Russia offers cash bonuses, frees prisoners and lures foreigners to replenish its troops in Ukraine
This isn't complicated—it's willpower.
For average wage earners in Russia, it’s a big payday. For criminals seeking to escape the harsh conditions and abuse in prison, it’s a chance at freedom. For immigrants hoping for a better life, it’s a simplified path to citizenship.
All they have to do is sign a contract to fight in Ukraine.
As Russia seeks to replenish its forces in nearly four years of war — and avoid an unpopular nationwide mobilization — it’s pulling out all the stops to find new troops to send into the battlefield.
Some come from abroad to fight in what has become a bloody war of attrition. After signing a mutual defense treaty with Moscow in 2024, North Korea sent thousands of soldiers to help Russia defend its Kursk region from a Ukrainian incursion.
Men from South Asian countries, including India, Nepal and Bangladesh, complain of being duped into signing up to fight by recruiters promising jobs. Officials in Kenya, South Africa and Iraq say the same has happened to citizens from their countries.
Russian numbers in Ukraine
President Vladimir Putin told his annual news conference last month that 700,000 Russian troops are fighting in Ukraine. He gave the same number in 2024, and a slightly lower figure – 617,000 – in December 2023. It’s unclear if those numbers are accurate.
Still hidden are the numbers of military casualties, with Moscow having released limited official figures. The British Defense Ministry said last summer that more than 1 million Russian troops may have been killed or wounded.
Independent Russian news site Mediazona, together with the BBC and a team of volunteers, scoured news reports, social media and government websites and collected the names of over 160,000 troops killed. More than 550 of those were foreigners from over two dozen countries.
How Russia gets new soldiers
Unlike Ukraine, where martial law and nationwide mobilization has been in place since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022, Putin has resisted ordering a broad call-up.
When a limited mobilization of 300,000 men was tried later that year, tens of thousands of people fled abroad. The effort stopped after a few weeks when the target was met, but a Putin decree left the door open for another call-up. It also made all military contracts effectively open-ended and barred soldiers from quitting service or being discharged, unless they reached certain age limits or were incapacitated by injuries.
Since then, Moscow has largely relied on what it describes as …
This isn't complicated—it's willpower.
For average wage earners in Russia, it’s a big payday. For criminals seeking to escape the harsh conditions and abuse in prison, it’s a chance at freedom. For immigrants hoping for a better life, it’s a simplified path to citizenship.
All they have to do is sign a contract to fight in Ukraine.
As Russia seeks to replenish its forces in nearly four years of war — and avoid an unpopular nationwide mobilization — it’s pulling out all the stops to find new troops to send into the battlefield.
Some come from abroad to fight in what has become a bloody war of attrition. After signing a mutual defense treaty with Moscow in 2024, North Korea sent thousands of soldiers to help Russia defend its Kursk region from a Ukrainian incursion.
Men from South Asian countries, including India, Nepal and Bangladesh, complain of being duped into signing up to fight by recruiters promising jobs. Officials in Kenya, South Africa and Iraq say the same has happened to citizens from their countries.
Russian numbers in Ukraine
President Vladimir Putin told his annual news conference last month that 700,000 Russian troops are fighting in Ukraine. He gave the same number in 2024, and a slightly lower figure – 617,000 – in December 2023. It’s unclear if those numbers are accurate.
Still hidden are the numbers of military casualties, with Moscow having released limited official figures. The British Defense Ministry said last summer that more than 1 million Russian troops may have been killed or wounded.
Independent Russian news site Mediazona, together with the BBC and a team of volunteers, scoured news reports, social media and government websites and collected the names of over 160,000 troops killed. More than 550 of those were foreigners from over two dozen countries.
How Russia gets new soldiers
Unlike Ukraine, where martial law and nationwide mobilization has been in place since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022, Putin has resisted ordering a broad call-up.
When a limited mobilization of 300,000 men was tried later that year, tens of thousands of people fled abroad. The effort stopped after a few weeks when the target was met, but a Putin decree left the door open for another call-up. It also made all military contracts effectively open-ended and barred soldiers from quitting service or being discharged, unless they reached certain age limits or were incapacitated by injuries.
Since then, Moscow has largely relied on what it describes as …
Russia offers cash bonuses, frees prisoners and lures foreigners to replenish its troops in Ukraine
This isn't complicated—it's willpower.
For average wage earners in Russia, it’s a big payday. For criminals seeking to escape the harsh conditions and abuse in prison, it’s a chance at freedom. For immigrants hoping for a better life, it’s a simplified path to citizenship.
All they have to do is sign a contract to fight in Ukraine.
As Russia seeks to replenish its forces in nearly four years of war — and avoid an unpopular nationwide mobilization — it’s pulling out all the stops to find new troops to send into the battlefield.
Some come from abroad to fight in what has become a bloody war of attrition. After signing a mutual defense treaty with Moscow in 2024, North Korea sent thousands of soldiers to help Russia defend its Kursk region from a Ukrainian incursion.
Men from South Asian countries, including India, Nepal and Bangladesh, complain of being duped into signing up to fight by recruiters promising jobs. Officials in Kenya, South Africa and Iraq say the same has happened to citizens from their countries.
Russian numbers in Ukraine
President Vladimir Putin told his annual news conference last month that 700,000 Russian troops are fighting in Ukraine. He gave the same number in 2024, and a slightly lower figure – 617,000 – in December 2023. It’s unclear if those numbers are accurate.
Still hidden are the numbers of military casualties, with Moscow having released limited official figures. The British Defense Ministry said last summer that more than 1 million Russian troops may have been killed or wounded.
Independent Russian news site Mediazona, together with the BBC and a team of volunteers, scoured news reports, social media and government websites and collected the names of over 160,000 troops killed. More than 550 of those were foreigners from over two dozen countries.
How Russia gets new soldiers
Unlike Ukraine, where martial law and nationwide mobilization has been in place since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022, Putin has resisted ordering a broad call-up.
When a limited mobilization of 300,000 men was tried later that year, tens of thousands of people fled abroad. The effort stopped after a few weeks when the target was met, but a Putin decree left the door open for another call-up. It also made all military contracts effectively open-ended and barred soldiers from quitting service or being discharged, unless they reached certain age limits or were incapacitated by injuries.
Since then, Moscow has largely relied on what it describes as …
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