Victor still runs his fingers over the ridged scars on his forearm, a lasting mark of the day a Ukrainian drone tore through his position on the front line.
The blast knocked him flat, spraying metal fragments through his arm and filling the air with dirt and smoke.
For a few seconds, he said, there was only ringing in his ears and the taste of dust in his mouth. Then came the shouting.
By then, he was already months into a war he insists was never his.
Victor is one of four Kenyans who told Agence France-Presse (AFP) that what began as routine job applications in Nairobi ended with rifles in their hands and orders barked in Russian on the battlefields of Ukraine.
Mark, Erik and Moses described parallel journeys shaped by economic strain at home and recruitment pitches that promised stability abroad. Their names have been changed to protect them.
The offers came through a Nairobi-based agency advertising well-paid work in Russia. According to the men, the roles sounded ordinary and legal, framed as a chance to earn several times what they could make at home. Interviews were brief but reassuring. Contracts were presented in English. Travel arrangements were handled quickly.
Victor, 28, said he signed on as a salesman. Mark, 32, and Moses, 27, believed they had secured jobs as security guards. Erik, 37, thought he was heading into a professional sports-related role, an opportunity he described as life-changing.
Family members saw them off at the airport with hope.
The shift, they say, began soon after landing.
Instead of being taken to civilian workplaces, they were transported to what they describe as controlled compounds. Passports were collected. New documents were introduced, some in Russian. They were told their employment contracts were tied to state service obligations. Objections were brushed aside. Leaving, they say, was not presented as an option.
Within days, military training began.
They were issued uniforms and boots. Instructors drilled them in weapons handling, trench movement and basic combat tactics.
Communication was strained by language barriers, with orders translated hastily or demonstrated through gestures. The transformation from civilian recruit to soldier happened quickly and, they allege, without informed consent.
Deployment followed.
Victor recalls the first time he heard sustained artillery fire. The ground trembled. He said he felt disoriented, aware that he had crossed from confusion into real danger. “I kept thinking about Nairobi,” he said. “How did I move from job interviews to this?”
The drone strike that wounded him came during what he described as a defensive assignment. He remembers a faint mechanical buzz overhead before the explosion ripped through their position. Shrapnel tore into his forearm. He pressed down on the wound as others around him screamed for medics. Some did not get up.
He survived after evacuation and treatment. The scars healed into raised lines, pale against his skin. The memory did not.
Mark and Moses spoke of constant anxiety in the trenches, of nights spent listening for incoming fire and days navigating terrain they had never imagined seeing. Erik described the psychological toll of fighting in a conflict he barely understood, isolated by language and haunted by the thought of dying far from home.
Their accounts point to a broader pattern of foreign nationals allegedly recruited under civilian pretenses and later absorbed into military service.
Human rights advocates have warned that cross-border recruitment pipelines can exploit economic vulnerability, particularly in countries where youth unemployment remains high.
Back in Kenya, the men say they are trying to rebuild their lives. Sleep is uneven. Sudden noises spark flashes of memory. Some struggle to explain to relatives how a job opportunity turned into combat.
Victor says he often studies the scars in silence. They are proof of survival, but also of trust misplaced. What began as a search for work became a fight to stay alive in a distant war.
“I was not fighting for my country,” he said quietly. “I was fighting to come back home.”
