Ukraine’s manpower problem is growing worse as forces have moved from the frontlines of the war against Russia to stage an incursion into Russian territory.
Ukrainian forces pierced through Russia’s border last week and have now seized more than 400 miles of territory in the Kursk region, in a surprise incursion that caught Moscow off-guard. But the troops that were sent to Kursk were transferred away from other key locations, further exhausting Ukraine’s already alarming lack of manpower against Russian forces on the frontlines of the war, according to the WSJ.
“If we’re supposed to have five or six people in a position, we’ll have two or three,” a 45-year-old army major stationed near the frontlines of the war in eastern Ukraine told the WSJ, adding that the manpower problem had grown so urgent that even cooks and mechanics were being deployed. “It’s a matter of time before the enemy finds a weak spot.”