Writer, publisher and soldier Vlad Sord: We have only an ongoing war. We stand and hold on to cold-blooded hate

Since the beginning of the full-scale war, Vlad Sord has only passed through the home to Vinnytsia once. He has been to Kyiv each time for no more than a couple of days for work issues or to bury his friends. It is not easy to find free time in his schedule. We agreed on an interview a couple of days before his return to the front.  

Vlad Sord, with the call sign Zmii [Snake], is the commander of the Seneca unit of the 93rd Brigade Kholodny Yar, poet, prose writer, social activist, publisher and designer. He fought in the early years of the Russian-Ukrainian war. After February 24, he returned to the 93rd Brigade, to which he once proposed the name Kholodny Yar, designed the symbols and wrote the text of the new anthem.

He told about his childhood, personal war, the way to his own publishing house, the creation of the Seneca unit and plans for the future in a conversation with Svidomi.

You come from the Vinnytsia region. Tell us about your childhood. What did you grow up on, and what were you interested in as a child/teenager? 

I come from a very poor family. Only last year, an asphalt road was laid to the village of Rudnytsia, where I come from. In my childhood, there were only two TV sets in the whole village. I remember I used to go to my classmate's house to watch it in the summer because we didn't have one. 

I have a complicated relationship with my family. I have a round scar on my hand - my stepfather's friend nailed my hand to a tree stump when I was a child. People in such semi-closed villages give birth to children to work and just be there. There are no conditions for a decent life. 

I brought up my younger sister by myself. My mother was rarely around us. Neither was my father. He is a career soldier and hardly ever lived with us; he is not adapted to civilian life. I remember he came home and brought a birthday present - 5 hryvnias. However, he had to return in the evening, so he took the money and left. 

I have been working since I was 13 years old. There is a railway station in the village where you could load coal into bags. Mainly, there worked people with alcohol addiction with nothing to live for, and me. Most of all, I wanted to order books. So I worked to buy books. 

As long as I can remember, I have always read everywhere — usually only fiction. I read everything in the school and village libraries, and then I got to the district library, but there was nothing special. I just wanted to read. I confess that I even stole books from libraries. 

Reading in the village was considered unacceptable because if you read, it meant you had a lot of free time and did nothing: did not carry stones, did not chop wood, did not build a house. 

An extensive forest stretches along the border with Transnistria [an occupied region of Moldova], then through Moldova and up to Romania. I used to run away to the forest and read. Later, in the 90s, there was a powerful ecological disaster there. There was an oil depot nearby. To pump out the oil, some " authorities" from Vinnytsia came, cut the pipe and let the oil flow through the forest. Fuel oil swamps were formed there. Since then, to be in the forest, you had to go through these swamps. So I did because only in the woods I had the opportunity to read in peace. 

At the age of 16, I ran away from home to Crimea. 

Why Crimea?

With the purchase of a computer, more or less good Internet appeared, and therefore access to information. I made friends and kept in touch with a guy who lived in Crimea. He knew the situation with my family and my desire to escape. Mainly in the village, your fate is as follows: you go to the district bursa and settle there. Even among fellow villagers, people who were in Vinnytsia are something unprecedented. I am not talking about Kyiv at all. Kyiv was fiction for them. It did not exist. I wanted to escape from there and grabbed the opportunity. 

Having moved to Crimea, I entered Yaroslav Mudryi National Law University. All contact with my parents was cut off at that time. Now they have been restored, but I treat them coldly.

What happened in Crimea while you were there, and what do you remember about 2014? 

Having entered the Crimean Law Institute, I immediately got a higher scholarship. Six months later, I got the parliamentary and later the presidential scholarship. Starting the third year, I had an internship in the Verkhovna Rada of the AR of Crimea. At the age of 20, I bought an apartment in Simferopol. My life was planned. I was a stingy and greedy guy from the village who wanted to break out and build his life in the best way possible. 

When the Maidan started, I realised that it was all worthless. I subconsciously understood that there would be revolution and war. I don't know whether it was the books that influenced me or something else, but in my early poems, the premonition of these events comes up. Therefore, as soon as the Maidan began, I left Crimea. 

We came to Maidan to check whether the revolution had started. 

We took the subway, got off in the center and asked a passerby:

- Where is the Maidan? 

- Everywhere.

