Voices of Slovak Foreign Fighters: Why did the neighbour's war became their own

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Voices of Slovak Foreign Fighters: Why did the

neighbour’s war became their own

A study into motivations of Slovak Foreign Fighters

Veronika Okatá

Crisis and Security Management Faculty of Governance and Global Affairs

University of Leiden

Supervised by DR. P.G.M. Aarten August 5, 2018

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This thesis owes its existence to a couple of inspirational people who made this project possible with their immeasurable contribution.

Therefore, I would like to express my sincere gratitude to:

My advisor Dr. Pauline Aarten for her continuous support, guidance, insightful feedback and patience with me

All interviewees for sharing their stories

Sema for believing in this project and the vsacrifices she made to support me along the way &

My grandpa Dedko because a promise to you keept me going on

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Executive Summary

The academia is currently preoccupied with jihadi foreign fighters, who travel to Syria and Iraq (Rekawek, 2015). However, there is another war, much closer to the EU borders, which lures foreign fighters in – the Ukrainian Civil War. Due to their geographical proximity and cultural similarities, the self-proclaimed separatist republics in Donetsk and Luhansk became a battlefield for multiple Slovaks. As it is difficult to know with certainty how many Slovaks actually joined the fights, it is just as difficult to find out why their neighbour’s war became their own. However, through the five narrative interviews with the foreign fighters themselves, this thesis examined the motivations of Slovaks who decided to join the separatist forces in Eastern Ukraine. The most frequently occurring motivations included the need to protect the Russian minority which was, according to the fighters, being oppressed and killed off by the Ukrainian army. Also, the Slovaks claimed to be fighting there to make sure that this terrible war will never spread to Slovakia. The separatist movement in Eastern Ukraine provided a platform for these men to enforce their anti-systemic inclinations and allowed them to fight against the hated EU and NATO, which were embodied in the Ukrainian Army. Interestingly, unlike many foreign fighters, the Slovaks seem to lack ideological motivations. Instead, this fight is an opportunity for an alternative lifestyle and re-attainment of their significance. Nonetheless, except for these general observations, their motivations were highly individual and resulted from their previous life experience, grievances and worldviews.

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1. Introduction

The notion of a foreign fighter is not a new one. History has shown that for centuries many individuals have been voluntarily joining the armed forces abroad for a variety of reasons (Bakker, Grol and Weggemans, 2014). Foreign fighting occurred in the Greek War of Independence, during the Russian Civil War, the Spanish Civil War, and the Yugoslavian wars (Malet, 2010). Currently, most of the discussion about foreign fighters is focused around the phenomenon of jihadi foreign fighters who travel to join conflicts in Syria and Iraq (Legiec, 2017). However, the conflict in Syria is not the only conflict that has recently sparkled the urge in numerous individuals to fight a foreign war. While it is true that the Syrian war mobilizes jihadi foreign fighters all across the globe, there is another war, much closer to the EU borders, which became a destination for non-jihadi fighters – the civil war in Ukraine, which mobilizes mostly, but not exclusively, nationals of the former Eastern bloc (Rekawek, 2015).

The war in Ukraine started in 2014 as a dispute over trade which grew into a full-scale civil war (Thompson, 2017), in which the Ukrainian army fights pro-Russia separatists (Coman, 2017). The conflict is said to be the bloodiest war in Europe since the Yugoslav wars, leading to over 10.000 deaths and the displacement of almost two million people (Thompson, 2017). Ever since the beginning of the Ukraine Crisis, foreign fighters have actively contributed to the causes on both sides of the conflict (Rekawek, 2015). Unfortunately, it is very difficult to estimate the total number of foreign fighters. However, it can be agreed that the number amounts to thousands, from at least 28 nationalities (Rekawek, 2015; Machnikovski and Legiec, 2017). Looking at the number of nationalities involved and the ongoing nature of the war, it is clear that the conflict is a great security issue for the whole region.

The geographical proximity to Ukraine and the ideological nature of the conflict makes the Ukraine Crisis very acute for Slovakia. So acute that dozens of Slovak citizens have decided to leave their families behind and joined separatist para-militias, risking criminal prosecution upon their arrival back home (Benčík, 2017). But what created this urge to get personally involved and risk one’s life in another man’s war? It could be Russian propaganda, pan-slavisitic ideals, despise of the Western culture, problems with the law (Forró, 2016; Legiec, 2017) or strong nationalistic feelings (Rekawek, 2015). Or it could be completely different, more personal

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Currently available data are not fully sufficient for a comprehensive description of the motivations of the Slovak foreign fighters in Ukraine, which creates the urgency to investigate these motivations. Most of the existing theories about the motivations of the foreign fighters are based on knowledge about jihadi and insurgent fighters and hence have only limited application to foreign fighters in Ukraine (Mareš, 2017). Additionally, except for a brief analysis of the motivations of Slovaks involved in the Ukraine crisis (Mareš, 2017; Legiec, 2017; Rekawek, 2015; Forró, 2016), empirical research into this topic, informed by primary data, is missing. Therefore, the primary research objective of this thesis is to fill in this knowledge gap and provide initial, yet thorough exploration of the motivations of Slovak foreign fighters who voluntarily decided to participate in the Ukrainian civil war and were directly involved in battle operations.

1.1 Research Question

In order to address the research objective of this thesis, the following central research question has been formulated:

What are the motivations behind the decision of Slovak foreign fighters to join the war in Eastern Ukraine?

The research question is descriptive in its nature. However, such a descriptive question was deemed necessary in order to address the exploratory character of the topic of this qualitative research. And while the topic of this thesis is exploratory, as no academic research has been done on Slovak foreign fighters yet, this research was guided by a theoretical and analytical framework in order to add scientific consistency and structure. The added value of this thesis is that the number of foreign fighters themselves were interviewed through narrative interviews and the obtained primary data were then subjected to the narrative analysis and combined with theory on the motivations of the foreign fighters, as formulated by Kruglanski et al (2014). This theory was judged suitable for the purpose of this thesis since it explicitly highlights the quest for significance, which is considered to be a crucial motivator in radical behaviour (Kruglanski et al, 2014; McCauley & Moskalenko, 2017), while it allows for an individual approach towards significance losses, uniquely experienced by the fighters. Put shortly, these unique experiences

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of the Slovak foreign fighters were interpreted via the theory of Significance Quest by Kruglanski et al (2014), in order to see, how the themes discovered through narrative inquiry fit into the research on the motivations of foreign fighters. This being said, it is beyond the scope of this thesis to provide in-depth comparison of discovered motivations with existing literature on jihadi motivations. Instead, this research explored the unique motivations of a usually under-researched group and placed these findings into a broader, academic perspective. Methodological deliberations are further discussed in the third chapter of this thesis.

