Russia Cuts Soldier Sign-Up Bonuses by 75% in Four Regions Amid Recruitment Crisis

9 comments

1. 37k recruitment compared to 95k a year bedore. They are running out of meat.

   Edit: for clarity these are recruitmwnt numbers not signing bonuses.

2. Life is cheap in Casablanca.

3. They are going to start relying on foreign soldiers and it isn’t going to work. Russia slowly but surely strangling. Need to eliminate Putin for the end game to commence. This is the first time I’ve ever seen the war for Ukrainian sovereignty crossing into Ukraine is winning even in the counter attack around Izium.

4. cutting sign up bonus during a recruitment crisis is a serious big brain move. reverse psychology stuff

5. We will fight for you, Vlad! 😅😅😅

6. Death by a thousand cuts for the paper tiger

7. > According to Important Stories, only 37,900 new contracts were signed between April and June 2025—the lowest quarterly figure in two years. By comparison, 92,800 contracts were signed during the same period in 2024.

   Important stories [also hint](https://istories.media/en/news/2025/08/18/contractors-decline-q2-2025/) that there might be no drop:

   > The exact reasons for the decline are unclear. In particular, the assessment of Janis Kluge, a research fellow at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs, [does not show](https://janiskluge.substack.com/p/russian-recruitment-the-first-half) a drop. According to his calculations, 191,000 people may have signed contracts in the first six months of 2025 — one and a half times more than indicated by federal data. This estimate is based on information about contract signing payments from regional budgets and allows for real-time assessment of recruitment rates. Data is available for 37 regions and extrapolated to all of Russia.

   As for why contract payments are lowered RFERL has a more detailed and less manipulative article – https://www.idelreal.org/a/bez-obyasneniy-i-zayavleniy-v-tatarstane-tayno-sokratili-edinovremennuyu-vyplatu-za-zaklyuchenie-kontrakta/33552621.html

   Analysts suggest the change reflects a broader trend toward centralizing and standardizing contract payments under federal control, so regions no longer compete over who offers higher bonuses

8. Keep in mind, it would be like if the USA was paying janitors/cashiers/taxi-drivers $150K to enlist in a foreign war. Nobody would bother doing low wage jobs. Problem is, when all your low wage workers are dead or on the frontlines, what happens? Labour costs spike rapidly.

9. The have issues finding new cargo 200 yet they cut bonuses?

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