We arrived and could not leave because we understood that historical events were happening around. The general atmosphere was like in the blockade of Vietnam. The capital was saturated with euphoria, sadness, fear, anger, solidarity and pride. Tires were already burning, Molotov cocktails were flying, and tear gas and bullets were fired. 

At first, we wandered around the tents, and then we got to Hrushevskyi Street, where the first clashes with the Berkut took place. There we met guys from the Pravyi Sector.

- Oh, so you are good. We need such guys. Join us, — they told us. 

We did, and everything started spinning. 

I returned to the peninsula only once when I brought a friend. I took him home to his parents because he had pneumonia from the water cannon. Then the House of Trade Unions was burned, and the occupation of Crimea began. 

There were still trains to the peninsula. Meanwhile, vigilantes of the so-called "Crimean self-defence" had already appeared in the cities. I drove my friend and went home to pick up some things. I put the key in, but it did not fit. I started knocking on the door. A man, a woman and a boy about 12 years old came out to me. When asked who they were and what they were doing in the apartment, they said they were from Saratov and had Russian documents for this apartment. 

I went to a lawyer I knew. He advised me to leave the peninsula as soon as possible because I might not be able to. Then it became clear that the war was starting. 

How did Maidan turn into a war, and why did you take up a volunteering job? Tell us about these first steps.

The turning point was the death of Yurii Popravka in captivity at the hands of Russians and collaborators (Yurii Popravka was the first activist tortured during the Russian-Ukrainian war in the east - ed). Yurii's mother came to our Mesnyky [Avengers] unit to the last. Each time I comforted her with words that he would return and everything would be fine. Once again, she came, and as soon as I wanted to console her and tell her that Yura would be back soon, she said: "I came to invite you to the funeral". 

Then we went with the Pravyi Sector to the training camp at the Desna military training ground. The war began, and we were preparing. My unit and the Sever unit of the late Serhii Tabala had already been formed. He was my best friend. We rushed to the front to defend the country. Everyone was very disciplined and motivated because of the risk of not getting to the front line. 

We had several days of races to the outskirts of Ilovaisk, where during the last one, I got under the first artillery shelling in my life and got injured in the back, damaging vertebrae due to the fall of a truck hit by a shell near our trench. Frankly, we did not know what war was and how to behave. 

While I was recovering, Sever got to Donetsk airport. He died there. At his funeral, all the guys from the old units gathered and decided to elect me as the commander. Then we continued as a volunteer detachment, "Avengers named after Serhii Tabala".

In one of your interviews, you talked about your call sign — you had a belt with a buckle in the form of a snake entwining a blade. Do call signs affect personality and influence the course of events? Is there a destiny in it?

When we first joined the Pravyi Sector on the Maidan, we were immediately told to choose a nickname. At that time, I did not even know what it was and decided to be Dante. Everyone quickly forgot the call sign, Dante. When needed, I was called "a bearded guy with a snake buckle". It was a long time; then, it was shortened to Snake (Zmii). 

Since then, the call sign has merged with me so that now few people call me by name. Perhaps my character has already adjusted to this call sign, or vice versa - the call sign has adjusted to my character. 

From a military point of view, the call sign is about security. But in fact, this is what characterises you first of all. Roma [Ratushnyi], for example, had the call sign, Seneca. He was the last one from his unit who could not choose a pseudo. It was even before he joined our brigade. When he was reading a book with the inscription Seneca, one of the guys came up to him and asked: "Maybe you will be Seneca?". He liked the idea. Seneca was one of those who preached stoicism (one of the directions of ancient philosophy, which is based on the idea of focusing on what is under human control and acceptance of what lies beyond it - ed.). It turns out that it was synchronised here as well. 

The decision to name the special platoon after Roman Ratushnyi. Why did you decide so, and how was this decision made? 

Roma Ratushnyi and I met at many protests, but we were not friends — we did the same thing. I supported him, and he supported my initiatives. When the full-scale war began, we got in touch more closely. He knew that I had experience in the war. He asked me questions, and I answered. After the liberation of the Kyiv region, he asked me to join the 93rd Brigade. I recruited and registered Roma together with 11 guys who were with him.

When we started working together, it was clear that we could do unreal things. Roma and I were constantly generating ideas. We had already accumulated enough social capital to easily implement those ideas together. It is not just to invent something but to develop, implement and launch it. We started working as two teams: my friend Panda and me, and Roma with Sergeant. 

