Zelenskky resists US pressure to draft 18-year-olds to solve Ukraine’s soldier shortage

President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said he will not lower the conscription age.

Ukraine’s President, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, has rejected US calls to lower its military recruitment age to 18 to help increase the number of soldiers fighting against Russia.

“We must not compensate the lack of equipment and training with the youth of soldiers,” Zelenskyy said in a post on X on Monday.

“The priority should be providing missiles and lowering Russia’s military potential, not Ukraine’s draft age,” continued the post.

“The goal should be to preserve as many lives as possible, not to preserve weapons in storages.”

The post was in response to US State Department Spokesperson Matthew Miller’s comment on Monday that the US was ready to train and arm new soldiers if Ukraine changed its conscription policy. The current minimum conscription age is 25.

“What we have made clear is that if they produce additional forces to join the fight, we and our allies will be ready to equip those forces and train those forces to enter battle,” said Miller in a press briefing.

Zelenskyy previously resisted the idea in November when an anonymous US administration official told reporters that reducing the draft age would help Ukraine keep up with Russia’s military.

“The simple truth is that Ukraine is not currently mobilizing or training enough soldiers to replace their battlefield losses while keeping pace with Russia’s growing military,” the senior official had said, according to The Financial Times.

In a speech to the parliament, Zelenskyy said: “Let there be no speculation — our state is not preparing to lower the mobilization age.”

Zelenskyy has repeatedly expressed frustration with delays in military aid from Ukraine’s Western allies, on whom it is dependent for advanced weapons such as Patriot and Storm Shadow missiles.

However, manpower shortages on the battlefield remain a key problem for the Ukrainians.

War analyst Michael Kofman told B-17 earlier this year that Ukraine’s “manning situation is the kind of thing that’s probably going to get worse before it gets better.”

Earlier this year, a Ukrainian service member told The Washington Post that the companies in his battalion were staffed at 35% of normal levels.