More Soldiers at All Costs

After mobilization, Russia launched an active campaign to recruit contract soldiers in order to continue sending people to the war with Ukraine. The main motivation is money: from August 1, Russians will receive a one-time payment of 400 thousand rubles from the federal budget for signing a contract (previously the payment was 195 thousand rubles) and a payment from the region, in some subjects — almost two million rubles. According to the authorities’ statements, this has made it possible to recruit 730 thousand new contract servicemen in a year and a half.

IStories together with the Conflict Intelligence Team (CIT) analyzed the data on one-time payments and tells how the recruitment for contract service actually goes and how much it costs for the state.

Underestimated

The figures given by the Ministry of Defense may be overstated by one and a half times. As follows from the data on federal budget expenditures, from the fall of 2022 to April 2024, about 426 thousand Russians received a one-time payment for the conclusion of a contract (195 thousand rubles at that time). The Ministry of Defense announced the number 214 thousand more people — according to the data of the department by the same date, 640 thousand had enlisted for contract service (for more details on the calculation methodology, check out the “Explaining our calculations” section).

Some frontline recruits are not included in the data on contracting payments, while authorities can count them in frontline recruitment claims. But their numbers are not that large and cannot explain such a difference between the number of payments and the Defense Ministry’s claims, CIT analysts say. Thus, fighters of volunteer units and irregular formations like Redut PMC do not receive federal payments: formally they are not servicemen. The so-called “special contingent” — prisoners recruited to the war front, the recruitment of which became the responsibility of the Ministry of Defense in 2023 — are in the same situation. They complain massively that they do not receive allowances and benefits that other contract servicemen are entitled to. On the contrary, the data on payments may take into account those who fought on the side of the DPR and LPR, who were subordinated to the Ministry of Defense and had to sign a contract with the agency.

The unreliability of the figures reported by the Defense Ministry is confirmed by other observations. Entire assault units made up of wounded and crippled soldiers have appeared at the front: “This has already taken such extreme forms when people on crutches and with Ilizarov apparatuses are sent to the front. We see this in all regions, from the Far East to border regions,” CIT experts note. Also, regions continue to increase payments for contracting in an attempt to attract new people, and Putin recommended that all regions raise this amount to at least 400 thousand rubles. This would not have happened if there were enough military recruits, analysts say.

The fact that the Defense Ministry’s plan to recruit contractors is not being fully implemented is confirmed by an IStories source at one of the contractors’ recruitment centers in the Russian Armed Forces (we do not specify its location for the safety of the interlocutor). According to him, in 2023 the regions managed to fulfill the plan only by 50-60%. This year, the rate of contract recruitment is higher, but they are still recruiting at a disadvantage because of the number of irreplaceable losses of the Russian Armed Forces, explains the IStories interlocutor.

In fact, some of the new contractors reported by the authorities do not increase the number of the warring group. “We do not physically see this number of new people at the front, because some of them were already at war, they just have changed their status. Both conscripts, mobilized and fighters of volunteer formations who have signed a contract are enrolled there, so that the region can report to the authorities about the fulfillment of the plan,” CIT explained. — “They do not care if they do not add more people to the front — the main thing is that the statistics should be fulfilled. But what matters is not the number of new contracts, but the number of new people in the army.”

Conscription or contract

The unreliability of the Defense Ministry’s figures is also confirmed by regional reports on one-time payments to contractors and mobilized personnel, which IStories has researched. If the Defense Ministry’s figures were correct (302 thousand mobilized and 730 thousand contractors in 2023-2024), then on average in each region there should be 2.4 times more contract workers than mobilized. However, this is not the case: on average, there are only 1.4 times more contract signatories than those who left under summons. 10 out of 29 regions where accurate data are available (for more details, check out the “Explaining our calculations” section above) failed to recruit contractors at all — there were more people mobilized than those attracted by money.

Among such regions are the ones that “exceeded” the mobilization plan and drafted more men than the 1.1% promised by the authorities. For example, Buryatia mobilized about 4,900 people, which is 2.2% of men aged 18-50. The republic recruited nearly 500 fewer men for the contract than it called for under summonses, according to reports on payments. Considering that even before the war Buryatia had a lot of contract servicemen, and mobilized to the front 2 times more than promised, it could be difficult for the authorities to find new people willing to sign a contract, analysts of Conflict Intelligence Team suggest. The situation is similar in the Zabaykalsky Krai, where 2.3% of the reserve — more than 5,300 people — were mobilized. This is 1.4 times more than the number of those who have signed a contract since the beginning of 2023.

Other regions that failed to recruit contractors include Kirov, Kaluga, Sverdlovsk, Murmansk Oblasts, Khakassia, Kabardino-Balkaria and Stavropol Krai. In some of these regions, contractors are provided lower payments in comparison with other regions: for example, in Khakassia they are paid only 50 thousand rubles for contracting, in Kaluga region — 100 thousand rubles. Some of these regions significantly increased the one-time payment in 2024, probably hoping to remedy the situation in this way. For example, Kabardino-Balkaria, where there are 1.5 times more mobilized than “new” contractors, since June 17 started paying almost three times more for contract conclusion — 805 thousand rubles instead of the previous 300 thousand rubles.

