Transcript of AE 1127 - Voices of Russia

G'day, you mob and welcome to another episode of the Aussie English Podcast.

Whilst creating the previous Voices of Ukraine episode, I felt the need to also reach out to my Russian friends in order to create an episode sharing their voices and experience regarding the war in Ukraine. Specifically, I wanted to ask them three questions.

What are you hearing in the news in Russia?

What are your thoughts on the conflict and the thoughts of those around you?

And, How has the conflict impacted your life?

The goal of this episode isn't to shame, blame, or vilify Russian people, but to instead share their personal views and experiences in order to hopefully give us a deeper insight into how Russians and those with mixed Russian-Ukrainian heritage view the war and how it's being sold to them by Putin.

So, this war is incredibly complex in how it came about. But before we go any further, I do want to firmly put on the record that I believe the war is absolutely disgusting and a needlessly aggressive move on behalf of Putin and the Kremlin.

Whilst I have heard arguments made that the US, Europe, and NATO have been perceived by Russia as threatening them over the past decade or more, I don't think that can ever be used for justifying the Russian annexation of Crimea in 2014, nor the current invasion of Ukraine.

Putin is trying to rebuild his personal fantasy of what the Soviet Union was in the past by taking sovereign states like Ukraine by force, all at the expense of these countries and their people's property, dignity, and lives, whilst also sacrificing the present and future well-being of his own people in Russia.

In order to justify an indefensible war on the Ukrainian people, he's tightened his grip around information that Russian people receive in the following ways:

Referring to Putin's war as a 'war' or 'invasion' is now a crime that can be punished by huge fines and up to 15 years in jail.

Social media websites like Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube have been banned.

Independent news sources have been shut down, and the only information available to Russians is now in the form of state run media outlets on TV.

This is all in an attempt to make sure that the Russian people only hear Putin's narrative about this "special operation" and how it's unfolding so that he can maintain popularity and support whilst trying to rebuild his deluded idea of the Russian empire.

Here is Russian born American journalist Julia Ioffe speaking on PBS Amanpour and Company recently. The link to the full interview will be in the show notes. Here she lays out the kind of reality that Russians are living in currently and the information they're receiving about the war in Ukraine.

You just interviewed one of the few independent pollsters in Russia who said that about two thirds of the people there support this war. I'm not sure what to believe about what people tell pollsters here or especially in Russia. But, you know, you were born in Russia, you've studied in Russia, you speak Russian. Tell me what your sense is about the Russian people. What they feel about this war.

It's very hard to gauge now more than ever because Russia has become kind of a black box with the shutting down of the last vestiges of Russian independent media. And because now people can be fined or go to jail for up to 15 years for even calling this war a war or deviating from the line about the war set by the Kremlin. So, if it was hard to poll people in Russia before, now it's gotten that much harder. You know, especially if you're polling older people who were born and lived in the Soviet Union and you have somebody from an official sounding organisation calling and asking you, "Do you like Vladimir Putin?". You know, what are you going to say?

The other thing, though, that's important to note is that Russians support the war that they're being told about, but it's not the war that's actually happening. The war they're being told about, again, in this informational vacuum is one that is very limited to the east. It's a liberating these breakaway these Astroturf breakaway republics. They're being told that Russians are being greeted as liberators. They're being told that there are no casualties, that the Russian army is purposely avoiding targeting Ukrainian civilians, that they're being extremely careful and kind to them. They're being told that there are very minimal losses in the Russian army.

They're not being told that the Russian army is purposely targeting civilians in this kind of punitive Chechen-Syrian style campaign. They're not being told that there is stiff Ukrainian resistance, not just from the military, but from the population. That Ukrainians are telling pretty much every Russian soldier they encounter "We didn't want you here. We didn't invite you here."

And so I wonder what their impression would be if they knew what was actually going on, which is, of course, the point.

So hopefully Julia has set the stage for the rest of this episode where you'll hear from Russians as well as people of both Ukrainian and Russian descent living either in Ukraine, Russia, or abroad.

Lastly, I'm under no illusions that as an Australian and Westerner, I am exposed to misinformation and disinformation as well as propaganda in my own country and other Western countries via the media. However, hopefully we can all agree what's currently going on in Russia with the complete suppression of free speech and no free media is a completely different Orwellian kettle of fish, which is starting to give North Korea a run for its money.

On that note, if you haven't read George Orwell's 1984, now is a very good time to do it.

So, Here are the voices of Russia answering the very first question. What are you hearing in the news?

