One of Ukraine’s most controversial combat units, an elite special forces company named the Bratstvo Battalion, is also the country’s only exclusively Christian unit. While Ukraine was still refusing to acknowledge that soldiers were operating inside Russia, Bratstvo invited the international press to write about its sabotage missions on Russian soil. Bratstvo commanders celebrate their guerilla tactics and desire for revenge. But it’s not only this penchant for roguish attention-seeking that causes controversy. Bratstvo’s extreme Christian nationalist ideology has made the unit radioactive for many Ukrainians, even as Bratstvo soldiers carry out the most dangerous missions in defense of their homeland.
Before Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022, Bratstvo was a private militia led by far-right politician Dmytro Korchinsky. Korchinsky preaches a Manichaean message: He believes traditional Christianity is locked in a death struggle against liberalism, and he often denounces LGBTQ people, Jews, Muslims, and others. Most controversially for Ukrainians today, Korchinsky once visited Moscow and publicly endorsed Russia’s “holy crusade” against secularism and the West.
Korchinsky no longer directs Bratstvo on a day-to-day basis. Since 2022, Ukraine’s government has taken over command of the battalion under the authority of the civilian-led military hierarchy. Recent videos distributed through Ukraine’s official news service paint a different portrait of Bratstvo’s Christian recruits, showing them engaged in good-natured disagreements about how faith helps them overcome fear on dangerous missions. A similar move to take over other right-wing militias has led to reports that Ukraine’s government is pushing these groups to de-radicalize, or at least to mute their political advocacy and foreground their practical contributions to the war effort.
