The Kremlin is spending billions on an assembly line to prepare schoolchildren for war

After the outbreak of a full-scale war against Ukraine, the Russian authorities are systematically turning military training into a mandatory part of the school curriculum. In 2023, military training was built into the life safety course, and from 2024, not only tenth-graders, but also eighth-graders are taken to them.

❗️The publication “That's So” published an investigation into how Russia is building a system of compulsory military training for schoolchildren and how much money is spent on it.

The “Not the Norm” project conducted an analysis of VK school groups specifically for this investigation. Over the entire period, 32,155 posts about military training were published in school public pages. Until September 2021, there were only 3,583 of them, and in the academic year 2024–2025 there were already 8,800, an increase of almost 2.5 times.

The main instrument of this system was the Avangard network of military-patriotic centers with 147 centers throughout the country. Over five days there, teenagers are taught to shoot, control drones and act in conditions of a chemical attack. In just one Avangard near Moscow, 200 thousand teenagers passed through five years of work.

At the same time, it is almost impossible to refuse to participate in military training: the mother of a tenth-grader from the Sverdlovsk region said that teachers directly warn that without training, the child will not pass the subject and will not be admitted to the 11th grade.

Official data on the financing of Avangard centers is not disclosed, but journalists have calculated that since 2020 , at least 36.5 billion rubles (~$486 million) have been allocated for their creation and operation alone. Fixed assets are the costs of infrastructure and equipment of centers.

In parallel with military training at the Avangard centers, there is a systematic recruitment into the army and law enforcement agencies . Representatives of the FSB, FSO and military universities hold meetings with cadets, distribute booklets and promise bonus points upon admission. The director of the main center, Daria Borisova, does not hide the goal: according to her, the share of those wishing to serve during the five days of training grows from approximately 50% to 90%.

❗️Journalists also confirmed the first case of death in the war against Ukraine of a participant in military training at the Avangard center.

In addition to Avangard, the authorities are developing another federal network - military-patriotic centers "Warrior" . Now it has 21 branches, four of which are in the occupied regions. Putin ordered the creation of this structure a day before mobilization, in September 2022. Since then, almost 15 billion rubles have been spent on it from the federal budget.