Ukrainian-born soldiers captured fighting for Russia grapple with identity and loyalty

Behind reinforced walls in western Ukraine sits a prison camp holding men captured while fighting for Russia. Many arrived from major Russian cities like St. Petersburg and Yekaterinburg, but scattered among them are soldiers born in Ukraine itself—men who took up arms against their own country and now face treason charges in Kyiv's courts.

Anton was a child when Russian-backed forces seized his corner of the Donbas. When Putin launched the full-scale invasion in 2022, Anton had just turned eighteen. He enlisted immediately, not for Moscow, but what he believed was his homeland. "I don't regret my choice. I went to defend my land," he says, though his voice carries the weight of loss. He and his friends all volunteered together. Now they exchange text messages about the dead. "Dead, dead, dead." All of them.

The men in this camp tell a consistent story: everyone they went to war with has been killed. Recruitment is slowing despite enormous sign-up bonuses—a sign that Putin's reluctance to impose mass conscription may soon collide with military necessity. For Anton and others like him, the calculus is simple. He considers himself Russian, not Ukrainian. His surname is irrelevant to him. He has spent his formative years under occupation, educated in Russian schools, consuming Kremlin-controlled media that branded Kyiv's government as fascist. He speaks almost entirely in Russian state talking points now, calling Putin his president, insisting the war should continue until Russia controls all of the Donbas, even as hundreds of thousands lie dead.

In the prison hospital, Artyom lies in a corner bed, his body embedded with shrapnel from just two months of fighting. He too came from Donetsk and volunteered willingly, driven by old grievances from 2014 when Ukrainian forces tried to prevent his region's secession. But the military has embittered him. His commander was incompetent. He never received his promised 400,000 roubles—roughly $5,000. A wounded Russian soldier in the opposite bed received five times that amount. The injustice compounds his suffering.

Yet not every Ukrainian-born prisoner chose this path. One man from Donetsk, eyes darting nervously as he spoke, admitted he was conscripted by force. Official intelligence estimates suggest more than 50,000 Ukrainians have been pressed into service against their will in occupied territories, though some sources claim the number is far higher. This man's only wish was to return to his wife and children, then disappear into hiding rather than face the front again. His family had stayed in Donetsk not from political conviction but because it was home.

The camp itself operates with a strange normalcy. Prisoners tend gardens of strawberries and cucumbers. In one workshop, men hammer together wooden coffins—the previous contract was for garden sheds. In another, they assemble artificial Christmas trees, their wages buying extra food and cigarettes. Sergei, born in Luhansk but identifying as Russian like his parents, joined the army a decade ago and now claims he will retire when released, not return to combat. "I've done my bit." Most prisoners will have no choice in the matter.

Konstantin, a drug dealer who enlisted to avoid a fifteen-year prison sentence, sits among them. "For me, 15 years in prison was too much," he explains. "I would be 60 when I got out." Three convicted murderers believed they could walk free after a year of service, only to have their contracts automatically renewed. When asked about killing fellow countrymen, Sergei calls the question provocative and refuses to answer. Konstantin is more reflective: "I see nothing good in any war, and in a war like this there can be nothing good a priori. We're not the same as Ukrainians, but we are close. We all have relatives there." He still believes his decision was right, though he wants the war to end immediately. "Everyone I know there has had enough."

At lunch, prisoners file into the dining hall in navy overalls, heads bowed, hands clasped behind their backs. A video about Crimea plays on loop, attempting to counter Russian historical claims about the peninsula Moscow seized in 2014. No one watches. For Kyiv, the real priority is using these men as bargaining chips to recover its own soldiers. But in exchange negotiations, Ukrainian-born prisoners rank low on Russia's list. Konstantin notes bitterly that only about a dozen have been transferred this year. "It seems like they don't want to exchange us. I think we will be the last to go." The men who believed they were defending their homeland now find themselves expendable to the very country they fought for.