After another trip, we sat and discussed the prospects of the fighters we had. We discovered that we had many people with specific skills in the field of electronics and radio engineering. From this, the concept of a mixed platoon began to form. We devised a mechanism for how to do it: to get a resource base and funding and find out what ideas each of us wanted to see and what areas of work would be implemented. We aspired to make everything more automated and organise work to minimise losses. In the process of this discussion, we were approaching Izium. Then Roma died. 

Literally, two weeks after that, I bought Plastun - a complex of electronic surveillance. Funds for it had been raised via Twitter. This complex is a military property that is difficult to buy. Nobody believed that we would do it. After that, the brigade commander called me and said: "I know what you are doing. So let's do it; I have an idea". 

Ruslan Shevchuk began to outline the same thing we had planned with Roma. We shared at least 95% of the vision. I told him that we had a ready-made structure the idea could already be implemented. So he offered me to lead the special platoon. 

I decided on the name on my own. I did not consult anyone, but everyone unanimously supported me because they remembered what we had discussed with Roma and what we had planned. This special platoon is our joint idea with Roma. I would really like him to see it and participate. In any case, he would have been a deputy or headed one of the areas. In fact, Roma is with us. 

The platoon is called innovative — what does it mean, why this direction, what are your areas of work and goals?

Since the beginning of the full-scale war, we are officially on the staff of the 93rd Brigade. In addition to the main official and combat duties, we are constantly strengthening our battalion and the brigade: we get equipment, raise funds, and buy vehicles. It is a structure within a structure. Our ties are horizontal. 

When we were still in the Kharkiv region, I brought enough people to the brigade via Twitter: engineers, programmers, and designers. The special platoon had been formed the day before the brigade was withdrawn from Izium and transferred to Bakhmut and Soledar. 

During the second week, already in the Donetsk region, we received our first combat mission and completed it. I took to my platoon some of the experienced scouts with whom I fought in the Sumy region. I managed to drag young, initiative, without combat experience, but with a lot of knowledge people, whose skills and potential were limited. After that, people themselves were attracted. 

Currently, there are 55 people in the Seneka special platoon. We are already being given a company - and it will be 160 people. We have a plan for constant expansion, and this process can not be stopped because the areas of work are developing. 

We have a combat group consisting of four subgroups. The first one is aerial reconnaissance, that is, reconnaissance by light drones at medium and short range, continuous live carousel broadcasting, detailed overflights, real-time artillery adjustment, etc. The second is light-strike drones. These are quadrocopters such as Mavic 3 and Autel EVO II, which operate at medium range and drop light ammunition to destroy enemy manpower or distract. 

Next is a subgroup of heavy strike UAVs, which engage enemy personnel and equipment using heavy multicopters, dropping medium and high explosives at short and medium ranges, mainly at night. The fourth combat subgroup, which is currently in the process of formation, is a universal mortar crew. The group of the special platoon works on the basis of mobility with 60-mm, 82-mm and 120-mm mortars in direct connection with the aerial reconnaissance subgroup, hitting available targets with real-time adjustments. It can autonomously train universal mortar crews of its own design if necessary.

In addition, we have an aerial reconnaissance department with Matrice M300 RTK multicopters and an Aeroscope operator. Matrice are large multicopters with a hybrid optical 200x zoom. They are used for continuous carousel broadcasts, real-time artillery adjustments and detailed reconnaissance overflights. 

These multi-copters work with the Aeroscope operator, who shows the exact coordinates of enemy pilots and unsealed drones and informs about the work done by the brigade artillery and reconnaissance.

We also have a unit of FPV drones that engage enemy ammunition and manpower. These are drones that are controlled with virtual reality glasses. Such a kamikaze drone can carry up to 800 g of explosives at a distance of up to seven kilometres. They fly into windows, dugouts and trenches and self-destruct. 

We have our own station of RER (radio electronic reconnaissance), which is transformed into REA (radio electronic assault). We listen to the Russians on the entire stretch. Now we are in the process of forming an EW point, which will allow us to jam any Russian landing within a radius of 10 kilometres, cut off communication and intervene in negotiations on their behalf. This allows for sabotaging offensive actions. Everything works in conjunction with the combat group and the Matrice, Aeroscope and FPV drones. 