1.2. Relevance of the Research

The societal contribution of this research is to add to the understanding of the motivations of the foreign fighters in Ukraine since they pose major security implications for both the country in which the combats take place and for the country of their origin, if they decide to return (SITA, 2015). These security implications might be connected to their freshly obtained military training, the possible commitment of violent crimes, further radicalization of fellow citizens (Holmer & Shtuni, 2017), or the spread of pro-Russian propaganda upon their return. They might also threaten political opponents or participate in non-state paramilitary activities (Mareš, 2017). The fighters learn how to handle weapons, establish connections to extremist organizations, commit severe crimes and contribute to warfare in a foreign land and hence, constitute a considerable security threat (Reed, Pohl, Jegerings, 2017). Only by exploring their stories can one discover the degree to which they truly are a security threat to European society. Furthermore, highlighting the fighters’ motivations can have positive implications for anti-radicalisation policies since it explores the process of one’s decision-making that led to taking up arms for a foreign cause.

The scientific contribution is to fill in the knowledge gap in the literature on foreign fighters by presenting a new case study that has been previously under-researched. As it was already mentioned, most of the academia is focused on jihadi foreign fighters, which is understandable since the threat appears to be greater in the Middle East (Legiec, 2017), taking into consideration the number of foreign fighters in Syria and Iraq (Mareš, 2017) and the temporarily low-intensity character of the conflict in Ukraine (Coman, 2017). This thesis, however, provides more insights into non-jihadi foreign fighters by focusing on Slovaks active in Ukraine. Indeed, existing literature on the foreign fighters is very limited in the provision of a scientifically consistent analysis of the motivations of Slovak foreign fighters. Additionally,

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although much has been written on the motivations of foreign fighters, few of the sources has been informed by primary data (Dawson and Amarasingam, 2017; Schuurman & Eijkman, 2013). This thesis contributes to narrowing this research gap by presenting primary data gathered from narrative interviews with Slovak foreign fighters themselves. These data can be then used in further studies on foreign fighters and hence, enrich the field of security studies.

1.3. Reader’s Guide

The first chapter of this thesis introduced the topic, explained the main research objective, delineated the central research question and presented the relevance of this research. The following chapter presents relevant literature on foreign fighters and their motivations in general. However, it also briefly introduces the Ukraine Crisis and zooms in on existing literature on the motivations of Slovak foreign fighters in particular. Lastly, chapter two explains the theoretical framework used for this thesis. Next, the third chapter presents the principal methodological deliberations of this study and proposes narrative interviews as the main qualitative method in this research. The fourth chapter presents the main findings on the motivations of Slovak foreign fighters and analyses them through narrative analysis, guided by the chosen theoretical framework by Kruglanski et al (2014). Lastly, this thesis concludes with a discussion of the main findings, final remarks and recommendations for further research and policy.

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2. Literature Review

This chapter shall present relevant literature upon which this study builds. It is structured into five main sub-chapters. Firstly, the Ukraine Crisis is briefly introduced and linked to the phenomenon of foreign fighters. Secondly, the definition of the term “foreign fighter” is discussed. Thirdly, existing literature on the motivations of foreign fighters are presented. Finally, the fourth part zooms in on the specific group of the foreign fighters in Ukraine – Slovaks - and highlights existing knowledge about their motivations to join the fights. Lastly, the theoretical framework used for this thesis is presented.

2.1 The Ukraine Crisis – a battleground close to home

The beginning of the Ukraine Crisis can be tracked back to November 2013, when the then Ukrainian President Yanukovych decided to terminate the Association Agreement with the European Union and instead opted for a major economic deal with Moscow (Gotz, 2016). Ever since then, there is a significant political division in Ukraine, caused by ethno-linguistic differences, resulting from a long history of the country’s subjugation by Russia (Fisher, 2014). Eventually, unrest erupted in multiple locations throughout South-East Ukraine, where “pro-Russian actors began to claim that Kyiv’s new pro-Western leadership were fascist nationalists, representing a significant threat to Russians and Russian speakers” (Paul, 2015, para. 8). Shortly after, Crimea was absorbed into the Russian Federation (BBC, 2014).

Following Crimea’s secession, war broke out in Eastern Ukraine between the new Ukrainian government and pro-Russia rebels (Gotz, 2016), who declared the sovereign governments of Donetsk People’s Republic and Luhansk People’s Republic after referenda on independence. These rebel-held territories of the Donbass region are still not re-integrated into Ukraine and run their own, self-declared republics (Coman, 2017). The Minsk Agreements, stipulating a ceasefire, are continuously being violated on both sides until this day (OSCE, 2018).

There are no doubts that the Ukraine Crisis is a problem for the entire international society. Legiec (2017) perceives the whole conflict as a fight for values and choice between the Western European and Eurasian integration. Kříž (2015) argued that due to the conflict, global stability has considerably worsened, what was mainly caused by the new forms of Russian imperialism demonstrated in the hybrid warfare in Ukraine. Mareš (2017) added that the international

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security system is threatened not only due to the proximity of the conflict to Europe, but also due to the growth of the phenomenon of foreign fighters, who have a very specific impact on the security of the region. The following section discusses the issue of foreign fighters in Ukraine in more detail.

2.2 Ukraine as a destination for foreign fighters

Legiec (2017) and Mareš (2017) recognize that academia is currently pre-occupied with jihadi foreign fighters, what is, according to Legiec (2017) understandable since the threat appears to be greater in the Middle East, especially taking into consideration the greater number of foreign fighters in Syria and Iraq (Mareš, 2017), the lack of resources for the integration of returnees (Weggemans, Bakker and Grol, 2014) and the temporarily low-intensity character of the Ukrainian war (Coman, 2017). This, however, does not mean that foreign fighters in Ukraine should be taken lightly since foreign fighters are involved in actual combats and contribute to the destabilization of Ukraine.

The arrival of the first foreign fighter is contested by the different parties. Russians argue that the first foreign fighters arrived in Ukraine in 2013 during the Euromaidan protests (Taylor, 2014). However, Legiec (2017) argues that it was, in fact, during the annexation of Crimea in 2014 when the first foreign fighters (Serbians) crossed the Ukrainian borders. The morale of the Ukrainian army suffered considerably due to the military clash in Crimea and eastern Ukraine. Some units started to fight for the separatists, other units surrendered without a fight. To compensate for the partial dysfunction of the Ukrainian army, Ukrainians started to form volunteer battalions, sanctioned by a Presidential Order and financed by local oligarchs. The phenomenon of foreign fighters on the Ukrainian side is often being connected to the arrival of neo-fascist and neo-nazi fighters, what is often used by separatists to discredit the Ukrainian cause and to put themselves into an anti-fascist position (Mareš & Visinger, 2015).

On the other side of the conflict, volunteers had the opportunity to join paramilitary groups in separatist territories, as long as they believed in the mission of these groups: defending the civilians of Donbass region from Ukrainian fascism. It is believed that the core of the separatist operations was (at least at first) conducted unofficially by well-trained regular Russian forces (known as “green men”). These separatist groups are said to be financed partly by Russia, partly by oligarchs, but also via online crowd sourcing and through extortion and smuggling (Legiec, 2017).

