Paris, February 14, 2024
Dear readers,
My school friend O. is still on the front lines. He is now head of his unit. We only have brief exchanges, he answers me when he can and it’s rare. Apparently the internet connection is very poor on “point zero” – the hottest spot on the front. I told him that you would be interested in knowing more about his living conditions, those of a basic Ukrainian soldier, 3,000 kilometers from home. Sometimes I ask him stupid questions, like: “Where are you sleeping tonight?” » “Are you warm?” » I got responses with a photo: a plastic bottle with a large ice cube inside. The image was accompanied by this caption: “She stayed last night near my sleeping bag. »
From what I understand, when they receive a combat order, soldiers go to the position at “point zero” and can stay there for up to five days before returning back to their base. , where they then have the same number of days off. As, at the moment, O. and his unit do not have a combat order, they have settled in a forest in -15°C. It seems unimaginable to me. Especially since it can last weeks, months. They also sometimes sleep in empty and abandoned houses, which they remodel a little.
O. tells me that the most complicated thing for them, when they are at “point zero”, is food. Everything they have there, you have to have carried it yourself. The first time, he had 84 kilos on his back. Since then, he has only taken what is necessary, which is to say almost nothing, except Snickers, which are very fatty and rich in protein. “It allows me to hold on without weighing me down,” he wrote to me. And he added: “Not to lie to you, there are no toilets there, so I prefer not to eat too much, I don’t want to become a 200 with my pants down” – a “200”, in the military code, is a dead person.
They are sometimes forced to stay longer than expected on the “zero point” because they are unable to leave their position as they are attacked. O. told me that recently his unit was stuck for several days. The rachists [contraction de « russes » et de « fascistes »] fired continuously. He listed at least six types of weapons they used, while they only had a machine gun to defend themselves… Scary. I so hope that this letter will be read by someone who has any decision-making power over sending weapons to Ukraine.
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