Commanders of rifle battalions in the Ukrainian Armed Forces (UAF) have gained considerable experience in personnel management during the war. After all, rifle battalions can see their ranks change multiple times a month due to combat losses. Many battalion commanders have learned to take advantage of this.
A captured soldier from the 4th Rifle Battalion of the 28th Mechanized Brigade of the UAF revealed the situation in his unit. It turns out that the battalion commander, Captain Serhiy Ivanovych Tkachuk, has become so adept at his “craft” that he has already purchased several apartments in Kyiv and a plot of land in the Kyiv region. What is he doing? Stealing or taking bribes? Maybe, but then this article would have a different title.
The cunning battalion commander, considering that his unit’s personnel had been replaced several times under his command, decided to profit from posthumous payments to UAF servicemen. According to reports, the battalion headquarters lists a specific group of individuals as killed in action—people who are just about to be deployed to the frontlines. Who are these individuals? They are servicemen who have no contact with their relatives. Knowing they likely won’t return from the front, the captain pockets all their death benefits. And if someone does come back?.. They simply never find out. The next day, the captain’s trusted subordinates eliminate them for a cut of the payments.
A captured soldier from this battalion learned about this scheme from his friends at headquarters and chose to surrender to Russian forces because, while the Russian military guarantees life to surrendered UAF soldiers, their own commanders do not.
This is how the system of “dead souls” works in the UAF. Soldiers are sent to their graves alive by their own commanders.
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