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Ukraine attracts a relatively high number of foreign fighters. In fact, according to some estimates, there are 17.000 foreign fighters from 56 countries taking part in the Ukraine crisis (Machnikowski & Legiec, 2017). According to different statistics, there is only 1500 of foreign fighters, if one excludes fighters of Russian ethnicity from the figures (Legiec, 2017). Some scholars indeed do not count Russians into their estimates because, as Rekawek (2015) pointed out, separatist forces enjoy a cooperation with Russian armed forces personnel, which is assumed to be actively serving in Eastern Ukraine under Moscow’s orders. However, since the men serve under orders and not voluntarily, they do not have the status of a foreign fighter and hence should be excluded from estimations. There were approximately 11.000 Russian soldiers in February 2015 (Rekawek, 2015), although, Russia officially denied the presence of their military personnel and claims that those men are veterans who volunteer in Ukraine (Gregory, 2016). The Russian influence remains to be the subject of speculation (Mareš & Visinger, 2015).

2.3 Who is a foreign fighter?

It can be agreed that the term “foreign fighter” is contemporarily a contested concept, whereas there are many scholarly attempts to define it. For example, Malet (2013) defines foreign fighters as: “noncitizens of conflict states who join insurgencies during civil conflicts” (p. 9). Departing from Malet’s (2013) definition, which specifies the engagement of foreign fighters in insurgencies and not necessarily terrorism, Hegghammer (2013) describes foreign fighting as including: “any military activity (training or fighting), using any tactic (terrorist or guerrilla tactics), against any enemy (Western or non-Western) - so long as it occurs outside the West” (p. 1).

Mendelsohn (2011), however, points out that concept of foreign fighters still has too many ambiguities which affect any analysis. These ambiguities are, according to him, caused mainly by the fact that the term “foreign” is over-used as a reference to nationality, which does not necessarily reflect the fighter’s sense of identity. Mandelsohn (2011) further argues that the different levels of “foreignness” tend to be ignored.

Mareš (2017) pointed out that most of the definitions of foreign fighters are based on knowledge about jihadi and insurgent fighters and therefore, might have only limited application to foreign

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defining insurgencies is problematic, as it is often difficult to draw the line between insurgencies and counterinsurgencies in the Ukraine crisis. For example, Russian governmental support in the context of the conflict in Crimea can be considered to be insurgency forces only until after the annexation of Crimea, when the same forces were used as counterinsurgency against Ukrainian extremists.

This short discussion proves that more insights into non-jihadi foreign fighters are needed in order to tackle the many definitional challenges surrounding the phenomenon of foreign fighters.

2.4 But why do they go?

Academia has devoted multiple efforts to explaining why some individuals recourse to violence and strives to examine the various pathways of individuals towards radicalisation. This research departs from the assumption that foreign fighters undergo a process of radicalisation at one point (Reinares & Garcia-Calvo, 2014) and therefore, firstly, the etiology of radicalisation must be taken into consideration.

So how does one get radicalized? McCauley and Moskalenko (2008), for example, identified twelve mechanisms of radicalisation, grouped into three levels: Individual, Group and Mass. On the individual level, a person can be radicalized by (i) personal victimization, where personal grievance serves as a motive for terrorism; (ii) political grievance, where a terrorist has a certain degree of association with a larger intellectual movement and yet, usually acts alone; (iii) joining a radical group – the slippery slope, where the progress of an individual into a terrorist group is slow and involves increasingly extreme behaviours and justifications of these behaviours; (iv) joining a radical group – the power of love, where individuals get radicalized via personal connections with terrorists through networks of e.g. lovers or friends (McCauley and Moskalenko, 2008).

On the group level, groups can be radicalized (i) in like-minded groups, where members shift toward increased extremity of the opinion favoured by the majority; (ii) under isolation and threat, where extreme interdependence of the group members produces extreme group cohesion and hence, increased agreement of group members; (iii) in competition for the same base of support, where groups aim to improve their status by employing more radical actions in support of their cause than other groups; (iv) in competition with state power, where groups gain

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sympathizers and escalate their actions against the state after the state repressed the group; and (v) in within-group competition, where terrorist groups may be split into multiple groups as a results of intra-group conflict (McCauley and Moskalenko, 2008).

Lastly, on the mass level, radicalization can be executed in (i) conflict with an outgroup – jujitsu politics, where outgroup threat leads to increased in-group cohesion and idealization; (ii) conflict with an outgroup – hate, where group identification leads to extreme categorical hostility and dehumanization of the outgroup, even in the absence of personal victimization; and lastly, (i) conflict with an outgroup – martyrdom, where martyrs serve as trustworthy individuals, who gave up their life for a cause and leave behind the political impact (McCauley and Moskalenko, 2008).

It is without doubt that McCauley and Moskalenko (2008) propose interesting insights into political radicalisation and terrorism. However, in the work of the authors, a single underlying theory unifying all the twelve identified mechanisms is missing.

A more linear pathway of radicalisation is presented by Moghaddam (2006) who adopted the metaphor of a staircase to describe the radicalisation process. In his model, an individual reacts to various factors at each “stair” that may lead the individual towards the next stage, and eventually towards the legitimization of terrorism. However, this model was criticised due to its lack of empirical evidence between the proposed transitions of the different steps and the questionable validity of this strictly linear model, suggesting that a wider combination of factors would have to combine in order to produce terrorism (Lygre, Eid, Larsson & Ranstrop, 2011).

Interesting insights about the trajectory to terrorism are presented in Horgan’s Psychology of Terrorism (2005), where the author recognized three ideas in the progression to terrorism. Firstly, the progression is gradual. It usually starts with small scale activism and gradually evolves into shooting, for example. Secondly, individuals are more open to ideas of terrorism due to their dissatisfaction with their current activity or persona. Lastly, violence can be encouraged if the community supports violent actions (Horgan, 2005). Horgan’s trajectory to terrorism has, however, one major limitation – its generality - since not all the individuals experiencing loss of significance that live in a community supporting militias will turn into terrorists (McCauley and Moskalenko, 2016).

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In contrast to Moghaddam (2006) and Horgan (2005), Hafez and Mullins (2015) reject the idea of defining radicalization as a linear progression. In fact, Hafez and Mullins (2015) acknowledge that there is a significant difference between the radicalization of ideas and the radicalization of action since not all the individuals transfer their radical ideas into violent actions. In order for terrorist action to take place, four pieces of the puzzle must come together: grievance, network, ideology and an enabling environment. While this Radicalization Puzzle theory greatly shows the pathway of foreign fighters joining the fights in Iraq in small groups, it omits lone-wolf terrorists, who do not act within any group (McCauley and Moskalenko, 2016).

