By Anna Rizhkova with assistance from Ivan Zhadayev Originally published in Vyorstka
Recruiting for Russia’s War on Ukraine has morphed into a complex system that involves a wide variety of Russians. The journal Vyorstka uncovered how women on maternity leave, “local authorities,” military careerists, and former HR professionals earn money persuading men to sign contracts with the Ministry of Defense and then ship off to the front lines. Some names of people and places have been changed out of safety concerns.
Fall 2024. Two men are standing at a grocery store checkout in Lipetsk waiting to pay for their water and cigarettes. Konstantin, a sturdy-looking grey-haired man and high-ranking regional official, is paying.
“What a rip-off,” says the second man, Artur, as he eyes the 80-ruble bottle of water. He is shabbily dressed and reeks of alcohol.
Together, they get into a black SUV and drive to the industrial part of town, distinctive for its five-story Brezhnev-era apartment blocks.
“You have a chance to change your life,” Konstantin said as he drove. “What do you have now? You’re alone, unemployed, a beggar.”
Artur didn’t argue. For the past few months he’d been drinking and cadging money off friends, including Konstantin, who he’d only just met this morning, but who’d spotted him a “fiver” (5,000 rubles, or about $62).
The men entered a brick building where they were welcomed “like honored guests” and went to the head of the line. None of the other visitors to the Lipetsk Voenkomat (Military Registration Office) that day were interested in signing up for military service, but Konstantin and Artur were there specifically for that purpose.
“I was afraid they wouldn’t take us: this guy was totally unfit, from the dregs of society. But the woman there said ‘How wonderful,’ and said to bring him on in,” Konstantin recalled. “My guy said, ‘Well, I haven’t decided yet.’ And she replied, ‘What do you mean you haven’t decided? Who is going to protect us?’ She was such a smooth talker, anyone would have signed up.”
While they were telling the out-of-work fellow about payments and “sacred duty,” the local official stepped into the deputy military commissar’s office.
“I’ll need a signed proof of delivery,” he requested of the commissar and received said paperwork. For “delivery” of his candidate, Konstantin was due a reward of R50,000 ($620), if, that is, the candidate passes the medical screening and actually goes off to fight.
The official left to take care of his own affairs, hoping that his candidate wouldn’t “slip away.” As he drives off, he opens his car windows to air it out.
After three years of war, recruiting Russians for the front has transformed into a market trading in human lives, where behind any single contract can be both a customer and a facilitator. Thousands of men head off to fight without knowing that, by doing so, they are helping regional and municipal departments and enterprises satisfy their Key Performance Indicators.
Scrolling through Telegram posts or discussing salary increases for the “Special Military Operation” with his neighbors, a man might not realize that “recruiters” (verbovshchiki) are competing for him as if he were a client. These people could be former HR managers who started working with the Voenkomat through middlemen. It could be mothers on maternity leave who have taught themselves to design enticing advertisements and post them on social media. Or it could simply be people with plenty of acquaintances and a talent for persuasion.
The most persistent among them, after they succeed in getting their candidate to the front, will receive a “commission” of 5,000-350,000 rubles, depending on what kind of “customer” (regional or municipal government office, private business) they are dealing with.
This is exactly how Artur ended up in the Lipetsk official’s car, being driven directly to the Voenkomat. Just the day before, local departments had “released a plan” for recruitment quotas, and Konstantin, who was given his own KPI (four recruits per month), turned to a recruiter for help. A “local [criminal] authority” provided him with recruiting services.
“He found me a suitable guy, Artur, and I decided to walk through the whole process with him, so that I could apply what I learned more broadly,” Konstantin said. “There was no deceit here. The guy could die from booze or dope. And I explained to him, ‘Look, you’re going to get money. You’ll return as a respected person, if you return.’ No one promised him that there were no risks and that everything would be fine.”
His candidate didn’t show for his medical screening. He “slipped away.” Later, according to an official, Artur chatted with another recruiter, yet he also didn’t get him to the front. It turns out that Artur was on the rolls at a mental health clinic and thus could not serve.
