Recruits into the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) will receive two months of induction training instead of 45 days as in the past, Ukraine’s Commander-in-Chief Oleksandr Syrsky said in a Monday statement.
Basic training will be expanded to one and a half months from the 30 days at present, Syrsky said in an announcement following the AFU’s final 2024 meeting on training military personnel.
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Both recruits and receiving units have complained that fresh troops are not given enough time to learn basic military skills or discipline, which leads to increased casualties and worsened morale once soldiers are committed to combat.
Recruits will soon receive a two-week training at their receiving unit before being assigned to a military job, giving them 45 days worth of training as a fresh inductee and 15 days within their receiving unit, Syrsky said.
The unit training, in particular, must adapt the soldier to “as much as possible for the challenges of modern warfare in order to keep him in combat,” Syrsky said.
The AFU faces serious personnel shortages in combat units due to casualties, desertion, and an overall lack of reinforcements and rotations, which worsens the number of casualties.
A common complaint is that new soldiers show up at receiving brigades poorly trained in basic combat skills like first aid, marksmanship and preparing field fortifications.
Unlike NATO armies, which often devote six to nine months to preparing a recruit in peacetime, the AFU rarely trains combat soldiers in advanced fighting skills like small unit tactics, coordination with other combat arms or battlefield leadership.
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Syrsky, in past comments, has said the AFU lacks the resources and manpower to train soldiers to NATO standards but added that troops learn on the job.
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