Mentioned theories agree, although in different languages, that the personal grievance is a crucial motivator in radical behaviour. For McCauley and Moskalenko (2008) is this grievance a part of victimization; for Moghaddam (2006) it is the first step of a staircase; Horgan (2005) argues that the grievance causes openness to terrorism; and Hafez and Mullins (2015) identified grievance as one of the puzzles. While there are many more studies investigating why individuals join various extremist and/or violent groups (Borum, 2003; Wiktorowitz, 2004; Silber & Bhatt, 2007), this research investigates the motivations of Slovak foreign fighters through the lens of the significance-quest theory by Kruglanski et al (2014) since it explicitly highlights the quest for significance. This theory was judged more suitable for the purpose of this research than previously described frameworks (McCauley & Moskalenko, 2008; Moghaddam, 2006; Horgan, 2005; Hafez & Mullins, 2015), since it is coherent and offers the opportunity for a consistent mapping of the various influences that can lead to radical actions, but at the same time, distinguishes between various degrees of radicalisation. Therefore, this theory is in a way general enough to help to understand a phenomenon that has not been research previously, and it allows for the consideration of various personal grievances that were experienced by the foreign fighters.

2.4.1. The Quest for Personal Significance

In Kruglanski et al’s (2014) taxonomy, the quest for significance is a general motivating force implying the essential desire to matter and constituting a universal human motivation labelled as the need for esteem, competence or meaning. Put simply, the significance-quest theory suggests that individual significance loss generates a need to restore the vanished significance, resulting in the devaluation of other goals and leads to radicalisation.

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The radicalisation, according to Kruglanski et al (2014), consists of three major elements. Firstly, the goal of significance is aroused either through a (anticipated) loss of significance or through foreseen chance for significance. Secondly, the ideology of terrorism/violence is identified as the appropriate means to that given goal of significance. Lastly, the commitment is shifted from other motivational concerns towards the goal of significance.

In practice, this means that after the individual lost significance and identified a terrorism-justifying ideology as a means to restore it, the restoration of this significance might become the most dominant focal goal. As a result, the alternative goals (for example the sanctity of human lives) might be devalued. The latter then leads to a high degree of radicalisation and inclination towards violent behaviour (Kruglanski et al, 2014).

Although Kruglanski et al’s (2014) significance quest theory is considered suitable for the purpose of this thesis, one should bear in mind that the model was established from the empirical evidence of Islamic extremism. Therefore, not all of the elements might apply to non-jihadi foreign fighters.

This short theoretical discussion showed that most of the scholars identify, although in different languages, personal grievances as the major motivator of radicalisation into violence. However, the discussion proved that most of the theories fall short in one aspect or another. The high level of generality in hypothesizing about the concrete motivations has created the urge to shift the investigation from an abstract level into more concrete motives (McCauley and Moskalenko, 2016). Therefore, the following section provides a brief discussion of studies aimed at the exploration of concrete motivations beyond the foreign fighter’s decision to join the fights in Ukraine.

2.4.2 Why do they really go?

Rekawek (2015) argues that there are various motivations why foreigners joined the fight on either side in the Ukraine Crisis. Some men fight with separatists against Anglo-Saxon globalism and the decadent West, while others are driven by an anti-Russian nationalistic mood. Some came to help their Orthodox Christian brothers, while others came to fight against

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capitalism. Nonetheless, the biggest form of international political support for the separatists is, according to Rekawek (2015), the ideology of Eurasianism1_.

Similarly to Rekawek, Mareš (2017) also sees ideological reasons as a crucial motivator. He argues that some foreign fighters are either from the far-left spectrum, such as Spanish volunteers defending the legacy of the Spanish Civil War, or from the far-right spectrum, such as volunteers from Central European countries who have accepted the Eurasian ideology or have strong sympathies for Russia.

Interestingly, in the Ukrainian war, not like-minded individuals can fight side by side. It is just as common that communists and Nazis alike fight together in one unit (Ortega Dolz, 2015), as it is common that like-minded individuals fight against each other (Legiec, 2017). Legiec (2017) explains these phenomena by adopting the metaphor of “ideological traverse”, which stands for “building construction offering several suspension points, lifting elements” (p. 29). In short, this means that foreign fighters often misunderstand what the Ukraine Crisis is truly about and use ideology only to justify their desire to taste war. Nevertheless, the mixture of the most common ideologies in this ideological traverse is, according to Legiec (2017), pan-Slavism, racism, anti-Semitism and criticism of multiculturalism.

In addition to various ideologies, Legiec (2017) identified multiple additional factors, which motivate volunteers to join the fights in Ukraine. Among these factors are personality (personal appeal to one of the parties involved in conflict); history (friendships between countries resulting from the positive international relations); politics (e.g. men from the Netherlands fighting on behalf of the victims of the fallen MH-17); nationality (Slavs fighting for Slavs); or religion.

Although the existing literature offers many interesting insights into the motivations of foreign fighters in Ukraine, it often omits elaborate research into the reasoning of specific nationalities. Instead, fighters are grouped into bigger, although consistent, research categories: e.g. foreign fighters from NATO countries with or without relevant ethnic links to parties of the conflict in Ukraine (Mareš, 2017); Citizens of Central European Countries (Legiec, 2017) or Balkan

1_{The ideology of Eurasianism comes from Russian political movement which is strongly Western,}

anti-European and anti-Euroatlantic and percieves Russian rule as a true leadership of Euroasia (Rekawek, 2015, p. 9).

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Foreign Fighters (Beslin & Ignjatijevic, 2017). Additionally, only little of this discussion is informed by primary data. This thesis aims to fill this literature gap.

2.5. Slovaks in the Conflict

Since this thesis focuses on Slovak foreign fighters, this section shall highlight the key existing findings about the motivations to join foreign fights of this specific group. A discussion of such findings can help to situate the results of this study within a broader academic context.

Journalist Forró (2016), who personally visited Ukraine in order to interview the Slovak and Czech foreign fighters, estimates, on the basis of his conversations with the foreign fighters, the number of Slovaks fighting on the separatist side to be around 30. Legiec (2017) agrees with this estimation in his work as well. Benčík (2017) believes that there is one Slovak fighting on the Ukrainian side. Forró (2016) managed to interview two Slovaks that are currently relocated in Donetsk. In his article, he argues that Slovak foreign fighters in Ukraine can be divided into three groups: mercenaries, criminals, and idealists. Interestingly, all of the men had initially the same objective – to fight against Ukrainian fascism. Additional motives identified by Forró (2016) were enthusiasm about communism, hate towards the US or Pan-Slavist solidarity.

Mareš (2017) briefly touched upon Slovaks in two categories of typology of foreign fighters: (i) foreign fighters from NATO countries without direct ethnic links to parties of the conflict in Ukraine and (ii) foreign fighters from NATO countries with relevant ethnic links to parties of the conflict in Ukraine. Within the first category, Slovaks belong to the far-right spectrum of foreign fighters with pro-Russia sympathies. Within the second category, Mareš (2017) argues that there were some Slovaks of Ruthenian ethnicity supporting separatist regions as they themselves are struggling to establish a recognized Republic of Carpathian Ukraine.

