Not long ago, Moscow’s propaganda was full of predictions of an unstoppable march and the final defeat of Kyiv this year. Things change — now the Kremlin’s mouthpieces accept that there are problems and are blaming an angry God and Russia’s own citizens for the army’s failures.
The Orthodox Church, led by Putin’s close ally Patriarch Kirill, insists the authorities are not to blame for the war spreading to Russian territory, since this was the fulfillment of God’s will. God permitted the defeat in Kursk to punish Russians for allowing abortions and continuing to live for themselves, the church’s spokesmen say.
A simple recipe is offered to overcome the negative trend: spend everything on the purchase of drones and get in line at military registration and enlistment offices. Otherwise, the preachers warn, there will be new defeats.
Former spy Andrey Bezrukov, now a member of the Council on Foreign and Defense Policy and an associate professor at Moscow State Institute of International Relations (MGIMO), does not differ greatly from the religious ideologues. He argues the nation is obliged to unite in periods of hardship, and the captured territories are “trifles” in comparison with the suffering, which has regularly befallen the Russian people.
He argues it will be impossible to defend the entire population, and that Russia is strong precisely because “it does not react to trifles.”Furthermore, anyone who says otherwise is an enemy provocateur.
Military analysts also assure their audiences that driving Ukrainians from the border territories will not protect the civilian population, and there is no hurry while the focus is on “cleansing the entire territory of Ukraine.”
Anatoliy Savenko, from the Regnum website, told his readers that the incursion into Kursk had backfired on the Ukrainians as they had discovered that the town of Sudzha was a well-built and a “European” city. This amounted to a severe psychological blow, he said.
Meanwhile, residents of the Kursk region have carried out their own investigation into the way the money intended to protect the region was spent. Predictably, it turned out, God was not to blame for what happened, nor were abortions or empty lines at recruiting offices. Instead, as so often, the answer lies in the banality of Russian corruption.
Construction of border fortifications was supposed to have begun in the fall of 2022, according to state contracts. The reality was different, and no work was observed by locals or the Ukrainian Armed Forces, despite a total of 12 billion rubles ($131 million) being earmarked for the work and contracts being signed, according to the documents. Even now, against the backdrop of the Ukrainian offensive, only one shelter, with a capacity of 10 people, has appeared in the Kursk region.
Residents still blame Ukraine, NATO, and local officials for what is happening in Kursk rather than Putin. But that might change if the federal authorities continue to drag their feet recapturing the region.
The propaganda narrative justifying the incursion, as well as possible new territorial losses, was not chosen by chance. The Kremlin lacks the resources to rapidly liberate the seized territories while pursuing its goals in Ukraine, and border defenses in other front-line territories are likely to be as poor as those in the Kursk region.
Military analysts strongly favor using the National Guard and security forces to liberate the occupied Russian territories and warn any delay would be “like death” and lead to a societal crisis. But in practice, it is not so simple.
Since the beginning of the Ukrainian offensive in Kursk, the authorities have stepped up efforts to persuade people to sign up for contract service. In August, the number of posts mentioning the recruitment website Sluzhbapokontraktu.rf increased fivefold, and the reach of publications was 5.8 times higher than the average number of views since the site’s launch in November 2022.
In August, the Moscow mayor’s office ordered advertising for contract service in the Yandex social advertising service for the first time. This has been taken up in other Russian regions, and recruitment bodies have become more effective at promoting themselves on social networks and on TV.
But even with ever bigger cash payments to entice recruits and promises of employment in state-owned companies if people sign up, not enough are being attracted to the frontline. Propagandists continue to insist that “the invasion of the Kursk region has failed” and Russia is becoming stronger, but these mantras no longer seem to be working.
Kseniya Kirillova is an analyst focused on Russian society, mentality, propaganda, and foreign policy. The author of numerous articles for CEPA and the Jamestown Foundation, she has also written for the Atlantic Council, Stratfor, and others.
Europe’s Edge is CEPA’s online journal covering critical topics on the foreign policy docket across Europe and North America. All opinions expressed on Europe’s Edge are those of the author alone and may not represent those of the institutions they represent or the Center for European Policy Analysis. CEPA maintains a strict intellectual independence policy across all its projects and publications.
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