Taras, call sign "Fox," is a reconnaissance soldier. He was among the first to sign the 18-24 contract, leaving his job in the hospitality industry and becoming a serviceman at the age of 22. He is currently undergoing rehabilitation after being wounded during an assault near Sudzha, the Russian territory.
In this interview, we speak with Taras about his path in the military, reintegration into civilian life after being wounded, the advantages of the Ukrainian army over the occupying forces, and how, in his view, Europe's perception of the war in Ukraine should be shaped.
I signed a contract with the Air Assault Forces, but fate had it that I ended up in intelligence. Before that, I had spent four years working in the hospitality industry — I traveled across a large part of Ukraine. That is precisely what influenced my decision to join the army. Living in every corner of the country, getting to know Ukrainians, I realized: they are the same everywhere — and I love them equally everywhere. Having had so many people pass through my life, I saw that there are people worth fighting for, worth dying for. Because I genuinely love Ukrainians. I love being Ukrainian. And I really don't want them to die because Shaheds are falling on them, or because this damned war of aggression is dragging on.
When we were gathered together — a group of guys from different parts of Ukraine, aged 18 to 24, some already had children, one had a pregnant girlfriend — people tried very hard to scare us. They said: you're not even 25, and you're already going to war. It came from veterans and civilians alike. Every time you start telling someone that you're about to join the military, people say: you don't belong there, you're not made for war, you're a great bartender — go back to your bar.
But if you think in those terms, then nobody belongs in war. Nobody would want to be there. But there are principles and there is duty: you have to do it. You specifically. Because if not you, then who? One of the mottos of the Air Assault Forces is "no one but us." And that resonates deeply with my own vision.
Thirteen of us signed contracts with this brigade. Each one understood that in the worst-case scenario, roughly half would survive. As it turned out, eleven made it. And that is truly a very good statistic for the positions we held — none of us sat in a headquarters, none of us were rear-echelon. Every single one of us took direct part in combat operations.
The guys in my unit managed to carry out two successful assault operations with live firefights. The first went cleanly. In the second, I was wounded.
There's a common belief that if you sign up for infantry, intelligence, machine gunner, sniper — you won't last two months. But practice shows something entirely different. There are guys who have been in it from the very beginning and haven't suffered a single wound. They received solid training, had the motivation, and did everything the way it's supposed to be done.
We were operating on the Sumy front, literally 500 meters from the Russian-Ukrainian border — closer to Kursk and Sudzha than to Sumy itself. Stabilizing the front line there was critically important: had the enemy pushed any closer, their artillery would have reached the Oblast capital. Sumy could have shared the fate of Pokrovsk, Bakhmut, and other frontline cities. Thanks to our work during that period, we didn't just stop them — we pushed them back from the positions they had been holding.
On the seventh day of the mission, we received our final task: recon another grid square. As we were approaching it, we came across a stray enemy machine gunner. We couldn't even have imagined he'd be there — this was already, in effect, our territory, where there should have been nobody. But thanks to the reaction of the guys with me, it was all over quickly. He managed to fire off a few rounds, and one of them hit me in the leg. He was neutralized just as fast. Which was fortunate — because a single machine gunner could have taken out the entire group.
The injury is quite serious. The bullet passed through me 2 millimeters below the knee joint. Had it been just a little higher, I probably wouldn't have been able to bend my leg — and it might have been amputated. I was wounded on October 5th. I've been in rehabilitation for six months now, with several more surgeries still ahead.
I was very lucky to end up with competent doctors who were able to put me back together and save the leg. Ukrainian doctors currently have, perhaps, the best experience in the world with this kind of surgery. In Europe, they likely couldn't have performed an intervention like this — preserving the knee and the joint, inserting a titanium plate so that a person could walk again. My tibia was shattered to pieces. I'm grateful to the doctors in Zhytomyr who were able to correctly fit a plate in its place. I can almost walk now.
I'm 23, and bones heal better at my age than they would in someone who's 50. They promised me that in a year I'll be walking just fine. The progress is there.
The strongest feeling right now is resentment. Resentment that things turned out this way — that I went out on a mission and came back with a wound that knocked me off track. I can't do my work, my physical training, my tactical drills.