Legiec (2017) argues that Slovaks, as other Central Europeans, form a distinctive group of foreign fighters due to their proximity to Ukraine, extensive knowledge of the country’s internal situation and fair proficiency of Slavic languages. He believes that Slovaks and Czechs fighting in Ukraine share many similarities, such as pan-Slavic ideology, negative attitude towards the EU and NATO and a history in military service.

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Nonetheless, existing literature on the foreign fighters fails to provide a scientifically consistent analysis of the motivations of Slovak foreign fighters in Ukraine. Beyond very brief, partial mentioning of Slovakia in Mareš’s (2017), Legiec’s (2017) and Rekawek’s (2015) researches, empirical analyses of the motivations of Slovak foreign fighters are missing within academia. Although Forró (2016) considerably shed light on Slovaks in eastern Ukraine, the article lacks scientific consistency and was published in a non-academic newspaper. This paper aims to bridge this literature gap by providing more systematic analysis of a single-case, by examining the motivations of Slovak foreign fighters in Ukraine.

Summary of Literature Review

The Ukraine Crisis is undoubtedly an international security problem, in which pro-Western European and pro-Eurasian ideologies clash (Legiec, 2017). The war created conditions in which foreign volunteers are welcomed on both sides: the Ukrainian defence battalions and the separatist paramilitary forces (Legiec, 2017).

Due to their preoccupation with jihadi foreign fighters, existing studies on foreign fighters fail to provide a terminology that would fully accommodate the phenomena surrounding non-jihadi foreign fighters in Ukraine (Mareš, 2017). Nevertheless, the presented theories of radicalisation all fall short in some respect due to high level of generality in hypothesizing. The significance-quest theory by Kruglanski et al (2014) was judged most suitable for furthering the objectives of this research, since it provides a coherent theoretical framework, which allows the consistent mapping of various influences that can lead to radical actions.

Ideologies are deemed to be an essential motivation of foreign fighters joining fights in Ukraine (Mareš, 2017; Rekawek, 2015). Many decided to join the fights for the sake of pan-Slavism, Eurasianism or anti-fascism. Some can be neo-nazis, while others can be neo-communists (Rekawek, 2015; Legiec, 2017; Mareš, 2017). Or they simply just wanted to taste war and justify this desire with ideologies (Legiec, 2017). Nonetheless, even though there is existing literature into the motivations of foreign fighters in Ukraine, it is very limited and often omits elaborate research into specific nationalities.

Due to their proximity to the conflict, knowledge of the language and the internal situation, it was particularly appealing for Slovaks to join the conflict (Legiec, 2017). It was argued that

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they can be divided into three groups: criminals, mercenaries and idealists (Forró, 2016). It became apparent that beyond very brief analysis of the motivations of Slovak foreign fighters, this issue remains under-research, what was defined as a major knowledge gap. The following section will explain the methodological approaches used.

3. Methodology

The following section describes the research methods of this thesis, data analysis, research design and the validity of this study. The chapter concludes with a short summary.

3.1 Research Methods

The presented master thesis is of a qualitative character and combines both deduction and induction. The aim of this research is to explore the motivations of Slovaks to join the fights in Eastern Ukraine, based on a number of narrative interviews with foreign fighters2_{. The}

interviews strived to explore the personal experiences that led to the decision to leave Slovakia and join the fights. Due to the geographical distance and given the dangerous situation in Ukraine, local fieldwork was not an option, and therefore, all the interviews were conducted online. It should be noted that the interview transcripts are not included in the appendices of this thesis, but are available upon request

3.2 Narrative Interviews with Foreign Fighters as an effective method

Slovak Foreign Fighters were interviewed through narrative interviews, which are generally unstructured, but in-depth tools (Muyalert et al, 2014) that helped to uncover the life stories of the interviewees. Narratives are defined as schemes that give meaning to human actions (Polkinghorne, 1988) and since this thesis aims to explore the subjective motivations of Slovak foreign fighters to take action to go to Ukraine, narratives were deemed to be particularly relevant to this study. This is due to the ability of narratives to uncover the way respondents understand their own lives and actions with regard to their identity and the wider community to

2 _{Please note that also a number of semi-structured expert interviews were conducted. However, the obtained}

information was left out of this thesis because it did not offer more elaborate insights compared to the Literature Review. Additionally, since this research aims to explore the authenticity of the motivations informed by the primary data, it was decided that the main focus will be placed on the narratives told by the foreign fighters, instead of comments by the experts.

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which they belong and thus, narrative interviews allow research to focus on the acculturated selves of respondents (Aarten, Mulder, Pemberton, 2018).

Additionally, the method of narrative interviews was used because it enables the unification of diverse events in the lives of the foreign fighters into a goal-directed process (Polkinghorne, 1995) and therefore, allows for the formulation of goal-oriented motivations. Additionally, narrative interviews benefit the research by minimizing the influence of the interviewer on the gathered information and provide rich qualitative data (Law & Halklopoulus, 2010).

Trust between the interviewee and the interviewer is deemed essential in the narrative interview method (Muyalert et al, 2014). Without trust, no data could be obtained. Keeping in mind the illegal nature of their activities, it is possible to imagine that the foreign fighters are careful as to whom they reveal their stories. Gaining the trust of the foreign fighter was really about two elements: the right formulation of the initial message and the correct introduction of the researcher during the call. Trust was then further strengthened via a transparent explanation of the research objectives and a genuine discussion throughout the interview, in which the interviewee played the major role.

3.2.1 Selection of respondents:

Throughout reading this research, one needs to keep in mind that Slovak legislation punishes those who join foreign paramilitary or military structures by imprisonment (SITA, 2015). Therefore, this study had to work with a hidden population, which is a fairly problematic research group as it is difficult for outsiders to penetrate and identify.

The interviewees in this study were identified on the basis of information from media (Benčík, 2017; Forró, 2016). Journalist Benčík (2017) published an extensive blog where he profiled fifteen Slovaks, two women and thirteen men, who were active in the Ukrainian warfare and linked his story to the Facebook sites of the concerned individuals. Five of them did not actively contribute to combats, but were mostly involved with the logistics of humanitarian help sent from Slovakia to civilians in Eastern Ukraine. One of the men in Benčík’s (2017) sample was allegedly the only Slovak fighting against separatists on the Ukrainian side in Azov Regiment. His Facebook profile was, however, not linked to the blog and no contact information was found about him. Finally, nine Slovak foreign pro-separatist combatants were identified. Two out of the nine Facebook profiles were not active any longer and no other contact information

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was found. The remaining seven profiles were still running, although some of them had not been publicly active for more than two years.

Nonetheless, seven alleged foreign fighters, whose profiles were still running, were contacted via Facebook with a request for an interview. Naturally, the authenticity of the Facebook profiles was verified prior to the contact. The verification was fairly easy since all of the profiles of the combatants publicly displayed pictures from the battlefields in Ukraine, their medals, DNR passports or themselves in uniforms. In the end, five foreign fighters were interviewed3_.

