories such as these start grounding people. This is not a game. 🇺🇦 🇺🇸
Trump and Vance will cut off all military aid to Ukraine should they take power in November. If they loose they will claim the election was rigged and call for violence to achieve their goal, a MAGA dictatorship. There is so much misguided sentiment for autocracy in this country, including within the military, that this could happen. To achieve success, a significant part of the military force would have to join the reactionary counter revolutionaries, or MAGA.
You no longer have to read between the lines to understand MAGA's foreign policy goal, an alliance with Russia, a theocratic autocracy. Trump's admiration for Putin and other dictators and the Trump/Vance call for an end to aid to Ukraine is evidence of their desire to create an truly evil empire. Trump disparages our traditional allies to send a signal to Putin. Under Trump, Putin would be allowed to extend his empire as far West as he desired. Trump said, "Putin can do what the hell ever he wants." He means it.
How do we stop this? By never ending our efforts to awake Americans to the true nature, evil, and unAmerican values of MAGA. If we can get the overwhelming majority of Americans, including those in the military, to see this we can stop MAGA.
It is imperative we do so. It is imperative that we nominate a president and vice-president capable of clearly articulating the threat MAGA represents to us and the world.