To determine the personal motivation of military personnel in the National Guard of Ukraine, which has been directly involved in Russia’s ongoing ‘hybrid war’ against Ukraine for five years, two questionnaires were developed, the Student t-criterion and the cluster analysis. The mathematical processing of data was done using SPSS 17.0. The empirical study allowed to distinguish four main types of servicemen’s motivation for professional activity: unformed, professional, compensatory, psycho-traumatized. For servicemen, motives of professional military dignity, self-improvement and professional liability are crucial. This article shows that officers are more motivated than contracted servicemen. The contracted servicemen’s motivation is more superficial, less forceful. Among the real reasons for their dismissal from service, they point out the high level of fatigue and disappointments.

Abstracted/indexed in: American Bibliography of Slavic and Eastern European Studies (ABSEES); America: History & Life; CSA Worldwide Political Science Abstracts; EBSCOhost Online Research Databases; International Bibliography of the Social Sciences (IBSS); International Political Science Abstracts; Lancaster Index to Defence & International Security Literature; OCLC; Periodical Abstracts (PerAbs); ProQuest; Scopus; and The Lancaster Index.