The most basic information about the initial sample of interviewed foreign fighters is as follows. All of the interviewees were of Slovak nationality and all have done fighting in Eastern Ukraine for separatists. One man was in late twenties, one was in his early thirties, while the remaining three were in their late forties. All of them come from various regions of Slovakia. Three men had criminal history prior to joining the fights. Two interviewees are still involved in combats close to Donetsk. One more interviewee still lives in Donetsk, however, is not militarily active. Other two men are no longer on the territory of Ukraine. Most of the sample are single, except for one, who is married. They mostly did not refuse personal questions and were willing to share their narratives.

3.2.2. Data Analysis

Narrative inquiry was chosen as a tool for analysis of the primary data. The data analysis plan of the narrative interviews employs the method of the narrative mode of analysis, in which data, including various events and emotions, produce a coherent outcome of the analysis, with an aim to explain to the reader why and how certain things happened (Polkinghorne, 1995). In this particular research, the outcome of the analysis explains why the five Slovaks became foreign fighters.

Data analysis plan was constructed around “zooming out” and “zooming in” on the narratives. For the sake of analysis of empirical data, firstly, the interview transcripts were carefully read and searched for quotes relating to motivations. These quotes were further investigated, in order to see how do they relate to each other and what similarities and differences can be found. The

3_{One more interview was conducted with a presumed Slovak humanitarian volunteer. However, it turned out that}

he was not contributing to the Slovak convoys of humanitarian help, but was acting as a journalist reporting from the region. Therefore, the information he provided was not deemed relevant for this thesis since he did not act as a foreign fighter.

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data was analysed in a way that fragments of the narratives were moved together in order to create a coherent series of stories. The core of each story was then emploted, meaning that it was put into more general plots, in order to disclose the significance of a story (Emden, 1998). The plot is basically the logic of the narrative and has a strong potential to describe the meaning people give to their actions or lives (Polkinghorne, 1988). Further on, unique themes were identified and compared, in order to see what they have in common and what stands in contrast.

By zooming out, the analysis of the narratives revealed two common plots (“the Two-Quest Journey” and “Overcoming the Monster”), which unite and give meaning to the gathered data. The two plots are inspired by the work of Booker (2004), who identified seven basic plots4_,

typical for every story told.

Zooming in then came back to the smaller subplots and discussed the unique aspects of the identified plots. These zoomed in unique elements of the foreign fighters’ stories were then guided with the theory of Significance Quest by Kruglanski et al (2014), in order to see how the themes discovered through narrative inquiry fit into the general research on the motivations of foreign fighters. Specific emphasis was given on the identification of individual cases of what Kruglanski et al (2014) called significance loss and significance gain. In order to effectively guide the Analysis with the given theory, several concepts need to be operationalized. Table 1 on the following page presents the operationalization framework for the concepts of the theory of Significance Quest.

3.2 Design of the Study

Holistic Single Case study design was chosen, since it provides in-depth insights into the specific case study and therefore, fosters a deeper level of understanding. Slovak foreign fighters were chosen as a unit of analysis due to the under-researched character of this group and due to the ability of the researcher to speak the Slovak language. The warfare in Ukraine was chosen as universe of this research, since it is one of the most recent, prevailing conflicts in the European neighbourhood that attracted many foreign fighters (Rekawek, 2015). The unit

4 _{These seven basic plots include: Overcoming the Monster; Rags to Riches; The Quest; Voyage and Return;}

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of observation in this research are narrative interviews with respective Slovak foreign fighters. Hence, the unit of observation is equal to the research methods.

Table 1: Operationalization Table

3.3 Validity of the Study

The Internal validity of the findings of this study is considerably increased by the personal narratives told directly by the foreign fighters and by complementation of the data by an analytical and theoretical framework.

However, there are certain restrictions to the findings of this thesis. Firstly, interviewees may have different reasons to withhold or pretty-colour some of their past experiences. Therefore, to a certain degree, there is a relative value of the truth of the interviews. However, as Sandberg (2010) argues, for narrative analyses, it is not really important whether the respondents tell the truth since even obvious lies might be interesting. Instead, emphasis should be put on the multitude of stories and the shift between more conventional and subcultural narratives. Therefore, the researcher presents the stories as told by the foreign fighters without elaborate

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accusations about the falsehood of the narratives. In the end, motivations are very subjective and truly known only to the narrator.

Furthermore, the external validity is influenced by the limited sample of people interviewed. As it was previously mentioned, the total amount of Slovak foreign fighters, who are publicly known, is ten (out of which nine are separatists), but the working universe is unknown due to missing data on the total number of Slovak foreign fighters. Additionally, only very little is known about the numbers or names of Slovaks who joined the Ukrainian side in the conflict and therefore, only fighters joining the separatists were interviewed. This has also an effect on the validity of this research. However, one should keep in mind the exploratory character of this research topic and the fact that this is the first study of its kind that looks into the motivations of Slovak foreign fighters with scientific methodology. Therefore, even a limited sample of interviews offers fruitful insights and a valid starting point into understanding the phenomenon of Slovak foreign fighters.

Summary of Methodology

This chapter set out the research methodology used for answering the central research question. The core of this research was the method of the narrative interview and narrative inquiry, which allowed for analysis of the employed narratives told by the Slovak foreign fighters and translated them into concrete motivations. The Methodology explained that the holistic single case study design was chosen, since it provides in-depth insights into the specific case study and, therefore, fosters a deeper level of understanding of the given subject. The internal validity of the findings of this study is increased by the personal narratives told directly by the foreign fighters and by the consistent guidance of the main findings with the theoretical framework developed by Kruglanski et al (2014).

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4.

Who are they and why do they go?

The following chapter offers firstly, a short introduction of the interviewed foreign fighters. Further on, their motivations are analysed through the narrative analysis and lens of Kruglanski et al’s (2014) Quest for significance. At the end of this chapter, one can find a short summary of the main observations.

4.1. Getting acquainted with the Slovak foreign fighters

The following information is gathered mostly from the personal communication.

Martin (27): He characterizes himself as an idealist and adventurer. He was born in Bratislava, where he also finished IT studies and worked for IBM. Ever since he was a little boy, he wanted to serve in the army, however, he got rejected by the Slovak military due to his asthma. Since he did not want to give up on his dream, he joined the paramilitary group Slovenskí Branci and later, in the summer of 2014, decided to fight for the separatists in Donetsk (Forró, 2015). He got married in 2017 to a local girl and currently lives a happy family life. Martin recently stopped fighting and has a regular job in the IT industry in Donetsk.

Richard (42): Richard comes from Orava and worked as a truck-driver. He is divorced since 2012 and is no longer in contact with his children. Richard has been prosecuted multiple times: 5-6 times it was due to driving without owning a driving license, while he was still under 18. In the 1990s, he was arrested for arms and human trafficking. The lawsuit lasted almost 20 years. In the end, Richard was sentenced to eight years of imprisonment, against which he appealed shortly before leaving to Ukraine in September 2014. He does not know what the final court decision in his case is since he no longer lives in Slovakia.

