A top-level Kremlin policy document discussing post-war political planning and how to neutralize potential ultranationalist discontent has been leaked to the Russian investigative site Dossier Center. Entitled “Images of Victory,” the paper gives a rare insight into the inner workings of Russia’s political machine. Crucially, it shows that while the Kremlin remains officially indifferent to peace talks, behind the scenes apparatchiks are working hard on selling an inevitable stalemate to the Russian people by dressing it up as a species of victory. The document was leaked before President Trump’s announcement today of a three-day ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine.

While the source of the leaked document is unknown, its tone and content seem entirely plausible and its authenticity has not been challenged by the Kremlin even though Dossier is funded by exiled London-based oligarch Mikhail Khodorkovsky. Significantly, the paper warns that continuing the war carries serious dangers for Russia’s economy and society. But in practical terms the policy paper’s focus is how to construct a post-war narrative of why the war was worth it, as well as how to systematically dismantle all potential areas of dissent, first and foremost from a constituency it describes as “armchair patriots.”

The paper was apparently prepared by the staff of Sergei Kiriyenko, a former prime minister who is now deputy head of Putin’s Presidential Administration (PA). He’s the Kremlin’s political manager, in charge of upcoming Duma elections in September. While hardly a dove, Kiriyenko is the opposite of an ideologue – and, importantly, is politically distant from hardliners in the Federal Security Service or FSB, or the military who have been the war’s leading cheerleaders. Kiriyenko is known as a pragmatist whose job it is to keep Putin in power and the political machine running smoothly.

The most immediately striking thing about........

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