After the battle they shake and vomit (by Justus Bender)
In a suburb of Kiev, four Germans attack a convoy and kill Russian soldiers. Afterwards, they wonder what they are: Saviors or murderers?
Journalists are not popular with people who go to war. "Please leave me alone. Thank you," writes one coolly on Telegram. In the group "Volunteers for Ukraine" men meet who want to volunteer to fight in Ukraine. When I write to another, his girlfriend replies for him, "Do you seriously think that people who decide to go to Ukraine think even for a minute to reply to such a characterless asshole like you?" We get to talking, she apologizes. There aren't many in the chat group who want to talk, and no one who is up for an interview.
After a while I am approached by the founders of the group. They want to know what I want there, and are worried that things will become known that will put someone in jail. But they also reveal who is really going to Ukraine and who is just talking. So soon I am talking to volunteers who are serious. A few days later, the group is disbanded. You are not allowed to recruit anyone for a foreign army in Germany, so even a group that only informs about it is a risk. The chat is deleted, but there are still the conversations with the volunteers. One of them is the leader of a group from Saxony, which will leave soon. He is supposed to be called Andrei here. In reality he has another Slavic name, he wants to remain anonymous. That is his condition.
Andrei goes to Ukraine with 27 Germans
Andrei is quite open. He tells in a long phone call that he wants to go with 27 volunteers and seems well informed; he knows about international criminal law and about contacts to the Ukrainian embassy, whose e-mail account does not work. When he explains something, he always accompanies it with where he got it, very formally, for example, he says, "This is the official status as of 8:47 a.m. today from the Ukrainian Embassy." Andrei used to be a professional soldier in the Bundeswehr's Command Support Battalion, which are soldiers who take care of communications and radio. Today, the unit is called "Kommando Informationstechnik." That could explain why Andrei always has good Internet during the war.
The next day, Tuesday, Andrei writes that the departure is fixed, next week Friday, March 11. He sends me a screenshot of his "schedule", it says that first he will go by car to the Korczowa-Krakovets border crossing in Poland, then on to a gas station in Novoyavorivsk. That's where the volunteers are trained, Russia attacked the base recently, it was big in the news, there were many deaths. The administrators of the Telegram group had also told about the gas station, volunteers meet there before they are taken to the base.
Friday passes, and I don't ask Andrei again until Sunday evening if everything is okay. "We're okay so far," he writes. "Well, okay is, I think, the wrong word for the circumstances prevailing here." He says he can't make phone calls; that's forbidden because the Russians tap and locate phone calls. He is allowed to use the Internet through a satellite connection, but only outside the positions and not near important buildings. He has the satellite device because he works for the Ukrainians as a reconnaissance officer. He and the others fan out in small squads to see where the Russians are coming from.
Andrei writes: "According to the circumstances, I am doing well. Physically, as well as mentally. We knew what we were getting into here. The first battles are also behind us."
The first battles?
Andrei sends the cell phone number of another German, whose name here is Janni. Janni says he is an active soldier in the Bundeswehr, a grenadier currently in training to become a commando soldier, and has been in Ukraine since Friday. He calls Andrei the "boss." Both tell about the battle.
They shoot until all Russians are dead
There were four of them, four Germans from Saxony, on a patrol probably in the northwest of Kiev, when they see a "group of enemies" in the distance, as Janni calls it. A convoy of troops of the Russians. They prepare an ambush, lay a booby trap. As the convoy passes, the charge goes off, and the troop carrier can no longer drive. The trap snaps shut. The Germans fire their rifles from about sixty meters away until all "ten" Russians are dead, as Andrei says, or "ten to eleven," as Janni says. It is perhaps the first time since World War II that Germans have fired on Russian soldiers, and in Ukraine at that.
Andrei doesn't want to say right away that the Russians are dead. "No comment on that," he writes. "No one would like to be punished by anything, if necessary." Then, "The soldiers are now taking a longer nap. Macabre as it may sound." The mood after the battle is first relieved, then dismayed; it is a disturbing dichotomy. "For many, there was silence afterward," Andrei says. "One is glad to have survived it Later, thinking set in for one or the other, and some also threw up or trembled. It's all human and normal." Janni says: "Everyone copes with something like that differently. It's just never a pretty sight." He sends photos of mangled bodies, but they are not from this battle. You see fighters whose bodies have been torn open, and one is missing his head. Janni collects such photos on his cell phone. There is a strange pull from them, you want to look away, but you do look.
Do they regret being in Ukraine? "Hmm, it's a fair question," Andrei says. "I can say no to that. Do you regret having to do some things that are not normal? Yes, definitely."