“I was told he could be removed from the rolls,” the official said. “But I didn’t sense any motivation on his part. That being the case, is it worth the trouble? I was disconcerted from the outset by the fact that he asked both me and the staff person at the Voenkomat the same question: “Can I sign the contract later, but get maybe 5,000 rubles today?”
Staffers at the Voenkomat said that they see recruiters daily and can instantly recognize them.
Yaroslav, an employee in the Moscow Mayor’s office who works at the Unified Recruitment Center, forwards a photo of a young woman in a burgundy suit with a matching leather bag, talking on the phone in front of a sign that read “X-ray Screening.”
“Generally speaking, they are mostly women, real operators,” Yaroslav said. “They stand there, scanning the area for someone, and bring them in, arm-in-arm. And they look sort of inappropriately flashy, like prostitutes. You can tell right away and for certain that they don’t work here. If they are wearing sneakers and pants and have a pot belly and a cookie, then they’re ours. But if they are wearing tight miniskirts and bright lipstick, then who the f— knows who they are? To us they’re like spiders whose goal is to catch someone. And they weave their webs in all sorts of places: some ensnare people in another city, some buy people tickets to come here, some entrap people at work.”
“These guys are hustlers, out for a quick buck, fixers,” said Dmitry, a military man who trains recruits in the Far East. “They interact with everyone, with middle-class folks, with people on the margins, with druggies, with guys they did time with. They have a buddy in every auto repair shop.”
Dmitry said he knows several recruiters by sight and is familiar with their backgrounds. For example, one member of the local government is a frequent visitor to the Voenkomat, helping his superiors and other local government offices meet their quotas. Another is an ex-Wagner mercenary, returned from the front. He now does recruiting on the side, to earn a bit of extra income.
The customer is always willing to pay for a candidate that is guaranteed to count towards his personal quota.
“Let’s say,” Yaroslav explained, “that a man was thinking of signing a contract in the usual way, but a curator finds out about him and decides to channel him through the police. He has a credit card and so they cook up the idea that the fellow is supposedly in debt and being pursued by federal bailiffs. That allows the police to add to their tally, and the guy goes to the front as a debtor.”
“They take you around to all the commissions,” Dmitry explained,“to make sure you go toward the quota of some specific organization. It could be the city electric company or the water utility, even a kindergarten.”
The recruits themselves, he notes, who are often men with loans or debts, don’t bother to ask what the recruiters get out of all this. They think they’re being given guidance and help out of the kindness of their recruiters’ hearts.
“While they’re waiting in line,” Dmitry explained, “the recruiters bring them coffee with a roll. And these are guys who’ve never heard a kind word spoken to them. It’s awful. It’s really horrifying to watch. One case was totally outrageous. A recruiter brought a guy with hepatitis to the Voenkomat five times. I look at his passport and said, ‘You’re not eligible!’ And the recruiter said to me, ‘It’s his first time here!’ They think we don’t remember people and brazenly tried to pawn him off on us. I wouldn’t be surprised if he gets sent off through some other region.”
Recruiters tell prospective recruits to sign up in different regions, where the payments and benefits may be more attractive. Telegram channels are awash with ads from across Russia showing different payments and benefits, displaying ads with curator phone numbers.
They try to create the impression that even in war, it’s possible to reduce your risk by enlisting the support of reliable people. For example, Olga promises recruits they will be sent to drone operator courses in Yaroslavl. Andrei promises jobs as drivers in the rear. Georgy guarantees vacations every six months.
All are ready to pay for airline or train tickets, to organize accommodation and three square meals a day during the medical screening process. And there are those who will never see their recruits in person.
This is how another category of recruiters works – remotely recruiting for the war online.
“I have no idea what happens to them afterwards,” said a recruiter named Victoria. “My job is to get them to show up and sign a contract. We don’t communicate afterwards. We’re not in touch.”