In addition, Seneca has a department of "wings" and analytics. That is, the data of the first combat subgroup engaged in aerial reconnaissance is transferred to the analytics department. They analyse everything frame by frame so that we know the entire territory better than the Russians themselves: fortifications, dugouts, positions, and locations of equipment. It was a breakthrough for the brigade that we could do such detailed reconnaissance. 

Our main goal is to protect people as much as possible and to get maximum efficiency (efficiency factor - ed.) with minimum human resources. 

Has the war changed in 2014 and 2022 in terms of feelings, values and motivation? 

I am tired and worn out. Now, the Donetsk region is already the third direction for our brigade. We had no rotations, no rest — only ongoing war. We somehow stand, but I cannot explain how. We just hold on. 

In the beginning, there was a crazy fervour. Now it is pure, cold-blooded hate. We all had a regular life: someone was building a business, a career, or a family. And the Russians came to destroy it. We continue to fight this lump of hatred, and continue to do our work. Everyone understands that if we don’t, everything we are fighting for will fall. 

What were your thoughts on the eve of February 24, and what was the first thing you thought of when you realised that a full-scale invasion had begun? What was the first thing you did on February 24?

On February 22, I created a private chat where I added people who I thought would benefit from knowing how to pack an emergency backpack, where to go, where to find equipment, the coordinates of our unit and the algorithm of how to get there. I wrote, pinned the message and called on Twitter for everyone to join. 

I was awake on the night of February 24, finalising the cover. Suddenly an officer I knew called and told me to get ready because the war had started. The next day I was already registered in the unit. At that time, there was a large influx of people - tens of thousands — at the permanent deployment point of the 93rd Brigade. 

By chance, I found a car and was already in Okhtyrka, Sumy region, in the morning. At about 10:00, I received the first trophy machine gun since the beginning of the full-scale invasion. 

I was just a soldier, standing at the posts, and together with others, I burned Russian equipment. I kept silent about the fact that I had a rank because I disliked commanding or taking on a lot of responsibility. But it turns out that I have to do it all the time. Later, someone did say that I was a senior sergeant, and I was appointed to command. At the end of the defenсe in the Sumy region, I was appointed commander of a communications platoon. There I made the first RER station. 

Now my duties as commander of the Seneca platoon are to interact with the higher command, receive tasks and monitor their implementation, develop new tactics and promote new initiatives. 

Tell us about your impressions and your personal war as you saw it.

Even though I am tired, I want to continue modernising the Ukrainian army. I have big plans for the platoon, and the main thing is that the brigade commander gives me the green light for it. 

I will not say that I look into the distant future, but I try to plan and scale everything I do. For example, I want to equip each brigade battalion with at least five remote turrets, train pilots to form mobile groups, make minimal machine gun calculations, put it into service, and introduce new tactics. And then launch small-scale production of ground kamikaze drones and turrets. It will have a significant advantage because it is not so much about defeating the enemy's human resources as about saving the lives and health of soldiers. Then we will be able to wage a much more progressive war and stand longer in any direction. 

I was repeatedly offered to continue my army career, but I refused many times. My business is to develop Ukrainian literature and my own publishing house, and this is what I want to do next. I have something to do after the war. 

Also, shortly before February 24, I mastered 3D modelling and designed concepts of steampunk and cyberpunk cars. My partner "Panda" - a talented car mechanic and extreme driver - assembles cars from scratch. In addition, he and I have access to the Kremenchuk automobile plant "KrAZ". After the war, we want to make a joint line of civilian vehicles and the first Ukrainian combat pickup truck, considering all the disadvantages and advantages of the cars that worked in combat conditions. We know what is missing. We can develop it and enter public procurement. It is essential because we want Ukraine to have its own high-quality, affordable car brand.

In 2018, you retired from the Armed Forces of Ukraine, and then you and your wife, Victoria Hranetska, founded your own publishing house. Tell us more about the concept and the process of creation.

After the army, I tried to work at regular jobs but could not because of professional deformation. I turned to creating something of my own and working for myself. My wife and I are writers, and we both strongly desire to develop modern Ukrainian literature according to our tastes - in the bizarre prose cluster. So, after thinking and discussing the idea of creating a "niche" publishing house, which would specialise in "bizarre" prose and poetry of contemporary Ukrainian authors, on October 31, 2018, on Halloween, the "House of Chimeras" was born.  

We understood that young authors are not the most commercial story that could be invented. In addition, we only had a little money at the start. But we knew and were convinced that there are enough young Ukrainian authors who, if given a chance, will be more potent than those analogues that we are offered abroad. 

