Rumored Russian draft makes headlines. Ukraine’s real one sparks street clashes

"The WSJ reported that the Russian military was “testing its readiness” to accept a new wave of recruits – the first since 2022. The authors did not claim that the Kremlin had already decided on another mobilization. Rather, they described a stress test of the system: Drills, logistics, and the military infrastructure’s ability to “absorb” large numbers of people should the order ever be issued.
Almost simultaneously, mobilization became a topic of discussion in Ukraine as well,

though in a very different context. In the final days of the month, the idea that military service should apply to every citizen, regardless of sex, surfaced several times in high-level circles.
Zelensky linked a hypothetical Russian call-up to the September elections to the State Duma, as though Moscow’s electoral calendar could itself affect the course of the war. Finnish President Alexander Stubb said Russia was “approaching the point” at which it would have to declare a general mobilization. Western front pages picked up – not a decision, but merely the expectation of one. In this way, a rumor became a political fact before any decree had even been issued.
The Kremlin’s response was unequivocal. On July 28, Dmitry Medvedev called the rumors of an impending mobilization a “false enemy provocation.”
Former Ukrainian Defense Minister Mikhail Fyodorov said that around 200,000 (!) service members had gone AWOL and that more than 2 million people were wanted by the authorities. Western estimates put the average age of a Ukrainian soldier at close to 47. In 2024, the minimum mobilization age was lowered from 27 to 25, while a previously promised provision allowing demobilization after 36 months of service was removed from the law.
This resistance almost never takes the form of an organized political campaign with slogans and a set date. Instead, it erupts sporadically, at the very moment TCC officers try to seize someone off the street. On July 8, 2026, for example, around 200 people in Lviv surrounded a TCC vehicle, chanted “hanba” (shame), damaged the van, and eventually overturned it. Zelensky called the incident “a very bad story” and separately condemned violence against people in uniform. The location was revealing: Not frontline Kharkov or Odessa, but a city widely regarded as a bastion of Ukraine’s national identity.
The same scene played out in Ternopol on August 25. That evening, TCC officers tried to detain a man on Lesya Kurbasa Street. Passersby came to his defense, the official vehicle was smashed, and one service member was hospitalized. After the police left, a nighttime march moved through the streets, once again accompanied by chants of ‘hanba’." RT