"I always rely on the element of surprise": R.U.G. Commander Hamlet Avagyan on his friendship with Da Vinci, Colombians fighting North Koreans in Kursk, and the Kupiansk effect

Captain Hamlet Avagyan commands the R.U.G. assault regiment, part of the Khartiia 2nd Corps of the National Guard of Ukraine. The regiment is mainly made up of foreign volunteer soldiers from across the globe.

Hamlet knows firsthand what it means to fight for a country that is not your own. In 2015, he came to Ukraine from Armenia to take part in the Anti-Terrorist Operation – combat actions in parts of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts against Russian military forces and pro-Russian separatists. At first he saw his service here as just another addition to his already unconventional CV. But over time, he realised that Ukraine had become far more to him than just a place to work.

Now, more than ten years later, Hamlet is still fighting under the Ukrainian flag and can no longer remember exactly when or how his contract came to an end. Last year, his assault battalion joined the Khartiia Corps and was immediately deployed to the Kupiansk front to take part in the Kupiansk operation, which turned out to be the Ukrainian military's first successful counter-offensive in a long while.

In this interview, Ukrainska Pravda traces Hamlet Avagyan's combat journey from Donetsk Oblast to Russia's Kursk Oblast and explores his philosophy and methods of warfare, the challenges of working with non-Ukrainian volunteer soldiers, the transformation of what was once a small assault group into a regiment within Khartiia, and the goal that drives him above all else: returning to the city that became his home – Mariupol.

"Putin can claim Mars if he likes – but we took back Kupiansk"

Hamlet Avagyan interrupts our conversation to answer his phone. "I'll be there tomorrow, but I can't tell you exactly when. I'm the commander of an assault regiment – that's the nature of the job. What's your name? I'll call you back," he says. When the call ends, he explains, "It's always like this for me. Never any different!"

We meet Captain Avagyan (who was promoted to major on the day this article was published) at the command post of his R.U.G. regiment. An entire wall from floor to ceiling is taken up by a huge Velcro display panel covered with captured Russian military patches emblazoned with letter "Z"s, OMON insignia and other identifying badges worn by Russian troops.

"I collect them," he says with a grin. "I've been doing it since 2022. Most of them were brought back by our men. Some were taken from POWs. But nearly all of them are from dead soldiers."

Back in 2023, Hamlet promised Ihor "Kornet" Obolienskyi – then commander of the Khartiia Brigade, now commander of the corps – that he and his men would eventually join the unit. At the time, Khartiia was based in Lyman and operating in the Serebrianka Forest. Avagyan had travelled there to visit them at their base.

"That's where I met Kornet," he recalls. "I liked him because of his motivation, determination and principles. I always enjoy working with people like that. I promised him we'd transfer to their unit."

Avagyan was serving with the 503rd Marine Battalion at the time, and he later moved to the "Magura" 47th Mechanised Brigade. Transferring from the Armed Forces to the National Guard is never straightforward. The process was long and complicated, but Hamlet says he had expected that. He kept his word and eventually joined Khartiia in 2025, just when – under a strict information blackout – the Kupiansk operation was getting underway. The R.U.G. had just one month to prepare.

"Kupiansk is an urban environment. That meant we had to prepare the fighters for urban combat," the captain explains. "Urban warfare is the hardest kind of fighting in the world. If someone has only been trained to fight in forests, they won't last five seconds in a city. Capturing buildings is only 20% of success. You need speed and decisiveness – there's no time for hesitation. That's what we trained for. We practised every manoeuvre and knew exactly how the assault would unfold, how fast we'd move and where we'd go."

Hamlet says the Russians had prepared their defences well. To break through them, his troops first had to conduct reconnaissance in force. That enabled them to understand the Russians' tactics, capabilities, logistics and supporting positions – and ultimately how to defeat them. In the end, they concluded that the front line had to be widened to create more gaps in the Russian defences.

"Russia claims to have huge numbers of troops, but actually it doesn't have that many," Hamlet says. "They can concentrate forces in one place, but they can't spread them everywhere. Everyone was focused on Kupiansk, but I knew we'd already mopped up Moskovka [a village west of Kupiansk that was renamed Myrove by the Verkhovna Rada in 2025 – ed.]. When they moved forces from the city to Moskovka, we advanced even further inside Kupiansk."

The Russians hadn't been expecting a Ukrainian attack in that sector and were unable to repel the rapid assaults carried out by Hamlet's troops.

"I always rely on the element of surprise," Hamlet says of his tactics. "The Russians weren't expecting the operation, thank God. They have this mentality: 'I've come here, and no one else will come after me.' I hope they keep thinking that. It suits us just fine."