Victoria’s avatar is blonde with long, false eyelashes and a plunging neckline. On Telegram she advertises military service as “a worthy choice for a patriot” and illustrates her posts with an image of a soldier in a helmet and telnyashka – the distinctive striped undershirt worn throughout the Russian military.
Victoria promises recruits that, with her help, they can get to the front without the rigors of obtaining a military ID, even if they are registered as a drug user, have hepatitis, HIV, or a criminal record.
The candidates’ older children, she says, will attend university at state expense; their younger children will enjoy free summer camp. If the family is in debt, the first 10 million rubles will be forgiven, and they will be given ten sotki (one sotka equals one hundred square meters of land). Any court cases will be suspended.
These are just a few of the promised benefits.
Dozens of men phone and write to Victoria. And they have no idea what city she lives in or what this person with the fake photo of a young blonde actually looks like.
“Are they taking women?” we write, responding to the ad.
“No.”
“If a male friend of mine decides to sign a contract, can I give him your number?”
“I would be very grateful. And I’ll send you R10,000 for each candidate,” Victoria suddenly promises, reassuring us that no one is being sent to “the red zone” anymore, because the “war is coming to an end.”
We asked Victoria about her work. She listed the pluses: she earns at least R300,000 ($3,725) per month, has a flexible schedule, can do other jobs. She started recruiting recently, thanks to a friend. In January 2025, an acquaintance invited her to join an agency that has agreements with “various Voenkomats,” and hires “managers.”
Prior to this, Victoria had worked in personnel recruitment for several years. Now, recruiting for the war, she’s basically still working in the same profession. For her, the job “doesn’t present any difficulties.”
Victoria and her colleagues – other agency managers – publish advertisements for contract service on Telegram and VKontakte, then reply to queries. They are daily competing for the attention of recruits with dozens of other agencies.
Victory is near, hurry up to receive all the benefits and payments. - Ivan We offer individual support and security! - Arina I take calls from 9am to midnight. Write me anytime, day or night. - Oleg
Over a period of nine months, recruiters placed some 7,945 ads on one of the largest Telegram Groups devoted to that topic (@Voennaya_Rabota_Vakansii).
“You understand,” said recruiter Yelizaveta, “men arrive at the Voenkomat, and they are told then and there, ‘Well, Pupkin, forget it – you’ve been sold for such and such a sum, and now you are ours.’ In other words, the candidates are immediately told that we are supposedly receiving money for them being there.”
“But you do get paid, right?”
“Well, of course, it’s like any other recruitment, whether for an IT specialist or a shift worker after they have worked five shifts. It’s the same here.”
Recruiter Victoria said that she’s become accustomed to the “difficult sorts,” and the “absolutely bonkers” men. Nevertheless, she’s happy with everything and only regrets not having had this opportunity sooner.
“Had I known about this earlier, I would have started earning ten times my regular salary a long time ago.” She conveyed this via voice message while on the road and suggested discussing the details later. She was on her way to a two-week vacation to Turkey.
Recruitment managers do not usually reveal the name of their companies or customers. They don’t specify how much can be earned, only indicating the “broad range” of fees that can be collected.
“From 100,000 to 150,000 per candidate, depending on the Voenkomat,” were the figures named by Victoria.
“From 50,000 to 300,000 per person,” her competitor Yelizaveta indicated.
On a state procurement site, we found four bid requests from companies that that needed help supplying their required number of military volunteers. Three of the announcements were from the Khanty-Mansiysk City Electric Network.
The network was prepared to spend a total of R15.5 million on services “searching for and selecting candidates who sign contracts.” The procurement documents specify two specific “remunerations to facilitators, per candidate”: R150,000 and R190,000. The company’s budget would therefore be sufficient to supply 90 men to the Voenkomat.
It is noteworthy that these tenders were posted soon after the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug raised its military sign-on bonuses to the highest level in the country: R3.2 million ($40,000).
Another tender for “candidate selection services” was issued by the Alexandrov City Shopping Center in Vladimir Oblast. On May 28, it inked a R300,000, month-long agreement with the Voyevoda Military-Patriotic Training Center.
