[simonmark6]

I'm not sure if the Ostfront is an apt comparison for Kalsiz. For the 5th, they've been given cart blanche to find their own way home and can probably rationalise being anywhere:

A whorehouse in Krakow?

We were lying low until the enemy action died down and were going to try to break through during the winter.

A floating brothel on the Wistula?

We were heading for the Baltic to look foe a ship home.

Behind NATO lines, deserters might well be treated differently.

The Soviets may well have tried the shooting deserters method, this is what has led to mass desertions and the massacre of officers. Many local commanders may have a different policy now as they are watching their own back, if they are too brutal with deserters, some of their own men might decide it's time for regimen change....

As for identifying friendlies, or at least not immediately hostiles, in the fluid environment of T2K, that's going to be really difficult. Some encounters are no brainers: convoys of merchants or soldiers are easy to identify, one can be traded with, one avoided/shot up and looted (mix and match according to your group). Hunters are more difficult, they could look like a scouting group for bandits, however they are likely to break contact and run after the first few shots.

Larger armed groups? More difficult, I've assumed that local forces will have some sort of ID, maybe an armband, certainly the army of Krakow and the Army of Sileasia do, however nothing stops marauders from wearing these too. For at least a few years there'll be a lot of shoot first and ask questions later in my opinion. After that, the lack of fuel and spare parts will most likely make random travel by small groups highly unlikely so things will get simpler as you are likely to know the people around you. This would make the life of random travellers more dangerous as local forces are likely to assume that forces they can't identify are automatically marauders.