Protection of civilians in high-intensity war: four lessons from Ukraine

2025 was the deadliest year for civilians in Ukraine since the beginning of the full-scale invasion in 2022. It is an indicator not only of the war's intensity but of how fragile civilian systems remain in high-intensity conflicts.

What this fragility looks like in practice is visible far from policy tables. During a community meeting in Ukraine's Sumy region, where CIVIC works with local residents and authorities, a mother shared that her five-year-old daughter can distinguish the sound of a Shahed drone from a cruise missile and demonstrate how to hide during shelling. Instead of rehearsing a dance for Mother's Day, children are learning survival drills. This is not an exception, but the reality for front line communities in Ukraine.

After more than a decade of war that began in 2014 and four years into its full-scale phase Ukraine no longer offers abstract debates about the protection of civilians. It offers hard-fought lessons that are increasingly relevant as conflicts worldwide become more urban and more unpredictable.

Lesson 1. Communities are not passive recipients of protection, they are active partners in shaping it

Whilst the state bears primary responsibility for the protection of civilians, during large-scale conflict it is crucial that communities have agency to determine their own protection needs. For protection to be effective and sustainable, and where protection by the state is supported by international actors, civilian voices must be amplified so that decisions around safety meet the reality of the conditions in which they live. Involving civilians in designing protection mechanisms not only increases their safety, but also increases their willingness to participate in emergency response roles, contributing their expertise and capacity to the protection of their own communities.

In 37 communities, state-developed Safety Centres have been introduced which integrate fire stations, emergency medical services and police units within a single facility. In rural and remote areas, volunteer fire brigades can respond to fires, shelling, and conflict-related emergencies. Many of these volunteer firefighter brigades are women-led, reflecting how wartime mobilisation has reshaped local protection capacities. Recent CIVIC research has shown that when these structures are in place, communities demonstrate higher preparedness for potential escalation, with this trend particularly observed in Rivne, Odesa, Chernihiv and Zaporizhzhia oblasts.

Involving communities in protection mechanisms, such as women-led volunteer firefighter brigades, not only increases civilian safety by reducing response times during crises, but it also increases willingness, participation, and sustainability of capacity and expertise.

Lesson 2. Civil-military engagement helps protection mechanisms to hold and adapt under fire

If communities help shape and implement protection mechanisms for civilians, civil-military engagement helps those safeguards hold, and supports them to adapt, during active hostilities. The conflict in Ukraine has seen new tactics and weapons develop at a rapid pace, which means that threats to civilians have also changed, affecting the types of protections that civilians need. The decisions that are made during the war directly affect how safe civilians are, which makes it very important that civilians have a way to talk to the military about what they need to be safe. It is also very important for the military to think about protecting civilians when they are planning and doing operations.

In Ukraine, civil–military cooperation (CIMIC) officers coordinate with local authorities, humanitarian actors, and communities, providing a vital link between safeguarding civilians close to frontline areas and sustaining military operations. These officers have supported evacuations, facilitated restoration of essential services, and maintained communication between armed forces and local populations during times of crisis. CIMIC officers have played an important role in civilian harm tracking, as well as collecting and understanding data on the civilian environment. CIMIC officers demonstrated a high level of commitment to addressing civilian concerns, and to coordinating with local authorities, contributing to a civil-military framework that has proved crucial to societal resilience in Ukraine.

With a frontline that extends over 1,000 kilometres, and with several major urban centres within the range of many of Russia's weapons, communities, authorities and the military working together is crucial for societal resilience. CIMIC officers can also play a vital role in assessing the civilian environment, which, when routinely incorporated into operational plans, and alongside structured liaison mechanisms, can help to mitigate harm to civilians, as highlighted in a case study by the Centre of Excellence for Civil-Military Cooperation. Institutionalized engagement strengthens protection outcomes under fire. Where such mechanisms are absent, civilian risk becomes more acute and less predictable.

Lesson 3. Protection of civilians must start before the strike

One of the clearest lessons from Ukraine's experience is that evacuation cannot be an afterthought. Traditional evacuation exercises often involve only essential workers under predefined plans. Yet in wartime, civilians themselves become first responders, forced to improvise under fire. This reality underscores the imperative of anticipatory protection planning that reaches beyond formal plans to include broader community preparedness.

In parts of Kherson Oblast, local communities have taken this principle into practice. Some hromadas conducted informal censuses to register people with disabilities, older adults, and those requiring assisted evacuation, and even mapped private vehicles to neighbours in case of rapid movement. These grassroots approaches emerged amid ongoing evacuations. In 2025 alone, more than 147,000 people moved from frontline areas toward safety.

Experience on the ground makes clear that protection planning must integrate civilian voices, clear responsibilities, and communication before the first evacuation order because once violence escalates, options narrow and lives are at stake.

Lesson 4. Protection fails without practical tools

International humanitarian law remains essential. It defines obligations, establishes standards, and affirms that civilians must never be the target of violence. What is happening in Ukraine shows that just having rules is not enough when fights go on for a long time in cities and involve a lot of technology. Just because people agree to follow the rules it does not mean that everyone will be safe.

What really helps reduce harm is having a plan: knowing how to get people out of a place having a way for the military and civilians to talk to each other having a map of what to do in an emergency and having a way to communicate when things get bad. These plans turn ideas into actions that people can take when they are, under a lot of pressure. When things are happening fast and no one is sure what will happen next people need to know what they have to do and have a plan that works for their specific area.

Global protection frameworks must therefore prioritize operationalization alongside compliance. These lessons extend far beyond Ukraine. From the Middle East to Africa, conflicts are increasingly urban, technologically advanced, and fought in densely populated environments where civilians remain in place. In the absence of operational integration, gaps between legal commitments and battlefield realities will continue to widen.

Joanne La Terriere, Country Director of Center for Civilians in Conflict (CIVIC) in Ukraine, expert in PoC with over 10 years' experience in the humanitarian sector