“It’s none of our business, we have nothing to do with it. We want peace.” In front of a yellow pet food stall on a mud path in Matveev Kurgan, just outside the southern Russian coastal town of Taganrog, the saleswoman in a mint green winter coat makes a helpless impression. Her voice balances between despair, frustration and irritation. Behind her shop are two old, but still ready-to-use Russian tanks sunk in the deep mud. They are remnants of the previous war in 2014, when pro-Russian separatists in Donetsk and Luhansk unilaterally seceded from Ukraine with Russia’s help. New tanks thundered past her for the past two weeks.
Fifteen minutes west, at the Uspenka border crossing, the black-blue-red flag of the self-proclaimed People’s Republic of Donetsk (DNR) hangs limp after a lashing downpour. Under the watchful eye of Russian soldiers, police officers and volunteers from the Russian Popular Front, thousands of women, children and the elderly from the Donetsk region crossed the border on foot or by car in recent days. Fled the violence that swelled to the astonishment of the world in the night from Tuesday to Wednesday into a war between Russia and Ukraine.
The evacuation was halted on Thursday. “It is safe at the front,” DNR leader Denis Pushilin wrote on Telegram.
Remarkably little can be seen in Taganrog on Thursday of that international bewilderment, despair and anger about the announced war. Residents go to work, do their shopping, and apparently sit quietly in the cafe.
The tanks and armored vehicles, which have been spotted on the roads in recent days, have largely disappeared. Departed for their final destination in the DNR, or to military targets in Ukraine. The clearest signal of war is the early morning message that the airspace over southern Russia will be closed. Thousands of Russians were stranded at airports in Rostov, Sochi, Krasnodar, Anapa and Belgorod.
In Taganrog, the war is physically close, but mentally it seems far away. Most residents do not want to answer questions these days. Many seem to have simply missed the news of the real situation – bombing of Ukrainian cities – from the hurricane of state propaganda. Residents who do talk try to put the messages into perspective or to parry them with arguments about Ukrainian war crimes. “And we? Have we not suffered in recent years?”, is the voice heard in many places.
‘They don’t want to listen’
“Russia has to defend itself against the aggression of Ukraine, they have already caused us so much suffering,” said Lyudmila, a neat sixties with black hair and a woolen vest, who works at a hotel in the historic center of the city. “Putin has long tried to persuade them to reason, but they would not listen. Now Kiev has pushed him to the limit; should he not do anything at all?”
There is indignation in her voice. “We want to live peacefully with the Ukrainians, why are they pushing us into this situation? Have you seen the refugees?”
In the border area close to the war, approval for the raid may be heard on the streets, but everywhere else in Russia there were loud voices of protest on Thursday. With the hashtag #Notowar and emotional and shocked posts on social media, prominent Russians expressed their disgust at the events. “Fear and pain. No to war!” popular TV host Ivan Oergant, never an outspoken Putin critic, wrote on Instagram. “We Russians will feel the effects of this day for years to come. Now I only believe the bad prognosis,” celebrity presenter and former presidential candidate Ksenia Sobchak also wrote on Instagram. Because of her father (who died in 2000), the politician Anatoli Sobchak, Sobchak is considered an insider from Putin’s circles.
Veteran political analyst Gleb Pavlovsky told online TV channel Dozhd the horror many Russians feel about the words “denazification” and “purification” used by President Putin to justify the Russian invasion.
Protest against the war
Towards evening, the horror became apparent as residents of 53 Russian cities took to the streets. They responded to a call from Moscow opposition politician Marina Litvinovich, who was herself arrested, to protest against the war from 7 p.m.
The riot police were ready: in total, almost 1,700 Russians were arrested during the protests, including six hundred residents of the capital†
Criticism of Putin and the Kremlin can also have major consequences for journalists. On Thursday, the Russian media watchdog Roskomnadzor warned that media risk fines of up to 50,000 euros for sharing information about the war “that does not come from Russian sources”. Russians who criticize the “special military operation,” as Putin’s invasion has euphemistically called it, think only of their “immediate problems and not of Russia’s security,” Senate Speaker Valentina Matvienko told state news agency Ria Novosti.
But Russians who, for whatever reason, prefer not to speak out at all – not about the war, not about Ukraine, not about the West – can no longer ignore it since Thursday: their country has become an international pariah. During the day, posts and photos of long lines at ATMs in the capital Moscow and in other cities were shared on social media. The ruble fell to an all-time low. Russians can only guess at what will happen to Russia as the effects of heavy Western sanctions become felt.
In a cafe in Taganrog, a boy of about twenty years old is sitting behind the bar on Thursday afternoon, looking at his phone. “Do I follow the news? Naturally. Ukrainian military objects have been destroyed today. Putin is not hiding anything. He started this conflict.”
A version of this article also appeared in NRC on the morning of February 25, 2022