‘I Am Not Brave’: An American Soldier on War, Sacrifice and the Ukrainians Who Saved His Life

An interview by Matthew Parish for the Lviv Herald

There are young men who dream of becoming soldiers, and there are young men who spend their entire lives preparing for the moment when they will finally experience war. R, a 27-year-old American from Montana who has been fighting in the Ukrainian Armed Forces since August 2025, belongs firmly in the second category. He has devoted virtually his entire adult life to military service, and much of his childhood was spent immersed in the history and philosophy of warfare.

An unusually thoughtful soldier, R is as comfortable discussing Thucydides, Machiavelli and Clausewitz as he is describing the brutal realities of modern infantry combat. He spent eight years in the United States Army before leaving in January 2025, determined to fight for Ukraine. His conception of military life is bound up with ideas of masculine duty, personal sacrifice, historical destiny and the moral obligation to defend what he considers Western civilisation.

Yet his experiences in Ukraine have challenged some of his most deeply held assumptions about warfare, heroism and the value of human life. During an assault upon Russian positions, R was gravely wounded by an explosive device. What followed was an extraordinary rescue in which Ukrainian soldiers risked their own lives to carry a badly injured American across kilometres of dangerous ground to safety.

R describes this experience in astonishing terms. He considers being wounded and subsequently rescued the most beautiful experience of his life, because it taught him something about human kindness and courage that all his years of military study and training had failed to convey.

We have agreed to identify him only as R, to protect his privacy and that of his comrades. In this written interview, edited for clarity and readability, he discusses his unusual upbringing, his complicated relationship with the American military, his understanding of fear and bravery, and the profound sense of gratitude he feels towards the Ukrainians who saved his life. Certain operational details have been omitted for security reasons.

The making of a soldier

Matthew Parish: Let us begin with your childhood. You grew up in Montana, in the American West. What sort of family did you come from, and what values did your parents instil in you?

R: I grew up in a family that was part of what you might call the haute bourgeoisie. My parents were business owners. My father died when I was still young, but from him I learnt the importance of hard work and energy.

He was a fanatic when it came to work. He despised any form of laziness, slept very little and was always moving. He reminded me of one of the great men of antiquity whom Plutarch wrote about. But like many great men, he was not necessarily a good person.

My mother, on the other hand, is a saint of a woman. Although she is not religious, she has always been concerned with doing the morally right thing. She finds it very difficult to speak negatively about another person. With considerable reluctance on my part, she taught me to develop a conscience, to become self-aware and reflective, and to love dogs.

Matthew Parish: You became fascinated with military life at a remarkably young age. What drew you towards the profession of arms, and why did it become so central to your identity?

R: After my father died, my older brothers moved out and I found myself surrounded by women. Different children cope with that sort of experience in different ways. In my case, I actively sought out male role models.

This was around the period of the American invasion of Iraq in 2003. I was far too young to understand the controversy or the political implications, but I understood that something very important was happening. I almost immediately began to idolise the soldiers fighting the war, the men and women who were putting their lives on the line for their country.

I came to believe that the most important aspect of human society is politics, and that the most important part of politics is war. So much is determined by the outcome of wars: geography, political parties, ideologies, technology and even language. The English language itself is a history of invasions by the Romans, Saxons, Vikings and Normans.

Today I see all these ridiculous videos about so-called alpha males and sigma males. I don't use social media myself, but I still encounter them. I think our modern understanding of masculinity has changed too much since Normandy. For me, being a man is about duty and sacrifice.

After 2003, I cared about almost nothing except military matters. I stopped watching cartoons and started watching the History Channel and the Military Channel. When I began reading seriously, I preferred Thucydides, Xenophon and Plutarch to the books assigned at school. Later I progressed to Jomini, Clausewitz and von Moltke.

Matthew Parish: That is a rather unusual reading list for a schoolboy. Did your intellectual interests help your education, or did your obsession with military history distract you from ordinary schoolwork?

R: It had a very negative impact upon my schooling. Although I always had good test scores, I never did my homework and frequently refused to put any effort into subjects that didn't interest me. I was a troublemaker and was suspended several times.

At 16, I was given the option of attending a six-month military school disciplinary programme. It turned out to be the best experience of my life. I fell in love with it immediately, was elected platoon leader and saw my grades improve from straight Fs to straight As.

When I returned to ordinary school, my grades remained acceptable but were nowhere near the level I had achieved at military school. At 17, I tried dropping out so that I could enlist in the Army. The recruiters refused to accept a school dropout, so I persevered for another year until I could enter the Army's Split Option Programme.

