Russia’s notorious Wagner Group has reportedly begun trawling schools in a disturbing new recruiting drive.
After the mercenary group was sidelined from prison-recruiting efforts last month, it now appears to be setting its sights on the next generation.
The twisted new recruiting method was captured in a video shared Wednesday by Lyubov Sobol, a lawyer and ally of imprisoned opposition leader Alexei Navalny. Sobol said a student who’d been present for Wagner’s presentation at a Moscow high school this week reached out and provided the surreptitiously recorded video.
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In it, a masked man wearing military garb with a Wagner logo talks up the students’ career prospects if they sign a contract with the private military accused of war crimes on multiple continents.
“We have the best prospects,” he said, describing members of the group as “cool, good,” and “nice.”
“The main hope is with you,” he told the teenagers, standing in front of a chalkboard that featured written messages of praise for the “special guest.”
“We welcome all our favorite musicians!” one message read, using a nickname for the group popularized while they slaughtered civilians in neighboring Ukraine.
Bizarrely, in his sales pitch to students, the Wagner fighter suggested that if he was allowed to join, anybody could.
“I’m a former inmate... and they took me, so they will take you as well. So, guys, we will be glad to have you,” he said, noting that he’d “brought some applications with” him and hoped the class would fill them out.
The form, titled “Application of a Young Warrior,” asked for basic details like name and phone number, along with the home address and personal information of the student’s parents.
It also asked students: “Do you have any relatives in unfriendly countries?” and “Are you ready to defend the motherland?”
The anonymous Wagernite also reportedly offered to show students a gun he’d made sure to bring with him. The teens were apparently not too impressed, however. The one who filmed the video was quoted telling Sobol: “‘We’ve already had members of the military come here—one of them was missing an arm—so we were not even surprised. And I filmed this Wagner [guy] just for fun. He was afraid to even show his face.”
