Paul Goble
Staunton, Aug. 25 – Under pressure from the Kremlin to provide more support for Putin’s aggressive foreign policy, ever more Russian universities are pressuring students to sign up for military service in Ukraine now and creating drone studies departments whose graduates will presumably help not only in that conflict but in future ones as well.
More than 80 percent of Russia’s highest-ranked universities now push students to sign up for military service although in many cases this effort is ostensibly for non-combat positions (novayagazeta.eu/articles/2026/08/25/47-iz-50-luchshikh-rossiiskikh-vuzov-agitiruiut-studentov-zakliuchit-kontrakt-s-minoborony-vyiasnila-novaia-evropa-news).
That is an extension of efforts the Putin regime has put in place since 2022 to ensure that it will be able to fill the ever-depleting ranks of Russian forces in Ukraine and thus is no surprise. But the decision to create drone studies programs at 32 of the 50 top higher educational institutions is something new and disturbing.
While using drones against Ukraine and defending Russians against Ukrainian drone attacks is a politically useful tactic, most of those who might enroll in drone studies programs almost certainly won’t be ready to work in this military sector in Putin’s current aggressive campaign in Ukraine.
Thus, the decision to create such programs highlights something far more disturbing: the intention of the Kremlin to continue its aggressive foreign policy beyond Ukraine and to use drones to do it, a technique that it had not prepared for earlier but now recognizes is going to be a feature of most future conflicts.
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