"It was worse at the BZVP". We explain how the training of mobilized soldiers has changed and what it has brought
"My group is arriving at the training center. I get off the bus and immediately hear an explosion. A shout: "Get out! Quickly! There is shelling! Get down!" I fall down. I realize that everything is exploding around me, there is smoke, something is burning, machine guns are shooting. I am crawling. I lose some things along the way, but I crawl, because this is war. Now I have to think more about my life, not about the electronic smoking device that fell out of my pocket. No one says where or why.".
This is how Day Zero begins at one of the Army's training centers, says LIGA.net Yevhen.
, a basic military training instructor
In early 2025, the Armed Forces of Ukraine updated the Basic Combined Arms Training (BCAT) program. It was extended to 45 days, structured, and the concept of zero day was introduced, as well as stress tests, virtual and augmented reality. A few months earlier, the program was updated in the National Guard, where the training period was extended to 54 days .
There is only one key indicator of improved training effectiveness: losses of the Defense Forces have decreased, says LIGA.net source in the General Staff.
To understand how the CPE program has changed,, LIGA.net interviewed instructors from five training centers in different structures of the Defense Forces.
From this text you will learn:
- why cadets hate instructors and why instructors like them;
- what they pay attention to when training mobilized people;
- what is the difference between volunteers and those who are forced to go to the BWC;
- how to prepare for the BWC to live through these 45 days of training painlessly.