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Chosen Company includes US volunteers fighting with Ukraine’s 59th Motorized Brigade.
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Helmet-cam footage uploaded this week shows an assault on a Russian trench.
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Two US veterans killed in a drone attack in Ukraine last month were part of Chosen Company, say reports.
A dramatic Ukraine war video appears to show US volunteers storming a Russian trench along the frontline in Ukraine.
The helmet-cam purportedly shows English-speaking fighters from the “Chosen Company” in open fields. The volunteers speak with American and Australian accents amid gunfire sounds, and expletives can be heard throughout the video.
The footage, captured by the helmet-cam of one of the soldiers, includes scenes of the squad dismounting from US-supplied Humvees stopping, firing at presumed Russian positions, and grenades being thrown. The video shows fighters moving through a trench amid heavy gunfire and smoke, with additional combat exchanges.
As they rush through the Russian trench, the soldiers repeatedly stop at dugouts, throw grenades inside, and yell “Frag Out!” — a US military term to let everyone else know to take cover.
Insider was unable to independently verify the time or location of the video, embeded with the words CHOSEN CO released this week. A recent report said Ukraine’s 59th Motorized Brigade was fighting in the Donetsk region of eastern Ukraine.
The Chosen Company is a volunteer group composed of military veterans supporting Ukraine against Russia’s invasion, Military.com reports.
Since Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022, volunteers from around the world have joined Kyiv’s forces.
According to reports, Chosen Company is believed to be a separate formation from the International Legion set up in the early months of the war, following a call by President Volodymyr Zelenskky for volunteers from all nations to join the battle against Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.
In a recent post on X, Ryan O’Leary, who describes himself as Chosen Company Commander and an Iraq and Afghanistan veteran, said: “Chosen is looking for Ukrainian veterans who speak English and are ready to join a tactical assault unit. If you have relatives, friends or you yourself speak English and want to deliver battle to the Russians day and night, contact us, ask for a transfer today.”
“A defender of freedom”
Recent reports confirmed the deaths of two US citizens in a Russian drone attack, according to friends of the deceased fighters.
US veterans Andrew Webber and Lance Lawrence, serving with Chosen Company, were killed in July.
Webber enlisted in the Ukrainian armed forces in May, according to Stars and Stripes. A graduate from the US Military Academy at West Point, in 2005, he was deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan. He held the rank of captain at the end of service, according to Heather Hagan, an Army spokeswoman, per Stars and Stripes. His military awards include the Bronze Star medal and a Purple Heart.
“He was a veteran education mentor, a relentless patriot and a defender of freedom who valued justice and liberty for others just as much as his own life,” said a GoFundMe page set to help support his family’s transition to their life “without their service member’s income.”
Webber, a father of two girls, was employed as a corporate attorney in Seattle when he decided to go to Ukraine.
Lawrence was a former machine gunner in the Marine Corps, according to Stars and Stripes.
“He was not a mercenary out for blood or excited for combat. He came because he thought what was happening in Ukraine by Russia was wrong,” O’Leary wrote on X.
A man from southern Florida who said he was wounded in the same operation that killed the veterans described Lawrence as “one of the hardest-charging dudes I’ve ever known who never failed to brighten the moods of anyone and everyone around him,” per the Stars and Stripes.
“Lance was an integral part of Chosen Company, our friend, and our family,” wrote the man using the X handle @floridasoldat.
Nick Maimer, a former US Green Beret who joined the conflict in 2022, lost his life in May 2023 in Bakhmut. Footage of his remains, recorded by Wagner Group mercenaries, was shared online in a video featuring the late Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin, who died in a plane crash on August 23.
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