Ukrainian Army – Finally – Admits ‘Shortfalls’ in High-Profile 155th Brigade Armed and Equipped by France

In the Ukrainian military’s first-ever public admission that something actually might be wrong with a very high-profile unit, army commander Oleksandr Syrsky on Sunday – very much in passing – conceded there had been shortfalls in training and equipment for Ukraine’s only combat brigade armed and equipped by France.

Syrsky’s (seemingly grudging) admission that the first major formation to train up outside Ukraine, the heavily publicized 155th Mechanized Brigade “Anna Kyivska,” needed perhaps a bit more support on the unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) front, came in the wake of nearly two months of Ukrainian military reports that the brigade was sent to war without first person view (FPV) drones or sufficient trained pilots, and that unit soldiers were taking to the internet to beg for donations to buy attack drones the army hadn’t supplied them.

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Ukraine’s senior general said that FPV drones are, by a significant margin, the single most deadly weapon in the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) arsenal, during December accounting for 54,000 hit targets, or 49% of all Russian casualties in December 2024.

During a monthly meeting about drone operations and development, and sandwiched between praise of other Ukrainian formations for reportedly setting Russian combat vehicles alight by the thousands, Syrsky said: “Particular attention was paid to increasing the capabilities of the unmanned systems unit of the 155th Mechanized Brigade, as well as to problematic issues that need to be resolved. (Gen. Syrsky) gave all the necessary orders (to resolve the problematic issues).”

Ukrainian frontline soldiers in interviews with Kyiv Post practically without exception have said FPV drones are a combat unit’s most effective weapon – and a formation lacking explosives-toting kamikaze aircraft in its arsenal are easy prey for any drone-armed unit.

Ukrainian military journalist Yuriy Butusov in mid-November was among the first to report the 155th Brigade, following four months of NATO-standard training at bases in eastern France, would be going to war without FPV drones. Technically his and other reports violated wartime censorship law banning publication of information about a specific unit’s combat-readiness.

Syrsky’s Sunday comments were silent about a host of other problems reported in the brigade including shoddy recruiting, critical kit shortages, and mass desertions. During  November and December, Ukrainian media reported in detail that the ramp-up of a 4,000-man brigade for combat had gone disastrously wrong and that Syrsky and army top leadership seemed uninterested in even considering the possibility there might be problems. 

According to military media reports in both Ukraine and France, at least 50 members of the brigade deserted while in training in France, and as many as 1,700 service members assigned to the 155th either refused orders to transfer to the unit or, once showing up at the brigade personnel receiving center, decided to return to their own unit or just go into civilian hiding rather than serve with the brigade.

On paper, the 155th was being groomed as the spearpoint of a wave of heavily armed Ukrainian combat brigades trained to NATO standards and armed with cutting-edge equipment. Among the weapons assigned to the brigade were French-made Caesar 155mm howitzer, a high-precision, long-range gun that out-ranges and out-shoots practically all cannon operated by the Russian military.

According to battle reports, infantry elements of the 155th brigade currently are fighting in the Pokrovsk sector, the epicenter of Russia’s main ground offensive against Ukraine launched in the eastern Donbas region more than six months ago. Most heavy weapons purchased by French taxpayers for the 155th have been parceled out to other formations, those reports said.

Along with the Caesar howitzers, the 155th has lost most of its French-made VAB armored personnel carriers, a portion of its German-donated Leopard tanks, and crews trained to operate observation drones or Milan anti-tank missiles have, at times, been reassigned to the infantry, those reports said.

The major French newspaper Le Monde on Jan. 4 confirmed that the 155th Brigade, for the time being at least, was no longer a unified formation and that AFU leadership had splintered it into sub-units delegated to other brigades and battalions.

One of the starkest indications of problems in the brigade appeared in mid-December when Brigade commander Dmytro Riumshyn, following the return of the brigade’s last soldiers from France, and as the 155th was spinning up to its first combat deployment, was sacked by Syrsky. An army statement signed by Syrsky “thanked” Riumshyn for his “hard work.”

Ukrainian military media widely reported Riumshyn refused orders to take the brigade to war because of personnel turmoil and major equipment shortages, among them FPV drones.

Riumshyn is well-known across the AFU’s for battlefield command skill and strong principles. In October 2023 Riumshyn took over the then-troubled 47th Mechanized Infantry Brigade, and by early 2024 had re-built it into one of the AFU’s most-effective formations.

Local and independent analysts, and increasingly Ukrainian combat commanders themselves, have suggested a better way for the AFU to create a top-tier unit using overseas training would have been to ship a seasoned, existing brigade abroad rather than attempting to assemble it piecemeal. Since the early days of the war, AFU leadership, in part because of risks associated with pulling units out of the fighting line, has dragged its feet on shifting formations from combat to reserve or training duties.

“It’s sheer idiocy to create new brigades and equip them with new technology while existing ones are undermanned,” wrote Lt. Col. Bohdan Krotevych, a veteran combat officer serving as a senior member of the command staff for Ukraine’s 12th National Guard “Azov” Brigade, one of the AFU’s best-known and hardest-fighting units.

“I really don’t understand why the Ukrainian army takes this route, it really seems this is not the best strategy,” Baku-based military researcher Agil Rustamzade said in a late December comment on the 155th.

President Volodymyr Zelensky, during a Sunday three-hour interview with US computer scientist and popular podcaster Lex Fridman, said that Western failure to deliver heavy weapons in quantities and on timelines as promised has stymied AFU efforts to raise new brigades systematically, because repeatedly the AFU has concentrated personnel only to find the weapons needed to arm them was late or not coming at all. Of the 12 combat brigades Ukraine planned to raise in 2024, only enough equipment to arm 3 has actually arrived, Zelensky said.

Ukrainian media has suggested that the AFU may have decided to send soldiers in France because of the high visibility French President Emmanual Macron placed on the 155th, which increased chances the armored vehicles, artillery and other heavy equipment would actually be handed over to the Ukrainian military. Macron, during a televised Oct. 9 visit to 155th Brigade training sites, said the training and weaponry France was providing would help defend democracy and Europe.

Zelensky, on Jan. 4, called a national security council meeting to investigate the “claims” the preparation of 155th Brigade had gone awry and declared  that he is taking the investigation under personal control.

The investigation will look into why army leadership chose to raise a brigade “without experienced command personnel, without technical specialists, without the minimum necessary time for training, without drones, without electronic warfare means,” a statement from his office said.