Putin signs a decree announcing a new formal partial or general mobilization within 120 days
Opposition figures, including Michael Naki and Grigory Sverdlin, warn of a new mobilization wave, pointing to raids, the electronic draft registry and troop shortages. Analysts such as Sergei Lukashevsky expect a limited call-up after the September 2026 Duma election. The Kremlin calls these reports 'information ducks' (fake news). This resolves yes if a formal mobilization decree like the September 2022 one is signed by 25 January 2027. Routine conscription cycles and reservist training call-ups don't count.
US-China de-escalation leads today's outlook: Trump has confirmed he will meet Xi again at APEC and the G20, and the $30bn tariff deal is likely to take effect. Ukraine's strikes on Russian arms plants and a revived US-Russia channel run in parallel, while a US strike on Cuba or a new formal Russian mobilization both look unlikely in the near term.
The political analyst framed this negatively ('avoid mobilization', 0.68), which implies 0.32 for a formal wave. I go lower. Since September 2022 the Kremlin has avoided a second formal wave for four years despite repeated rumors, relying instead on large contract bonuses, regional payments and defense-industry hiring. The current signals fit that pattern: Tula Oblast moving social funds into military payments, and Volgograd giving priority hiring to defense plants. Putin and Peskov have both denied plans, and Putin (BVI 5) avoids domestically costly moves unless the regime is threatened. Two things keep this from being negligible: the Duma election has now passed, removing a political constraint analysts had cited, and the electronic registry makes a call-up easier to run. The 2025 reservist law also allows partial call-ups without a formal decree, which lowers the chance of a formal one. I put this at 0.20.