But I understand that even after a full recovery, I'll still need time to reintegrate back into my unit's operations. Returning before I'm 100% recovered is not an option. The physical load out there — a backpack, body armor, a rifle — is roughly 50 kilograms, and I weigh 65. The problem isn't that I'm afraid for my knee. The problem is that I might need to evacuate a wounded soldier, and I simply won't be able to do it. I risk becoming a burden to the entire group.
So for now, there's an opportunity to develop new skills — management, UAVs, instructor work. I completed the reconnaissance school, spending a bit longer there than is standard. I understand how a soldier should fight in 2026, taking into account drones and thermal imaging. I could train people who are just entering the war.
After a wound, a person faces two key problems that make it hard to keep going: psychological — PTSD — and physical. But when someone has been wounded and is able to return, in 90% of cases they do return to service. Because once you've been through it, you realize: the system isn't as terrifying as people say. You've already walked that road, and the worst things that were going to happen to you have already happened. The fact that you're alive means you're still okay.
But a great deal depends on civilians. When you're wounded, you become a combat veteran, and how society perceives you starts to matter. You're no longer talking to soldiers — you're talking to civilians, and they become your support system. If you have people close to you, they're the main anchor, because they will always be there for you. But it's important to send a message to society as a whole: veterans shouldn't be ashamed to speak up, and society shouldn't shy away from these people.
There needs to be healthy communication. Don't ask someone who has just been wounded when the war will end. Be patient: these people have been through hellish moments and may not behave the way civilian life expects them to. Find something to do together — go fishing, simply be present. When that happens, it's so much easier for a person to reintegrate.
If the war ended, I'd literally be back behind a bar within two days — or I'd open my own. But if it doesn't end — and right now, that seems to be the case — I understand that I need to contribute to victory even beyond direct service.
Right now there's a prospect of launching production of interceptor drones to fight shaheeds. Russia can produce up to a thousand Shaheds a day, and our air defense is clearly not ready to shoot down every single one. If the war ended — of course, I wouldn't be doing this, I'd be living my life and pursuing my own goals. But there are more urgent needs that have to be addressed right now.
There's a long-held belief that any Ukrainian is worth ten Russian servicemen — it was true in the time of the Cossacks, and it has been true ever since. That dynamic holds to this day. Yes, they outnumber us by a wide margin, they have more equipment, more money. But even with our limited resources, we have shown that we can hold our ground. In 2022, many Western politicians thought Kyiv would fall in three days. The whole world saw that even with a smaller army and fewer human resources, we are capable of standing up to a military machine where an entire country is working toward the seizure of a few kilometers of Donetsk Oblast.
Our volunteers are mostly people driven by conviction. Every Ukrainian serviceman is significantly better trained. We don't have situations where someone is mobilized and two days later they're already at the front with a rifle. Every soldier goes through basic training and specialized training depending on their role. That is why every one of our fighters is so much stronger. Only this year, in March, did we reach parity with Russia in drone deployment — even though we should have surpassed them long ago, because we build them better, cheaper, and more effectively.
If foreigners know even a little history, they need to understand: Ukraine is the easternmost bastion against the Russian Empire. The Cold War, the Iron Curtain, the Berlin Wall — all of these were consequences of Europe yielding to Soviet imperial narratives. It could happen again, in the 21st century, if Ukraine fails to hold.
The average European sees gas prices rising because of the war in Ukraine. But they need to understand: they are not paying that price because they are supporting some Ukrainians — they are paying it because Ukrainians are not letting Russian evil seep into Europe. We are doing an enormous amount of work on their behalf — and while our citizens are dying and our cities are being bombed, theirs are at least living in peace.
Would they be ready to fight this machine themselves if it reached them? Would their citizens be willing to mobilize by the millions? I very much doubt it.
So even for an ordinary European, it matters to understand where part of their taxes are going. They are going toward ensuring that they and their children don't have to go to war. We can fight. Just give us weapons, give us the means to fight, give us the technology and the intelligence. And we will be ready to destroy this stronghold of evil ourselves.
