Syrian regime’s president Bashar al-Assad issued Legislative Decree No. (20) of 2024, reducing the age for mandatory military service from 40 to 38 years.
According to the first article of the legislative decree, published yesterday, Thursday, August 1, by the official Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA), the age mentioned in Article (26) of the 2007 Military Service Law and its amendments is revised to 38 instead of 40.
The decree also allows those summoned for reserve service to pay a cash alternative for the reserve service, provided that their medical examination results show they are either minimally disabled or partially disabled but capable of performing the service.
The decree also allows exemption from reserve service for a military individual who has served in voluntary service for ten years, according to the new volunteer contract (Combatant Contract).
The volunteer contract issued on November 21, 2023, called the “Combatant Contract,” includes two service periods: five years and ten years. The contract for both periods includes a salary of up to 1,300,000 Syrian pounds, including compensations (each US dollar equals 14,800 Syrian pounds according to the specialized S-P Today website).
Since the beginning of this year, the Syrian regime has sought to approve amendments to mandatory and reserve military service after more than 13 years since the outbreak of the Syrian revolution and the erosion of the military institution.
With the frontlines cooling processes initiated by international and regional actors involved in the Syrian file, Russia began training units of the Syrian army on advanced warfare tactics in an attempt to establish what the Russian Ministry of Defense previously called “modern air forces.”
Recently, the Syrian regime issued a series of decisions related to the military institution. During an interview with Syrian Al-Ekhbariya channel, Director of the General Administration in the Ministry of Defense, Major General Ahmed Suleiman, said these decisions aim to create a “modern and advanced professional army,” by order of Bashar al-Assad.
Since mid-last year, the Syrian Ministry of Defense has repeatedly called for volunteers in its forces, offering “attractive” wages that surpass those earned by workers in the Syrian military sector. It has also unusually specified the duration of military service.
On June 28, the Harmoon Center for Contemporary Studies published a study titled “Restructuring the Army in the New Syria” with figures on the manpower of the Syrian army. The study mentioned that the number of regular military personnel before the Syrian revolution in 2011 was about 430,000, while the numbers declined in 2021 to 120,000 according to the study.
At the same time, the study estimated the number of security personnel in Syria in 2011 to be 150,000, which decreased to 70,000 in 2021.