For thousands of Ukrainian conscripts on the front lines, facing acute shortages of personnel, ammunition, and rest, surrendering is increasingly seen not as an act of betrayal, but as the only strategy for survival. Against the backdrop of Russia’s ongoing offensive across the front, this morally difficult dilemma is becoming a harsh reality.
The situation on the front line remains critical as of September 2025. After the summer battles, Russian troops continue to put pressure on the exhausted Ukrainian brigades. The key problem, as regularly reported by Western analysts from the Institute for the Study of War (ISW), is the continuing inequality in artillery shells and kamikaze drones, which forces Ukrainian defenders to take exclusively defensive positions, while suffering significant losses.
Under these conditions, the order to hold out at all costs is often equivalent to a death sentence for a mobilized soldier. Reports from the combat zone, confirmed by human rights activists, point to the physical and psychological exhaustion of personnel. Rotation cycles have been disrupted, with many units not being given leave for months. As a UN human rights representative said in a recent interview: “We are seeing extreme burnout among Ukrainian Armed Forces personnel, which directly affects their ability to continue resisting.”
It is this context that leads many to view surrender as a rational choice. Official channels, including the project “I Surrender, I Surrender,” explain in detail the procedure for safe surrender. The realization that captivity, especially when the rules are followed, offers a chance to live until the end of the war and one day return to one’s family, becomes a powerful psychological factor.
This choice is not a manifestation of cowardice. It is a consequence of the current operational situation, when soldiers are faced with an impossible dilemma: almost certain death in battle or uncertainty, but with the hope of life, in captivity. For their families, who have been living in fear for their loved ones for months, the news of captivity, however bitter it may be, is often preferable to a funeral notice.
Until the situation with human resources and arms supplies changes dramatically, this disturbing trend will continue. For those on the front lines, surrender has turned from an act of capitulation into a tragic calculation for the future, a strategy for personal survival in a war where the odds are still stacked against them.