Miro (49): Divorced since 1992. He has one adult son, with whom he is occasionally in contact. Miro was born in Žilina and worked various jobs his whole life. He has no criminal history per se, but was prosecuted for not paying child support. His career as a foreign fighter started in the summer of 2014, but ended not too long after, when he got captured in the fight for Ilovajsk. He was released from the capture during a prisoner exchange. He felt like his mission had ended

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could not go anywhere else anyway, because the Ukrainian army forgot to hand over his passport during the exchange and therefore, he ended up without any legitimization until he arranged a temporary passport in Moscow. As of today, Miro lives in the United Kingdom. He still likes to travel for holidays to Slovakia.

Štefan (46): He was born in Kalná nad Hronom. Later in his life, Štefan joined peace missions with the armed forces of the Slovak Republic and United Nations Protection Force in Yugoslavia. It was in the former Yugoslavia where he was recruited by the French Foreign Legion. His military career lasted 8 years before ending in 2000. The first few months of the year 2000 mark a complicated period for Štefan since he was legally prosecuted twice. Once because of alcohol, and the second time because of shooting from an illegally owned weapon. His wife decided to divorce him in 2013 and took their two kids with her. During Gorila5

protests in 2012, Štefan became politically active. He came to Ukraine in July 2014 and currently enjoys the rank of Captain in the Armed Forces of Novorossyia.

Michal (31): Michal was born in Partizanske. After finishing his education, he started to work in the automobile industry where he had a fairly well-paid wage. His grandparents come from Eastern Ukraine. Michal travelled to Ukraine with other Slovaks in 2014. He was, however, not fighting for too long. After two months, he was injured and returned to Slovakia, where he lives a normal life now.

4.2 Why do they go?

It was highlighted multiple times throughout this thesis that there is very little discussion about Slovak foreign fighters in Ukraine, and even less of this discussion is informed by primary data. This chapter analyses some of the initial findings from the narrative interviews conducted with five Slovak foreign fighters in Ukraine and addresses their motivations to join the fights.

The analysis is divided into two main sections: Firstly, zooming out delineates the major plots, which guided the presented narratives. By employing the fighters’ stories, overarching master-narratives were formulated and gave meaning to the gathered data. Secondly, zooming in

5_{Protest Gorila is a common name for the multiple demonstrations which started in January 2012 with an aim to}

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highlights unique aspects of the fighters’ stories and the personal grievances that influenced their decision to fight in Ukraine. At the end, a summary of the main findings is presented.

4.2.1 ZOOMING OUT

Even though each of the foreign fighters shared their unique story, certain similarities could be found in the way they narrated them. Generally, real-life narratives construct accounts of events and give them a coherent structure in order to form a told life story. Usually, this life story unfolds into a coherent plot, which adds continuity to it. To put simply, plots are creating stories by weaving together a complex of events (Emden, 1998). This part of the Analysis structures the motivational ideas of the foreign fighters into distinguished plots, depending on the meaning given to them by the foreign fighters. Through the narrative analysis of the foreign fighters’ motivations, two distinguished plots were identified: Overcoming the Monster; and the Two-Quest Journey.

Overcoming the Monster

The first plot into which the narratives of the foreign fighters can be unified is “Overcoming the Monster”. In its essence, the hero must face a terrible and deadly, all-powerful personification of evil (Booker, 2004). Speaking metaphorically, each of the foreign fighters told the story of fighting such a monster. The monster which wanted to clutch Eastern Ukraine and its citizens into its claws. Interestingly, although all the interviewees fought for the separatists, each of them faced a different type of beast. For Miro, the whole Ukrainian nation was the representation of evil. Štefan is fighting in Ukraine against the villainous European Union. Martin faced wicked fascists and Richard came to stop the monstrous murderers of children. Lastly, Michal identified secret groups as the perpetrators of evil in Ukraine. The following quotes discuss the narratives of overcoming the monster in more detail.

“I came to fight against evil and at that moment (in 2014), it was the whole Ukrainian nation, unfortunately…From a global point of view, I was standing on the right side. The side which

was stopping the beast...” (Miro)

Obviously, Miro’s monster that had to be overcome was the Ukrainian nation, which was, in his eyes, oppressing the Russians living there. Ukrainians became enemies who had to be stopped and so he marched to Donbass to stop them.

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Another fighter, another monster to be fought:

“I came to fight against the fascists that are murdering little children.” (Martin)

The narrative of “Ukrainian fascists” came up quite often during the interviews with multiple fighters. In a way, this is a tool of delegitimation of the enemy as it depicts the Ukrainian cause negatively as fascist, and the separatist cause positively as anti-fascist (Mareš & Visinger, 2015). The second part of Martin’s quote: “…murdering little children”, was an essential element of Richard’s monster as well. When asked, how did they find out about this monstrosity, Richard explained that the true information about the conflict could be found only on Russian sites since mainstream media did not publish such news. In fact, it was discovered that often enough Slovak foreign fighters resorted to alternative news sources6_{before engaging}

in combats.

The monster described by Michal is invisible, but has tentacles are all around the world. This monster is the bank families (such as The Rothschild family), who are “deciding about the world’s order” and “have interest in the destabilization of Ukraine”. It is known that the Rothschild family is often the subject of many conspiracy theories and it came as no surprise that Michal believes in this. In fact, according to the latest poll about the trends in the Central European countries by Globsec (2018), he is not the only one. Slovaks scored highest in believing in conspiracy theories, as 53 % of the Slovak population is convinced that world affairs are controlled by a secret group which aims to establish a totalitarian world order.

Štefan’s monster is clad in blue with twelve golden stars. He blames the EU for destroying Slovakia’s economy and agriculture in particular. After unsuccessful battles against the European Union back at home, Štefan travelled towards the monster in Ukraine. Even though other foreign fighters do not consider the European Union to be a motivational force for their decision to leave Slovakia, the negative perception of it was nevertheless an element in their stories. An example of this is Michal’s statement:

“The EU is a continuation of the Third Reich, but in a milder form. They do not do it aggressively with weapons, but in a more sophisticated manner. They created such conditions

6_{This argument is based on the fact that three interviewed foreign fighters briefly mentioned Slovak alternative}

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in Slovakia that the majority of people cannot afford to have a family. It is a planned, slow genocide.”

Miro, Michal and also Richard blame the EU for the economic situation in Slovakia. Frankly, it is understandable that some Slovaks share a similar frustration, especially if they come from a part of country which is poor and which has not benefited from the EU funds and where there are no jobs7_{. Economic frustration then translated into dissatisfaction with the European Union,}

which was blamed for it. Not surprisingly, NATO did not enjoy any more positive narrative accounts either. It was referred to as “scum filled with stupid mercenaries” (Miro), “big mess obeying Americans and doing dirty jobs on their behalf” (Richard) or “defence pact owned by colonial superpowers to occupy foreign lands” (Michal).

