Paul Goble
Staunton, Mar. 9 – Until Putin launched his expanded war in Ukraine in 2022, the number of Russians performing alternative work to service in the military had been approximately 1,000 a year. It rose in 2023 and then jumped by more than a third to 3212 last year, the Vyorstka news portal says.
Under Russian law, it continues, alternative service consists of work in the interests of society and the state which an individual performs instead of military service” either because his convictions don’t allow him to bear arms or because he is a member of certain numerically small peoples (verstka.media/chislo-prohodyashhih-alternativnuyu-sluzhbu-rossiyan-dostiglo-rekorda).
The large increase in the number of men performing such alternative service over the last year appears to reflect both a desire to avoid being caught up in what has become a war without prospects of any end and also the draft authorities going after people whom it might earlier have ignored.
A third explanation for this rise, the Vyorstka article suggests, is that the fact that the draft now takes place not twice a year but all the time gives both men called to serve in the military and the draft agencies more time to consider applications for alternative service.
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