To make a project from scratch from a novice author - to promote and promote a personality and a book - is a lot of work, and we managed to do it. At the same time, we managed to create a profitable business. At first, we were in debt, but over time we came out in the black. 

We were even going to open our bookstore cafe. I was thinking of getting land in the centre of Vinnytsia, buying a decommissioned Vinnytsia tram, painting it black and buying smoke machines so that they would work around the clock. 

Why this particular focus - fantasy, horror? What prompted this? What books did you personally like to read?

I almost constantly read books in the bizarre literature cluster: science fiction, steampunk, cyberpunk, fantasy, dark fantasy, mysticism, and magical realism. First, it interests me. Secondly, American literature, for example, passed the stage of formation and establishment of a bizarre cluster more than 50 years ago. Here it is just emerging because Ukrainian culture was oppressed for centuries. It was significantly affected by the shot revival, part of which tended to the Gothic direction. But it was shot by Russia. 

It is at an embryonic stage but is already in great demand. It is evident from the moment our publishing house was created, as well as Zhupanskyi's publishing house, which specialises primarily in publishing translated literature. In Ukraine, many people are interested in "dark" literature and gravitate towards it, but few produce it. In addition, there is no community to unite people. We were the ones who created it. Fans of various fantasy series and people who finally found an alternative to Russian literature started to flock to us. 

How does war affect writing? Did you lose the desire to write about the war after the full-scale invasion?

There is almost no time to write because I command a unit. Since the beginning of the full-scale war, I have written only four poems. Before that, I almost stopped writing them. The density of the actions taking place now is very thick — there are already stories for three more Bezodnia [The Abyss](a collection of war stories written by Sord during the first four years of the war - ed.) In addition, there are many stories that I did not even think I would witness such events.  

The second part of Bezodnia is almost ready - before the full-scale invasion, I had to finish just two stories, but I did not have time. Someday I will finish the second and then the third. 

Also, two films are being made based on Bezodnia: a short film based on the science fiction story 2033, which tells about one of the reasons for the victory in the war with Russia — a super-soldier suit developed by Ukrainian scientists, and a full-length film based on the entire book. 

The film's script is written by Ukrainian artist, writer and director Valerii Puzik. I wrote the script for the trailer. Unique footage, especially for the trailer, was shot by my military friends in the area of the Butivka-Donetska mine. All of them returned alive. In addition, the band KARNA gave official rights to use the track Vitrolom in the trailer.

Both films have not been released yet; the work is still ongoing. But the trailer is already online and was released by the Ministry of Defence and the Ministry of Veterans. 

The task of Bezodnia was not to distance the issue of war from people who read and love genre literature. It had already started to work like a needle that pierced the information bubble. You buy a mystical book but are affected with minor PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder - ed.) And now there are no problems with this at all since most Ukrainians have PTSD, and not only minor. 

In general, I want to continue to make my designs and write not about the war. I have several blanks for future books. The first one is a post-apocalypse with cyberpunk elements, strangely enough, about Ukraine. The second is a science fiction book about a frozen planet. And if we talk about the development of the Ukrainian mythologisation of the army, I would like to write a military mystery novel based on real stories. I have already developed covers for all three books, but I still need to write them. 

I am at the stage of life when I no longer want to destroy. Since 2014, the war has taught me how to do it better. I want to build and create. It is how we made the House of Chimeras and the projects and initiatives completed in the intermediate stages. 

What did you plan within the publishing house if it were not for the full-scale war? 

We planned to publish 13 books - we bought Finnish paper. I have already designed the covers and almost finished them all. We also had to attend festivals' presentations and make a Moto-tour with our authors. 

Today, the publishing house is fully working for the army — we transfer the funds from sales either to the platoon or to help other battalions of the 93rd Brigade. At the beginning of the full-scale war, at the expense of the publishing house, we bought several cars, Starlinks and other equipment. Currently, only my wife works in the publishing house.

Is there time for reading at the front? If yes, what kind of books?

I have always read a lot all my life. It happened that I read 50 books a month non-stop. But for almost nine months of the full-scale war, I read only one book - non-fiction by Adam Kahane, Collaborating with the Enemy: How to Work with People You Don’t Agree with or Like or Trust. Frankly, I feel like I'm stupid. I want to read, but there is no time at war. I used to despise people who recorded voice messages. Now, to somehow interact with someone and convey my opinion quickly, I record only voice messages because there is no time to type. 

