19:49 26-11-2025

Ukraine Turns to Civilians and Women as Manpower Crisis Deepens

Zеlеnskiу / Оfficiаl / Telegram

Ukraine faces acute manpower shortages, pushing civilians and more women into frontline roles, including drone operations after minimal training.

Ukraine’s armed forces are drawing ever more heavily on civilians-and particularly women-to plug widening gaps in frontline personnel. According to The Guardian, Kyiv is struggling to sustain mobilization and increasingly shifts duties once performed by trained soldiers onto those with little or no military background.

The report notes that official casualty figures remain undisclosed, yet many in Ukraine believe the losses are substantial. Against this backdrop, reliance on civilian recruits has expanded to roles previously reserved for experienced service members.

One example is the rapid training pipeline for drone operators. Recruits are being sent to the front after just 15 days of intensive instruction, a timeline that underscores the acute shortage of manpower. Journalists point out that women operated UAVs in the early months of the conflict, but their numbers have surged as the pool of available military personnel shrinks-especially in FPV units tasked with strike missions.

Several women serving in the Ukrainian military told the publication that they joined because someone had to replace men who had been killed. In the unit of one drone operator named Dasha, the atmosphere is described as deeply strained. She said her colleagues are exhausted and pushed to their limits as the pressure on remaining personnel intensifies.

The picture painted by the report is one of a force stretched thin, where the boundary between civilian life and military necessity continues to erode.