Editor's note: The Ukrainian military's 3rd Separate Assault Brigade reviewed the images before publication.
KYIV, Ukraine — As Ukraine continues its mass conscription drive to fight Russia, more and more civilians find themselves in the armed forces. Many units do their own recruiting.
An elite 3rd Separate Assault Brigade even allows civilians to try living and training like soldiers for a week, to give them a quick sense of what they will face if they are conscripted or decide to sign up for the military voluntarily.
Live and train like soldiers
At the training base of what the military calls "Test Week," at an undisclosed location in Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, several dozen people are exercising on a clearing that serves as an improvised battlefield. Carrying mock-ups instead of real guns, they learn how to move and regroup during an attack, to cover their comrades and evacuate the wounded.
Every few minutes, firecrackers explode, simulating grenades and artillery fire.
Although Ukraine’s draft is for men who are 25 to 60 years old, several of the participants were younger than that but still eligible to volunteer to serve in the military, with a minimum age of 18.
Twenty-year-old Oleksii Sichkar is younger than conscription age but old enough to serve. He believes if Ukraine doesn’t have enough soldiers, the Russians might one day enter his hometown of Ladyzhyn, in the central Ukrainian Vinnytsia region, far from the front line.
“We’re not sure that hostilities won’t come to our area,” he says, before joining other trainees for a next exercise.
For seven days, Sichkar and other participants learn how to use weapons, study battlefield medicine and improve their physical fitness. Many have signed up for this course because among Ukrainians the 3rd Separate Assault Brigade is known as one of the toughest units.
Maryna Kirsanova, a 50-year-old engineer, heard so much about the brigade’s exploits from her friends that she decided to take the course.
“They are so cool,” she says. “I didn't even expect that everything would be so real.”
Instructors with combat experience
All the “Test Week” instructors have real combat experience. Maksym Levchenko helped set up the program. He joined the army at the beginning of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, and was one of those who volunteered to fly into the besieged port city of Mariupol later that year.
“We had to fly to Mariupol and bring weapons, food, medicines and soldiers," Levchenko remembers.
He fought in the city and managed to get to the Azovstal steel plant, site of a fierce, months-long last stand before the city fell, and he ended up in Russian captivity.
Last year, Levchenko was released in a prisoner swap. But he couldn’t go back to the front line because his eyesight worsened. Instead, now he’s preparing civilians for military service.
“We give them assessment according to physical training, knowledge of theory, medicine [and drones],” Levchenko explains. “Also we evaluate their leadership abilities, teamwork and analytical mindset.”
At the end of the week, all participants receive feedback as well as advice on what to improve.
The main requirement is motivation
One of the common fears among many Ukrainian draft-age men is that they will find themselves at the front line if they are conscripted.
Volodymyr Davydiuk, the head of the 3rd Separate Assault Brigade’s recruiting center in Kyiv, assures recruits not everyone has to fight in trenches.
“The army is a much wider structure, and there are many noncombat professions there that require specialists,” he says. “We show civilians that they can choose the unit and the position in it.”
The brigade relies mostly on its own recruiting rather than conscription, looking for motivation more than anything else.
“Two to three weeks of physical training will put you at a decent level of conditioning," Davydiuk says. “Tactics and medicine — you can teach everything that is needed for war.”
To encourage civilians to sign up, the unit launched a nationwide ad campaign with banners strung across city streets calling to join. There’s even a documentary on Netflix called We Were Recruits, recounting the journey soldiers take from basic training to fighting on the front line.
The "Test Week" program for civilians is also considered effective. Of about 400 people who took part in it, almost 1 in 5 signed up after, according to Levchenko.
Sichkar, the participant from central Ukraine, has decided to enlist in the 3rd Separate Assault Brigade.
“I’m doing this for my family, to protect my mother and sister," he says. “I love them more than anything in the world.”
Sichkar wants to join the brigade’s assault forces, even though he realizes how dangerous his choice is.
Editor's note: The photos above were reviewed before publication by the Ukrainian military for anything that might reveal their location.
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