Russia is feeling the cost of the war, but Putin’s authority rests on victory, force and fear. Lasting peace would require a political reckoning.

Karl Marx once wrote that theory becomes a material force the moment it grips the masses. Soviet leaders took that line and ran with it – straight into catastrophe – again and again. Vladimir Lenin turned it into a rationale for revolution, while Joseph Stalin used it as a licence to starve and work millions of people to death in pursuit of rapid industrialisation and a “bright future” that never arrived. Nikita Khrushchev, for his part, invoked it to legitimise de-Stalinisation in 1956, as though history could simply be ordered onto a different path.

While the objectives changed, the governing logic remained the same. The Kremlin first decides what reality ought to be, then forces people to conform to its vision, no matter the cost. Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine is the latest chapter in that story, and this summer, the costs are becoming impossible to ignore.

Over the past four years, Ukraine has become remarkably adept at making Russians feel the impact of a war they were never supposed to experience. When Putin launched his “special military operation” in February 2022, Russians were promised a short, victorious campaign that would leave their daily lives untouched. Instead, Ukrainian drones now reach deep into Russian territory, striking oil refineries, factories, and energy infrastructure with increasing regularity.

The cracks are beginning to show: a budget deficit of more than six trillion rubles (US$83.5 bn), soaring inflation and petrol........

© Pearls and Irritations