During the assault, the skies were filled with Russian FPV drones. But according to Hamlet, his assault troops know how to evade or counter them. During the whole campaign, he says, only 1% of his men were killed by FPVs.

"When an FPV drone comes in, a trained soldier immediately makes a quick left-right manoeuvre," Hamlet explains. "There are five seconds when the operator is seeing that and processing where he needs to steer next. If a trained fighter gets those five seconds, the advantage is his. You hear the drone and you instantly know you can't stay still. Or you fight back – you shoot it down."

The successful Kupiansk operation carried out by Khartiia's search-and-destroy group dealt a humiliating blow to the Russian military leadership and to Vladimir Putin personally, since he had claimed that Kupiansk was under Russian control.

"The significance of the operation is that our president went there and checkmated Putin," Hamlet says. "Putin says 'Kupiansk is ours' – then our president records a video message from Kupiansk. He can claim Mars or Saturn if he likes, but we took back Kupiansk."

Kupiansk is still entirely under Ukrainian fire control today, although, as Hamlet notes, Russian forces have not given up trying to infiltrate the city by crossing the Oskil River in small groups. But the Ukrainian defenders are successfully dealing with them.

"Surveying wasn't for me – I wanted adrenaline"

Hamlet Avagyan was born in the Armenian capital Yerevan. The First Nagorno-Karabakh War between Armenia and Azerbaijan was raging all through his childhood, and it left a lasting impression on him.

"We saw soldiers constantly," he recalls. "I wanted to spend time with them and talk to them. I was fascinated by weapons, ammunition, and anything to do with war."

After leaving school, Hamlet completed his compulsory military service between 2000 and 2002, where he trained as a mortar operator. Afterwards, however, he decided to train as a surveyor.

"My life back then was like any young person's," he says. "When you're young, what do you care about most? Going out and having fun, right?"

After completing the training, Hamlet began a work placement with a construction company. The trainees were sent out to work in the field.

"I stood in this field for three hours in nearly 40-degree heat and realised it wasn't for me," he says. "I just didn't take to the job. I prefer adrenaline."

So Hamlet never worked a single day as a surveyor. As soon as his placement ended, he returned to Yerevan. For many years he worked in his father's furniture workshop as the manager. Then, as he puts it, he "did something he shouldn't have", and his father moved him to the paint shop.

"My parents were well off," Hamlet says. "My father was a very wealthy man. He died last year. He was supportive of me, but if I did something wrong, I'd be punished. Not physically. It was just fair: if you did something, you had to answer for it."

Once he had served out his father's punishment, Hamlet decided to leave. He started working in private defence contracting in NATO countries, gaining experience with American defence contractors.

Then, in 2008, Russia started a war with Georgia, and Hamlet couldn't stand aside. He followed the example of a second cousin he'd been close to since they were children and went to fight alongside him.

"I wouldn't say I was running around there fighting," Hamlet explains. "But Akhalgori, Gori – that was the area I was in, and I did take part in the fighting for a short time. I still didn't really know how to fight, so I was fascinated by everything. Mostly I was gaining experience. Later I realised I wanted to be a soldier. Assault operations appealed to me most."

After that, Hamlet began looking for places where he could use the combat experience he had gained. Eventually he found them, taking part in special operations in the Middle East.

"I was in Baghdad and Syria," he says. "There you might have had to storm a building, for example, or something like that. But when the enemy only has assault rifles, and you're well trained and going in with an entire arsenal of firepower to take the building, that isn't war, it's a mission. It was child's play compared to what's happening here."

"For me, the Ukrainian nation began with Da Vinci"

Hamlet arrived in Ukraine in 2015, when the Anti-Terrorist Operation was already underway. From then on, he was involved in fighting on a far greater scale than anything he'd experienced before. He was supposed to leave after three months, along with the other fighters from the American company. But things turned out differently.

"In Avdiivka I met Da Vinci [Dmytro Kotsiubailo, a volunteer and Hero of Ukraine who was killed on the Donbas front line aged 27 in March 2023]. Up until then, it had been like working in any other country," Hamlet says. "But I became friends with him and began to feel what he felt, to think the way he thought: Ukraine is home. Russia is the enemy. So when everyone else left, I stayed. I decided I wouldn't abandon my friends."

In 2016, Hamlet signed a six-month contract with the 130th Reconnaissance Battalion of Ukraine's Armed Forces and was put in command of a group of fighters. Their positions were in the industrial zone. Every day, the mobile group went to work on a broad stretch of the front line from Mariupol to Stanytsia Luhanska. Mission followed mission, and the fighters became close. Before long, they had formed a combat unit that celebrated its 10th anniversary this year.