That programme allowed me to undergo basic training during the summer holidays while still completing high school. Afterwards I could attend advanced individual training and join my unit. I entered the Army at 18.

Matthew Parish: What did you believe about America during those formative years? Was your motivation primarily patriotic, or did you see military service as something connected to a broader political philosophy?

R: I love my country very much, both as an idea and as a great power. My political philosophy has been heavily influenced by Machiavelli's Discourses. I view politics and history through the lens of hegemonies and competition between great powers.

There will always be powerful states competing for supremacy. That has always existed and always will. My outlook is pragmatic rather than blindly nationalistic. I would rather see the United States, despite all its flaws, remain the dominant power than see that position taken by China or Russia.

America has many problems, but we possess the tools to improve our country. I am nevertheless very disappointed with many of my fellow Americans. They are often immature, spoiled and unaware of how fortunate their lives are.

Those who hold political power must be accountable for the problems they create, but I also believe that the people who vote for them bear moral responsibility. Shakespeare understood a great deal about this. Much of what troubles me about American society is explained in the opening scene of Coriolanus.

Eight years in the American Army

Matthew Parish: You subsequently spent eight years in the United States Army. Did military life fulfil the expectations you had developed during childhood?

R: Initially it was a tremendous disappointment. I found myself working in a field that I hated, and I was still a peacetime soldier. To me, being a peacetime soldier felt emasculating. I had a very difficult time looking at myself in the mirror.

For several years I was extremely angry with the world. I pushed away friends and spent most of my time alone in my apartment, getting fat and drinking too much. My commanders became sufficiently worried about my wellbeing that they ordered me into therapy.

But those four years turned out to be the most important period of maturation in my life. I learnt that nothing comes easily. You have to work hard, and even then you may not obtain what you want.

In 2020 I was deployed to Eastern Europe for a year as part of Defender 2020, an American military exercise intended to demonstrate NATO's capabilities. I was still immature and grumpy, but eventually I decided that I needed to improve myself.

I started going to the gym, eating properly and making a constructive contribution at work. After I was promoted to sergeant, I increasingly concentrated upon the soldiers under my command. I received a great deal of praise for my work, but I remained deeply dissatisfied.

History does not remember peacetime soldiers. My last assessments as a non-commissioned officer were sufficiently positive that my brigade commander telephoned me and offered transfers and other opportunities to persuade me to remain in the Army.

I told him that I would stay only if I could finally become what I regarded as a real soldier. Ultimately I left the US Army in January 2025, after eight years of service.

Matthew Parish: Looking back, do you regret those years of frustration and unhappiness, or do you think they were necessary to make you the person you are today?

R: I look back upon those experiences more maturely now, and without very much regret. They taught me lessons that I probably needed to learn.

Today I feel confident and comfortable with myself. I no longer feel that anything is holding me down, or that I have anything to be ashamed of. I am happy and self-assured, and nobody can take that away from me because I fought to achieve it.

Why Ukraine?

Matthew Parish: You arrived in Ukraine in July 2025 and joined the Ukrainian Armed Forces the following month. What persuaded an American soldier from Montana to risk his life in a European war?

R: I had been following events in Ukraine since 2014. I was very familiar with the 1994 Budapest Memorandum and understood that Putin was attempting to hold on to what remained of his dying empire.

I always imagined that the long-term geopolitical confrontation would be between East and West. I simply did not expect it to happen quite so soon. I see Russia's war in Ukraine as an attempt to confront the West through military force.

This war is Europe's problem, but it is also very much America's problem. My interest in the conflict had always been extremely strong.

I tried to leave the US Army early so that I could fight here, but those attempts were unsuccessful. Eventually I left in January 2025, arrived in Ukraine at the beginning of July and signed my contract at the beginning of August.

Coming here to fight was never really a question for me. It was simply something that I had to do.

Matthew Parish: How did your family and friends respond to your decision? Did they understand why you wanted to fight for a country so far away from home?

R: Most of my friends were supportive, as were members of my mother's family. Some of my other relatives are committed supporters of the MAGA movement, and there were differences of opinion.

But everyone knew that this was the path I had chosen. I have never had a problem with travelling or spending long periods away from home. In that sense, coming to Ukraine was a continuation of the life I had already been living.

Matthew Parish: What were your first impressions of Ukraine, and how did the Ukrainian Army compare with the American military in which you had spent so much of your life?

