343 Tage an vorderster Front: Der lange Einsatz eines ukrainischen Offiziers unterstreicht Kiews Personalprobleme

Infantry officer Oleksiy just spent 343 days without leaving the front line, in what his battalion believes is one of the longest combat deployments for an officer in the Ukrainian Armed Forces.

[His lengthy deployment](https://www.cnn.com/2026/04/20/europe/ukrainian-soldier-frontline-manpower-issues-latam-intl?utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=missions&utm_source=reddit), in the woodlands between settlements in the eastern Zaporizhzhia region, underscores Ukraine’s severe lack of manpower as the war drags on after more than four years.

The 37-year-old had the opportunity to leave the front at one point but volunteered to stay due to the manpower challenges.

“My company is understaffed (as are all the others) and of those who are here, roughly half are in the 50-plus age bracket,” said Oleksiy – whose call sign is “Botanik,” a.k.a. “nerd” – in a statement published by his unit. “Ideally, an infantryman would spend a month on combat duty and a month recovering in a frontline village. But under current conditions, that’s completely unrealistic due to the shortage of men.”

His battalion, which identified Oleksiy only by his first name, told CNN that a typical deployment is about three to four months for their unit. Throughout the military, soldiers typically serve on the front lines in rotations of less than three months, although it varies widely.