The ad has so far been released on major Russian social networking sites.
Moscow:
The Russian military has launched a video campaign to entice more professional soldiers to fight in Ukraine that challenges those who are willing to show they are “a real man” and fight for the battlefield. What do we do as a civilian life?
The music-boosting ad follows a report by British military intelligence and Russian media suggesting Moscow is looking to recruit 400,000 professional soldiers – on a volunteer basis – to bolster its forces in Ukraine. For.
The ad has so far been released on major Russian social networking sites.
Russia, which is prosecuting what it says is “a special military operation”, does not disclose full casualty figures. But according to a recently leaked estimate from the US Defense Intelligence Agency, 43,000 Russians have been killed in the war so far.
An estimated 17,500 Ukrainians were also killed.
The ad, which invites the men to sign a contract with the Russian Defense Ministry for salaries starting at 204,000 rubles ($2,495) a month, shows a man in military uniform holding a heavy machine gun in a supermarket shows the He is then shown in a security guard’s uniform with the question:
“Did you dream of becoming such a protector?”
Further on in the video, a man walks along with other soldiers in a fog that looks like a battlefield. He is then shown as a gym instructor helping a client lift weights.
“Is this really your strength?” the video asks, before cutting to a taxi driver collecting a customer’s fare who transforms into a soldier on the battlefield.
The ad says, “You’re a real man. Be one.”
After launching a partial mobilization campaign in September that prompted tens of thousands of Russian men to flee the country to avoid the draft, officials are downplaying the prospect of a second mobilization call – to replace the electronic call up paper Despite the move to shut down draft dodgers – and are looking to recruit volunteers instead.
Posters demanding professional soldiers have appeared in the Russian capital in recent weeks, saying “our vocation is to defend the motherland.”
The posters, which say the army is looking for gunners, sappers, military medics, drivers and tank commanders, promise potential recruits “respect, a respectable profession and decent pay.”
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)