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Notes -
Different kind of existential threat. You are (probably) thinking of existential threat in terms of 'we are about to be overrun', but the Ukrainian perspective is more in 'this war will determine whether the next war will be our last.'
Remember this is the third continuation war since the invasion of Crimea, and that Russia's opening war-termination demands were such as to render a future-Ukraine functionally unable to resist a future attack (i.e. demanding that the Ukrainians demilitarize to a smaller tank fleet than the number of tanks they've lost since continuing to fight, limiting Ukrainians to weapon ranges that couldn't hit rear areas, allowing a Russian veto on foreign assistance to Ukraine). The Ukrainians view their prospects in a future war where they may have no allies / partners far less optimistically than continuing this one with foreign support.
There certainly are plenty of young men (volunteers), and there are definitely unequal brigades (of wildly varying equipment quality), and you aren't wrong in how the unequal brigades are being used (though 'make-work' is probably the wrong way to put it). While Russia is prioritizing efforts in the Donbas, there is a long border to be guarded, and so units of various levels are being sent there.
But for the question of drafting demographic in particular, Ukraine is taking what might be called a seed-corn approach, i.e. prioritizing future growth potential. Ukraine is aware it is a rapidly aging country, and that the youths are the future, and to the degree possible it is trying not to rely on the youth to carry the costs of combat. (Additionally, the older age brackets are far more supportive/tolerant, and thus less politically costly, for mobilization.) The loss of a young man is worse than the loss of an older man, not least because there are a lot more older men and the youth will be needed to take care of the survivors.
Note that this is similar to why women may volunteer, but also aren't being drafted. Women have more long-term value to the nation. If things were so catastrophic in an immediate sense, the state very well could and likely would draft women as well just as it started mixing molotovs in the capital at the start, as many other existentially-threatened states have in the past. But for now it doesn't perceive a need, because the existential risk isn't in the current war, but how this war sets up the next one. Ukraine is operating off of the assumption that it is going to be significantly demographically impacted regardless of how the war ends, but prioritizing the more enduring elements while trying to establish longer-term deterrence.
None of this says that the current strategy is sufficient, or superior, or best. It's not an argument that the Ukrainians aren't losing on the Donbas front. But it is a point that there was a tradeoff of costs, and that the risk perceived as greater isn't imminent military collapse existential risk.
This is one of the issues that the AWOL/foreign flight/draft dodger issue isn't as catastrophic as one may think: the ones doing it are primarily already older (though not old) men, and between expanding the draft age and simply cracking down harder on draft dodger demographics, the state would prefer the later. This is not analogous to the US experience in Vietnam, where college kids flee to Canada to get out of going to war and so spend all their most productive years benefiting another nation.
Fantastic set of posts, reported for AAQC.
Danke
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