“The Facilitator shall be considered as having provided services as stipulated if the Candidate arrives at the place of military service,” the contract specifies.
Voyevoda’s financial accounting shows that the center’s earnings rose rapidly in 2024, when they began to place ads for contract service on behalf of Rostov Oblast, Krasnodar Krai, Tatarstan, and Bashkortostan. The center went from losses of R604,000 in 2023 to a profit in 2024 of R46 million.
“Do you need staff?” we asked Victoria.
“You know, there’s competition here, it’s every person for themselves,” she replied. “You teach yourself. You search for Telegram channels where you can post. You also have to be able to persuade, to cajole, so they go through you and not someone else. No one is going to teach you that… that’s how it is.”
To start making money from recruiting, you likely need to register as a sole proprietor, to figure out the advertising market, and be prepared to make personal investments. It can cost tens of thousands of rubles to advertise on major Telegram channels.
For example, for R45,000 ($585) Telegram will publish a recruiter’s ad in hundreds of online communities for particular cities that masquerade as groups with civilian job openings while encouraging signing up for the “SVO” (Special Military Operation): “Work in St. Petersburg” or “Voronezh Oblast jobs.” In each case, the post will appear 30 times, but it is difficult to gauge its effectiveness.
“This month, I’ve spent over R100,000 on advertising, with no response at all,” Victoria complained. “My ads quickly roll up the screen among thousands of similar ones. It’s a lottery, and it all depends on luck. I just hope it’s a lull because of the May holidays.”
While recruiters battle with competition, regions give volunteer recruiters the chance to earn the same fees. Without advertising or registering as a sole proprietor, you can earn R100-200,000 if you bring in friends and relatives, rather than strangers, to the military registration office.
“It’s not essential that you come with him. He can just say, ‘My sister brought me.’ Or who is it? His wife? And he’ll write a statement.”
This is what we were told by a staffer at the Yaroslavl Voenkomat answering a phone call at the end of the workday and explaining how the local program works, which, ironically, is being compared with “bring a friend” referral programs. The oblast at first promised to pay R30,000 to anyone who “brings a volunteer to the Voenkomat” and later raised that payment to R100,000 ($1,300).
“And I don’t even have to come with the candidate?” we ask.
“Sure. He himself can indicate you in his statement, in his own handwriting. The statement is first approved by our selection committee, then we submit it to the administration, and they approve it. Then they call you, you come into the administration offices, where you will need to sign the statement. And then, within a week, you will receive your payment.”
“And will I need to somehow prove that it was specifically me who referred the candidate?”
“You don’t need to prove anything. The main thing is that they accept him into the military unit. It’s best to get tested in advance for syphilis, hepatitis, HIV, tuberculosis. But all of that is free.”
In the Voenkomat in another city, Ulyanovsk, where referral payments are part of the social program called “Care,” the conditions are a bit more onerous. You can’t “bring” a candidate in without physically accompanying him. But the payout here is higher: R150,000.
“You just have to stay involved,” a staffer says. “Be present for the medical screening, stick close to him until he leaves. And when he leaves, they’ll give you a chit, and you go to the administrative offices, hand that in, and that’s it.”
“Does it matter what our relationship is?”
“Doesn’t matter. Doesn’t matter at all. Payment goes out within a week, two maximum.”
“So I just have to come with him, wait through the medical screening, and that’s it?”
“That’s it. Basically.”
IN FEBRUARY 2025, Ulyanovsk Oblast allocated seven million rubles to its “Care” program, but in April they added another 19 million to the pot. Then in May, the former deputy minister for Property Relations and Architecture, Alexander Taushkin, was arrested. According to the investigation, he, along with his subordinates, submitted a fictitious list of 12 recruits to the Ministry of Social Development and received R1.8 millionas a payout.
Only a few regions, including Tatarstan and Bashkortostan, have officially announced referral campaigns. According to staff at Voenkomats, the program operates in “many places” and Russian citizens “pretty often” get paid for referring their relatives.
