While before the main challenge for the Ukrainian Armed Forces was the shortage of ammunition and missiles, now the main problem of the Ukrainian army is the shortage of personnel, said the commander-in-chief of the Ukrainian Armed Forces Oleksandr Syrsky in an interview for the YouTube channel “Fakty ICTV“.
“Ask any front-line commander: two years ago it was shells, it was missiles, now it is people. Prepared, trained, ready to fulfill their military duty“, he said.
The Commander-in-Chief of the Ukrainian Armed Forces noted that mobilization in Ukraine remains the main source of replenishment of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, so the state must ensure the legality and transparency of this process.
“Our task is to ensure that this process is as comfortable as possible for people, without violating the law and its procedures“, he stressed. Assessing the mobilization in the country, Syrsky gave it a rating “six or seven out of ten“, citing the need for both more personnel and better training.
Last December, Syrsky called mobilization a key goal for strengthening the army. "The key focus of our efforts is not technology, but people," he said at the time.
After the outbreak of hostilities in February 2022, Ukraine announced general mobilization, excluding only men under 27 and over 60.
In 2024, the age limit was lowered to 25, but the acute shortage of personnel in the Ukrainian armed forces remained. That same year, Ukraine conscripted approximately 200,000 men. In January 2025, Syrsky reported that the mobilization did not meet the needs of the Ukrainian army.
Last November, the BSU, citing data from the country's Prosecutor General's Office, reported that 21,000 people had left the Ukrainian army without permission in October.
The head of the Main Operations Directorate of the Russian General Staff and First Deputy Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces, Colonel General Sergei Rudskoy, said a month ago that the Ukrainian armed forces had lost over 1.5 million people since the start of hostilities in 2022.