"I was the commander of an assault group in the company," Hamlet recalls. "I was also learning to snipe with a Barrett 12.7 rifle. Then I formed a sniper group along the same lines, so we became a sniper-assault group. Our battalion commander entered us into the combat order as a reconnaissance strike group. That's how the R.U.G. [short for 'reconnaissance strike group'] was born. At first there were only 12 of us. By 2017, there were 40."

One night, sitting in a trench, Hamlet asked a fellow soldier – "a fighter, brother and friend" – what sort of emblem he thought might suit the new group. His friend suggested a skull with a rose between its teeth. Hamlet liked the idea.

"I asked him: 'Why the rose?'" Hamlet says, smiling. "And he said: 'Because we kill with love.' Our motto is 'All you can hope for is death.' I asked him: 'What can you hope for in this life that will never deceive you?' And he said: 'Death will never deceive you. It will come anyway.' So that's what we put on the patch."

In 2016, Hamlet was wounded for the first time near the Butivka coal mine, between Donetsk and Avdiivka. The R.U.G. still completed its task – retaking a bridge. The following year, Hamlet and his men stormed Almazy, a strongpoint held by Russian-backed militants near Avdiivka's industrial zone, to the left of Butivka. Then came the fighting near Svitlodarsk. His six-month contract quietly came to an end.

"I said: 'I'm leaving.' But my battalion commander – he was a great guy – said: 'How about another six months?' And all my men said: 'How can you abandon us, commander?'" Hamlet recalls. "So I said: 'Let's do another six months.' And then another six months, and another. In the end, I served three years in the 130th Battalion."

In 2018, Hamlet and his group transferred to the 503rd Marine Battalion, then commanded by Vadym Sukharevskyi. Hamlet says he had been watching Sukharevskyi closely for some time. Impressed by the battalion commander – who would later lead the Unmanned Systems Forces and serve as deputy commander of Operational Command Skhid (East) – Hamlet decided he wanted to serve under his command. Life in the Marines, he recalls, was non-stop "moving, fighting, firing, bombing".

By then, Hamlet had been wounded nine times in different areas of the front, including near Svitlodarsk, Avdiivka and Stanytsia Luhanska. Two of his wounds, to the abdomen and groin, were serious. Da Vinci came to his aid when he was wounded the second time, and Hamlet says he saved his life.

"I called the company commander because the radio wasn't working," Hamlet recalls. "I told him: 'There are seven of us and we're all wounded.' He replied: '++'. Then I called Da Vinci. He came to get us straight away.

I pressed my finger into the wound in my groin to close the artery. I could see flashes in front of my eyes. I couldn't lift so much as a cigarette any more. Suddenly I heard Da Vinci shouting: 'Hamlet, ambulance!' I opened my eyes and saw [Oksana] Korchynska [the medic] packing the wound with tampons. She even gave me a slap and said: 'Wake up!' And I thought: 'What the hell!'

After that, Da Vinci became a symbol of the Ukrainian nation for me. My understanding of the Ukrainian nation began with him. I always say everyone should be like Da Vinci."

Fighting shoulder to shoulder with Ukrainians, Hamlet never felt like an outsider in Ukraine. He knew he had to keep going.

"How could I be under fire and not fire back?" he says. "I thought: if I'm alive and in one piece, then this is God's will. So I can't leave."

Hamlet later suffered another serious injury, this time to his arm. Doctors somehow managed to reconstruct it.

"I've never gone through rehabilitation in my life," he insists. "I have to be with my people. After they stitched me up, I was already back in formation on crutches. When we went into Almazy in winter, I led the group for a kilometre and a half on crutches. In all that time, I never took a break from service. I'm not tired. I love my work and the people around me."

In 2019, Hamlet made another life-changing decision: to settle in Ukraine permanently with his family. He chose Mariupol.

"The sea, the shore… I thought: why not?" he says. "So my family, my children, moved to Mariupol. We brought a lot of things from Armenia. We bought a huge house, 870 sq m. And my father gave me a hotel and a restaurant there. Mariupol was where my real life started. I lived, worked and served there. I had a home, a business, my children were starting school – I had it all. And then, after a very short time, I lost it all."

"My convoy of Hummers was the first to enter Kherson"

On 24 February 2022, Hamlet and the Marines were in Verkhnоtoretske. When Russia launched its full-scale invasion, the R.U.G. was redeployed to Kyiv. Hamlet immediately realised that this was a different kind of war, and that his family had to be evacuated as far west as possible. He sent them to Uzhhorod that same day.

