Staff report
Attorney Ben Dusing, waiting out his temporary suspension from the Bar, and his colleague John Gardner are about to embark on yet another grand adventure in Ukraine — and also a risky one. It will be Dusing’s fifth trip and Gardner’s second.
They leave just after Christmas.
What Dusing describes as a “midlife magic carpet ride” led him to get involved in a humanitarian effort for the people of Ukraine — and that in turn has led him to connect to a large online network of others on a humanitarian mission, thrusting him into a leadership role he never anticipated.
Photo from a previous trip
The news of continuing devastation and suffering of civilians in Ukraine as a result of the Russian invasion, occupation, and bombings have permeated reports around the world.
Dusing who spent time in Russia as a youth, learned to speak and understand the Russian language — and that skill, which has been honed by necessity on the ground as a volunteer — has earned him a prominent role in the broader humanitarian community.
It has been quite a turn of events for Dusing, who has come to earn the committed, enthusiastic support of people both near and far for his humanitarian work in Ukraine.
“In hindsight, my suspension freed me to do some things I’ve always wanted to do,” he said. “My life journey since then has changed me forever and given me the opportunity to make the kind of contribution I’ve always wanted to make.”
Dusing went to the Polish-Ukrainian border for a week soon after Russia invaded Ukraine back in February thinking that the volunteer experience would be a good way to spend his unexpected “time off.” He certainly never anticipated that what would happened next would happen next.
What happened next can be described only as one amazing thing after another, the effect of which was to cause Dusing to play a bigger-and-bigger role in the foreign volunteer effort – an effort now recognized as the backbone of the world’s humanitarian response to the Russian-Ukrainian conflict. Indeed, he’s in the process of completing a book about the experience which he hopes to publish soon, the proceeds of which he plans to use to help with Ukraine’s post-war reconstruction.
The once-in-a-lifetime experiences he has had along the way involve actors associated with the Ukrainian military and can’t be told until the end of hostilities for security reasons. He was the first “face of humanity” to meet and greet the thousands of Ukrainian refugees arriving at the busiest border crossing at the height of the biggest refugee crisis since World War II. He traveled to Kyiv to help a war-weary refugee. As part of small teams formed of courageous foreign volunteers based in Kharkiv, Dusing was among the first faces to greet and provide humanitarian aid and comfort to the devastated populations of the newly-liberated territories in the aftermath of the Russian occupation.
And while it has been “one glorious ride after another,” it still isn’t over.
The new ambulance
As he and Gardner embark on their next trip, Dusing has established an organization, Ben for Ukraine, and now finds himself with a “crew” of various local Ukrainian and foreign volunteer partners — and a full-fledged “fleet” of highly-prized humanitarian vehicles.
“We just acquired an ambulance,” says Dusing. “A for-real ambulance. Hope I can figure out how to work it.”
Dusing owns the ambulance because the foreign volunteer who was using it had to go back home to England and offered to sell it to him, via the volunteer network. Since the Russians retreated from the places they’ve de-occupied – like Kherson, most recently – they took all of the firetrucks and ambulances with them. So an ambulance is a valuable asset. The vehicle is the second Dusing has purchased, the first a specialized 4×4 van also secured from a “retiring” English volunteer.
Both purchases required that Dusing take a “leap of faith” – bankrolling the purchases upfront while relying on donations to be solicited and received later. As an unemployed lawyer, his decision to take advantage of these opportunities so that he and his foreign volunteer “teammates” could help the Ukrainian people even more obviously involved a lot of risk.
“I feel like my part is easy. My part is to clear my heart and head of the clutter of life’s anxiety and worry and have the courage to hear and heed the call of the God to go where he leads me and do what he calls me to do.”
Dusing says that that’s how he’s seen and approached the entire journey from the beginning – as one big “leap of faith,” for which he has been rewarded many times over.
John Gardner with the van used to deliver food and other supplies
He is quick to note too that a big part of the wild ride he finds himself on has been the incredible support he’s gotten from people he’s never even met or talked to who have been “following” his Ukrainian humanitarian work on Facebook. From Northern Kentucky locals who write checks to all the Northern Kentuckians who pick up his check when they see him eating out with his kids to the old friends and classmates and new foreign volunteer and Ukrainian friends spread all across the world, all of whom have actively supported him in some meaningful way.
“One act of love and support begets the next,” Dusing says. “The love and support propels me to do more, and the cycle repeats.”
One example is the New Mexico attorney who befriended him in Medyka when Dusing was at the gate dressed in a chicken suit greeting refugees and bringing smiles to sad and suffering families. The man told Dusing that “any attorney willing to look ridiculous to bring joy to suffering children was a hero.” In the end, it would be that same New Mexico attorney who put in for half the cost of the van and the ambulance.
When Dusing leaves for his service in Ukraine, he admits he will be missing his kids but will have a heart full of gratitude for the opportunity to make a big difference for the Ukrainian people.
He and Gardner will be based in Kharkiv and will have the vehicles they need to deliver significant humanitarian aid to suffering, injured, and displaced Ukrainians.
Dusing and Gardner in Ukraine
His biggest worry? That he won’t be able to drive the ambulance. He’s counting on figuring it out.
“That ambulance is a critical asset for the people of Ukraine right now and it is needed just about everywhere, honestly,” he said. “If I had to guess, I’d say that we will be spending a lot of time in Bakhmut, which is just brutal at the moment.”
Russian forces attempted a siege of Bahkmut on the front in the East – a place that has seen the heaviest fighting of the war in recent weeks and has been described in the international press as a “meat grinder.”
“They need to get both military and civilian injured off the front lines and to the field hospitals. John and I haven’t done that yet,” he said, “but something tells me that’s one of things we’re going to be doing.”
Dusing and Gardner will be returning home in mid-February.
Donations to support Dusing and Gardner can be make via the gofundme link for Ben for Ukraine.