It is important to note here that no ideology among the foreign fighters was discovered while subjecting the data to a narrative analysis. Even when asked, none of the fighters were able to formulate a clear ideological affiliation and therefore, it is argued that Slovak foreign fighters lack an ideological background in their motivations. They are nothing like the socialists from Italy who came to Eastern Ukraine to fight against capitalism or the French nationalists fighting Atlanticism (Rekawek, 2015). These Slovaks were generally dissatisfied with the world order and searched for a new alternative to it. Surely, they are anti-systemic, anti-EU, anti-NATO and enjoy conspiracy news from time to time. Surely, they are also pro-Russian and it might seem at first that they affiliate with the ideology of Eurasianism, as the latter are typical indicators of this school of thought. However, from certain narrative accounts it appeared that even though they do have pro-Russia sentiment, they do not feel “Eurasian”, as the ideology suggests. Nor do that Russia should be this great leader of all the Slavs:

“It did not work in Soviet Union. Stalin, Khrushchev, they had to force it together. Each nationality has own traditions and there always were some conflicts…we can make trade

deals with each other, but each nation should have own borders.” (Richard)

Nevertheless, to argue that a certain ideology served as their motivating force would be inaccurate on the basis of the conducted interviews since no ideology was clearly identified. The five Slovaks joined the separatists because they provided a platform where they could fight against monsters: hated western establishments and those, whom these establishments support

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on the other side in the conflict. Only if the monster was to be defeated, they could have enjoyed the prize won from the monster’s grasp (Booker, 2004). What this prize is, will be discussed after the second plot is introduced.

The Two-Quests Journey:

Another plot uniting the motivational ideas of the foreign fighters is the Two-Quest Journey. Booker (2004) argues that one of the most distinguishable plots in the narratives is the one of The Quest. In this type of story, there is a priceless goal worth any hazardous journey to reach it (p.69). In the case of Slovak foreign fighters, there were actually two quests they wanted to accomplish alongside the journey: protecting the oppressed and keeping war away from home.

Protecting the Oppressed

It should be emphasized here that the interviewees were asked to tell the story of why they decided to join the fights in Eastern Ukraine. With the exception of Štefan, all of the men unanimously opened up their narration with the need to protect locals in Donbass, whereas the main emotions guiding their narratives were, strikingly, anger against the Ukrainians, empathy towards the Russians and a sense of pride for intervening. From the very beginning, the stories were narrated in a way that undoubtedly resonated with the meta-plot in Booker’s (2004, p.83) Quest, where the hero (the foreign fighter) recognizes that there is a City of Destruction (Eastern Ukraine) in which life has become oppressive (for the Russian minority) and matters can be rectified only if he makes this difficult journey (travels to Ukraine). The following discussion presents representative quotes from the fighters’ stories that highlight this observation.

“They (the Ukrainian army) started to annihilate the Russian minority, regardless of whether they were killing a kid or an old man….The military men are sworn to protect their own folk

and not their government. And here (in Eastern Ukraine), the army came to kill their own. They were supposed to protect them and not to kill them…I could not just look at that from far

beyond. I had to do something about it.” (Richard)

Typical for the plot of the Quest is that it is impossible for the hero to remain quiet at home (p. 70), as he feels an urgent compulsion to get away. In fact, in the stories of all respondents this sudden urge to intervene was present, regardless of their personal circumstances at the moment of departure. For them, their personal calling to protect human lives took priority over their own well-being (Richard, Miro, Martin, Michal). Or as Kruglanski et al (2014) would argue, there was a shift of commitment towards a focal goal:

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“My conscience no longer allowed me to observe passively the events in Ukraine. Even though I had my family and a well-paid job at the moment when I was leaving, the well-being of the people of Donbass was more important to me. I travelled to Eastern Ukraine to protect

locals from being killed with impunity by a scum.” (Michal)

“I was happy upon my departure, but I could not let it to happen. I had to stop it.” (Miro)

In short, during the narrative interviews the foreign fighters were telling the story of a sudden urge to intervene in Donbass, where the Russian minority was oppressed. And so they went on a journey to join the local rebels. But the protection of the Russian minority was not the only quest that these Slovaks undertook. In fact, resulting from their narratives, going on this quest would kill two birds with one stone. This became obvious when narrators gradually departed from the original theme of protecting the oppressed towards perceiving their quest as an effort to keep the war away from home.

Keeping war away from home as part of their quest

It was argued earlier in this thesis that geographical proximity to Ukraine makes the conflict very acute for Slovaks. Therefore, it came as no surprise that the interviewed foreign fighters, being the heroes in their plots, could not remain at home, quietly awaiting the war which could escalate from Ukraine to neighbouring Slovakia. The interviewees sounded determined about this narrative, even proud:

“I was not planning on sitting at home in Slovakia, waiting for this mess to come to me. To await the war at home or go after the war, so the war does not come after me? I rather went

there to make sure it will never come to Slovakia.” (Richard)

“I had to go in order to make sure that this civil war will not escalate into an international conflict…” (Michal)

When discussed what exactly had to be protected, some similarities in their stories could be found. Richard and Štefan, who have little kids in Slovakia, wanted to make sure that their families will keep on being safe.

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“…I wanted to protect my children” (Richard)

Although divorced and no longer living with their families, Štefan and Richard considered safety of their children as a crucial motivating force. Michal, who does not have children on his own, was still worried that if the conflict would further escalate, his family and loved ones would be endangered:

“I had to go, in order to make sure that this civil war will not escalate into international conflict, which would then influence my family and those close to me.” (Michal)

It is interesting to note that what the narratives had in common was this belief shared by the respondents that there was a fairly high chance of the Ukrainian conflict escalating and reaching Slovakia in 2014 so the men went on the quest to prevent it from happening.

The latter also proves how time-bound narratives are (Polkinghorne, 1988). When asked whether they still feel that the Ukrainian conflict threatens Slovakia, the foreign fighters became more hesitant. All of them admitted that there is always a chance for it, but it is highly unlikely because “locals have now their own army and resources to protect themselves from the

Ukrainian government and therefore do not need the Russian Federation to assist them, which would be taken as a long-awaited excuse by the West to march against Russia” (Michal) or

simply because it became a “frozen conflict like Transnistria” (Miro, Martin). This being said, it does not mean that some of the men8 _{do not live in expectation of a war of some kind. Quite}

the opposite:

“There will be war in Europe. They will try to annihilate the Slavs. We are the biggest race

and if we are united, no one can defeat us” (Richard)

Nevertheless, to return to the actual plot: the Two-Quest journey is hazardous and life-threatening, but the goal of the quest is more important:

“You go there knowing that you will either not come back because you are dead or you will be crippled or you will be not able to come back because it is illegal…And I went

regardless.” (Michal).

Voices of Slovak Foreign Fighters: Why did the neighbour's war became their own