Russia faces an unprecedented internal security crisis as over a million soldiers prepare to return from the war in Ukraine. Among them are career soldiers, conscripts, and thousands of pardoned convicts—men promised glory and riches who are instead coming home to runaway inflation and a battered economy. The skills they honed in combat are now being sold to the highest bidder, with criminal gangs across Russia already competing to hire these battle-hardened veterans.
This isn’t speculation: by October 2024, independent Russian media outlet Verstka had identified almost 500 cases where veterans had either harmed or killed someone after returning home. What makes these numbers particularly alarming is that most Russian soldiers have yet to leave the frontline. Behind the grand parades and fiery speeches, Kremlin officials are quietly bracing for an even greater surge in violent crime that risks spillover beyond the country’s borders.
A Monster of the State’s Own Making
While it might be tempting to view Russia’s looming instability as an unavoidable consequence of war—after all, every nation that marches into conflict brings some violence home—what makes Russia’s situation unique is that the crisis results from a series of deliberate decisions made by the Kremlin during the course of the war. These decisions, viewed with the benefit of hindsight, appear less like strategic necessities and more like dangerous gambles that are now coming due.
Key Takeaways
- Russia is confronting a self-inflicted security crisis stemming from decisions made during the Ukraine war, including recruiting convicts into military service and loosening weapons controls.
- By October 2024, independent Russian media outlet Verstka had identified almost 500 cases where veterans had either harmed or killed someone after returning home, with the vast majority of soldiers still deployed at the frontline.
- The crisis threatens to extend far beyond Russia’s borders through weapons trafficking, mercenary exports, destabilization of Central Asian neighbors, and increased cybercrime.
- President Putin views the mass return of soldiers as a potential threat to political stability and is hardening internal security forces in response.
- Experts argue that only a comprehensive disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration (DDR) program can prevent the worst outcomes, though implementation remains uncertain.
The first and perhaps most consequential of these decisions was the choice to recruit convicts, including murderers, rapists, and thieves, directly into the war machine. In late 2022, when it became clear to the Kremlin that this special military operation would last considerably longer than the initially anticipated three days, they dispatched Yevgeny Prigozhin—at the time a key Putin ally and head of the shadowy paramilitary outfit the Wagner Group—to prisons across the country to recruit for the army.
According to Vladimir Osechkin, head of a Russian prisoners’ rights group, the Wagner Group offered 200,000 rubles (approximately $2,700) and amnesty for six months of voluntary service in Ukraine, provided the prisoners returned alive. For men trapped inside Russia’s overcrowded and violent prisons, joining the war seemed preferable to serving their sentences. Others, such as Rustam Borovkov, were lured by the prospect of returning home not just alive but as pardoned men, able to rejoin their families. Speaking to Reuters, he explained: “I have a small child.
I wanted to get back to my family.”
However, once they joined, the reality proved far harsher than any had imagined. Those who faltered or showed hesitation were beaten. In some cases, those who disobeyed orders or attempted to flee were executed, their deaths used as lessons for the rest. After training, they were sent on what Ukrainian soldiers termed “meat assaults”—massive waves of Russians rushing positions with little cover, attempting to overwhelm defenders through sheer force of numbers.
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It comes as no surprise that these convicts were among the first to turn violent once they returned home. Azamat Iskaliyev, convicted for murdering his wife, was only a few years into a nine-year sentence when the war offered him an escape route. Pardoned in exchange for six months on the Ukrainian front, Iskaliyev returned, pursued an ex-girlfriend, and killed her after she rejected his advances.
War does not rehabilitate violent offenders. It often magnifies the worst of their instincts and teaches them new ways to apply their violence. More significantly, it can eliminate any fear they had of law enforcement—especially when the Russian president himself has issued their pardons—removing a key deterrent that might have kept their darker tendencies in check. The effects on their communities have been devastating.
Mariana Katzarova, a U.N.-backed human rights expert, told reporters: “Many of them who return—and this is an emerging trend—have been perpetrating new violent crimes to begin with against women, against girls, against children, including sexual violence and killings.”
