Black Widows and Wives for Hire

In the summer of 2025, a court ruling in Bryansk brought to light the first officially confirmed Russian case of a sham marriage designed to profit from a soldier’s death. According to the court, a 37-year-old woman married 40-year-old volunteer Sergei Khandozhko solely to gain access to state benefits if he was killed in the war.

The wedding took place the day before he left for the front. As soon as Khandozhko left the village, his wife resumed living with her actual partner. She nevertheless continued to work at the military commissariat responsible for recruiting new soldiers.

The case was far from unique. Similar arrangements had already been reported, and the phenomenon became widespread enough to give rise to a term for the women involved: “black widows”.

Who Gets the Payout?

In December 2025, a bill targeting such marriages was introduced in the State Duma but failed to pass. Some Russian regions have nevertheless introduced measures of their own. In June this year, the Legislative Assembly of the Amur Region passed a law limiting financial benefits for women deemed to have entered such marriages. Critics warn, however, that genuine widows could also be affected.

The difficulty is distinguishing a sham marriage from a genuine one. A wedding shortly before a soldier leaves for the front does not necessarily indicate fraud. After his death, however, his relatives may allege that the marriage was fictitious because, if the widow is disqualified, the benefits instead go to his parents or siblings.

The resulting court battles often pit a widow against her mother-in-law. On 8 July, a Russian court ordered the first divorce involving a soldier listed as missing in action and a woman it regarded as his “black” widow. If the man is eventually declared killed in action, she will receive nothing from the state and the benefits will pass to other relatives.

You might be interested War-Weary Ukrainian Children Recover in the Carpathians

What a Soldier’s Death Is Worth

The sums at stake help explain why such cases have become a recurring feature of the war.

Compensation for the family of a fallen Russian soldier comes in several parts. Presidential compensation amounts to five million rubles (approximately €53,200 or $61,400), while a separate one-time payment provided for by law is three million rubles (approximately €31,900 or $36,900). Families may also receive insurance payouts and payments from regional authorities.

Yet even relatives whose claims are uncontested often struggle to obtain the money to which they are entitled. Some receive only part of the promised compensation, while others wait months for payments or official recognition.

Statement spoke to Yulia, a 26-year-old Russian widow from the Ivanovo region. Her husband, Alexander K., was killed during the invasion of Ukraine. His funeral took place in his hometown after a church service in November 2025.

“Not all the benefits have arrived yet. Only my son receives his orphan’s allowance regularly. The posthumous military decorations promised to my husband have still not been awarded, and my older son has not yet received confirmation of his status as a family member of a SVO soldier”, Yulia said.

SVO is the Russian acronym for the propaganda term “special military operation”, which the Kremlin uses to refer to the war against Ukraine. Yulia’s older son was four years old at the time of the funeral. Her younger son was just two weeks old, having been born only days before his father’s death.

“While the government talks about the need to increase the birth rate and praises the family traditions of the Caucasus peoples, many Russian wives and mothers are paying the price for the never-ending war, and Russian children are growing up without their fathers”, Yulia added.

How Russia Fills Its Ranks

The scale of Russia’s war effort provides the backdrop to these disputes.

Following the announcement of partial mobilization on 21 September 2022, the Kremlin called up 300,000 men, according to Russian officials. The mobilization formally ended in late October.

According to a tally by Mediazona and the BBC’s Russian service, at least 236,066 Russian military personnel have been identified by name as having been killed since the full-scale invasion began. The true toll is substantially higher: the Center for Strategic and International Studies estimates that Russia suffered around 1.4 million military casualties between February 2022 and June 2026, including between 400,000 and 450,000 deaths.

Other estimates put Russian military deaths as high as 518,000 and total casualties – including the wounded and missing – at up to 1.5 million, equivalent to roughly 3% of Russia’s pre-war male population of mobilization age.

But the men called up during the partial mobilization make up only part of Russia’s fighting force. Many Russians have sought ways to avoid compulsory military service and mobilization, sometimes paying for advice on how to do so. At the same time, large numbers of soldiers have reached the front after signing contracts with the Russian Ministry of Defense, either voluntarily or under pressure.

Soldiers serving under such contracts – regardless of their nationality or citizenship – are often described in Russia and abroad as “volunteers”, and some frontline units consist predominantly or entirely of them.

Russian law formally distinguishes between contract soldiers (контрактник) and volunteers (доброволец). Following legislative changes in June 2023, however, most of those distinctions disappeared. The changes came shortly before Yevgeny Prigozhin’s mutiny later that month. In practice, Russian troops are now broadly divided between those serving under Defense Ministry contracts and those who were mobilized.

Airborne Forces Day celebrations in occupied Donetsk on 2 August 2026. Photo: Alexander Ermochenko/Reuters

Ukraine’s Marriage Loophole

Ukraine has seen a different form of fraud.

Although the phenomenon of “black widows” has not become widespread there, sham marriages do occur. Some Ukrainian women with disabilities have offered to marry draft-age men for several thousand euros. The men could then leave the country with their new wives and avoid serving in the Ukrainian army.

The Center for Strategic and International Studies estimates that Ukraine suffered between 525,000 and 625,000 military casualties between February 2022 and June 2026, including between 125,000 and 150,000 fatalities. Like Moscow, Kyiv officially acknowledges substantially lower losses.

In both countries, the fate of soldiers listed as missing creates further problems for their families.

In Russia, fallen soldiers may remain officially classified as missing for long periods, preventing relatives from claiming death benefits or even holding a symbolic funeral. Investigative journalists working in exile attribute the problem partly to efforts by Moscow to limit expenditure and partly to disorganized military records resulting from the chaotic nature of combat operations on parts of the front.

Russian families can turn to the courts, which may declare a missing serviceman to have been killed in action.

In Ukraine, family members can apply for state support even if a serviceman has been captured by Russia or declared missing in action. Unlike compensation following a confirmed combat death, however, such payments are not granted automatically and relatives must apply to the relevant authorities.

The family of a fallen Ukrainian serviceman is entitled to a total of 15 million hryvnias (approximately €290,000 or $335,000), paid to the eligible beneficiaries.

Payments can also be delayed. Ukrainian Ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets has said that misconduct by some Territorial Recruitment and Social Support Centers, frontline commanders and Defense Ministry officials has contributed to delays in one-time payments to soldiers’ families. Ukrainian lawyers have reported similar problems.