Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree on the start of the spring conscription campaign, during which 147,000 citizens will be conscripted into military service, the official Russian news agency TASS reported on Thursday, citing Reuters.

In September of last year, Vladimir Putin signed an order to draft 120,000 Russians in the autumn campaign. At the time, the TASS news agency quoted Moscow’s Defense Ministry as saying that the recruitment was in no way connected to a “special military operation” — Russia’s official name for the war in Ukraine.

All men in Russia must complete one year of military service between the ages of 18 and 27 or equivalent training during higher education.

On average, in recent years, about 130,000 people were drafted into each spring-autumn campaign, TASS reports.

Russia wants to get 400,000 soldiers

In its latest assessment of the war in Ukraine, Britain’s Ministry of Defense said that Russia is preparing a new recruitment campaign in which it wants to attract 400,000 soldiers “voluntarily” to join the army, but that the authorities are likely to resort to coercion. to fulfill their conscription quotas set by Moscow.

Thus, the number of soldiers that the Kremlin wants to receive even exceeds 300,000 as part of the “partial mobilization” announced by Vladimir Putin last September. At the end of October, Defense Minister Serhii Shoigu stated that this quota had been reached and that “no further similar measures are planned.”

Many were sent to fight in Ukraine, where Russian forces suffered huge losses, sometimes over 1,000 soldiers per day (according to Ukrainian estimates), especially during the unsuccessful winter offensive.

British military experts said in an assessment on Thursday morning that the Kremlin wanted to avoid upsetting domestic waters with a campaign to recruit “volunteers”.

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