What lies behind Russian support for Putin's war in Ukraine?

“You could have done this before “, this woman told Radio Free Europe as she spoke through tears and anger and while her son was looking, she reflected on our common “account in the years 5090. In the Soviet Union, everyone stood up. Everybody. Where are you now? Why don't you stand up to protest? Why do you trust [Russian president Vladimir Putin]? Why don't you protect your sons, your children? Stand up, please. Protect them. I'm begging you”

Although the collapse of the Soviet Union was initially sparked after mass protests dating back to the late 1980s in the Baltic states, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia and other non-Russian republics had also protested the world. We March 10, 1991For example, 500,000 Moscows gathered outside the Kremlin, demanding the resignation of Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev and the breakup of the Soviet Union.

But now Russian opposition to the war in Ukraine has been limited to some relatively modest gatherings, protests with one person, signing petitions and open letters, and postings on social networks. O VD-Info, a nongovernmental organisation that monitors political repression, has reported that over 14,200 people have been arrested throughout Russia in anti-war activities.

Thousands of anti-war protesters in Ukraine arrested in Russia

Moreover, many who oppose the war have left Russia either in recent years or since Putin began his invasion of Ukraine on February 24. Despite international sanctions and rubling, tens of thousands of Russians have left the state since the beginning of the month.

Russians assault Armenia because of war in Ukraine

At the same time, however, there has been no massive display of support for the war either government-organised or spontaneous support during the first days of the invasion. Later, such demonstrations began to appear, most of which were tied to the symbol "ZEC" that was drawn to many of the machines of the Russian invading forces.

According to some reports, in these demonstrations, such as “peace projectors”, which was held in Kazan in Tatarstan on March 10th, turnout was mandatory.

As the war in Ukraine is in the third week, there is no clear picture of the perception of public opinion in Russia because two decades of Putin's authoritarian rule have made it impossible to have a detailed and reliable measurement of public perception. Independent polls and sociologists have been marginalised, while a self-dance reigns over the population of this state that has numerous ways of persecuting dissidents.

Putin's War Heritage

Poll agencies, which are controlled by the state, have published some results allegedly showing strong support for the war. One of these agencies, controlled by the Russian government, V. TsIOM claimed on March 5th that 71 percent of Russians support what the Russian state calls the special military operation “=x1> in Ukraine. On March 3rd, another state-controlled agency, FOM, reported that in a survey conducted on 25-27 February, 65 percent of Russians surveyed supported the war.

An independent survey, commissioned by CNN just days before the launch of the Russian occupation, found that 50 per cent of Russians said it would be “right for Russia to use military force to prevent Ukraine's NATO membership... and if it is threatened by foreign activity in former Soviet states”. These are the two narrators Putin has used to justify Russian aggression against Ukraine.

The accuracy and dynamicity of such figures is hard to measure in Russia, but data suggests that a considerable portion of the population support Government, and it is not difficult to find Russians who say the same thing.

I'm here for Putin”, a woman said on March 3rd, when Time's journalists tried to show pictures of Ukraine's destruction. “I support Putin. I don't even want to see the pictures. I'm with Putin. I support Putin in everything”.

Various thoughts about war, in some cases, have caused great division among friends but also in family reports.

Yekaterina, a 28-year-old winner coach at Rostov-on-Don, located close to the Ukrainian border, told Free Europe Radio that her mother is loyally protecting Putin, that she is feeling she is no longer getting to know her mother.

Its main argument was: There is nothing we can do and nothing is up to us, said Yekaterina, who asked that her last name be not published because of her controversy over the war. “Later its argument was even worse: They asked for our help. The war didn't rock my mother, it didn't give her any emotion. I've been shocked with her reaction”

“Now I ask myself, who is this woman?”, she added, stressing that her mother “has been crying” every year on May 9th for Soviet sacrifices in World War II. This date in Russia is marked as Victory Day. Do I know my mother? How can I live with a person who gets so cold-hearted for a war that's been started by her government?

Victoria, a 24-year-old from Rostov-on-Don, who also asked not to be published her last name, had a similar experience like Yekaterina.

A day after the start of the war was my mother's 45th birthday and I went home, even though I didn't know if I should have gone”, she told me. We agreed not to talk about politics, but I could hear how she and Dad were watching the news on TV and were commenting on everything: We're defending our right, we haven't done this to Ukrainians. I came to go to my room and scream. But I knew that this would serve nothing to”.

For the first time in my life, I have felt really ashamed and disgusted by my parents”, she said. And since then, I've rarely talked to them.

The frenzies that the Kremlin has pushed forward throughout the entire military campaign in Ukraine have been cultivated in schools, museums, films, state-controlled televisions and elsewhere since Putin took power in 2000.

Since the beginning of the years, Russia has experienced a rebirth of patriotic mobilization”, it said in a report in 2018 of the Crisis Group. “This resurrection is not spontaneous: it is supported by a joint state effort to instill patriotic values, praise Russia's military past, and promote the renewal of Moscow as a world power. This mobilization appears to have helped build the support of ordinary citizens for Moscow's foreign policy, including for a tougher stance towards the West and interventions in former Soviet sphere states”, it was said in the report.

This great effort includes textbooks and academic programs <x0patriotic”, the ritual of the Immortal Regiment and cult for the Soviets' role in World War II, the financing of films “patriotic” and museum programmes, the cultivation of homesickness for the Soviet Union and the rehabilitation of Soviet dictator Josep Stalin's image. In addition, a historical “chain has been created that aims to present the Kremlin's view of the country's 1,000-year history.

"Psicologically impossible"

Writer Svetlana Aleksievich, Nobel Prize laureate in an interview The REL on March 5th said that “all the money Russia has earned over the years has gone to propaganda and the army”.

The result, according to her, has been to fuel an aggressiveness for most of Russian society.

I recently developed a conversation with a Russian in Berlin”, she said. “E sees a person who has a good car, dressed in good clothes, but there was so much hatred in it when he spoke of Ukraine”.

It is difficult for Russia to prove the role of aggressors, to identify with Nazi aggressors who have also bombed Kiev [during World War II]”, he said. This is psychologically impossible for most of society”.

Sociologist Iskander Jasaveyev, who lives in Kazan, has protested the war. He also said there are aggressive tensions in Russian society.

I'm not a psychologist, but I think some kind of internal tension is rising among people. I understand they're lying. They're feeding on propaganda. But, they want to be deceived”, he said. The “is easier for them, easier for them to suppress internal conflict”.

While such factors prevent the interruption of support for such a war, Yasaveyev said Russian society could be <x0 quadrupted” quickly if military losses and economic consequences from sanctions increase.

A considerable number will start to compare their situation with what was reported to the media”, he said. “and inevitably they will realize that they have been lied to and fed with propaganda”. / REL