PROFILE: Bohdan, Oleksandr, Serhii — Three Soldiers Ukraine's Military Reform Leaves Behind

Introduction: The reform that arrived four years too late

Fedorov's announcement in June 2026

In June 2026, Ukrainian Defense Minister Mykhailo Fedorov presented the first phase of Ukraine's military reform as a response to frustrations accumulated since the start of the large-scale invasion. New contracts, higher wages, a simplified process for soldiers in AWOL status — the program looked complete on paper. On the ground, among soldiers who have served since 2022 or before, the reception was very different: a fresh wave of frustration, a sense of injustice, and deep uncertainty about their future.

This reform, long overdue — the updated mobilization law had already eliminated fixed service terms in 2024 — arrives in a brutal military context. Russia has massed 721,300 soldiers in Ukraine according to Ukrainian commander-in-chief Oleksandr Syrskyi. The front is under constant pressure. Units are desperately short of reinforcements. And yet, the soldiers who have held that front for four years and more find themselves signing two-year contracts just to get clarity on when their commitment might someday end.

Bohdan Mykolaichuk: six years of service for one year's reprieve

The portrait of a veteran trapped in the system

Bohdan Mykolaichuk has been in the Ukrainian army since 2022. He served more than a year on the front line in the eastern Donbas region before being reassigned to a rear-area officer post. As of June 26, 2026, to remain in his current role and get any clarity on the end of his military commitment, he must sign a two-year contract. In exchange, the reform grants him roughly one year of reprieve — approximately one month of deferment per year of service completed through June 2026. Six years of service. One potential year of relief.

The Ministry of Defense insisted on the new system's fairness: all military personnel are eligible for the new contracts, wages are rising, and the mechanisms for returning from AWOL have been simplified. What the ministry does not state clearly is that the reform treats a soldier who joined in March 2026 the same as one who has served since 2022 in terms of deferment measures. Mykolaichuk put it plainly: "It is unfair to those who have served a long time. The main criterion should have been length of service and time spent in combat."

The question of employers and returning to civilian life

Beyond the perceived injustice in the deferment terms, Mykolaichuk raises a concrete problem the reform fails to address: a minimum of six months of deferment is not enough to rebuild a civilian life. Employers have little incentive to hire a former soldier who could be recalled to service in six months. Professional retraining takes time. Returning to family life requires stability. Promising six months is promising a parenthesis — not a life.

This question has direct economic implications for Ukrainian society. A country emerging from war needs to functionally reintegrate its fighters into the economy and social fabric. Demobilized soldiers without a safety net, without a viable reintegration plan, with a civilian window too short to be meaningful — that is a real social and economic risk that Fedorov's reform does not appear to have fully reckoned with.

Oleksandr: the drone operator who sees the screws tightening

The frustration of veterans facing new advantages for newcomers

Oleksandr, a drone operator who has served since 2022, told the Kyiv Independent what many feel without always finding the words: "It seems more and more that those who stay in the army have the screws tightened further, and the longer they stay, the worse their conditions become compared to newcomers." This perception — that loyalty and length of service are inversely rewarded — is toxic for morale and unit cohesion.

This is not an isolated anecdote. The June 2026 reform introduces tangible benefits for new recruits — clear contracts, higher wages, explicit deferment prospects. It creates no compensatory mechanism for those who served through the hardest years, when those benefits did not yet exist. The difference in treatment between veterans and newcomers may not be intentional on the ministry's part, but it is real in the perception of the soldiers concerned.

The drone system mechanics and performance-based payments

The reform introduces a "mission control" system for infantry and assault troops that verifies their presence at assigned positions and documents completed combat missions for bonus payments. A similar system already existed for drone operators like Oleksandr. In theory, this system aligns compensation with operational performance. In practice, as several soldiers interviewed by the Kyiv Independent explain, it requires video proof of mission completion — impossible to obtain in many combat conditions.

For infantry units in direct contact with the enemy, in conditions of fog of war, intense pressure, and degraded communications, capturing a mission confirmation video is a luxury that the reality of combat does not always permit. The result: bonuses to which soldiers are entitled on paper may elude them in practice for lack of documentation. It is a pay promise with an administrative layer that reduces its real value.

Serhii: wounded, still serving, underpaid

The master sergeant who can no longer serve on the front line

Serhii, a master sergeant in an assault regiment, was wounded in the course of his mission. He continues to serve in a rear-area role, unable to return to combat. Under the new salary structure, his monthly pay is that of rear-area personnel: at least 30,000 hryvnias ($660), a fraction of the 300,000 hryvnias ($6,700) that front-line troops can earn. His argument is direct: "You cannot evaluate someone's contribution solely based on whether they are at the front or in the rear. UAV specialists, electronic warfare operators, and communications personnel also do essential work — and deserve to be fairly compensated."

This touches on a blind spot in the reform: the pay scale rewards physical proximity to danger, not competence or total contribution. An electronic warfare specialist based 20 kilometers from the front who jams Russian communications may have greater strategic impact than an infantryman in direct contact — but will be paid far less under the new structure. The reform creates an implicit hierarchy of military value that the soldiers themselves contest.

