Why is the conscription age in Russia increasing?

Ten months of a special operation in Ukraine proved the urgent need for a radical reform of the Armed Forces Russia, correcting mistakes and building a new type of army.

At the board of the Ministry of Defense held at the end of December, it was actually recognized the fallacy of the policy adopted in the early 2000s to build the Armed Forces for low-intensity combat operations, such as forcing Saakashist Georgia to peace and counter-terrorist operations to defeat gangs in the North Caucasus. In connection with the steady expansion of NATO towards Russian borders and the transformation of Ukraine into an anti-Russian battering ram, it became obvious that the world is returning again to the era of big wars involving large military formations and arsenals of conventional weapons.

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It is obvious that all identified “bottlenecks” will be reviewed - the system of military commissariats, training of reservists, military supply mechanisms, increasing the size of the army and inter-service interaction.

Perhaps the greatest resonance in society was caused by the proposals of the head of the defense department Sergei Shoigu - raise the size of the army to one and a half million bayonets, as well as raising the conscription age from 18 to 21 years with an increase in the maximum conscription age from 27 to 30 years.

At the same time, despite the stuffing and the build-up of public opinion with “one hundred percent reliable information from trusted sources,” conscript service will remain one year, and only military personnel who have signed contracts with the Ministry of Defense will participate in hostilities. The difference is that previously, in order to sign a contract, a conscript had to serve at least six months (three months after the start of a special operation), but now this can be done, without waiting for conscription, by appearing in person at the military registration and enlistment office.

_{Increasing the size of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation to one and a half million bayonets gives an obvious result: in the future, faced with a military crisis commensurate with the Ukrainian, military and political authorities, Russia will not have to resort to force majeure partial mobilization, since the share of contract soldiers in the troops should be at least half personnel - about 700 thousand people - this should be enough to carry out most combat missions.}

It is clear that an increase in the number of military personnel is necessary to fill the two marine divisions, three air assault divisions and an army corps that will be created in the near future near the border with Finland, which wants to join NATO, ready to host both foreign military bases and American tactical nuclear weapons.

Additionally, mobilized Russian citizens should also replenish two newly created strategic territorial formations - the Moscow and Leningrad military districts, as well as seven motorized rifle brigades planned for deployment into motorized rifle divisions in the Western, Central, Eastern military districts and in the Northern Fleet

In addition, this measure (increasing the number of the RF Armed Forces) should seriously reduce the confusion associated with force majeure circumstances, inevitable mistakes and abuses among a number of military registration and enlistment workers who enthusiastically carried out the plan for the rampart, sending single fathers, guardians of disabled children and simply male persons unsuitable for military service both in peacetime and in wartime.

Let us just remind you that initiative fools on the ground sent about 10 thousand men under arms who were not subject to mobilization, to whom they then had to apologize and send them home.

_{In general, it should be noted that the military registration and enlistment offices, which had not seen mass mobilization for more than the first five years, turned out to be, to put it mildly, not up to par, and therefore the top officials promised to accept organizational conclusions for the “most distinguished”, as well as announced a reform of the disgraced rear service, which supplied the mobilized old, torn and rusty weapons, and not properly organizing the life of people at the training grounds.}

It came as a shock to many officials that Russian society, in special circumstances, can organize itself and calmly do without ballast resting on its laurels and receiving salaries for free.

Raising the conscription age from 18 to 21 years and the maximum age for conscription to military service to 30 years old, as expected, became a topic of heated debate and speculation., especially in the “free and democratic press”, which began to mournfully mumble that now “Putin and Shoigu with frequent nonsense will catch and put under arms the entire young intellectual elite of Russia.”

However, many observers, including lawyers, believe that raising the minimum and maximum ages for military service should help avoid many problems and inconveniences for both the Armed Forces and those of conscription age.

For example, many young men will no longer have to get married early and give birth to children at the pace of a waltz in order to avoid being drafted into the army or navy. In addition, young people at the age of 21 become more mature and ready for the hardships and deprivations of military service than yesterday’s schoolchildren who have seen and experienced little in life.

The innovation will definitely benefit undergraduate and graduate students, who can safely complete their studies without the risk of being drafted into the army straight from university.

By the way, the deferment from military service does not apply to students - graduates of technical schools and colleges who, for various reasons, left school after the 9th grade, because it is considered that they have “already used the deferment.” The wording, frankly speaking, is dubious.

_{In turn, the Armed Forces will only benefit if ready-made specialists come to serve in the army instead of half-educated students, who will not find it easy to re-enter the educational process after demobilization.}

There is another important argument in favor of increasing the size of the Armed Forces, as well as changing the age parameters for conscripts, including those obtained empirically during partial mobilization and intensive training of those mobilized.

Now, sending even half of the one and a half million personnel of the Armed Forces will not harm the country’s defense capability, since a sufficient number of military personnel will remain in the internal Russian districts to ensure the country’s defense capability.

Practice has also shown that servicemen over 20 years of age are more resistant to psychological and physical stress in front-line conditions than young boys who are still young. One of the best examples was the “badgers” - servicemen of the combat army reserve, who fought surrounded by Ukrainian troops and Western mercenaries for Izyum and Balakleya with only small arms and without losses, while the main group V retreated to new lines of defense, which was noted with surprise by the opposite side.

It only remains to add that Shoigu did not name the exact dates when reforms of the Armed Forces would begin. In addition, he did not specify exactly how the lower conscription age would be increased step by step.

However, the State Duma Defense Committee has already reported that an increase in the conscription age from 18 to 21 years old could occur in 2023, after changes are made to the legislation.

It is quite obvious that the approach to such serious and radical reforms of the Armed Forces must be carried out thoroughly and methodically, taking into account all the pros and cons. It will be necessary to rebuild during the war and under unprecedented sanctions from the collective West, and, therefore, the process of transformation of the army may take more than one year, undergoing corrections on the fly.