Conscription in Russia
[2] Before Peter I, Russia formed the bulk of the military from the nobility and people who owned land on condition of service.
In 1736 it was reduced to 25 years, with one male member of each family excluded from the obligation to serve in order to manage shared property.
On 1 January 1874 , a statute concerning conscription was approved by the Tsar by which military service was generally made compulsory for males at the age of 21.
This measure created a large pool of military reservists ready to be mobilized in the event of war while permitting the maintenance of a smaller active army during peacetime.
The large population of Russia permitted exemptions from military service on a greater scale than in other European armies of the period.
Muslims and members of certain other racial or religious minorities were generally exempted from conscription, as were about half of the Russian Orthodox population.
The first all-union conscription law of 1925 was tailored for the mixed cadre-militia structure of the peacetime Red Army after the Civil War.
During the Great Patriotic War, all non-disabled men of ages 18–51 were subject to draft except specialists declared vitally necessary in the domestic military/defense industry.
[10] The two-year conscription term in force in the USSR after 1967 continued in Russia following the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union until 2006, when the Government of Russia and State Duma gradually reduced the term of service to 18 months for those conscripted in 2007 and to one year from 2008, while dropping some legal excuses for non-conscription from the law (such as non-conscription of rural doctors and teachers, of men who have a child younger than 3 years, etc.)
Failure to obey such a summons could mean potential "bans on driving, registering a company, working as a self-employed individual, obtaining credit or loans, selling apartments, buying property or securing social benefits.
The new legislation, which came into effect on 1 January 2024, required men to carry out at least a year of military service, or equivalent training during higher education, between the ages of 18–30, rather than 18–27.
[17] In August 2023, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a law raising fines relating to conscription avoidance, after being approved by the State Duma and the Federation Council.
[1] Began in October 2023 the process of the creation of the Unified Military Register (Russian: Единый реестр воинского учета, romanized: Yediny reyestr voinskogo ucheta) also known as Unified Register of Military Personnel (Russian: Единый реестр военнообязанных, romanized: Yediny reyestr voyennoobyazannykh).
[18] The register includes among others personal data (full name, passport, address), health status, reasons for delay, sending and receiving subpoenas, appearance/failure to appear at the military registration and enlistment office, restrictions imposed for failure to appear, complaints and appeals in connection with accounting, administrative and criminal liability for military registration.
[20] The register of the call-ups will be synchronized with the register of persons liable for military service, but it will contain data directly about these official documents:[19] In August 2024, Ukrainian forces crossed the border into Kursk Oblast during the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine resulting in part of the oblast becoming under Ukrainian occupation.
[27] In November 2024, reports and videos of police raids on some of Moscow's largest and most popular nightclubs surfaced, many male patrons were detained and transported to local conscription offices.
These reports came amid indications that Russia was struggling to meet manpower demands due to heavy losses, leading to intensified conscription efforts.