The question of personal expenses

Oleksii, a master sergeant in a drone unit, adds a dimension that official announcements pass over in silence: Ukrainian soldiers regularly spend their own money to perform their duties. Fuel to move along the front, rent outside barracks, supplies, repairs, equipment materials — all expenses that significantly reduce the net value of the pay received. "If you have a family, you are cut off from social life because you do not have the resources to maintain it," he says.

Deputy Defense Minister Mstyslav Banik acknowledged at a press conference on June 15, 2026, that the ministry would like to increase payments but is constrained by available resources. That is a rare moment of official candor — but one that also reveals that the announcements of impressive salaries do not always reflect the economic reality experienced by soldiers on the ground.

The reform's numbers: what they say and what they conceal

300,000 hryvnias per month for front-line fighters

The Ministry of Defense announced that front-line troops, particularly infantry and assault forces, would earn an average of 300,000 hryvnias per month — approximately $6,700 — with a ceiling of 460,000 hryvnias ($10,200). These figures were presented as positioning Ukrainian soldiers among the "best paid in the world." The comparison is debatable — the cost of living in Ukraine is very different from that of Western countries whose armies are cited for comparison — but it illustrates the genuine effort made by the government under an extremely constrained budget.

The reform as a whole costs approximately 60 billion hryvnias ($1.3 billion). Fedorov indicated these funds were secured through internal budget optimizations and savings, without direct recourse to additional international aid. That is a notable financial achievement for a government simultaneously managing a total war and an economy under constant pressure. But MP Iryna Friz, a member of parliament's defense committee, sounded a warning: the legal framework underpinning these payments remains fragile, with the new regulations designated as a "pilot project" not fully aligned with the military service law.

200,000 people in AWOL: the reintegration challenge

As of January 14, 2026, Fedorov estimated approximately 200,000 people were in AWOL status. The reform offers those who went absent for the first time an opportunity to return without criminal prosecution, with the choice of their new unit. It is a pragmatic mechanism that acknowledges that prior service conditions may have generated departures that were legally unjustifiable but humanly understandable.

However, as Sergeant Oleksii notes, the administrative mechanics of return remain complex and slow. Soldiers wishing to change units may wait months for the paperwork to be completed. The announced simplification will need to materialize concretely in actual procedures to have a real impact on the AWOL return rate. Good legislative intent and the reality of Ukrainian administrative practice do not always coincide as quickly as one would hope.

The salary grid: what the numbers alone do not tell

A pay gap creating inter-unit tensions

The June 2026 reform creates a four-level salary grid based on proximity to the front. Rear-area posts receive at least 30,000 hryvnias ($660) per month. Logistics and first-echelon support roles rise to 50,000 hryvnias ($1,100). Command post personnel receive 70,000 hryvnias ($1,540). Combat role troops — drone operators, artillery, electronic warfare — reach a base of 120,000 hryvnias ($2,600), with bonuses pushing up to 300,000 hryvnias for infantry and assault troops. These amounts are real and represent a genuine financial effort by the Ukrainian government under an extremely tight budget.

The system nonetheless creates internal tensions. Units in the same sectors but with different classifications perceive pay disparities that breed resentment. The reform did not sufficiently account for the fact that unit cohesion requires a sense of equivalent fairness within the same structures. When one member of a unit earns five times more than another because their roles are classified differently, collective solidarity is not always forthcoming.

The hidden cost of reassigned wounded soldiers

Soldiers who were wounded and can no longer serve on the front line but continue serving in rear roles — like Serhii — find themselves in a particularly unjust situation under the new grid. They paid the physical price of war, they continue to serve, and their salary reflects only their new posting location, not their front-line service history. No mechanism in the June 2026 reform compensates for this pay reduction caused by a war wound.

This gap in the reform is morally difficult to defend. A soldier wounded in the service of his country should not automatically suffer a pay cut as a direct consequence of that wound. That is precisely the type of correction the second phase of the reform must incorporate if the government wants to maintain the trust of soldiers who gave everything.

Progressive demobilization: a conditional presidential promise

A promised presidential decree with no firm timeline

The Ministry of Defense indicated it would begin the progressive demobilization of troops who have served since 2022 or before by year's end. Fedorov clarified in June that the process would begin in autumn and that a presidential decree on the demobilization of the armed forces "will take priority" over previously signed contracts. This conditional language is precisely what worries the soldiers concerned: the "will take priority" depends on the situation at the front, which itself does not follow ministerial schedules.

For Mykolaichuk, the prospect of this decree remains "elusive." He does not know how the mechanism will work, or who will replace the demobilized soldiers. The Ministry of Defense has sketched a plan to open a "recruitment market" to foreign fighters, with the goal that foreigners make up as much as 50% of Ukrainian infantry and assault units. This ambition — enormous in its scope — has no clearly defined timeline or operational mechanism yet.

The paradox of demobilization in wartime

The fundamental contradiction in any demobilization policy in Ukraine in June-July 2026 is this: Russia maintains 721,300 soldiers on Ukrainian territory, with the "thousand cuts" tactic described by Syrskyi. Fedorov himself admitted it plainly: "You cannot release everyone fighting since 2022 at once, or the front line would simply collapse." That is a military truth that overrides any consideration of individual fairness.

