The Ukrainian army’s offensive in the Kursk region has been ongoing for almost two weeks. Almost daily, news reports of Russian soldiers being captured, including conscripts. Authorities in the regions of the Russian Federation, including Tatarstan, are sending humanitarian aid, transferring part of their salaries to help Kursk residents, and declaring their readiness to organize temporary accommodation points for evacuated residents of the region. At the same time, according to Tatarstan political scientist Ruslan Aisin, “there is no smell of sincerity here.”
The Kursk operation of the Ukrainian Armed Forces became a new reality. It completely changed the political and psychological alignment of the war and exposed the weakness and frailty of the Putin regime. At that moment, the disposition became practically the opposite. Russia found itself in the state of a poorly defending side.
It has come to the point that Russian propaganda, which is no longer capable of constructing a false reality, has itself become a victim of attacks from officialdom. Someone has to be appointed as the culprit. The Ministry of Defence is formally being “cleansed” of embezzlers and traitors after the removal of Sergei Shoigu and his team — which means it cannot be such. How so? After all, Putin put a “crystal clear” man with the impeccably speaking surname Belousov at the head of the department. Dissatisfaction with military officials resulted in the rebellion of Yevgeny Prigozhin a year ago. The march on Moscow was stopped then, and the head of the Wagner PMC and his associates were killed.
Now a new march on Moscow – through Kursk. This time by the Ukrainian Armed Forces.
However, the culprits have already been found. They turned out to be Z-bloggers, disseminating false information about the progress of battles with the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) in the border regions of Russia and sowing panic. The toad clashed with the viper. Russian Senator Natalia Kosikhina stated that the entire country is following the events in the border regions, so “military bloggers with millions and half a million followers” are of particular importance. In some cases, “irresponsibility and an adventurous attempt to attract subscribers leads to an increase in anxious moods, and sometimes outright panic,” the senator emphasized. She also noted that Z-bloggers should remember that they are read and watched “not only by Russian citizens but also by Ukrainian special services, who write materials based on this information and send them to our citizens.”
The Kremlin needs a scapegoat. The loud and hate-spewing Z-scribblers have been chosen as the new “fifth column.” They will pick others when these run out. The system has long lived in the paradigm of an endless search for internal and external enemies. These will be used and forgotten. A year ago, the “Wagnerites” were heroes, and then suddenly they became traitors and enemies of the state.
Almost the entire western part of Russia has become a frontline grey zone. The smoke of war spreads inexorably across the territory. Refugees, the dead, the wounded, battles, missile and drone strikes, panic, curses… All this was brought about by Putin, who continues to sow horror. Everyone saw the confused expression on the Kremlin leader’s face during the meeting “on the situation in Kursk,” as he called the Ukrainian Armed Forces’ event. But he is not going to stop yet. Or is he?..
For most Russians living outside the direct combat zone, the war has become routine. Endless reports from the fields are one line long and sound like a familiar background. Tatarstan is also one of them, although Ukrainian drones have flown into the republic. But still, the roar and cannonade of weapons of destruction for locals is somewhere out there – beyond the horizon of events.
Some of the active public on social networks are outraged by the fact that Ukrainian troops entered Kursk and are demonstrating patriotic fervour in every possible way, while others are silent: either in a position of “hostile neutrality” or with a feeling of internal approval of what is happening. But this cannot be expressed publicly – the terror machine will immediately get to such an author.
Officials routinely report that “we are together, like one family.” But there is no scent of sincerity here. Everyone survives alone. Everything is routine and standard. Tatarstan, on the instructions of Rustam Minnikhanov, sent humanitarian aid to residents of Kursk Oblast as part of the “Yardem yanaseh! Help is near!” campaign weighing 80 tons. The president of the republic himself transferred part of his salary to help the victims in Kursk Oblast. It is also stated that Kazan is ready to organize temporary accommodation points for evacuated residents of the region. Nothing new – all this has been going on since 2014.
Mentally, Russia is already disintegrated and torn apart. There can be no talk of any unity or coherence of the territory in a political sense. The feeling of so-called “universal unity in the face of an external threat” is nothing more than a set of words from the Soviet propaganda lexicon. We do not see indignant masses of people storming military registration and enlistment offices in a desire to immediately go to the front to defend the homeland from the enemy or other uplifting actions and activities.
Putin wanted to bind the country in the vice of the “Russian world”, but it turned out to be the opposite. The “Kursk Bulge” bent even more tightly.
Ruslan Aysin is a Tatar activist, publicist and political scientist, currently living in Turkey. He is published on the pages of various Tatar and Russian publications as an expert on national issues and the situation of Islam in Russia. The Russian Ministry of Justice considers him a “foreign agent”, which the publicist himself does not agree with.
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