Russia-Ukraine War: In the shadow of the continued fighting in Ukraine and the failures of the Russian army on the battlefield, the Kremlin continues its attempts to recruit more soldiers to the battlefield in Ukraine. In the new “campaign”, the Kremlin decided on a financial incentive, and announced that it would pay each Russian soldier 500 rubles for every kilometer he succeeds in conquering from the land of Ukraine.
In an advertisement distributed in the Yaroslavl district, about 300 km from Moscow, the soldiers were also promised an additional bonus of 3,100 rubles. The advertisement offered recruits the incentive in cash, and was also distributed on government websites and on the social networks of high schools throughout the country. This, after the president, Vladimir Putinis trying to recover from a particularly unsuccessful recruitment round, when in the last one, thousands fled the country.
Fresh recruits to the Russian army (Photo: Reuters)
The ad circulated in Russia also offered recruits a monthly salary of 2,000 rubles, and a bonus of 80 rubles for each “engagement in offensive and active action on the battlefield.” In the meantime, the recruiting office on behalf of the Russian army began to work regularly with the universities and social services, to entice students and unemployed people to enlist in the army, when impromptu recruiting offices began to appear in many cities and towns throughout the country.
As mentioned, this is not the first time that the Kremlin has launched a recruitment campaign, in order to try and convince more citizens to enlist in the army. Last December, the Russian government made a surprising announcement for its soldiers on the battlefield, when it offered to pay for the freezing of the sperm of the Russian soldiers, in case they die during the fighting in Ukraine. The “incentive” payment for the Kremlin’s sperm freeze is designed to encourage more Russian men to join the invasion of Ukraine, without fear of not being able to have children of their own in the future. The Kremlin also said that it will pay the soldiers’ wives for the fertilization process, if the soldiers do die in the war, according to a report in the “Telegraph”.
Head of the Bar Association of Russia, Igor Tronov, confirmed that the government gave its support to the proposal “to create a free bank of genetic material” for the soldiers. Tronov claimed that many families contacted him with a request to freeze the sperm of their son who was forced to enlist and participate in the battlefield in Ukraine. Also, the Russian Ministry of Health said that in the next two years it will allocate funds to cover the costs, as well as the storage of “biological material of the citizens recruited for the war”.