In the three months since #Russia launched a full-scale invasion of #Ukraine, the general mood among the elites in #Moscow has flipped more than once. In early March, insiders told Meduza that President Putin’s decision to go to war horrified most #Kremlin and ministerial officials, who feared that Western #sanctions would ruin their careers and maybe even their lives. Shortly thereafter, however, a “patriotic surge” took hold. By April, several prominent figures were calling publicly to fight “to the bitter end.”
Now, three months into the #war, pessimism is staging a comeback. “It won’t be possible to live like before. Any talk of development is out the window. But life goes on. There are gray imports. There’s trade with #China and #India,” said a source close to the prime minister’s cabinet.
At the same time, officials in the Kremlin still see no realistic scenario in which President #Putin could end the hostilities in Ukraine and retain his high approval rating in Russia. As Meduza reported previously, the administration’s domestic policy team has been brainstorming strategies to “withdraw with dignity” since just a few weeks into the invasion, but officials have yet to come up with anything.

https://meduza.io/en/feature/2022/05/24/almost-nobody-is-happy-with-putin #eu #economy #donbas #georgia #southossetia #belarus