Many Russians Want to Evade the Draft and Both State and Society have Made That Easier, Former Draft Official Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, October 30 – Polls show that more young Russians are ready to serve in the military, at least in part because of difficulties in finding work in the civilian economy; but many young men still seek to evade service and they are being aided in that by both the laws and policies of the government and the attitudes of society, Sergey Kozlov says.

            In an article in Novoye voennoye obozreniye, the former draft administrator and now military historian says that the number seeking to evade service illegally is disturbing because it points to a larger problem in Russian society of loyalty to the state and to actions by the state that encourage rather than discourage this trend (nvo.ng.ru/realty/2020-10-29/3_1115_army.html).

            This year, he writes, approximately 640,000 young men will reach the draft age of 18. That means that about 320,000 are potentially available for service in each of the two cycles, less about 10 percent who have genuine medical problems. But fewer than half of that number will actually be taken into the ranks. Last spring, only 135,000 were.

            That means that many who could be drafted won’t be and that pattern only encourages those who are at risk of being called to the colors but don’t want to be to seek ways and means of avoiding service. Instead of tightening the system up to block them, both the government and society have made it easier for young men to avoid service with fewer real penalties.

            Kozlov argues that the chief cause of this is “the lack of a state ideology” promoted by patriotic education in the schools. “Having liquidated ‘Primary Military Preparation” in the middle schools, our educational system has ceased to prepared draftees ready for service for the defense of the Fatherland.”

            And “having destroyed ideology,” he continues, “we have allowed our enemies to raise from among our children a generation of rootless cosmopolitans who do not know the history of tehri country and do not have the spiritual values and ideals for which they would be prepared to sacrifice their lives.”

            But Kozlov makes clear that this absence of ideology affects not only the potential draftees who don’t want to serve but the state and the broader society, with the former not doing enough to enforce draft laws and the latter looking the other way in the cases of those who evade service.

            Earlier this year, Putin increased fines for those who don’t show up at military commissariats when called from 500 to 3,000 rubles (seven to 40 US dollars). Does anyone think that discourages those who have decided to try to avoid service, Kozlov asks. That is obviously a purely “rhetorical question.”  

            He points out that the Russian law on military service “does not have a real mechanism” of ensuring its execution. It assumes young men will simply show up and accept being drafted. That means that each commissariat has to come up with a plan on how to look for those who don’t. Some are effective; but many simply allow people to avoid service.

            Russian lawmakers have constantly reduced the penalties on those who do illegally avoid service. Restrictions on government employment have dropped from a lifetime ban to ten years to five or, in reality, even less, Kozlov says. And the number of firms offering to help young men get medical certificates to avoid service has exploded, leading to competition among them.

            Military commissariats do have the right to challenge these certificates, but they don’t always. Sending young men to military hospitals is something not all of them choose to do, especially as they can meet their quotas without doing so. As a result, this kind of fraud often works.

            As for others who don’t show up or ignore notifications, Kozlov continues, the commissariats first have to catch those involved before they can enforce any laws that do exist to punish them. That is something these boards often lack the staff or stomach for, given that the young men are often a step ahead of them and many in society are on their side.

            Many Russians today may admire the military but that doesn’t mean they want their own sons or the sons of their friends to serve there. After all, some of them think, there are plenty of others who can bear that particular burden.