The Russian government is engaging school children in military drills including assembling guns, marching practice, throwing grenades, and shooting with real ammunition, CNN reports.
From the Pacific to the Black Sea, playgrounds are becoming parade grounds, and service in the armed forces is accorded more honour in schools, while the national curriculum is being modified to emphasise defence of the country.
Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24, 2022, and both European neighbouring countries have intensified in winning the war.
With the recent development in the country turning schools into military sites, Russia’s children are being prepared for war.
The militarisation of Russia’s public schools has intensified since the Russian invasion of Ukraine, driven not by a spontaneous surge of patriotic feeling, but by the government in Moscow.
Russian Education Minister Sergei Kravtsov said recently that there are now about 10,000 so-called “military-patriotic” clubs in Russian schools and colleges, and 250 people take part in their work.
Reports revealed that these clubs are part of the efforts to prepare children for mandatory classes on military-patriotic values among others.
In August, President Vladimir Putin signed a law introducing a new mandatory course in schools: “Fundamentals of Security and Defense of the Motherland.”
The Education Ministry subsequently promoted courses as part of this initiative to include excursions to military units, “military-sports games, meetings with military personnel and veterans,” and classes on drones.
The law makes high school students also be taught to use live ammunition “under the guidance of experienced military unit officers or instructors exclusively at the firing line,” according to the ministry.
CNN said the programme, which is being tested this year and will be introduced in 2024, is designed to instil in the students “an understanding and acceptance of the aesthetics of military uniforms, military rituals and combat traditions.”
Furthermore, modern history is being rewritten too and the standard textbook, ‘History of Russia,’ now has the Crimea Bridge on its cover and a new chapter devoted to the recent history of Ukraine.
The book has sections entitled “Falsification of history,” “Revival of Nazism,” “Ukrainian neo-Nazism,” and “Russia is a country of heroes.”
An extensive survey by CNN of local and social media in Russia found that children as young as seven or eight are receiving basic military training.
In July, for example, children in Belgorod gave themselves call-signs – one adopted “Sledgehammer” – and took part in exercises that included the use of automatic weapons, assembling a machine gun and getting through an obstacle course.
-Vanguard
