Quote:
Originally Posted by Raellus
That said, the average age of replacement soldiers is reportedly in the 40s (WTF?!?). No amount of Western aid is going to save Ukraine if Ukrainians aren't willing to save their own country. That's easy for me to say, safe behind my keyboard, but I'm really struggling with the psychology of the average Ukrainian 18-35 year-old. -
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One factor is probably that the age limits for conscription are 27 to 60, I believe in part because Ukraine is trying to avoid future demographic issues if men who are statistically unlikely to have had children are killed in combat. There is talk of lowering the lower limit to 25, but one of the things they're trying to avoid is not having a workforce in 20-25 years because too many young men got killed and there were no children to grow up to become workers. There's a need to balance immediate needs against long-term needs, and while I have no doubt they'd drop that conscription age if there was significant advancement by the Russians, as long as things are mostly static I don't expect much change.