If you google the name Vlad Sord, the first thing that will come up in the news is the action on March 20, 2021, in support of Sternenko. You are detained and handed a suspicion under the article on hooliganism with weapons. How did the action and the accusation of breaking windows affect you?

If you want to get something, you have to give something. I was not ready for a massive information campaign against me. Later it turned out that at least five thousand dollars were involved. 

It all started the morning of the next day after I was released from house arrest. At first, I had a feeling of derealisation - I didn't think that one day in my life, I would have to prove that I fought and existed in the first place. I took everything to heart — I stayed at home and asked myself who I was and what was going on. I tried to prove to everyone that everything was a lie. But then, I realised what the point was. They did not find anything they could use against me. Therefore, they began to invent and promote lies through large information capacities: 1+1, bloggers under the authority of Herashchenko.

They thought that I was a homeless veteran. But it turned out that I had my own publishing house, published books, and my audience and reputation, especially among the people I fought with. Because of this, I was a little bit laid back. 

At first, because of the information influx, it seemed that everyone was on the side of the information attack, and I began to think: "Maybe all this is really true?". But people began to support me: my friends, artists, military, veterans, and public figures.

Due to the suspicion that my award was allegedly "fake" and could not be checked in the database, I gave up. When the trials began, it turned out that the only evidence was a disc with the recording "Rights to power", in which I stated that I was awarded the Order of Bohdan Khmelnytsky III degree.

The Commission of State Awards and Heraldry, which had been sent requests, neglected them. The lawyer who defended me went abroad. The court imposed a fine as a penalty, but they did not remove it because they had a bad "smell" of this case. 

The award is real; it is registered. But such awards are made and issued by order of the President. And how they issued it, if there was no presidential decree, remains a question. I spent a lot of energy and nerves on all this. 

A protest action is a protest action. Since the Maidan, I know that you always need to fight for something, and this feeling is quite acute. The main desire was to have judicial reform, to release Rif [ed. Andriy Antonenko], Serhiy Sternenko and other illegally imprisoned people. If someone doesn't like you on the street tomorrow, they will just throw you in jail. You will not prove anything to anyone and will not influence anything.

It is ridiculous to me when they say it did not give results. Rif and Strenenko were released, Herashchenko was fired, and Avakov resigned. There are results, and it was worth serving two months under house arrest. 

The case is still open. I continue to receive notices for the appointment of other courts. These summonses include Serhii Filimonov, Yevhen Strokan, Artem Lisovets, and Roma Ratushnyi. All these people are at war, and Roma is dead. 

After the war, this case will continue unless the president or the court decides to close it. We have no other problems in our country but to defend the honour of the door (During the rally near the President’s Office, activists damaged the front door. Later, the authorities brought this door to broadcasts in the media, and activists called all the cases brought against them due to hooliganism "defending the honour of the door" — ed.) Moreover, all the demands at the rally have been fulfilled in one way or another or are in the process. The work is going on. There is no point in continuing this case because at least all the participants now protect or have protected our country. They have proved that they are ready to do anything for Ukraine. 

After demobilisation in 2018, was there any rehabilitation assistance from the state? What do you think about the assistance to veterans, and do you see changes due to the full-scale invasion? 

The state did not help then. I did not even pass the military medical commission — no one said it was necessary. I just resigned and was not paid anything. The only thing I received was the right to own a land plot. 

Then, after returning to civilian life, I realised that no one needs you when you return from the army. I hope this will not happen after this phase of the war, but the scale is countless. Almost everyone will bear psychological traumas. 

I cannot say whether it is good or bad, but this time there will be no such gap in society between civilians and veterans. Then there was a total misunderstanding. 

PTSD, strangely enough, helped me in business: you know what you are doing; these are the stressful conditions you are used to. 

What do you dream about, or what are you planning now? 

I don't know how to answer this question because it always seems I am not doing enough. I want to do more, to make much more significant contributions while I can. 

If I think about personal things after the war, I will fall into a continuous reflection and will be ineffective. It distracts from the war. 

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You can support the "Seneca" special platoon of the 93rd Brigade Kholodnyi Yar at the following link: https://quicknote.io/b7678210-e593-11ec-a8a0-9f08ea27db6d

The funds will be used to purchase necessary equipment, repair vehicles and other current needs of the soldiers.