It bears emphasizing again that this violence is currently being perpetrated by only the first wave of soldiers to return from the battlefield. When—or perhaps if—the war ends, more of these convicts will pour back into Russian society, and unless something changes, the violence seems destined to multiply exponentially.
The Weapons Problem
The convicts represent just one component of a complex problem. The second is the ease with which they and other criminals can access weapons. According to Dr. Mark Galeotti, one of the leading experts on Russian crime, Russia had a massive problem with illegal weapons even before the 2022 invasion. Since 2022, the volume and sophistication of arms slipping into Russia has multiplied many times over, causing a spike in gun crime rates.
Compounding this situation is a push by several influential politicians from the ruling United Russia bloc to loosen gun control laws, especially for war veterans. They believe that veterans can handle weapons responsibly and that keeping them armed provides social protection. Critics argue the opposite: that this will blur the lines between legal and illegal firearms, creating cover for trafficking and spreading illegal weapons throughout the country. The critics are almost certainly right.
The convicts and the weapons are just parts of this equation. The Kremlin made other choices that are feeding into this crisis, particularly regarding the economy.
Economic Pressures and Historical Parallels
For the past three years, the Russian economy has been running hot, fueled by government contracts and military spending. This has kept GDP numbers looking deceptively healthy in the short term; however, analysts believe that the country’s longer-term economic outlook is becoming increasingly precarious. Civilian industries, such as timber, have been gutted by sanctions, and inflation is eating into whatever pay people earn. The state has leaned so heavily into military production that any slowdown risks massive layoffs and could trigger an economic downturn.
If that happens, the issues plaguing Russian society will be magnified a hundredfold. A society already grappling with how to reintegrate traumatized veterans and emboldened ex-convicts will now have to contend with mass unemployment. A potential economic collapse poses a significant security risk for Russia, as it might push the very people the government needs to reintegrate into the hands of organized crime.
There is precedent for this scenario. In the 1990s, in the aftermath of the Soviet economy’s collapse, soldiers who had fought in Afghanistan and Chechnya became the backbone of organized crime groups. Some, such as Sergei Domanin, a former senior lieutenant in the marines, formed their own gangs. This period reshaped Russia’s criminal landscape for a generation, and it is not difficult to imagine history repeating itself. The effects will be felt around the world.
The Global Fallout
History has proven time and again that crises in a country as large as Russia are rarely confined within neat geopolitical borders. They ripple outward like shockwaves from an earthquake, and the current situation promises multiple vectors of international impact.
The first and most obvious danger involves weapons proliferation. Dr. Galeotti believes that since the Russian gun market is nearly saturated with both old and new weapons, arms will likely flow from Russia to other countries where Russian gangs maintain networks of allies and clients, such as Spain, Portugal, and Colombia.
These arms will fuel conflicts far removed from their original battlefield. History rhymes here as well: after the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan, the Kalashnikovs and rocket-propelled grenades once carried by Soviet troops suddenly appeared everywhere, from the mountains of the Caucasus to the slums of West Africa.
The second danger is manpower export. Russia has created a vast pool of men trained for war. If they return to a country where they have no prospects, they are likely to seek opportunities abroad. Some might choose to join the Africa Corps, the paramilitary group that rose to replace the Wagner Group, in their missions across various African countries.
Others might not want to continue working for the government and might instead be tempted by the myriad conflicts around the world. They might receive offers from cartels in Mexico or militias in Syria—countries with a history of recruiting ex-military personnel from troubled nations.
Central Asian Vulnerabilities
The Central Asian nations close to Russia face their own unique risks if the worst-case scenario plays out. Millions of Central Asian migrants from countries such as Uzbekistan and Tajikistan work in Russian cities, sending money back to their families. If Russia’s economy slows after the war, many could be forced to return home because of inevitable layoffs. But they will not come back empty-handed—they may bring weapons, drugs, or connections to Russian gangs.
This could lead to waves of crime and political instability in their home countries.