This reality traps long-serving soldiers in an impossible position: too indispensable to be quickly demobilized, too exhausted to continue indefinitely, and too wounded in their sense of fairness to enthusiastically sign new contracts. Yevhen, an infantryman interviewed by the Kyiv Independent, says it plainly: "If you let experienced veterans go, you can't simply replace them with new recruits."

The fragile legal framework: a parliament sidelined

A pilot project circumventing existing legislation

MP Iryna Friz, a member of the Ukrainian parliament's national security and defense committee, expressed a fundamental concern about the reform's legal structure: the new regulations governing payments and AWOL return procedures are designated as a "pilot project" not fully aligned with the military service law. By circumventing parliament through experimental regulations, the ministry risks creating a situation where soldiers who sign contracts or accept the new terms cannot be certain that commitments made to them will rest on solid legal foundations.

Friz put it directly: "The longer this process drags on, the harder it will be to explain — to those who will sign contracts and those who return from AWOL — how the state will continue to fulfill its obligations to them, and to what extent those obligations will be reliable and consistent." She also noted that the Defense Ministry had been "trying to circumvent legislative amendments through experimental regulations" while bypassing parliamentary involvement.

The financial sustainability question

Beyond the legal framework, Friz raised concerns about the reform's financial sustainability. The ministry did not present the parliamentary committee with a plan for how the spending would be funded over time. The 60 billion hryvnias cost for the first phase is secured, according to Fedorov, through internal savings. But what will happen in the second phase, when the volumes of soldiers involved increase and budget pressures intensify? The question remains without a satisfactory public answer.

Ukraine receives an estimated $60 billion in international aid for 2026 according to some estimates. But this aid is conditional, distributed in tranches, subject to the political vagaries of donor countries. Building a durable military salary reform on that kind of financial flow without a solid internal legal foundation is a systemic risk that soldiers themselves, if they understand it, may be less inclined to trust.

Conclusion: A necessary reform that must do better

The right to be frustrated

The soldiers expressing frustration at the June 2026 military reform are neither ungrateful nor cowardly. They are men and women who held the front for four years, who survived things few people in the West can imagine, and who are asking for one simple thing: to be treated fairly in a system that recognizes their length of service. That is a legitimate demand. Fedorov's reform, however well-intentioned, does not fully meet it in its first phase.

The real test of the reform will not be its June 2026 announcements, but what happens in autumn 2026 when the first demobilization decrees must be issued, when soldiers decide whether or not to sign the new contracts, and when the 200,000 people in AWOL decide whether or not to return. Those moments of truth will tell whether the Ukrainian government has managed to build a sustainable military system — or has simply deferred the crisis to a later date.

What these portraits reveal about the war

Bohdan, Oleksandr, Serhii, Oleksii, Yevhen — these faces of Ukraine's military reform are reminders of what abstract numbers always obscure: behind every soldier lies a life on hold, a family waiting, a civilian identity put in storage awaiting the day it can reclaim its rights. Ukraine is asking these men and women for extraordinary selflessness in defense of values that the West claims to share. The least the Ukrainian and Western governments can do is look them in the eye, acknowledge what they are living through, and build a system worthy of their sacrifice.

Ukrainian resistance is real, documented, admirable. It is also human, fragile, exhausted. Naming both is not contradictory. It is the condition for honest solidarity.

By Maxime Marquette, columnist

Columnist's transparency note

My biases and my sources

This profile is based primarily on a Kyiv Independent article dated June 26, 2026, written by Kateryna Hodunova, who conducted direct interviews with the soldiers cited. I did not conduct these interviews myself — I rely on the work of a field journalist within the limits of a press article. The names of the soldiers (except Mykolaichuk) are presented without patronymics for security reasons, as indicated by the original publication.

I support Ukraine in this conflict, which may make me more attentive to the failings of the Ukrainian military system when I perceive them as injustices toward people who deserve better. I have nonetheless tried to be fair to the Ukrainian government: it faces a real and short-term unsolvable constraint, and the reform represents a significant budgetary and political effort.

What I do not know

I do not know how many soldiers have already signed the new contracts since their introduction in June 2026. I do not know whether payments began on time despite the delay reported on June 23 by the military rights center "Pryntsyp." I do not know whether the promise of progressive demobilization in autumn 2026 will be kept. These elements will determine whether this reform goes down in history as a step forward or a missed opportunity.

Sources

Primary sources

Kyiv Independent — Ukraine's long-awaited military reform falls short for long-serving troops, June 26, 2026

The Guardian — Ukraine war briefing: Zelensky, 40-day blitz, June 26, 2026

Kyiv Independent — Latest news from the war in Ukraine, July 2026

Secondary sources

EuroMaidan Press — Articles on Zelensky and Ukrainian defense policy, 2026

Militarnyi — Syrskyi: Russia concentrated 721,000 soldiers in Ukraine, June 26, 2026

EuroMaidan Press — Ukraine news, defense and policy category, July 2026