TL;DR:
Naturalized and undocumented migrants in Russia are being targeted by state organs as fodder for meeting recruitment goals to sustain the War in Ukraine.
Law enforcement is teaming up with ultranationalist ethnic Russians to raid migrant communities. Migrants are given the choice of serving in Ukraine or being deported.
Current legislation introduced to the Russian Duma is designed to block employment for immigrants in most sectors. The goal appears to be to make military service the only viable option for anyone wishing to join the Russkii Mir — the Russian World.
Replacement Theory is becoming an increasingly popular buzzword in the West. Far-right circles see the migrants coming across the US-Mexico border as a key reason why white Americans are set to lose their majority status by the year 2044. To many right-wingers, this demographic shift threatens identity of the US as a white, Christian nation. The theory is also roiling European nations. For example, Dublin, Ireland experienced riots and roaming brawls with police after a teacher and two children were stabbed outside an elementary school the day after Thanksgiving.
It should be no surprise then that Russia’s own far-right movement has embraced Replacement Theory. Central and East Asian migrants face endemic mistreatment. I knew a Hapa (mixed white-Asian) guy, like me, who studied abroad in Moscow back in 2014. He was jumped by two young men who called him “tatar” while punching him. To be fair, I am sadly confident there are many students who visit the United States and become victims of hate crimes, but unlike the US or Ireland or any free European nation, Russia’s government is right-wing and fascist, and there is widespread state support for victimization of migrants.
This can be seen in the fact that Russian war deaths are noticeably higher in areas populated by ethnic minorities. A report by BBC/MediaZona found that as of December 29, 2023, 1,071 individuals from the Republic of Buryatia have been reported by family and friends as killed in action in Ukraine. Buryatia has a total population of less than a million, so more than 1 of every 1000 people living there has died fighting in Ukraine. Moscow oblast has approximately 8.5 million resident, of which 1114 have been killed in the war, meaning that roughly eight times as many Buryats have died in Ukraine. Also, a disproportionate number of Buryat deaths occurred during the first year of the war, since signing a contract to serving in the pre-invasion military was a common path out of poverty.
By the end of 2022, the Russian armed forces were facing serious manpower shortages. Partial mobilization helped buy time, but the real goal was cannon fodder — “meat,” as even Russians now call one another. To achieve that, Wagner Group, under the leadership of Prigozhin, recruited heavily in Russian penal colonies. Inmates were promised presidential pardons in exchange for service in Ukraine, which were widely and publicly issued to survivors.
But then the prisons ran low on able-bodied criminals.
Efforts targeting migrants for cryptomobilization – “hidden” or “secret” mobilization – began in summer 2023, but on October 26, 2023, the Russian Duma passed an amendment to citizenship laws that is now being widely used to coerce migrants into military service:
The amendment most notably allows Russian authorities to revoke Russian citizenship from naturalized citizens who are convicted of discrediting the Russian military and of committing “certain crimes encroaching on public and personal safety” regardless of when the crime was committed, the date of sentencing, or for how long the convicted has held Russian citizenship.
Naturally, the “certain crimes” are ill-defined. But once a migrant is placed on a “controlled stay” status for violating the law — including those statutes forbidding illegal immigration — the migrant will lose all ability to “to register legal entities and as individual entrepreneurs, engage in real estate transactions, purchase and sell vehicles, drive a car, obtain a driver’s license, open a bank account, transfer money, or get married.” In other words, the legal system is being carefully structured so that migrants convicted of the vague offense of discrediting the Russian military will have no employment except the Russian military.
This is a deliberate outgrowth of Replacement Theory in Russia’s turbulent and fascistic political space. To illustrate, this clip shows ethnic white Russian ultranationalist groups coordinating with police to raid migrant communities. Detention centers to which victims are sent have become some of the Kremlin’s most important hubs. Deceit, intimidation, and outright coercion are common tactics for getting migrants to sign contracts.
From ISW’s daily assessment published November 20, 2023:
Russian military and security elements - particularly the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD), MVD, Rosgvardia, Investigative Committee, and the Federal Security Service (FSB) — appear to be spearheading efforts to coerce migrants into the Russian military. These Russian government organs have consistently conducted raids on migrant communities to issue military summonses to naturalized migrants, recruited migrants from migrant detention facilities, offered Russian citizenship in exchange for military service, and advertised Russian military contract service in Central Asian languages.
On January 4, 2024, “Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree strengthening procedures for granting foreign citizens Russian citizenship in exchange for Russian military service in Ukraine,” making formal a dark Russian variant of the legal path a given to foreign legionnaires wounded in battle: “Français par le sang versé” — French by blood spilled.
The United States needs to pay attention to this. Replacement Theory politics are creating a grotesque legal structure in Russia, where free reign is given to the right wing’s worst impulses. Rather than dying themselves, ethnic white Russians are using their historically colonized subjects as lambs to slaughter. Ukraine is fighting an anti-imperial war it and the rest of the world must win. Preying on huddled masses searching for a better life cannot become the international norm.
If Russia wins, Ukrainians will face the same fate in Putin’s next conquest. First Wagner now the Russian Armed Forces have forced not just convicts but many others into what might appear as a Faustian bargain: If you fight in Ukraine and live, you will be a free man. But in reality, if you do not fight, means by which you can continue living will be restricted or withdrawn, nor will you be allowed even to be a Russian.