Why isn’t anybody calling Ukraine a military dictatorship?

I can understand why some well‐meaning people would be reluctant to categorize Ukraine as neofascist; you could argue that that is either an exaggeration or too vague. But military dictatorships are relatively well understood and well defined phenomena that alternative media outlets could easily apply to a present government.

So far, these pacifists are the only folks that I’ve seen categorizing Ukraine as a military dictatorship. (Well, technically they didn’t say that it was one quite yet, but I suspect that they’d call it one now.) Their observations are useful:

We call on President Zelensky to withdraw his Bill No 3553 on military dictatorship as it violates not only his public promises to voters, but, more importantly, constitutional and fundamental human rights: the right to peace, the right to work, the right to freedom of thought, belief, and to conscientious objection against military service.

We believe that the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine should not rush to pass a law on military dictatorship, which undermines the constitutional foundations of a democratic civil state governed by the rule of law in Ukraine. Public discussion of the scandalous bill No 3553 should be ensured at all stages of the parliamentary procedure.

The will of Ukrainian people demanding to stop the war must be fulfilled. Parliamentarians should hear and take into account the proposals of Ukrainian pacifists about possible ways to achieve peace in our country and around the world.

(Emphasis original.)

And while the following observation doesn’t necessarily prove my claim, I find it very alarming how the head of state is in the company of soldiers a lot. Roughly half of the time that I see photographs of Zelenskyy he is standing next to a soldier… for the life of me I can’t think of any other living head of state who has been directly in the company of troops as frequently as Zelenskyy has. Not even George W. Bush comes close.