Eighteen-year-old army private Vitaly Minder is dressed to kill, if only figuratively. His coat of top-grade wool sparkles with golden buttons and gold braid; the belt buckle is inscribed with the Ukrainian trident. Topping off the ensemble is an astrakhan fur hat.
It's not the recommended outfit for combat, but then Minder is unlikely to ever use his bayonet in anger. He is a member of the Ukrainian Honor Guard, a unit trained to welcome foreign dignitaries on the tarmac rather than fend off foreign forces on the battlefield.
Ukraine has had its own honor guard since Soviet times, but the unit's workload has increased dramatically since independence, to the point where the two companies made up of 166 officers and draftees are now called into action every other day on average. As foreign leaders hustle in and out of Kyiv to cement ties with one of Europe's newest nations, it is the Ukrainian Honor Guards who greet them at the airport and lay their wreaths at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.
'We are the face of our state. We are the first thing overseas presidents see when they land in the airport,' says guard commander Lt. Col. Ihor Kozyrkov. What the visiting dignitaries miss are the exhausting hours of parade-ground drills and the immense psychological pressure the soldiers have to endure during ceremonies. Kozyrkov recalls the arrival of U.S. President Bill Clinton on his first official visit to Ukraine in 1994. 'I stood still with a sabre fixed at my nosebridge in a saluting gesture, waiting to follow Clinton as he walked along the line of soldiers. But Clinton obviously changed his mind and fell into a fit of eloquence some 40 minutes long, at the end of which my arm had gone completely numb,' recalls Kozyrkov with a smile.
Not everyone manages to overcome such ordeals by stillness. Lt. Yury Vlasyuk says one soldier assigned to a wreath-laying detail once fainted near the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier moments before the arrival of President Leonid Kuchma. The unlucky recruit fell from a platform, breaking several teeth and smashing his rifle into pieces. 'But we managed to push forward a substitute, so the president did not even notice,' brags Vlasyuk. The selection process for the Ukrainian Honor Guard is far more rigorous than that for male models. Candidates must be at least 1.80 meters (5'11'') tall and free of gold teeth, scars, tattoos and other blemishes. No one who has ever had a bone fracture, jaundice or anything but perfect vision need apply.
Aside from that, recruits must come from two-parent households, because the military believes traditional families foster the even temperament and steadiness of nerve so prized in potential honor guards. 'The draftees must pass many psychological tests here, and if we register any deviations, for example some signs of suicidal moods, such a draftee leaves the company. Usually we sift away about 5 to 10 percent of newcomers,' says Vlasyuk.
The unit is made up of draftees from the Cherhihiv, Poltava, Sumy and Cherkasy regions in central and northern Ukraine. According to Ukrainian statistics, these areas have the lowest rates of alcoholism and drug abuse. The military also likes the fact that they are less politicized than other regions.
For some, a stint in the Honor Guard has become a family tradition: Minder's father served in the same unit some 20 years ago, his older brother preceded him by two years. Though Kyiv's Honor Guard company was formed 35 year ago as a Red Army unit, it had few chances to show its stuff under Soviet rule. Highlights include a 1980 visit by Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev to dedicate the Mother Victory monument and two earlier reviews by the late Yugoslav leader Joseph Broz Tito.
Yugoslavia was not the only entity to break up following Tito's departure from the scene. 'After each of his visits, the units were disbanded: Tito was discontented with the schooling,' says Kozyrkov.
Today, the Honor Guard is the Ukrainian army's pampered elite, rewarded with bonus rations and the status that comes with proximity to the powerful. One soldier received a gushing letter from his sweetheart after she, along with their entire village, recognized him as he stood guard during a televised ceremony.
But the biggest perk of all is the absence of the brutal servitude inflicted by veterans on new recruits, a practice Ukraine's military has inherited from the Soviet Army. 'An older guy just cannot force a young one to go to a greeting ceremony instead of him or to keep his leg high for him during marching drills,' says Kozyrkov.
