cross-posted from: https://lemm.ee/post/60029299
Russian President Vladimir Putin has ordered the conscription of 160,000 into military service.
The decree, which was reported by news agency Interfax and also published on the government website for legal announcements, says conscription applies to all citizens aged between 18 and 30 and covers the period from April to July.
Why do news media have to repeat this kind of weirdness:
Russian forces have slowly made territorial gains in Ukraine over the past but that has come at a cost.
What kind of “territorial gains” is it that during all of year 2024 the Russia managed to gain 0.7 percent of Ukraine’s total area. Less than one percent! That is in no manner significant. Taking over 0.7 of a country’s land means the frontline having frozen in place, not the country gaining territory.
And of course, if we take the events in Kursk province into account, the percentage gets even lower…
Also, this article says “will conscript”, while in reality it is “wants to conscript”. Putin can want whatever. Being able to get what it wants is a whole different question.
It’s so dumb, it’s basically invisible on the chart, that’s how small the territorial changes are over what, 15 months? What a joke. It only cost them a whole generation of men.
Two questions.
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Who is reporting the 0.7% figure you’re reporting, and how is it able to be confirmed as true?
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If putin wants to conscript 160k soldiers, what’s stopping him?
Nobody is reporting the 0.7 %. What they’re reporting is that the Russia gained about 4200 km² of Ukraine’s territory in 2024. That is reported by several sources, such as this one: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/1/8/russia-gained-4000sq-km-of-ukraine-in-2024-how-many-soldiers-did-it-lose
Ukraine’s total territory is 603 628 km², and 4200 km² of that translates to 0.7 %.
Some sources talk about just over 2000 km², which would be around 0.3 %, but the rough measurement I made on the map was around 4000 km², so I don’t trust the lower number.
You can search for “how much Ukrainian territory did Russians gain in 2024”, and 4200 and 2000 are numbers you will find.
This 4200 km² does not include the areas inside the Russian Federation around the city of Sudzha. There Russia lost a land area that equals about 0.2 % of Ukraine’s total land area, and if you count that in, then that brings the Russian gains down to 0.5% instead of 0.7 %.
I’m not really sure what’s stopping Putin, but at least all the previous times he’s declared how many new soldiers the Russia will recruit, they’ve fallen very short of that number.
What is known is that the Russia’s recruitment capacity is 25 000 to 35 000 new soldiers per month. It is not able to reform during wartime, because that reform would cause a mess for a few years, lowering the capacity for first.
He’s saying he’ll recruit those soldiers within 4 months. That translates to 40 000 per month, which vows over even the pessimistic estimates for its recruitment capacity. And that would mean that they only recruit conscripts and nobody else during those four months. Of they recruit others than conscripts, they have that much less capacity for the conscription.
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They’re probably also counting the Russian land that the Russians reclaimed from the Ukrainians. You know, the land that Ukrainians invaded.
But there really wasn’t much of that, either.
The 0.7 % considers only Ukrainian territory, and completely ignores everything that happened inside the Russia
In the end of 2024, Ukraine controlled an area in the Kursk province that equaled about 0.2 % of Ukraine’s total territory. If that area was taken into account, the Russia’s net territory gain would be about 0.5 % of Ukraine’s total territory. At the peak of the Kursk province operation , Ukraine controlled about twice as big an area of the Kursk province as in the end, so an area equalling about 0.4 % of Ukraine’s total territory and 4/7 of the area the Russia managed to temporarily gain from Ukraine.
(Edit: and, my understanding is that the 4200 km² does not contain the territories Russia reclaimed, but now I’m getting a bit unsure, as I don’t remember the exact phrasing of the text telling how much area the Russia gained)
This story comes out every year, when russia announces their normal conscription process. These enlistees a) go to basic training - which for Russians is totally insufficient to make a difference on the ukrainian battlefield, b) can’t and haven’t been used for offensive operations, c) Mostly cycle back to civilian life when they’re done. This isn’t special, it isn’t news, and if he were stupid enough to rush these guys from their jobs as delivery drivers, baristas, IT support and tire shop technicians into the battlefields, the entirety of them would be chewed up in about 3 months. This isn’t a story. This is their normal conscription process.
Please let it finally be the straw that breaks the camel’s back.
Otherwise, expect huge Russian casualties. They love to throw their fresh conscripts at their enemy’s weapons
It would be hilarious to see Russians, throwing other Russians at Ukrainian drones, flying hundreds of feet overhead.
I’m imaging a ringling bros circus act, where 4 people are standing on each others shoulders, and the 5th person runs up, he jumps as high as he can, and then they grab him midair, and throw him 30 up, and the next person throws him up, and so on and so on until he’s like 60 feet in the air.
Dear Putin, Ukraine isn’t worth the effort. Just go back home.
So is this just normal consription or not?
My understanding is it’s “normal” conscription, but 10k more than last year.
I believe Russian officers have been “pressuring” conscipts to sign full military enlistments before their conscription year is up and that’s part of how they have been keeping up with their losses, without sending “conscripts” to war.
Kind of like when a shitty joker begs the king for food because he’s hungry but the other way around.
Don’t forget that ruzzia wants just peace, it’s those damn Ukrainians, who are attacking the ruzzia’s territory. If Ukraine stops resisting, there will be peace in our lifetime. /s obviously.
Hmm, I haven’t kept up with casualty rates, but this will buy him another 8-9 months if I had to guess?
Similar conscription amounts have been inside the current numbers as well.
These 160 000 are not an addition to the troops. They are just an explanation of where the steady recruitment of new soldiers comes from this year. This means that they are no longer able to find enough suitable prisoners to send to the front and must slightly increase the yearly amount of conscripts to keep things in balance.
