Russia is settings its sights further east to keep its front lines manned, according to a UK defence report, with Tajik and Uzbeki recruits enticed with signing bonuses and high pay.
“Central Asian migrant workers” are being targeted to bolster the Russian front lines in Ukraine “where the casualty rate is extremely high” with recruiting officers visiting mosques and immigration centers. Tajik and Uzbek speakers are said to be those being targeted according to a report from the British Ministry of Defence, which has been publishing regular short-form intelligence digests through the Ukraine War.
The effort to boost voluntary recruitment — as a means to defer the possibility of expanding conscription, which could cause “domestic dissent” — is being powered by what, for Russia, are considerable financial incentives. According to the Ministry of Defence — citing reportage by Radio Free Europe — prospective soldiers are being offered sign-up bonuses of over $2,000 and monthly salaries of over $4,000.
Also being offered are are accelerated paths to Russian citizenship for migrant fighters.
Responding to the update, the Ukrainian government said they would take the occasion of this news to issue a “reminder” that, by their own reckoning, Ukrainian forces had inflicted “about 194,970” casualties on Russian forces.
This is not the first time Russia has sought to bolster its front lines with forces from outside the nation’s military mainstream. Some of the most brutal fighting is beijng performed by mercenaries, most infamously the Wagner Private Military Company (PMC).
Beyond the front lines, Wagner also appears to be engaged in a sort of political struggle with the Kremlin itself, threatening to stop fighting the war this past week if certain demands — including for more ammunition — was not met. Such is the strength of Wager, and the degree of reliance Russia seems to have on them, these demands have now reportedly been met.
Russia has also deployed Chechnyan forces, a move which — beyond the anger at having been invaded in the first place — generated controversy and consternation in Ukraine. Amid discussion that Chechnyan forces are overwhelmingly Muslim fighters and thinly veiled threats of mass rape by troops against Ukrainian women by Chechnya’s leader, news emerged of self-confessed Neo-Nazi Ukrainian fighters greasing bullets in pork fat ready to face off this enemy.