What four years of war in Ukraine looks like from Russia

0:00Today on State of the World, what four years of war in Ukraine looks like from Russia. You're listening to State of the World from NPR. We bring you the day's most vital international stories, up close where they're happening. I'm Greg Dixon. We recently passed the four-year mark since Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine. But still, the Kremlin isn't calling it a war. It's a special military operation. Whatever you call it, it has become the deadliest conflict in Europe since World War II. with more than a million and a half people dead, injured, or missing, according to Western governments and think tanks.

0:41And throughout the last four years, one of the biggest questions has been hard to answer. Is this what Russians want? NPR's Charles Maines in Moscow tries to find out. This was the scene last May. I was on Red Square watching goose-stepping soldiers, missiles, and tanks as they marched and rumbled over the dark cobblestones.

1:08All of it for a military parade, marking the 80th anniversary of the Soviet Union's victory over Nazi Germany in World War II. And yet what I kept hearing about was another victory, one that hadn't happened yet, over fascism in Ukraine. Our grandparents did everything to defeat the Nazi threat, and we'll do the same now that it's raised its head again, said Yevgeny Viltin, a lieutenant colonel in the Russian army. Yulia Belikova said her son was proudly serving on the front while she worked with military families at home. We know what we're doing and why, she told me. I also ran into Alexander Boroday, a key figure in Russia's initial shadow war in eastern Ukraine more than a decade ago, before the full-scale invasion.

1:54Now a member of parliament and sanctioned by the West, Boroday told me he still didn't know when, but victory in Ukraine was coming. Yes, it's taken longer and been harder than we would have liked in Ukraine, thanks to interference by the West, said Boroday. But we'll get there, and we're willing to pay any price.

2:16In today's Russia, history can feel like a feedback loop. The past echoed, amplified, and accelerated to distort the present. We absolutely fundamentally speak about that we're fighting with neo-nazist. For four years, in speech after speech, Russian President Vladimir Putin has drawn parallels between the fight against Nazis then and the current military campaign against supposed fascists in Kiev.

2:43And for four years, the Kremlin leader has insisted Russians remain united behind the war effort in Ukraine, one that's dragged on far longer than many predicted, even longer than the Soviet Union's battles against Hitler's armies. This illusion of a unified country that can go to any lengths to achieve what Putin wants to achieve, I would say it's one of the strongest weapons. That's Alexei Mignailo, an opposition activist who launched Chronicles, a research project to counter what he argues is weaponized polling in favor of the war. To create some kind of illusion of overwhelming support. Mignailo says in an environment where criticism of the Russian invasion is criminalized, Of course, a vast majority of Russians say they support the military campaign.

3:27It's out of self-preservation. Yet when presented with more nuanced choices, for example, would you support a decision to withdraw forces early or prefer government resources be devoted elsewhere, a truer picture emerges. We don't have any kind of pro-war majority, and consistently much more people choose to end the war without reaching goals, but sooner than fighting till victory. In other words, the answers you get depend on the questions you ask.

4:02In smaller towns like Livni, some 300 miles to the south of the capital, the war mostly thrives on conformity, money, and fear, says Irina Turbina. Her son Arseni, serving a five-year jail term for his anti-war views. He was just 15 years old, a precocious eighth grader with a love for physics, Real Madrid, and opposition politics, when mass government security agents stormed their apartment in 2023. He was later convicted on terrorism charges for aiding the Ukrainian army, a crime Arseny denies and his mother maintains was fabricated.

4:40My boy is now a terrorist. Can you understand that? A terrorist. A lot of people are suffering because they don't agree with Russia's position towards Ukraine, because they thought what was happening was wrong and couldn't stay silent. Amid Arseny's legal troubles, Turbina has watched as neighbors and colleagues avoided contact or gone out of their way to show support for the Russian invasion, just in case she suspects. Meanwhile, others in town have gone off to fight, with army enlistment bonuses and state bereavement payouts and the tens of thousands of dollars transforming the local economy.

5:16These payments are beyond many people's wildest dreams, but it's all at the expense of those who sign up for the war, because most of them in their previous lives never knew that kind of money.

5:31The government's ability to preserve a sense of normalcy has been key to maintaining public morale, says Sergei Politaev, a supporter of the war effort who writes for the politics blog Vat4. Of course people are tired, because it's a war of attrition. People are exhausted, on the front lines and in the factories, but the rest of society goes on with their lives. They go to work, buy apartments, go out to eat. And it's true. Despite wave after wave of Western sanctions, Russia's economy has performed far better than anyone predicted. Even amid more recent signs of mounting economic troubles, Politaev insists Russians can adapt, because they always have.

6:14This is the sixth economic crisis in my lifetime, and it's far from the worst.

6:22Yet there's a growing sense that amid a conflict with no immediate end in sight, the state's need for control too knows no bounds. Last fall, the arrest of musicians from the band Stop Time over their performance of anti-war cover songs on the streets of St. Petersburg made global headlines. In court, the group's singer, 18-year-old Diana Loganova, who goes by the stage name Naoka, said they were just playing songs they like to a public that wants to hear them.

6:54She and another band member have since fled the country, but the case has served as a reminder. Wartime censorship laws dictate what Russians can hear, watch, read and share. They impact everyone.

7:09Putin made a huge strategic mistake with this war, says Viktor Yarafeyev, one of Russia's leading contemporary writers, and now among the ranks of hundreds of thousands of Russians living in exile. These days, Yarafeyev often writes about what went wrong in his homeland, what he and others could have done differently. Why do I write these things? Because I feel guilty too, that I could have done more. These are dark times, argues Yarafeyev. Russia may be stuck in an endless war in Ukraine, but its might makes right worldview. What Yarafeyev calls barbarism is on the march everywhere, including the U.S.

7:47Today, America's future is as unpredictable as Russia's, warns Yarafeyev, adding one key difference. Russians, he says, we're used to it. Charles Maines, NPR News, Moscow.

8:08That's the state of the world from NPR. Thanks for listening.

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