Russia will Remain Divided in a Variety of Ways Even after War in Ukraine Ends, Volkov Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Jan. 21 – Putin’s expanded war in Ukraine has divided Russians generally between a small majority which supports it and a smaller minority that opposes it, a division that parallels the division in society between those who support the Kremlin leader generally and those who oppose his policies, Denis Volkov says.

            That has been widely recognized; but polls and focus groups suggest, the Levada Center sociologist says that such divisions will last for long after the war ends and that “the return to a peaceful life” won’t happen easily either for those who fought in Ukraine and for those, the majority, who didn’t (levada.ru/2026/01/21/kak-obshhestvo-otnositsya-k-uchastnikam-svo/).

            One of the divisions that will likely continue, Volkov says, is between residents of major cities who haven’t served in the war and believe that those who have done so from poorer regions and republics beyond the ring road have done so primarily as a way of earning money, a calculation the urban residents don’t understand.

            But a deeper one is between those who did not serve but are anxious about the impact of returning veterans on social and political life and those who did serve and expect to be taken care of and even deferred to because of their service. Volko says that this division will exacerbate existing divisions.

Volkov says that “almost all focus group participants noted it will be difficult for former soldiers to cope with PTSD … and return to civilian life." And they suggest, he continues, that "the longer they stay there, the harder it will be for them to adapt later,” difficulties that will be shared by their wives and children as well as for society as a whole.

According to the Levada Center expert, “Citizens see the state's role in the return of participants in the special military operation to civilian life primarily in organizing psychological rehabilitation for both the veterans themselves and their families, providing quality medical care, employment, benefits, but also in supervising former prisoners.”

However, Volkov continues, “the policy of assisting military veterans, coupled with promised benefits and general signs of respect from the state, may inadvertently exacerbate mutual animosity between those who served and the rest of society,” one the regime is inadvertently promoting.

Participants in focus groups say that is because “now in every questionnaire for a child, you have to indicate whether the parents are participants in the special military operation or not,” a potentially dangerous move given that, in their words, “to pay someone, you have to take away something from someone else.”  

Volkov points to another development that participants in focus groups often remark upon: the experience of combat has led some veterans to have “a heightened sense of justice,” something they will return with and become the basis for protests against injustice in Russian life generally and Russian officialdom in particular.

In short, he concludes, while fears about a crime wave in the wake of a mass return of veterans are real and have attracted the most attention, these concerns may not prove to be the most important and long-term consequences of that development, one that many in Russia expect will happen relatively soon.