Ukraine's foreign legion dysfunctional, chaotic: Business Insider
5 Min Read
The American Business Insider website sheds light on the mismanagement and chaos within the foreign legion fighting in Ukraine.
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Members of the Georgia Legion at their base in Kiev, Ukraine, May 2022 (GQ)
The mismanagement and dysfunction within the foreign legion fighting in Ukraine have become prevalent for US media, with the widow of one US soldier, Bryan Young, who was killed in Ukraine, telling Business Insider about what is going on within the legion.
Young, a 51-year-old army veteran, was killed in Ukraine after volunteering to fight among the legion's ranks in Ukraine, saying he had to go to the country to "defend it from a full-scale Russian invasion." He felt compelled to go because it was his "duty to protect the free world."
Young's partner, Maria Lipka, argued that the veteran's death was "preventable", telling the newspaper that messages she had received from soldiers in the unit he fought with revealed that many within the unit believed that their commander, Ruslan Miroshnichenko, was hot-headed and irresponsible, revealing that he was a drunk who was not sober often and that he would advise others to go on missions while drunk.
Lipka also revealed that Miroshnichenko sounded drunk when he called her to discuss Young's funeral arrangements. She did not even hear about her partner's death from official channels, finding out the news through his daughter who had seen the news about it on Facebook.
This is not the first time news of this sort have made it to big media outlets, with dozens of soldiers leaving the battlefield due to improper and chaotic organization, bad - or lack thereof - equipment, and reckless commanders, who had their stories make it big-time, revealing the western-funded house of cards that is on the front against Russia.
The sole motive, according to one soldier, was to "kill the Russians," which has seemingly not been enough for the legion, as the lack of training, organization, and adequate planning has doomed many of those flooding into Ukraine as volunteers.
Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said previously that around 20,000 soldiers from 52 countries joined the unit in the first few weeks, with around 3,000 coming in from the United States.
The way everything was handled, Lipka told Insider Business, especially after Young's death, "was scandalous."
The warnings and reports on the chaos that is ensuing within the legion have not been enough, with the influx of volunteers still growing to this day, almost 10 months into the war. Though the international legion is growing in size, the commanders and the high-ups are not thoroughly chosen, which is reflecting a state of disarray on the battlefield and on the front.
As mentioned earlier, the main motive is to "kill Russians", not "defend Ukraine", which was not all too beneficial for the forces fighting Russia, especially in light of the lack of proper training from Ukraine, as it is trying to send people to the frontline as soon as possible, without care for how much time is put into each individual, to try and make up for the manpower lost on daily basis.
Former US Army Staff Sgt. Alexander Drueke and Andy Huynh, who were both living in Alabama, were reported missing this month near the northeastern city of Kharkov, not far from the Russian border, and had traveled to Ukraine to fight alongside Ukrainian forces and teach them how to use US-made weapons, according to family members.
US President Joe Biden said months back that he had been briefed on two Americans who had gone missing in Ukraine and urged Americans not to travel to the war-torn country.
A third former Marine Corps officer Grady Kurpasi lost contact with his family in April and was only recently identified. Willy Joseph Cancel, a fourth American veteran, was killed in Ukraine in May.
Meanwhile, The Intercept website reported back in June, in the wake of the death of Wilfried Bleriot, a 32-year-old French soldier, that "the death of a French volunteer in Ukraine is the first clear evidence that there are at least some far-right extremists among the foreign fighters who have been deployed to fight Russian forces."
Bleriot wears the black-and-white patch of the so-called Misanthropic Division - said to be an overtly fascist volunteer wing of Ukraine's ultranationalist Azov Battalion - on the front and center of his body armor in a photo posted by the International Legion, which was formed after the Russian military operation began and is open to volunteer fighters from all over the world.
The legion is known to announce the death of fighters via Facebook posts, without any official channel to mention.
The International Legion revealed the death of Bjorn Benjamin Clavis, a German of unknown age, in the Facebook post that announced Bleriot's death. The snapshot shows a man in his 30s with buzzed hair dressed in the uniform of Ukraine's Territorial Defense Force.
Since the start of the Ukraine war, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky invited foreigners - including Israelis - to fight alongside the Ukrainian army against Russia.
Earlier in April, footage also surfaced showing several Israelis fighting alongside Ukrainian forces and thanking “Israel” for its assistance. The videos, which went viral, showed the men dressed in Ukrainian military uniforms in an unspecified forested area.