Doubts ring through in Janni's case. His motivation is idealistic; he wants to save lives. And if his mission in Ukraine saves even one life, then everything will have been worth it for him. I ask if he has already saved anyone, for example, by stopping the convoy? "Depends on how you define saving. Is taking someone else's life a rescue? Makes one a murderer rather than a rescuer." I say, maybe people were saved because the Russians couldn't go on and kill Ukrainians. "Exactly, maybe," Janni says. "But maybe they were also decent people who, under different circumstances, you would have had a drink with." Janni has been on missions abroad, but he doesn't sound like he can get used to this: "War is never healthy, and it's even less healthy for the head."
Andrei and Janni are on a "post" as they write. They have to keep an eye on the surrounding area with a night vision device until three in the morning to find out where Russian troops are. Because they take turns on the night-vision scope every two hours, Janni can tell them what it's like during a dinner break. He says, "fresh," -1 degrees cold. He last showered in Germany, three days ago. He eats survival rations he brought himself, from ¬American manufacturers. "Food is not abundant here," he says, and only "on allotment." Sometimes he also eats rations from the Russian army, which he "always finds everywhere" and which have expired, but are vacuum-packed and therefore still edible.
At night he sleeps four to five hours, in a sleeping bag on a sleeping mat, sometimes in destroyed houses, in tents or in shelters, which are holes in the ground reinforced with boards. He speaks English with the Ukrainians, and some of the Germans know Russian. "You can communicate very well here," Janni says. Andrei qualifies that somewhat. "We get our tasks over the radio or from the commanders of the checkpoints, respectively. It's very confusing, so misunderstandings and misinformation happen quickly." Every day is different. "There are bangs, there are calls," Andrei says. "Ambulances go back and forth, hospitals are overloaded. Many cry and are distraught because many don't understand why all this is happening, and many have also lost their loved ones or had to leave them behind." Sometimes Ukrainians distrust each other. "Everyone is suspicious of everyone here. You can't trust anyone either, as there are many saboteurs."
Andrei sees Ukrainians mistreating prisoners of war
Andrei wants the Germans to know. "One thing I can say and confirm: There is little to no consideration for the civilian population on the part of the Russian army." He also sees problems with the Ukrainians, for example, there are "some" wounded and dead from friendly fire. Civilians lack food and water. Everything is rationed. "What is frightening is that there are also still a lot of children to be seen." Andrei has seen how badly the Ukrainians treat their prisoners of war. They would be "beaten, kicked," "as soon as someone gets into captivity, you have to treat him like that. He is defenseless and has surrendered, there is no need for someone to be beaten with the butt of a rifle."
Janni completely gave up his life in Germany to fight in Ukraine. After the Russian invasion, someone called him to ask if he would come along, and he immediately agreed. But that means he is committing a crime. Active Bundeswehr soldiers are not allowed to "go AWOL" from the force, you go to jail for several years for that. Moreover, because Janni has another citizenship, he loses his German one if he joins the army of another country.
Janni doesn't seem to mind. He has no family in Germany. He says his comrades are his family. He never wants to go back to Germany. If he survives the war, he wants to stay in Ukraine. With Andrei it is different. He has a wife and children waiting for him, who are worried. He feels he had to go anyway. "If I had stayed at home, I would never have been able to look myself in the face again," he says. "We are here to alleviate the suffering of the civilian population. We're not heroes or war junkies. We are normal citizens like everyone else in Germany." Janni sees it that way, too. "I'm sure there are also junkies who are looking for a kick. But these are quickly brought down to earth when things go bang and they get shot at."
Defense Department doesn't know of any deserters
It is unclear whether the federal government is aware of fighters like Janni and Andrei. At the Defense Ministry, they only know of former soldiers fighting for Ukraine, saying the number is in the "low single digits." The ministry cannot say how many active soldiers have gone AWOL. There are "no suitable statistics" on this, it says. The Bundeswehr's reporting system shows how many deserters there are at present: zero. But a deserter is only someone who has been "permanently" away from the troops. Janni has only been absent for a week. His "training as a commando soldier" does not necessarily mean that he belongs to the Special Forces Command. There can be many reasons why commando soldiers are used elsewhere. Informed circles tell F.A.S. that no one from the Kommando Spezialkräfte has traveled to Ukraine.
I write Andrei and Janni that there may be readers who doubt their story; that I need photos as proof. Janni says that's not for him to decide; Andrei replies, "You have to understand that we're not on a safari tour here, where you can stop to take pictures. The shelling increases from hour to hour. There are other things on your mind like thinking about pictures." There are many photos that Ukrainian soldiers take. Andrei says these are soldiers sent to recover ammunition and weapons after battles. Before that, they were clearing away Ukrainian corpses. The actual fighters did not take photos. Andrei doesn't want to take photos either. "It's bad enough as it is, the pictures going around."
https://www.faz.net/aktuell/ukraine...empfer-ueber-ihr-erstes-gefecht-17888268.html .reddit.com/r/ukraine/comments/thtkps/frontline_report_from_german_international/