Kazakhstan faces a different and perhaps more acute threat. It shares a 7,598.6-kilometer-long border with Russia and is home to a large Russian-speaking population. Kazakhstan has long been a target of Russian nationalist rhetoric, and one could envision a situation in which armed veterans rally around calls to defend Russians abroad, similar to the calls Moscow made in the lead-up to the invasion of Ukraine. Astana could face provocations that are difficult to control.
These may not come as official invasions but rather as freelance militias while the Kremlin officially denies responsibility.
This is not paranoid speculation. The Kremlin has already hinted at designs on Kazakhstan. In mid-2022, former president Dmitry Medvedev wrote a screed on Vkontakte setting out a “historical” claim for Kazakh lands and declaring: “Kazakhstan is an artificial state.” This is exactly the sort of language the Kremlin uses about Ukraine, while the use of freelance militias to infiltrate a neighbor follows the same playbook used at the start of the Donbas War in 2014.
To be fair, Medvedev later claimed his account had been hacked, and the post was taken down. Nevertheless, polling from across the last three years suggests that a significant minority of Kazakhs are deeply worried about a military incursion from their northern neighbor. Whether or not the Kremlin launches a full-fledged invasion of Astana—or as they might call it, a special military operation—depends on how the final days of the Ukraine war play out. A successful Moscow might have a greater appetite for further military adventures.
The Cybercrime Dimension
Cybercrime represents another arena where the impact of this crisis could be felt globally. According to POLITICO, the Kremlin has become reliant on cybercriminal groups loyal to Moscow to support the country’s war in Ukraine. Once the war is over, these groups, emboldened by the support they have received from the Kremlin, might continue to conduct cyberattacks but with a wider range of targets. Ransomware attacks on European hospitals, sabotage of infrastructure in the United States, or financial hacking in Asia could all be traced back to disillusioned Russian veterans making money on the side in such a scenario.
Is This Inevitable?
If this represents the worst-case scenario, not just for Russia but for the entire world, the critical question becomes: is it inevitable, or even particularly likely?
For President Putin, it is not. According to three sources who spoke to Reuters, Putin views the prospect of an army returning en masse as a potential risk he wants carefully managed to avoid destabilizing society and the political system he has built. The sources emphasized that the President is wary of repeating the same mistakes that occurred at the end of the Afghan war.
This is why the Kremlin has begun to harden its internal security forces. The Rosgvardiya, Russia’s version of the National Guard, recently announced that it would be reintroducing tank units. According to the Opfor Journal substack, this decision was portrayed as necessary to bolster the firepower of Russian internal security forces and boost their interoperability with the conventional military.
However, the author questioned that justification, noting that Rosgvardia’s role in the war has diminished since the initial invasion. They believe that the upgrades are linked to fears within Russia of the security impact of demobilization.
In other words, Russia’s strategy is essentially not to prevent the fire, but to have enough firemen available when the flames inevitably appear.
A Comprehensive Solution: Disarmament, Demobilization, and Reintegration
Dr. Mark Galeotti offers a different approach. In a paper for the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime, he argues that Russia should develop a comprehensive disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration (DDR) plan to tackle the oncoming crisis. DDR is not a unique concept and has been attempted in many conflicts around the world, such as in Liberia and the Democratic Republic of Congo, with varying levels of success. Dr. Galeotti believes this is Russia’s only path away from the crisis.
On disarmament, he warns that without an immediate and credible program to collect the trophy weapons picked up from Ukraine, Russia will lose any chance of reversing the tide of illegal weapons—not just those coming in from Ukraine, but those already in the hands of gangs. Proper disarmament would require systematic buy-back schemes, strict amnesties for veterans who surrender their arms, and tighter oversight over the country’s porous border regions where trafficking thrives.
Beyond weapons lies the thornier question of demobilization—specifically, how to send soldiers home after the war. The traditional route of sending them home with a handshake, a paycheck, and a medal is a recipe for disaster. Russia requires a structured exit program that emphasizes several important factors: first, screenings for trauma and addiction to ensure that soldiers receive proper help once they leave the army; second, staggering the releases instead of releasing all soldiers at once; and third, providing transitional employment to prevent former soldiers from sinking into joblessness.
