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To Dakota’s surprise, it wasn’t the shelling that terrified him the most.
A veteran of the Marine Corps who volunteered to fight in Ukraine, he hid behind walls as Russian shots pierced and felt the artillery throttle so many times that his catchphrase “It’s OK” became a joke in the piece.
What is not normal, he said, is the feeling of fear as he hides and listens to Russian attacking helicopters fire at the position from which his team of tank hunters has just escaped. This moment, he said, “was, frankly, the most restless I’ve ever been.”
Dakota, who is now at home in Ohio after seven weeks of fighting abroad, is among a legion of Western volunteers who have taken up arms against Russia. Like others, he speaks on condition that his full name is not disclosed, citing concerns about his safety and that of family and friends.
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In interviews with The Washington Post, foreign fighters from the United States and elsewhere described glaring differences between what they expected the war to be and what they experienced. They remembered entering the battle insufficiently equipped and with excellent weapons, the occasional thrill of blowing up Russian vehicles, and they were torn whether to return to Ukraine. Some intend to do so. Others saw friends die and decided that was enough.
For a few, the turning point came in late April when 22-year-old Willie Joseph Cancel, another Marine veteran, was killed in a battle northwest of Nikolaev, a region that has witnessed brutal violence as Russian commanders tried to expand territorial gains. The full circumstances surrounding Cancel’s death remain a mystery and his body has not been discovered. Attempts to talk to Cancel’s family were unsuccessful.
There are no known US military personnel in Ukraine, and the Biden administration has tried to discourage US citizens from engaging in the battle on their own, although this is not against the law. Officials said the battlefield was complex and dangerous, and that Americans who wanted to help the Ukrainian cause should look to do so in other ways. And while the exact number of American volunteers is unknown, about 4,000 have shown interest since the invasion in late February. Many entered the battle after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky personally called on foreign volunteers to travel there and fight.
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Military veterans, in particular, are drawn to the war, encouraged by their combat training and eagerness to apply their skills in a conflict that many see as a struggle between good and evil.
But the conflict has also attracted Western military veterans who have either never fought in battles or experienced only asymmetric riots – not this type of war, with contested airspace, ruthless missile bombings and swarms of drones with sophisticated thermal targeting technology.
Dane Miller, a U.S. Army veteran, has traveled to Poland to take on a quieter but important role – helping logistics for refugee aid centers and sending important supplies across the border to Ukraine. He also assisted volunteer networks in reviewing the military files of future foreign fighters to assess whether they “have the experience … to take on a huge army,” he said. While many do, the common theme is that boasting sometimes replaces relevant experience, he noted. He advised some veterans not to go to Ukraine.
“There is this idea of heroism and it is glorified. I will look at your 214 and tell you if you are ready for it, “he said, referring to the US Army’s Discharge Documents, DD Form 214, which lists the training and certificates completed while in uniform.
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In the Marine Corps, Dakota spent four years as an anti-tank missile shooter, according to his length of service provided by the Marine Corps. He has never seen fights, but has spent time in Afghanistan as a performer, he said.
He postponed his first semester of college so he could fight the Russians, saying “righteous outrage” forced him to do so. He arrived in Ukraine within days of the invasion. The commanders were patient, he said, to use his knowledge of US-made Javelin anti-tank weapons, thousands of which were transferred to the Ukrainian army.
The cohort of foreign Dakota volunteers was attached to a Ukrainian military unit and brought by yellow school bus to Kyiv, from where they were sent northwest to a city with battles outside the capital. It was the beginning of March. They were issued anti-tank weapons and Javelin missiles, but no batteries for the launch unit, he said. Without a power source, the equipment does not work.
The houses were on fire, Dakota recalls. His unit gathered to patrol the forest. One commander waved, “Everything is Russian this way.” The artillery covered the area. The Ukrainians and their volunteers dispersed. Some entered trench lines, others entered homes. There was still a Christmas tree in an abandoned residence, he recalled. Some Russian troops retreated as fighting intensified, leaving behind a wounded comrade who howled until nightfall, Dakota said.
By the end of the second night, eight of the 20 volunteers in the Dakota unit had left their posts, he said, including a Marine veteran who appears to have broken his machine gun with a stone in hopes of betraying it in battle. Another pretended to be injured, he said.
Dakota fought in the Kyiv region and was later sent south to help train others to use Javelin. On one mission, he said, he failed to obtain a lock of a Russian tank with a cold thermal signature. Then four men climbed on the hull to sit and smoke. The view focused on their body heat. His rocket sprayed the vehicle, the impact was recorded on video.
An American volunteer named Dakota fired a Javelin missile at a Russian tank east of Nikolaev, Ukraine, in April. (Video: obtained from The Washington Post)
Half an hour later, Russian artillery struck their positions and the Dakota team withdrew under cover of night. About a week later, he felt sick to his car. He was diagnosed with a brain injury related to his proximity to the shelling, he said, and left for home in late April. He has been recovering ever since.
“This is not the end. It is not done. It is not finished,” he said.
Other volunteers describe various disappointments. Pascal, a veteran of the German army, was on a team with Cancel, the American killed in battle in late April. Problems arose during their first mission, he said.
The team suspected that their two-way radios were being monitored by Russian forces and lacked additional batteries, forcing them to rely on unprotected cell phones and WhatsApp to communicate. Shortly after they exchanged plans, their position was attacked by Russian artillery, he said.
The volunteers felt uninformed during many of their missions, not knowing where they were – and vitally where the Russians were, Pascal said. On the day Cancel was killed, he said, they fired from a position they considered Ukrainian, but had no radio link to confirm. Two members of the team dared to investigate. A shooting was heard and they never returned, he said.
The other members of the team came under heavy fire, including artillery shells, from the same direction, Pascal said. One member of the team was killed in the shelling. Pascal and another volunteer turned their attention to Cancel, who was hit by shrapnel, he said. They put on turnstiles in an unsuccessful attempt to stop the bleeding. Their bodies were abandoned when Pascal and another survivor withdrew.
This was Pascal’s last mission. He later moved to Poland. Miller, an American volunteer, met him at a bar in Warsaw and noted how shaken he looked. They went outside and Miller comforted him using Google Translate to find the right words in German. They hugged.
“From the beginning, we didn’t stand a chance,” Pascal said in an interview. “I wondered why I survived and the others didn’t.
A Ukrainian-born man who is a naturalized US citizen spoke to The Post on condition that he be identified only by his radio call sign: Texas. He recalled seeing images of his hometown on fire at the start of the war, and two days later set out to join the battle.
Texas, who returned home to Houston earlier this month, has never served in the military. He works in an office. But he was a quick learner, he said, and soon passed on lessons learned from his American counterparts to the Ukrainians he fought with – things like tactical ambush theories and staying out of sight of Russian drones for observation and optics. installed in vehicles.
Texas has patrolled in teams of killer hunters in southern Ukraine, he said, including a mission in which he spotted a T-72 tank dug into a berm near Nikolaev, its tower barely visible for more than two kilometers. Texas fired a rocket and it cut the tank right next to the tower. Good luck, but the rest of the team groaned. They wanted to see a column of fire raising the tank tower high in the air.
“It didn’t explode the way we’d like it to,” said Texas, whose lessons are documented in an April report in the Wall Street Journal. “We were kind of upset about that.”
Life at home lacks a sense of purpose and excitement, Texas said. He is embroiled in divorce proceedings before leaving for Ukraine, and occasionally hears from friends who inform him via text messages about his successful tank harvests.
In quiet moments, he reflects on what he has taken from the experience, good and bad. He is calmer at work and …
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