The assault troops operated in the forests and other areas around Borodianka, a town in Ukraine's Kyiv Oblast that was on the primary front of the Russian advance towards Kyiv in 2022. In April, after Russia's offensive on Kyiv collapsed, they were sent back to Donbas, towards Marinka. Almost immediately they were redeployed again – this time to Mykolaiv Oblast, where they spent about a year.

"Almost every successful assault in Mykolaiv Oblast was carried out by my unit," Hamlet says. "The first Hummers used in assault operations were ours too. We attacked every day without stopping. We gave the Russians no time to recover."

Hamlet says his convoy was the first to enter liberated Kherson.

"We came in through Muzykivka and were the first to reach the Antonivka Bridge. Everyone was supposed to go in then, but a lot of them hesitated and waited. So I gave the order: 'Let's go!'" Hamlet says. "The people in Kherson were overjoyed. They hugged us. Success always gives you joy and motivation. You understand that you have to keep going. But for me, taking back a piece of land is not joy in itself. It's a small success that you have to build on until you reach your own home."

After that, the R.U.G. was sent back to Donetsk Oblast. The assault troops operated along the line from Avdiivka to Krasnohorivka. For Hamlet, this was familiar ground. But combat in Donbas was no longer what it had been during the ATO and Joint Forces Operation. The difference was not only the scale of the fighting, but the collapse in the enemy's morale. Instead of "motivated volunteers who knew what they were getting into", Ukrainian forces now faced men who did not know what they were fighting for.

"We recaptured over 80 enemy positions. There were a lot of remarkable assaults, and we took loads of prisoners," Hamlet recalls. "I've never had one who said, 'I knew I was going there to kill people.' They all claimed they had no idea where they were being sent. It's the same old story they all tell."

The assault troops fought in Donetsk Oblast for more than a year and a half, until October 2024. Then, together again, they transferred to the 47th Magura Separate Mechanised Brigade. Almost immediately, they got involved in one of the defence forces' boldest operations of the full-scale war.

"Who could ever have imagined Colombians fighting North Koreans in Kursk Oblast?"

In August 2024, Ukrainian troops launched a surprise cross-border incursion into Russia, seizing a number of settlements in Kursk Oblast. The R.U.G. joined the operation after it was already underway and spent nearly a year fighting fierce battles in Sudzha, Novoivanovka and other locations.

"We were only assigned assault missions – I don't get any other kind," Hamlet says, smiling. "Who could ever have imagined Colombians fighting North Koreans in Kursk Oblast? But that's exactly what happened in my unit. Our Colombians acquitted themselves exceptionally well and killed plenty of them."

Hamlet first came up with the idea of recruiting foreign nationals into his unit back in 2022, when a young Ukrainian fighter with the call sign "Romeo", who had served with the R.U.G. since 2016, was killed in Mykolaiv Oblast.

"I thought to myself, 'How can I make it so that my Ukrainian fighters aren't the ones doing the fighting, but the ones leading it?' So I started recruiting foreigners – I brought in nearly 300 of them," Hamlet recalls. "They fought well, but they were hot-headed. They'd argue and swear at one another, and there were frequent clashes because of their different mentalities. It took me some time to figure out how to lead them. In the end I organised them by nationality: Brazilians, Colombians, Americans, Germans, Israelis, and so on. Each group lived separately and had its own commander. And they were deployed on missions as separate units."

Over time, however, that approach evolved. Today, Hamlet emphasises, every foreign national who joins the R.U.G. fights first and foremost under the Ukrainian flag, for Ukraine.

"Throughout history, wars have always been won with the help of people from many different nations. But no one has ever said that one nationality won a war and another didn't," the captain explains. "Once they arrive here and sign a contract, they become Ukrainian soldiers. And they understand that."

According to Hamlet, the main reason foreign citizens come to fight in Ukraine is money, and the second is the opportunity to learn something new in wartime.

"How they come to see your country afterwards depends on you and your team," he says. "We give them warmth and kindness. We show them: 'What you've done by coming here to help is important, but here is our heart in return.' They realise that you don't see them as expendable, but as people. And they begin to feel they are part of Ukraine."

Foreign volunteers sign one-year contracts and have the right to terminate them after six months. In practice, however, Hamlet says that rarely happens.

"Very few foreigners decide to go back home," he says. "Some of the Colombians have been with me for four years now. They've even brought their families here. They stay and renew their contracts."

Now the R.U.G.'s assault operations within the Khartiia Brigade are carried out exclusively by foreign volunteers. A display board at the command post is covered with flag patches representing the dozens of countries they come from, including Colombia, Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, Mexico, Chile, the UK, the US, France, Italy and Switzerland. The Ukrainian personnel, meanwhile, serve as drone operators, provide logistical support and fill command roles.

