By Sultan Musayev | 2025-11-13

A year ago, signing up to fight in Ukraine could make a Russian volunteer a millionaire overnight. Today, that same decision barely buys a used car.

Regional governments across Russia have slashed one-time enlistment bonuses that once ran into the millions of rubles, according to Russian media reports.

As of October, volunteers from Chuvashia, Tatarstan, Mari El, the Nizhny Novgorod and Ulyanovsk regions, the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous District and Bashkortostan began receiving payments that are a fraction of previous amounts.

The federal government's base payment for signing a contract with the Defense Ministry remains fixed at 400,000 RUB (about $5,000). Each region supplements that with its own one-time bonus, but many have now cut those top-ups drastically.

In the Samara region, the payout for new contract soldiers has been reduced to one-ninth of its original sum, from 3.6 million RUB ($45,000) to 400,000 ($5,000). Tatarstan slashed its offer from 2.7 million ($33,750) to 400,000 RUB as well, while Mari El and Chuvashia made similar reductions.

Bonuses slashed sharply

The cuts follow a brief period of rising enlistment bonuses. In August, Tatarstan increased its one-time payment for volunteers from 2.2 million to 2.7 million RUB (about $27,500 to $33,750) to lure more recruits.

Now, those payments are shrinking as enlistment slows. Around 38,000 people signed contracts with the Russian Defense Ministry in the second quarter of 2025 -- two and a half times fewer than a year earlier, iStories reported in August.

Experts link the decline to mounting battlefield losses and the growing use of infantry as Ukrainian drones make armored equipment more vulnerable. Local media in the Irkutsk region said officials there missed recruitment targets "due to insufficient funds."

Some analysts say the cuts are concentrated in regions that already met their quotas, including Tatarstan.

Mikhail Delyagin, deputy chairman of the State Duma's Economic Policy Committee, told RTVI in June that the Finance Ministry's policies are "wringing the country dry" and undermining even "affluent regions like Bashkortostan."

Enlistment plunges fast

Russians are voicing anger over shrinking enlistment bonuses and what some call predatory recruitment tactics.

Ivan Chuvilyaev of the Idite Lesom (Get Lost) human rights group told Sever.Realii, the Russian service of RFE/RL, that some regional incentives verge on absurd.

"In Sakha, if a husband signs a contract, the family is given a cart of firewood," he said in October, adding that offers such as unwanted land plots near Saint Petersburg show "people aren't idiots" and "everyone understands."

Sever.Realii reported that recruitment drives in some regions resemble hard-sell campaigns, with limited-time offers.

In Tyumen, volunteers who sign before November 30 can receive 3.4 million RUB (about $42,500). In Tambov, Moscow and Tula, those who enlist before year's end are promised 2.6 million RUB ($32,500). In Samara, the top rate applies only to officers.

Migrant workers from Central Asia have also been targeted.

A Tajik construction worker in Moscow, Berkhuz M., told Kontur that acquaintances promised to fix his finances, support his family in Dushanbe and grant Russian citizenship if he enlisted.

"I said no. They often trick Tajiks," he said.

Even volunteers who signed contracts have sometimes been denied payment.

Saint Petersburg authorities retroactively canceled bonuses for members of the Russian Combat Army Reserve (BARS), Sever.Realii said. Those promised 1.6 million RUB ($20,000) were turned away after a local decree quietly eliminated the payout.

"When payments are introduced or raised, it's all over the news," Chuvilyaev said. "When they're reduced or canceled, you don't hear about it."

Budget woes ignite fury

Even as regions slash bonuses for volunteers, many are spending heavily on those who recruit them.

Since mid-2024, about one in three Russian regions has paid bonuses for "assisting in recruiting citizens to sign a contract to perform military service."

By October, recruiters nationwide had collected at least 2 billion RUB (about $25 million), according to iStories. That figure covers data from only 11 regions, suggesting the real total is far higher.

Analysts say the sums rival regional spending on healthcare, education and social programs -- evidence of how the war has distorted local budgets.

These strains come amid a weakening economy marked by labor shortages and a growing brain drain. To sustain enlistment, the Kremlin continues offering volunteers bonuses and loans of up to 1 million RUB ($12,000), often targeting Russia's poorest areas.

Economist and financial consultant Sanzhar Doszhanov told Kontur the government is now cutting military spending for the first time in years.

Defense outlays were not raised in the 2026 draft budget, he said, as falling oil and gas revenues, rising war costs and a slowing economy have left Russia running a deficit.

"Already there isn't enough money, and things will only get worse," Doszhanov said. He warned that if the financial squeeze deepens, authorities could again turn to mass mobilization like that of fall 2022.