Russia is preparing to mobilize 500,000 troops next fall, with plans to send some recruits to the Eastern Front within weeks of training, a Ukrainian official said on Saturday.Andriy Kovalenko, head of the Ukrainian Center for Combating Disinformation, said the Russian military command intends to use the mobilized forces to address the immediate shortage of personnel and set a new operational direction.“Russia is preparing to mobilize 500,000 people for the fall. Some of them are scheduled to be sent into battle in the first two weeks to fill gaps in the east, while others will be trained for at least a month for the possible opening of a new front direction.
This is the plan of the Russian Federation,” Kovalenko wrote in a telegram.He added that Russian officials, including First Deputy Chief of Staff Sergei Kiriyenko and Chief of General Staff Valery Gerasimov, assured the command that mobilization would provide a military advantage.
Hiring shortages and election concerns
This warning follows Ukrainian military intelligence assessments that Moscow has avoided the issue of mobilization to mitigate domestic political risks ahead of the Duma elections in the fall.
Andriy Chernyak, a Ukrainian military intelligence officer, said the Russian government is actively suppressing public debate about mobilization. “The Kremlin will now avoid the issue of mobilization as much as possible and say that it will not happen because they are preparing for the elections,” Chernyak said, adding that the possibility of mobilization remains high after the elections.Chernyak stressed that Russia has the necessary infrastructure to handle the influx of large numbers of individuals.
He added: “They have enough training centers, they have enough existing training fields. Mobilization is necessary to strengthen those areas that already exist.”
Russia is not meeting its recruitment targets
The expected mobilization campaign is linked to a reported shortage of Russian military recruitment contracts. Ukraine’s foreign intelligence service reported that only 195,000 military contracts had been signed in Russia, falling short of the target of 204,500 contracts.
The agency also estimated Russian personnel losses in 2026 at approximately 196,700, including approximately 115,300 “irrecoverable” losses.Regarding possible new attack axes, Chernyak said that Ukrainian intelligence does not currently notice any attack groups forming in Belarus. While nearly 50,000 Belarusian soldiers and Russian support units are stationed there, there is no immediate sign of an offensive buildup, although troops could be moved within weeks.