R: Some things were exactly what I expected intellectually, but you cannot anticipate the emotional impact of actually seeing them. You travel through villages and cities and encounter memorials displaying the faces of the fallen. You see people who have lost limbs. Those things hit you very hard.

The differences between the American and Ukrainian armies are enormous. The Ukrainian Army is not standardised in the same way as the US Army. American military culture is governed by strict rules and regulations. In Ukraine there are rules, but the same comprehensive regulatory culture does not exist.

Some Ukrainian units receive excellent training and have developed very effective military cultures. Others have significantly poorer training. Attitudes differ considerably between units and individuals, but there is one thing virtually everyone has in common: exhaustion.

This has been a very long war. Ukrainians have endured twelve years of this madness.

Matthew Parish: Have you learnt anything from Ukrainian soldiers that your American military training could not have taught you?

R: One important lesson is just how much training you can accomplish when you eliminate the American military concept of 'hurry up and wait'. In the US Army, even a relatively straightforward training exercise can occupy an entire day because of the administrative procedures surrounding it.

In Ukraine, the same sort of work can sometimes be completed in minutes. The American military teaches many good principles, but it also encourages people to overthink things.

Another significant difference is the importance of drones. American military training, at least in my experience, provided little preparation for the extraordinary role drones now play in modern warfare.

What is bravery?

Matthew Parish: You have devoted almost your entire life to studying and practising warfare. What does bravery mean to you, and do you consider yourself a brave man?

R: My definition of bravery is very simple: putting your life at risk for the sake of others. People label far too many actions as brave, mostly because they have never truly experienced bravery.

I do not consider myself brave. I have never acted beyond what was expected of me in combat.

For me, fear is a good thing. I have many disagreements with people about fear. Some reject fear and convince themselves they will never be hit. If that works for them, fine. But for me, fear prevents complacency.

I constantly analyse everything that might kill me. Every time I cross an open field, I imagine an FPV drone striking me. Every time I hear an incoming artillery shell, I imagine that it will hit me directly and vaporise me.

The important thing is to maintain control of yourself for the sake of everyone else. If one person starts panicking, panic can spread like a plague. I try to make the safest possible decisions because I understand how dangerous the environment is.

If there is bombing near my house, I wake everyone up and we go downstairs. Whenever you encounter a threat, you must recognise that it really can kill you. It is stupid to call someone a coward for taking cover from something that might kill him.

Fear can sometimes make my thinking muddy. I admit that I sometimes cope with it by drinking, which probably isn't healthy. A shot of vodka can numb the fear just enough to stop it becoming overwhelming.

But I regard my overall attitude as pragmatic. Use fear to identify dangers and prevent unsafe decisions, and hold yourself together mentally for the sake of your men.

The world is full of dead 'tough guys'. This war is dangerous enough without making it any more dangerous than it needs to be.

Matthew Parish: Do you believe courage is an innate quality, or can people learn to become courageous through experience and hardship?

R: I think courage can arise either through ignorance of danger or through a conscious acceptance of the dangers confronting you. Those are two very different things.

I was not born or raised to be courageous. But during this war I have encountered acts of bravery that have genuinely shown me the beauty of life.

Matthew Parish: When you are fighting, what ultimately motivates you? Is it the mission, your comrades, your political convictions or simply the desire to survive?

R: My reasons for being in Ukraine are personal, historical, moral and political. But when I am actually on a mission, my priorities become much more immediate.

My motivation is the safety of my people and myself, combined with the need to accomplish the mission. I am generally more willing to put my people ahead of the mission itself.

This war is already bloody enough. I do not believe in taking unnecessary risks with other people's lives.

Matthew Parish: Has killing, or the possibility of killing, changed your understanding of the value of human life?

R: I regard killing in war as a collective activity. I rarely say that a particular individual killed a particular enemy soldier. I would normally say that we killed a certain number of Russians.

In many combat situations, several soldiers are firing towards the same positions, and it may be impossible to establish who caused a death. Many soldiers who go to war never actually kill anyone, and even fewer know with certainty whether they have done so.

I am very sceptical of people who confidently boast about having killed particular numbers of enemy soldiers. A great deal of that is nonsense.

But the value of human life means much more to me now than it did before. For a long time I struggled with the question of whether life was really something precious. In Ukraine I have come to see its beauty.

I have encountered some extraordinary people here, including people for whom I would willingly die. Sadly, I have also encountered people whom I regard with absolute contempt. War reveals both the finest and the ugliest aspects of human nature.

