Behind the Article: "Mobilized, Forgotten, Ignored: Russia’s Control Mechanisms of its Minority Populations Amid the Russo-Ukrainian War" by Nick Lekkas

In a debut format, host Shawn Rostker presents a narrated version of a peer-reviewed journal article from Nick Lekkas, a senior columnist at the Georgetown Security Studies Review and fellow SSP colleague. Nick’s article, titled “Mobilized, Forgotten, Ignored: Russia’s Control Mechanisms of its Minority Populations Amid the Russo-Ukrainian War,” explores the disproportionate effect that Russia’s conscription efforts have had on ethnic groups from the Buryat, Kuban, and Dagestan regions. Nick analyzes the Kremlin’s political motivations for sparing its Slavic population from front-line deployment, and explains why this imbalance may become a greater vulnerability for the Russian regime than it realizes.