The largest contingent comes from Latin America. Interpreters are on hand to help with communication, and some Colombians, Hamlet notes, have already risen to the rank of sergeant and now command troops at the command post.

"We have a rigorous selection process across Latin America and other parts of the world. We recruit people between the ages of 18 and 35 – they're all young and fit," Hamlet says. "The way they fight, the commitment they show – it's extraordinary. They fight just like Ukrainians do. It's not about the money – they fight with genuine conviction, as though they were defending their own country. None of these operations would have been possible without them – Kupiansk, Vovchansk, Kindrashivka and many others."

There are foreign nationals fighting for Russia too. Hamlet mentions an Iraqi, a Colombian and several Africans who were killed by his troops in recent operations.

"The only thing infantrymen need right now is competent Ukrainian commanders," he concludes. "For everything else, we've always found a way to make it work, and we still do."

"I'll bring in three million foreigners if I have to – but I'll return to Mariupol"

After the Kursk operation, Hamlet and the R.U.G. continued to carry out missions in Yunakivka, in Sumy Oblast. From there, the assault unit transferred to the Khartiia Brigade on the Kharkiv front, joining the Kupiansk operation that came as a wake-up call for the Russians.

In April and May, the R.U.G. also launched a surprise assault on Russian positions on the Vovchansk front, smashing the Russians' forward defensive line in the forest near Starytsia. The assault troops mopped up enemy dugouts and wiped out Russian personnel.

"We carried out a pure assault operation without holding the ground afterwards, so as not to lose people or create logistical problems further down the line," Hamlet says. "We practically mopped up the entire forest. We have to show the Russians that we've still got teeth – that whenever we choose, we can go in there and give those f**kers a good hiding."

The operation was the first successful counteroffensive in the area for a long time.

"We only had one soldier taken prisoner there, and that was because he was unconscious after a strike. And we only lost five or six men in the entire operation," Hamlet says. "Believe me, wherever I've served, I've always valued my people – every single one of them. And so has my command."

Since his time in the 47th Brigade, Hamlet no longer takes part in assaults himself, instead directing operations from headquarters. He admits that at times this is hard for him psychologically.

"I fight alongside them. I practically jump into the monitors," he says. Asked whether he ever feels the urge to go to the front line himself when he sees mistakes being made, he nods. "Of course. But we correct those mistakes. We do everything possible – and impossible – to ensure the mission succeeds. And it does."

In March, the R.U.G. expanded from a battalion into a regiment. Since then, Hamlet has been forming a new assault battalion almost every month. But he says growth has brought greater responsibility with it as well as more personnel.

"I was used to knowing every single person in the trenches. Now I have to travel around, meet everyone, talk to them. I have to, because I can't imagine doing this any other way."

Asked how more than a decade of military service has changed him, Hamlet says he hasn't changed at all.

"I'm still the same soldier I always was. Why should my job change the way I treat people? Just because I'm a regiment commander now, does that make everyone else a nobody? I was a nobody myself once," he says. "The only difference is that I used to be able to jump out of the car, chase after someone and punch them in the face. I can't now. I'm a regiment commander."

The goal that motivates Hamlet to keep on fighting is returning to Mariupol. He has no doubt that one day he will.

"Some bastards were living in my house in Mariupol, and they sold it to some other bastards for US$450,000," he says. "Mariupol will always be the heart of Ukraine for me. I'll bring in three million foreigners if I have to, but I'm going back to Mariupol. There are seven billion people in the world, and two billion of them desperately need money. Whoever feeds them becomes their mother and father. We'll get Mariupol back. Otherwise what's the point of this war, if I can't reclaim my home?"

Hamlet remains committed to the idea he embraced more than a decade ago after coming to Ukraine: "to finally destroy Russia". As for what he will do after the war, he says he'll decide that when the time comes.

"By then I'll be at an age when I should make time for my wife, because she's spent all these years waiting for me to come home," he says. "She told me, 'Don't bother coming home unless you win this war.' I said, 'Yes, sir.' She's my motivation."

It's ten years since Hamlet last went back to Armenia. He still follows developments in the country closely, including the recent elections that didn't go so well for Russia.

"Russia is taking a hit there as well, and that's very good," Hamlet says with a grin. "It may be a huge country, but little by little, it's getting smaller."

Dmytro Kuzubov

Photos Alina Andreieva for the Khartiia Brigade

Translated by Myroslava Zavadska, Ganna Bryedova and Anna Kybukevych

Edited by Teresa Pearce