Allegedly he's not gathering people from Moscow or St Petersburg etc, he's going to the shitty poor areas of Russia, the territories on the edge.All bullshit and propaganda aside - press ganging folks to be canon fodder in a failing war is one of the things that bring autocratic regimes down?? (Not in isolation admittedly)
The idea is that the only people he has to really keep from ballsing things up with are these fairly affluent central types. Russia is so insanely massive, and disjointed, he can herd up them outer lads and nobody is really going to know or care hugely.