Finally, there is the most difficult component: reintegration. To properly reintegrate soldiers, the Russian establishment must acknowledge the challenges these men are experiencing. They are dealing with PTSD, substance abuse, and a learned dependency on violence, all of which will affect how they interact with civilians. To handle this, Russia needs to invest heavily in healthcare and welfare.
If reintegration fails, veterans will not just be criminals in waiting; they will become a political constituency of angry, disillusioned men who feel betrayed by the state. And these are the most dangerous men of all.
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Simon Whistler
Simon Whistler is one of YouTube's most prolific educational creators. WarFronts is his deep dive into military history and conflict analysis.
FAQ
How many violent incidents have been linked to returning veterans so far?
By October 2024, independent Russian media outlet Verstka had identified almost 500 cases where veterans had either harmed or killed someone after returning home. What makes these numbers particularly alarming is that most Russian soldiers have yet to leave the frontline.
Why did Russia recruit convicts to fight in Ukraine?
In late 2022, when it became clear the war would last considerably longer than initially anticipated, the Kremlin dispatched Yevgeny Prigozhin to prisons across the country to recruit for the army. The Wagner Group offered 200,000 rubles (approximately $2,700) and amnesty for six months of voluntary service in Ukraine if prisoners returned alive.
What are ‘meat assaults’?
Meat assaults is a term coined by Ukrainian soldiers to describe the massive waves of Russians rushing positions with little cover, attempting to overwhelm defenders through sheer force of numbers.
How has Russia’s weapons problem changed since 2022?
According to Dr. Mark Galeotti, Russia had a massive problem with illegal weapons even before the 2022 invasion. Since 2022, the volume and sophistication of arms slipping into Russia has multiplied many times over, causing a spike in gun crime rates.
What solution do experts recommend for Russia’s demobilization crisis?
Dr. Mark Galeotti argues that Russia must develop a comprehensive disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration (DDR) plan. This includes systematic weapon buy-back schemes and strict amnesties for veterans who surrender arms, staggered releases rather than mass demobilization, screenings for trauma and addiction, transitional employment programs, and heavy investment in healthcare and welfare to address PTSD and substance abuse.
Sources
- https://archive.is/jSGvk
- https://www.opforjournal.com/p/weekly-significant-activity-report-ecc
- https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/content-series/russia-tomorrow/five-scenarios-for-russias-future/
- https://europeanleadershipnetwork.org/commentary/not-so-quiet-on-the-western-front-why-russias-zapad-exercise-highlights-the-need-for-military-confidence-building-measures/
- https://www.journalofdemocracy.org/articles/what-putin-fears-most/
- https://www.rferl.org/a/russia-economy-slowing-kremlin-problem-oil-war/33530234.html
- https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/heroes-villains-russia-braces-eventual-return-its-enormous-army-2025-09-09/
- https://www.reuters.com/breakingviews/russias-economy-would-struggle-cope-with-peace-2025-03-17/
- https://globalinitiative.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/Mark-Galeotti-Trouble-at-Home-Russias-looming-demobilization-challenge-GI-TOC-June-2025.pdf
- https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2025/06/26/nearly-140k-russian-soldiers-back-from-war-are-in-need-of-reintegration-kremlin-says-a89581
- https://www.newsweek.com/russia-recruiting-prisones-diseases-hiv-hepatitis-1754579
- https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-war-convict-wagner-crime-108e410835e4bf27ac3192cd7f945b39
- https://apnews.com/article/russia-violence-former-prisoner-released-ukraine-32061e35c7a153bf9bdf101c4c5684e5
- https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2025/07/15/russias-timber-industry-faces-shutdowns-amid-sanctions-strong-ruble-and-slumping-demand-a89821
- https://eurasianet.org/russian-nationalists-again-rile-kazakhstan-by-questioning-its-nationhood