IStories identified from which regions 219 thousand mobilized and 227 thousand contract workers went to the front. These data show that some regions took almost 5 times more men to the war in percentage terms than other subjects. If in Moscow those recruited for the war - that is, mobilized and contract servicemen who entered the service after February 24, 2022 — make up only 1.5% of the number of men 18-50 years old, then in the regions-”leaders” this share is close to 5%. At the same time, some Russians specifically go to sign a contract in the region where a higher one-time payment is offered, CIT analysts note.

Among the leaders are the regions that have established high payments for contracting: the Sakhalin Oblast (4.8% of men under 50 went to war) and the Primorsky Krai (4.7%) paid new contractors 300 thousand rubles each in 2023. Also, the total share of mobilized and new contractors is high in “poor” regions where the average per capita income is below the national average — for example, Buryatia (4.3%) and Karelia (4.6%).

Who joins the contract service

In the first year of the full-scale war with Ukraine, conscripts were the main source of contract recruitment. The authorities continue to try to replenish the numbers of contractors with the help of conscripts and mobilized soldiers, some of whom are forced to sign contracts by threats or deceit. However, no serious results are achieved, according to data on regional budget expenditures. For example, in the Smolensk Oblast, about 309 conscripts and 120 mobilized men have signed a contract in a year and a half. This is 11% and 4% of all new contract recruits, respectively. In the Orenburg Oblast, conscripts signed only 4% of contracts.

Now the main resource is prisoners and people with financial problems. “We have started looking among those who have so-called social debts: alimony, utility bills. Of those recruited from the outside, almost half of them have debts of more than 50 thousand rubles on enforcement proceedings,” CIT analysts say. IStories previously told how regional authorities were instructed to recruit debtors, bankrupts, migrants, the unemployed, persons under investigation and other vulnerable categories of the population.

“Lately, everyone who comes to contract comes because of money. The ideological ones are either already disillusioned or dead. Some insist on being taken even though they are unfit for service due to their health,” says an IStories source at one of the contractors’ recruitment centers. According to him, there are also many who, after some time, call from the war front and ask if they can return the money they received in exchange for returning home.

In the first quarter of 2024, 73.3 thousand people received payment for contracting, while during the same period banks received 33 thousand applications for credit vacations from those fighting in Ukraine. Assuming that there is one loan per military man and the application for deferment is submitted without delays, almost every second new contractor may have debts.

A scarce resource for three trillion rubles

Over the past two years, the government has spent at least 1.1 trillion rubles to support those fighting in Ukraine — at least 925.4 billion from the federal budget and 179 billion from regional budgets (including monthly social payments to mobilized soldiers, contractors and military medics, allowances and benefits for families of soldiers, one-time payments for signing a contract and subsidies to the Zaschitniki Otechestva (“Defenders of the Fatherland”) fund. And payments for deaths and injuries could amount to another 2.6 trillion for the entire duration of the war, the Re:Russia project has calculated, assuming that the authorities have transferred the promised compensation to everyone (however, this number may be overstated due to the fact that in reality the authorities are reluctant to pay money for injuries and try to complicate the process as much as possible, CIT experts say). Total — the “new elite” may have cost Russia more than 3.7 trillion rubles.

With the help of such investments, the authorities could recruit more than 720 thousand new soldiers for the war — 302 thousand mobilized and 426 thousand contractors, and this excludes prisoners and irregulars. This is three and a half times more than it was at the time of the invasion — at that time the grouping of Russian troops in Ukraine was estimated at 200 thousand people. Thus, Russia has significantly strengthened the army in terms of numbers and was able to turn the situation on the front in its favor:

“In the fall of 2022, the front started to fall apart because there were not enough people, and then Putin announced mobilization. The first mobilized were thrown in without training to cover the holes in the Kharkiv Oblast. Now they are mainly used to hold a stable front line, plus a lot of people are needed for all sorts of rear work,” CIT analysts say. — “And for offensive actions the authorities have discovered a terrific source in the form of volunteers, who sign contracts for money. Without them, it would be very difficult to carry out the resource-intensive assaults we have seen over the past year.”

But this is still not enough to cover the demand for manpower in the war. Russia still needs to replenish its losses, take the offense and strengthen the front line. That's why the authorities keep raising payments to attract as many debtors and others who want to earn money as possible. IStories calculates that the average regional payout for signing a contract has grown 1.5 times in a year, and including municipal surcharges — 2.4 times by June 2024.

“The base of people who were willing to go to war for less money is running out, while the recruitment plan remains. Regions are competing with each other for a scarce resource — volunteers, so they are constantly raising payments for contracting. The main thing is not to be the last one on the list, because the plan has come down from the ‘top,’ and it must be fulfilled,” the CIT experts conclude.

Featuring Irina Dolinina

Editor: Alesya Marokhovskaya