The men who carried him out

Matthew Parish: I understand that you were seriously wounded during an assault upon Russian positions, and that a group of Ukrainian soldiers subsequently risked their lives to rescue you. Can you tell me what happened?

R: It happened on the second day of an assault. We were clearing Russian trench positions when I noticed several explosive traps and shouted a warning to the other soldiers.

As I was moving back, I triggered what I believe was a concealed grenade. One moment I was talking to my friend, and the next everything went dark.

I remember asking myself what had happened. Had I been blown up? Was I dead? Was this what death felt like?

Then I saw a flash of red and began to regain consciousness. I was lying on my right side, and much of my equipment had been blown off me. Because of my medical training, I immediately tried to establish whether my lungs had been damaged.

Then I examined my hands and my right leg. When I lifted my leg, I saw that my foot was dangling, with no apparent structural support.

I managed to crawl out of the trench. Two of our men dragged me into some bushes and applied tourniquets to my leg and arm.

Then the shock began to wear off, and the pain arrived. I spent perhaps twenty or thirty minutes rolling around, moaning and crying in agony. The only way I could calm myself was to roll over and bite into the ground.

Two Ukrainian guides who had worked with us the previous day then came to help. They carried me back towards positions we had already secured.

Initially I had reported my own condition as yellow, meaning that I did not consider myself to require the most urgent category of medical evacuation. But when the medics saw the amount of blood I had lost and the symptoms of hypothermia, they upgraded my condition to red.

For the next eight or nine hours, six Ukrainians carried me for approximately five kilometres through extremely dangerous terrain until I could finally be evacuated to safety.

Matthew Parish: Those Ukrainian soldiers were risking their own lives to rescue an American whom they barely knew. What did that mean to you, particularly given your lifelong admiration for military heroism?

R: Those Ukrainians were absolute heroes. I am no hero. These men risked their lives for someone who does not even speak their language.

A lot of soldiers, especially Americans, grow up with fantasies about becoming war heroes. They imagine themselves charging machine-gun positions under fire, performing extraordinary feats of courage and winning the Medal of Honor.

But when the situation is reversed, and you are the one being saved, it is an incredibly humbling experience.

You realise that you are completely helpless. Other men are placing themselves in danger for your sake, and there is nothing you can do except trust them with your life.

I became very emotional at one point in hospital when I reflected upon what those men had done for me.

Matthew Parish: You have said something extraordinary about this experience: that being wounded was the most beautiful thing that had ever happened to you. How can an experience involving such terrible pain and suffering also be beautiful?

R: Getting wounded was the most beautiful experience of my life because I saw true courage and kindness. In hospital I received nothing but love and respect.

It was the moment when I finally realised that life really can be something precious.

Being wounded makes you feel extraordinarily vulnerable. It is not like the movies, where someone gets shot and simply carries on fighting. Your bones are broken, your muscles and organs may be damaged, and the pain can be overwhelming.

Recovery takes a very long time. As you have seen, I am still waiting for surgery so that I can run again.

My wounds will affect me for the rest of my life, but I do not spend my time crying about that. I still have all my limbs, and I am not dead.

Matthew Parish: Earlier, you defined bravery as risking your life for other people, and you told me that you do not consider yourself brave. Did witnessing those Ukrainian soldiers rescue you change your understanding of courage?

R: It showed me what genuine courage looks like. These men did not have to do what they did for me, but they came anyway.

I have spent my life admiring soldiers and studying the great military figures of history. Yet some of the most extraordinary acts of bravery I have ever encountered were carried out by ordinary Ukrainian soldiers who were simply determined to save another human being.

That is what I mean when I say that this experience revealed the beauty of life to me. I saw people demonstrating courage and kindness in circumstances where it would have been understandable for them to think first about their own survival.

The meaning of sacrifice

Matthew Parish: Having experienced both the brutality of war and the extraordinary kindness of the men who saved you, are you now more optimistic or more pessimistic about human nature?

R: Far more optimistic, but also very grounded in reality. I suppose you could describe me as a cynic who nevertheless hopes for good things.

There is an old saying: expect the worst, hope for the best. That is probably the best description of my outlook.

Matthew Parish: How do you make sense of the sacrifices of soldiers who die in this war? Do you believe that there are causes important enough to justify giving one's life for them?

R: I am not very interested in the sort of competitive boasting and insults that sometimes take place between soldiers. Even when someone dies in what might be considered a foolish way, I still believe that person has made a sacrifice.

