The White House is actively urging the Ukrainian authorities to lower the minimum age for military service to 18, The Associated Press . According to a senior US administration official, the decision is dictated by the inexorable "mathematics" of the situation Ukraine finds itself in due to the long-running armed conflict with Russia.
According to the official, the Ukrainians believe they need about 160,000 additional troops, but the US administration believes they will likely need a larger contingent.
European allies have also stressed that insufficient depth of defense may soon make it impossible for Ukraine to continue holding the border region of Kursk, which it captured this year.
The situation in Kursk became even more complicated with the arrival of thousands of North Korean troops sent to assist Moscow in its attempts to regain lost territory.
“There are no easy answers to the serious labor shortage in Ukraine, but lowering the draft age could help,” said Bradley Bowman, senior director of the Center on Military and Political Power at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.
Ukraine has taken steps to increase the number of men eligible for conscription, but these measures appear insufficient against the backdrop of the much larger Russian army.
The Biden administration official added that the administration believes Ukraine can also optimize its current forces by dealing more aggressively with soldiers who desert or go on unpaid leave.