Yet some bring their brothers or husbands not to the Voenkomats, but to recruiters that they find through advertisements, with no expectation of any reward.
“That’s exactly what they write: ‘Please send him off. Here he’ll die of alcoholism, but there at least he’ll die with pride,’” recruiter Yelizaveta said. She’s been sending recruits to the front for over a year, but asserts that she does it “honestly,” and even talks those not ready out of enlisting.
Yelizaveta bases her personal brand as a recruiter around the idea of a human approach. She explained that, in contrast to her colleagues, she doesn’t sever her ties with recruits, but communicates with their families, sends soldiers cigarette money, and is even willing to send them phones or tablets, without demanding repayment. And for those who romanticize war, she shows them a video of bodies being evacuated – “with corpses with holes in their heads.”
“On the internet,” Yelizaveta said, “they say, ‘Okay! You want to be a driver? Come in, come in, drive generals and colonels around.’ And then bam, they change his clothes, take away his phone, and send him into battle. Today I talked one young man out of it. He said, ‘Is it true that in Yaroslavl they’re training drone operators?’ ‘It’s true,’ I said, ‘but there’s no 100 percent guarantee.’ ‘How can that be?’ I explain that they could reassign him along the way, if necessary, and send him to the front lines. I don’t want to pretend to be a saint, but I’m not ready to live with that, because then it’s dirty money.”
She clarified that, still, about “three out of five” of those she works with go to the front.
Yelizaveta posts screenshots on social media of her correspondence with her recruits, showing how she asks them to write her weekly, how she asks if they have received their payments, and makes them promise to return home.
“Give me your word: when the contract is up, we’ll meet in Moscow. How does that sound?” she asked a new recruit.
The soldier promised Yelizaveta to get together with her if he “survives until his leave.” He likely doesn’t know that she hasn’t lived in Russia for several years.
At the same time she’s drumming up recruits on Telegram channels, Yelizaveta is taking part in Istanbul expat chatrooms. She’s looking for a rental apartment with two bathrooms, a café with a wonderful view where she can have breakfast, a Russian-speaking speech therapist, and a playgroup for her two-and-a-half-year-old son.
During our telephone conversation, Yelizaveta is constantly interrupted by her son, who is not yet attending preschool. She said she sympathizes with women who stay home alone while their husbands go off to fight.
We ask if she regrets anything from her year of work, and Yelizaveta immediately answers, “Yes, yes, there are at least three cases.”
“The first was a citizen of another country. He signed up, went to training, and got scared. He wrote me, ‘Yelizaveta, can you please help me terminate my contract? My mother had a heart attack. I need to fly to Uzbekistan.’ And I knew there was nothing I could do to help him in that situation. Second, was a very young boy. I suggested he try shift work instead of military service, but I couldn’t convince him. Three weeks later, he wrote, ‘I’m scared.’ And now it’s been a year since he’s signed onto WhatsApp or Telegram."
The last recruit that Yelizaveta recalled was a father with many children who went off to fight without telling his family. In the morning, he left for work and stopped answering his phone, and his wife noticed that his slippers and towel were missing from the bathroom.
“His wife and his mother, who had just undergone heart surgery, started calling me,” Yelizaveta recalled. “‘Lizochka, what are you up to there?’ they asked. ‘Why did you send him there?’ I tried to persuade him to come home, but he replied, ‘Block my whole family.’ A month later, we received news that he was missing in action. His children were hoping he’d be home for New Year’s.”
Yelizaveta said these incidents raised doubts in her mind. She claimed to often reflect on the “boomerang of life.”
“When another soldier was pronounced missing in action, I stopped advertising,” she said. “I’m definitely taking a break for now.”
A week later, she reappeared on one of the largest Telegram channels promoting contract service.
“Thank you, our heroes!” she wrote in a post, promising income of over R6 million a year.
Since September of last year, Yelizaveta has advertised her service more than 160 times.
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