I think that defending the freedom of a country and protecting the West are worthwhile causes for which to die. That does not mean that every death is necessary or that every military decision is a good one. But the underlying cause matters enormously.

A soldier's future

Matthew Parish: You are still only 27 years old, although you have already experienced enough military life for several ordinary careers. Can you imagine a future in which you cease to be a soldier and pursue a conventional civilian life?

R: No. I intend to remain a soldier. I cannot imagine doing anything that I would consider beneath that calling.

I could have had a comfortable civilian life and made a great deal of money. But for me, duty must always come first.

Matthew Parish: Where do you now regard as home? Is it still Montana, or has Ukraine become a second home for you?

R: Montana is my home, and Kharkiv is my home away from home. Both places are important to me, although in different ways.

I do not enjoy remaining static for too long, and I dislike making overly fixed plans for the future. As von Moltke famously observed, no plan survives first contact with the enemy. I think there is a great deal of wisdom in that, both in military affairs and in ordinary life.

Matthew Parish: Finally, imagine that you could speak to the 18-year-old version of yourself who was just entering the American Army. Knowing everything that you now know about war, suffering, fear, courage and human nature, would you encourage him to follow the same path again?

R: For the most part, yes. I would remain on the same path.

Life is in no way easy, and I need to make something very clear: war is the hardest thing you will ever do in your life. Nothing else comes close.

But I wanted this life then, and I still want it now.

I do not understand people who want to go through life without ever discovering what fear, sacrifice, hunger, loss, pain, suffering and courage truly mean.

For me, it is about earning your place at the table.

I can have a very happy life. I can have a family and a real career as a soldier. And at the end of the day, I will never have to question whether I have earned those things.

The courage of strangers

There is something profoundly affecting about R's account, not least because his experiences seem to have challenged the very romantic conception of warfare that first drew him towards military life. As a child, he devoured the works of classical historians and military theorists. As a young man, he sought the military profession with an intensity that ordinary civilian life could never satisfy. He wanted to become a soldier in the fullest possible sense of that word, and he was prepared to sacrifice the comforts and opportunities of American life to achieve that ambition.

Yet when the moment came that would change his understanding of heroism, R was not leading a triumphant assault or performing some spectacular feat of martial courage. He was lying grievously wounded, unable to walk, overwhelmed by pain and dependent upon the mercy and determination of others. His survival rested upon the willingness of six Ukrainian men to undertake a long and dangerous evacuation of an American soldier with whom they shared neither a common language nor a common upbringing.

The contrast between the classical military heroes of R's childhood imagination and the Ukrainian soldiers who carried him to safety could scarcely be more striking. These men were not concerned with the military glory that fills the pages of ancient histories. They were engaged in the exhausting, dangerous and profoundly humane task of preventing another soldier from dying.

Perhaps the most interesting aspect of R's philosophy is his insistence that he himself is not brave. He has fought in a war, suffered catastrophic injuries and endured experiences that most people would struggle even to imagine. Yet he reserves his admiration for those who voluntarily placed themselves in danger to preserve his life, rather than for his own willingness to expose himself to danger in the first place.

His account also reveals the complexity of a young soldier who combines an almost uncompromising belief in military duty with a newly acquired appreciation for the fragility of human existence. He remains an unapologetic believer in the martial profession, sceptical of civilian complacency and convinced that defending Ukraine is an essential part of protecting the Western world. But he has also learnt that military courage is not necessarily about attacking, overcoming or destroying. Sometimes it is about carrying another human being to safety when every instinct of self-preservation might counsel doing otherwise.

R's experiences will undoubtedly leave permanent physical consequences. He is still awaiting further surgery and hopes to recover the ability to run. His future remains uncertain, although he insists that he will continue to regard himself as a soldier and that Kharkiv will remain his second home.

What is most memorable, however, is not his determination to continue fighting. It is his description of the men who saved him, and the remarkable transformation in his understanding of life's value that their actions brought about.

In a war characterised by industrial-scale destruction, relentless technological innovation and unimaginable human suffering, six Ukrainian soldiers undertook the ancient and simple task of carrying a wounded comrade away from danger. They saved the life of an American who had travelled halfway around the world to fight for their country.

And in doing so, they taught him something that eight years in the United States Army, a lifetime studying military history and all the philosophy of the great military strategists had not fully taught him: that the greatest expression of courage may not be the willingness to die for one's principles, but the willingness to risk death so that another person may live.