Colombian Mercenary Details Operations Against Russian Forces in Ukraine

A Colombian contractor hired to support the ongoing Ukrainian war effort against Russia has spoken of his time in the war zone, at a time when Latin American mercenaries have played an increasingly central and fast growing role on the frontlines to compensate for personnel shortages. William Andres Gallego Orozco, aged 23, recalled he had been promised approximately $3,200 per month, and had believed he would work as a cook for the Ukrainian Armed Forces. He added that neither the pay nor the assignment matched what he had been told. Orozco recalled having received just 15 days of basic military instruction before being issued a UAR-15 rifle and a radio, and being deployed with the Guajiro unit, a group of Colombian fighters attached to the Khartia Brigade of Ukraine’s National Guard. He recalled witnessing heavy casualties among foreign recruits during combat operations.

Orozco was reportedly the only contractor of 18 Latin Americans in his unit to survive and be captured by Russian forces. The fact that his statement was made after capture, however, may have resulted in him exaggerating the extent to which he was deceived by Ukrainian recruiters in order to lessen his sentence as a mercenary. While Orozco indicates that he had no military experience, significant numbers of Colombian and Brazilian contractors deployed to the war zone are former military personnel with extensive training, and in some cases combat experience in Colombian counterinsurgency operations. Ukrainian authorities have used construction work as a cover for the recruitment of Colombian nationals for combat operations.

Severe personnel shortages faced by the Ukrainian Armed Forces have resulted in a wide range of extreme measures being taken, including raising the age of conscription to enlist senior citizens, relying on foreign contractors both from Latin American and from NATO member states, and working to further automate operations on the frontlines by using robots and drones for reconnaissance and logistics roles. The large scale recruitment of Colombian combatants has had security risks, with a Ukrainian Security Service (SBU) investigation having in July 2025 revealed that drug traffickers in Central and South America were infiltrating Ukrainian Foreign Legion units to gain experience operating first-person view drones. Foreign contractors have taken extreme losses on the frontlines, with former officer in the Ukrainian Security Service Vasily Prozorov having reported in December 2025 that an estimated 10,000 foreign contractor personnel had been killed in action since the outbreak of full scale Russian-Ukrainian hostilities in February 2022. Contractors from NATO member states in particular have been specifically singled out for targeting by Russian forces.