NOVEMBER 16, 1991 — JUNE 10, 2022
30 YEARS, MILITARY CORRESPONDENT
War entered Oleksii Chubashev’s (call sign Recruit) life twice. His first rotation to the Anti-Terrorist Operation was in June 2015. That same year, Oleksii started working as a war journalist. However, since February 24, he had been at the front not as a journalist, but as a soldier. According to his brothers-in-arms, he was the only war journalist the Spec Ops servicemen welcomed to their unit. He was very skilled and very apt with multiple types of armament. On June 10, 2022 during the assault on the building in Sievierodonetsk, Oleksii was killed.
«There is no second try at the front, — the journalist said, — for there are no score points at the front. The reality is harsh there. Therefore, one must be ready for it. Day — night — day — night... everything is melted in one. It’s hard to tell the day or the hour of the day. The only way is to get to the finish line. To say «I made it», to stay alive to tell the tale» — that was what Oleksii considered his mission to be.
The journalist was from Polohy, the town in Zaporizhzhia region. He was born on November 16, 1991. Oleksii first put on his military uniform in the summer of 2008, when he enrolled at the Ivan Bohun Military Lyceum in Kyiv. He studied in his tenth and eleventh grades there. When his peers were having fun, Oleksii was cleaning the parade ground from the snow, was on 24-hour duty, or was not sparing his feet while getting ready for the 2009 Independence Day parade.
In 2010, he enrolled at the Military Institute of Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv and studied journalism. The admissions office claimed that Oleksii was the only male to win the creative contest that year. In 2015, he got his officer’s epaulettes and his master’s degree, ahead of schedule.
Oleksii was an active Instagram user with over 25 thousand followers. His posts were military-themed, he showed his training and shoots for work. The reporter authored and was the protagonist of the first in Ukraine military project «Recruit.UA». Oleksii showcased how he, a war correspondent, was trying to become a paratrooper. The first episode was called «Paratroopers». It was about the initiation and struggles of those soon-to-be Spec Ops servicemen. About their selection, training, formation and operational record. It is the project about the people defending Ukraine, at all times. This is where Oleksii came face to face with death.
«I was scared. The first time is always the most frightening, — he wrote, — I was just doing my job, regardless of the destruction around. The enemy was out of sight, but he was very close. We had no clue which direction we might get shot at from. And we got shot. Not me, but Andrii. I tried to resuscitate the warrior who got hit with a bullet he was not hiding from. I tried to save him...» — says the journalist at the beginning of the episode. Oleksii is also known to be the former chief of «Armiia FM» and Military Television of Ukraine.
He is survived by wife Yulia and two small children — daughter Daniela and son Teodor. Oleksii only saw his son once. The kid was born four months prior to his father’s death. «Teodor — a little boy — is among those children who, sadly, will never know their fathers, — says the family friend Yana, — we are the ones to tell him about his dad. About him being a true patriot, about him loving his country, about him going to war to defend it, so that hundreds of thousands of children could live in the free and Independent country».
Wife Yulia is certain that Oleksii had fulfilled his duty; it is now our duty to not let his sacrifice — and sacrifices of so many others — be for nothing. «We must live with dignity. We must smile and rejoice. We must be grateful for our lives, for the best Ukrainians lay their lives for us», she says.
