“Everyone must serve.” The deputy chairman of the Duma Defense Committee proposed to raise the age of conscription to 50 years

The Defense Committee of the State Duma considers it insufficient to raise the conscription age to 30 years. The war in Ukraine has shown that the upper bar can be limited to 50 years, and in general “everyone should serve in the army”, said Alexei Zhuravlev, the first deputy chairman of the committee.

“I would raise the draft age not to 30 as now proposed, but to 40, even to 50. Now those who are far behind are holding the defense at the front – and I must say they are doing well,” he said. news.ru.

Zhuravlev believes that Russians themselves should want to join the army, because they are able to understand the “danger that threatens the homeland” after its invasion of Ukraine, which ended in a long bloody war.

And those who do not agree with this and the regulations on conscription adopted by the authorities, the MP suggested leaving the country. “If you have made the decision to live in Russia on your own, there is no other way out. You have to give back to your homeland, regardless of your age or marital status, stressed the deputy.

Zhuravlev himself did not serve in either the Soviet or the Russian army. The MEP is 61 years old, so he too is not subject to the measures he has announced. Formerly Żurawlew proposed extending the period of military service in order to increase the professionalism of the military.

He also emphasized that men should not join the army to receive material benefits and benefits from the state, because people who sign a housing contract will not be defenders of the homeland. The most important thing for the military is “respect and honor” from the population, and prosperity is secondary, Zhuravlev said. In addition, he called for the execution of soldiers for leaving their posts without permission.

On July 25, the State Duma adopted a law to raise the conscription age to 30 years without a transitional period. If the document is approved by the Federation Council and signed by the President, the changes will come into force in 2024.

During the third reading, Andrei Kartapolov, head of the Duma’s Defense Committee, admitted that this law was “written for a great war, for general mobilization, and now this great war already smells of it.”

He also “rebuked” MPs who tried to defend amendments exempting fathers of three minor children from conscription and those responsible for military service who have a disabled child to support. “We are all still looking for who we can remove, who we can protect [от мобилизации]. After that, there will be no one to protect, ”Kartapolov said.