Russia’s recruitment of soldiers to fight in its war in Ukraine has disproportionately drawn from the country’s Indigenous peoples. Individuals from these communities—most notably Buryats, Tuvans, Kalmyks, as well as members of small-numbered nations—have been recruited at above-average rates and experienced higher-than-average combat death rates. While these elevated recruitment and death rates affects the entire regions where these groups reside—often some of the poorest regions in the country—it is their specific ethnic communities that face the most long-lasting and potentially devastating consequences.

Disproportionate Losses

According to Alexandra Garmazhapova, president of the Free Buryatia Foundation, at least 2,470 Buryatia residents have been killed in action since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. The figure, which is based on open sources and therefore is likely to be an undercount, includes both ethnic Buryats and Russians. In a republic with a population of only 980,000, of which 30 percent are Buryat, this translates to 252 combat deaths per 100,000 residents.

For comparison, the number of Muscovites killed in action is estimated at 1,215. In a city of 13.2 million, this translates into 9.2 combat deaths for 100,000 residents. Looking at the broader Moscow region (population 8.7 million), it has suffered 1,236 combat deaths, equating to 14.2 deaths per 100,000 residents. (Data about soldiers killed in action is from Mediazona). Data for Saint Petersburg and the Leningrad region likewise show figures that are much lower than those in Buryatia.

“Rational Economic Choice”

The Kremlin prefers to recruit troops from remote, impoverished, and sparsely populated regions for both political and economic reasons. Russian law prohibits sending conscripts into active combat zones, especially abroad. The Kremlin, therefore, relies on contract soldiers to fill the ranks of those fighting in Ukraine. In these regions, high levels of poverty make outsized signing and death bonuses an attractive proposition.

Buryatia is a case in point. It is one of the poorest regions in the country and has “one of the highest concentrations of military units or military bases in the region per capita,” Maria Vyushkova, a scholar at the University of Notre Dame, told the Kennan Institute’s Russia File podcast last year. According to her, the army has long been one of the region’s largest and most stable employers, offering benefits such as “housing, mortgages, and other perks” that are especially attractive to men with young families.

With the start of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, enlisting in the military became “a rational economic choice,” the Wall Street Journal reported last fall. New recruits are offered high salaries and bonuses that can exceed the national average wage by up to five times. In poor regions, families of killed in action receive “life-changing” sums of up to $150,000—more than a 35-year-old could earn in total “working as a civilian until the age of 60,” according to economist Vladislav Inozemtsev. The Journal also noted that from January of 2022 to November 2024, bank deposits in Buryatia grew by 81 percent. Residential construction was up 32 percent for the year in November 2024, compared with the 2 percent national average.

Devastating Impact

The smaller the Indigenous group, the higher the impact of these cynical recruitment policies. For some communities, the stakes are existential. According to Pavel Sulyandziga, president of the International Indigenous Fund for Development and Solidarity “Batani” and lifelong advocate for Indigenous peoples, there are 42 small-numbered Indigenous nations living in Siberia and the Russian Far East. Of these, 7 have fewer than 1,000 members, 12 have fewer than 2,000, and none exceed 50,000. For these groups, every loss to recruitment—and certainly every combat death—poses a potential threat to the survival of the entire ethnos.

Sulyandziga’s organization estimates that in Khabarovsk region, where military casualties among Indigenous men are disproportionately high, Indigenous communities were targeted for recruitment nearly three times more often than non-Indigenous ones, he said at a recent Kennan Institute webinar.

This suggests that the “disproportionately high military casualties among the Indigenous population” in this region are the result of a “disproportionate forced recruitment into the war.” He described a village in Khabarovsk region where, during the “partial mobilization” drive of 2022, the entire male population aged 18 to 50 got recruited, leaving behind only women, children and the elderly. It was only after the women began to raise the alarm that the authorities relented and allowed some of the men to return.

Sulyandziga warns that this could have generational consequences. Many small Indigenous communities are already on the brink of extinction, he explained.  The recruiting of men from these communities is pushing them even closer the edge—the final step in a long process of dispossession, stemming from loss of their lands and access to traditional hunting, herding, and fishing grounds. If widespread deforestation caused by rapacious logging practices previously accelerated these trends, the war may prove to be the final blow against these communities.

Propaganda Does Its Work

As in other parts of the country, men returning in coffins have not sparked serious protests in the regions disproportionately impacted by casualties. There are many reasons for that. For one thing, speaking out against the war and the regime has dire consequences. Psychological factors play a role as well. “For a mother who lost her son in the war, it’s hard to accept that his death may have been in vain,” Garmazhapova said. On top of that, “Kremlin propaganda is always one step ahead,” quickly seizing on new cultural trends and repurposing them for its own aims.

One example is the patriotic song “Russians Don’t Surrender, Buryats Don’t Run,” which has become a hit. Inspired by an interview with Putin, in which he praised the courage of Buryat soldiers, it invokes pride in Buryat ethnicity while underscoring unity with Russia and Russian patriotism. Propaganda outlets now frequently spotlight Buryat war heroes, portraying them as brave defenders of the “Russian world,” Garmazhapova explained. She noted the “sticky” quality of the song: “You catch yourself humming it even though you disagree with the message.”

Russia has also coopted the United Nations to shield itself from international scrutiny and prop up its narratives internationally. According to Sulyandziga, the Kremlin has placed its own representatives in both UN bodies dealing with Indigenous issues: the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues and the UN Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Rather than represent genuine Indigenous interests, they are using their positions to promote Russian propaganda and deflect attention from Russia’s abuses of Indigenous populations.

Religious authorities in Russia, including Buddhist leaders, are fully under the heel of the state and actively promote pro-war narratives as well, she said. According to one popular narrative, the Buryats are fighting for the “Russian world” in order to preserve the “Mongolian world.” (One possible interpretation of this overt non-sequitur is that the “corrupt” West and “Nazi” Ukraine threaten both.)

Buryat Diaspora Growing

While few risk protesting, anecdotal evidence suggests that those who can are doing their best to leave the country. In a recent investigation, award-winning journalist Olga Mutovina documented the growing Buryat diaspora in the US. Today, an estimated 10,000 ethnic Buryats live in the US, making it one of the largest Buryat diaspora communities in the world. Gathering information about this group can be a challenge, she notes. When the emigrant society Shambala tried to run a community census, many people declined to participate. Many feared harming their relatives back home. Some did not even tell their loved ones that they had moved to the US.

When it comes to Russia’s Indigenous peoples, the effect of Russia’s war in Ukraine goes beyond the tragedy experienced by individual families. Its devastating toll on its Indigenous communities and small-numbered peoples is one of the many unforeseen consequences of this war that Russia will be grappling with for years and decades to come.

The opinions expressed in this article are those solely of the author and do not reflect the views of the Kennan Institute.