Needed: Wheels

Simply put: volunteers need vehicles. Our partner Mykola is no exception.

The Armed Forces of Ukraine and volunteers like Mykola both rely heavily on civilian vehicles for logistics, deliveries, medical evacuations, and reconnaissance and assault operations. In a perfect world, these would be carried out in armored vehicles.

This is not a perfect world. The reality on the ground and the scale of operations overwhelmingly force military and civilians alike to carry out their objectives in used civilian cars imported from the EU and other countries, as armored vehicles are scarce and Ukrainians have long since exhausted their local used car market.

(Decorated war veteran, civil society activist, and Ukrainian Women Veteran Movement head Andriana Susak was part of a small delegation of women who visited Capitol Hill in September 2022 to make the case for equipping Ukraine’s armed forces with, among other things, armored vehicles. On December 1, 2022, it was learned that she had sustained life-threatening injuries when a russian mine blew up the civilian SUV she was driving, which, like so many other vehicles in use at the front, had been purchased by volunteers. Her rehabilitation will be long and costly.)

In April 2022, Mykola created an initiative he called Project Tachanka 0.1 to secure a vehicle and deliver it to the 72nd Mechanized Brigade. Project Tachanka 0.1 fully supports service and repairs to the car, which has miraculously survived while many others have been destroyed.

After securing Tachanka 0.1 for the 72nd, Mykola borrowed another vehicle, Tachanka 0.2, from a family who fled the war. Tachanka 0.2 enabled him to travel and make deliveries. The time has come, though, for Tachanka 0.2 to return to its owners.

It’s finally time to start Project Tachanka 1.0.

Tachanka 1.0 will not be a new car. It won’t be a car for school runs or grocery shopping or any of the other mundanities for which we get behind the wheel without a thought. Tachanka 1.0 will be a used vehicle sturdy and capacious enough to handle pickups from our courier at the Polish border in the west, deliveries to the front in the east, and anything it might be needed for in between.

Like the Ukrainians who will use it, it will be called upon to serve in more than one capacity.

The horizontal connections between Ukraine’s military and civil society aren’t limited to supply runs and morale boosts. Ukraine is world-famous for its tech talent. Many of its brightest, bolstered by a global community eager to contribute their own ideas and expertise, are now applying their skills to cracking arcane signal, frequency, and encryption problems. (In fact, the Wall Street Journal reported on it while I was drafting this post.)

One such group, operating out of a basement in downtown Kyiv, have dubbed themselves the Ghostbusters, and since opsec prevents us from saying–well, anything–about what they do, the Ghostbusters they shall be. 

Mykola has ridden with the Ghostbusters on combined delivery and ghostbusting runs in Sumy, Chernihiv, and Odesa. Having witnessed their work firsthand, he attests to the efficacy of the tools they’ve developed in meeting specific challenges facing Ukraine’s military.

When the vehicle isn’t required for support runs, or when support and ghostbusting missions can be combined, the Ghostbusters will use it to bust ghosts.

So what’s needed?

Since we’re buying used, we don’t have a specific vehicle in mind. We’ll take whatever the market offers that best suits our needs and budget.

The primary concern is that it be sturdy and reliable. Repairs take the vehicle, the Ghostbusters, and Mykola out of service and cost money that is better spent elsewhere.

Tied for primary concern is that it be roomy. These photos of Mykola’s flat show an average delivery run’s worth of supplies. (Look for the winter uniforms that you helped purchase!) Since the vehicle will be used to transport people, cargo, and proton packs, it must have both seats and plenty of cargo space. 

And finally, a stretch goal: a tow hitch and enough oomph to pull a mobile kitchen.

You may recall that in addition to supply runs, Mykola sometimes hits the road with a chef and brings freshly cooked food to soldiers, refugees, first responders, and anyone else they come across. He often has the use of a mobile kitchen graciously loaned by Foundation of Kindness and Love. A vehicle that can tow it would broaden their combined humanitarian reach, which is ever more critical as russia continues pounding Ukrainian infrastructure in hopes of freezing and starving Ukrainians to death or capitulation, whichever comes first.

We plan to purchase the car through an organization which secures vehicles for the military. They take a small commission but handle the entire process. We estimate that $12,000 to $15,000 will suffice to cover the purchase and associated taxes and fees.

Please consider donating today to keep supplies rolling, Ghostbusters busting, and hungry people (and dogs) eating.