We know the official version that it was just military operation to protect people in Donbass from genocide. Nothing threatens the civilians. And also we can read something like Kharkiv was totally destroyed by Russian bombs or something else like that. And it's really hard to know what is truth and what is not.

In official Russian news said that Russia is saving Russian speaking people from a Ukrainian nationalist who are part of militaristic groups such as Azov. So, and these groups create a genocide against Russian speaking people who have been living in Donetsk and Lugansk. So, this is [the] main idea and they explain that Russia is actually again [is] fighting against Nazism.

Donetsk and Lugansk territories wanted to be autonomous after the illegal change of power in Ukraine in 2014. But Ukraine did not agree to recognise their turnover. Russia did not officially intervene in the conflict but provided humanitarian assistance to the eastern territories of Ukraine. Recently, a huge amount of military equipment from NATO has been supplied to Ukraine. Russia began to worry about its security, not to refuse to sign the agreement that Ukraine would not join NATO and would not move military equipment towards Russian territory. The last straw was that Ukraine threatened to become a nuclear country. In response to these events, Russia officially recognised Donetsk and Lugansk republics and signed [a] mutual assistance agreement that... with them. After that Russia launched a military operation to Demilitarise Ukraine.

Because I listen to different channels, news channels, not only Russian, such as [at the] present time, you know, Radio Freedom, maybe T-Rain before they had banned. And I hear a lot of different information. But if you mean the Russian channels, yes, of course, they are full of war propaganda. They call it "special military operation", but of course, it's bullshit. It's a war. Of course, I don't support this war. I think it's [a] war between Mr. Putin and Ukraine, not between Russia and Ukraine. I didn't say "my president" because I didn't vote for him.

Unfortunately, it is true that the Russian government showed propaganda that poisoned a lot of minds not only of Russian people, but out of people in the rest of the world. It's using different methods. For example: two parts different media channels and social media. They typically manipulate information about Ukrainians, it's nationalists, and terrorists. The Russian propaganda and Putin calls it an "operation" to save Donbass. But that's not true. But what I call it is that it's a total war and Ukraine, as a sovereign nation, that they want to destroy it's democracy that people build. And what I really think is Russia is heading to become a fascist state in my eyes, and even beat Somalia in brutality and dedication to destroy[ing] cities and innocent lives.

Well, it's true that the Russian government has been showing propaganda to people ever since Putin came to power. So all independent media channels were nationalised and people essentially have been getting news from just one source of information for 20 plus years. And the government has been living by the famous quote from the Nuremberg trials, from Hermann Goering, that "the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. All you have to do is tell them that they're being attacked and announce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger."

So, that's basically what Putin is doing. He's telling Russians that Ukraine is full of fascists and nationalists and that Russia is the country that beat fascism in the Second World War. And it's a very painful part of history, the Second World War, for Russians, where obviously the country had the most human losses from all the allied countries. And essentially every family has someone who died in that war. So the propaganda exploits that pain and tells the people of Russia that there are currently fascists in Ukraine that want to murder the Russian people. So, they're saying things like "the Ukrainian government is developing biological weapons that targets particularly the Russian population." He's saying things like "they have all been paid by the American government. We are brotherhood nations and the Americans bought the Ukrainian government and we need to free and liberate the Ukrainian people." They're also saying, like the casualties and everything that that is happening in Ukraine, the way they are portraying it is that that's the Ukrainian army, that they're... That that causes all the deaths and the casualties, because the Russians came as liberators and they're saying, "just put down your weapons and there will be no casualties. But it's the Ukrainian army that's fighting because they're nationalists and fascists."

So, that's basically the way they're twisting the information. And as we speak yesterday on the prime media news and the prime propaganda news, there was a riot. A lady on air on the news jumped at the back of the news with a poster saying, "No war. This is propaganda. Don't believe it.". She will probably be arrested and put in a psychiatry department for that. She's a mother of two. And they will probably show on state media channels and write everywhere that she was a psycho. But she wasn't a psycho. She was a hero. And a lot a lot a lot of Russian people do not support this, do not believe in the propaganda. And it's just... It's a tragedy.

Wow. Okay. So, the people of Russia are being told that this quote-unquote, "special operation", that is, in my opinion, an unjust war, is a mission to save their country from becoming vulnerable to attack and to save the Russian speakers in the east of Ukraine from, "Nazis".

These claims have been shown to be completely false by experts across the board and which have been fabricated by Putin in order to create a monster to fight and garner support from the Russian population. Fortunately, as the voices in this episode attest, many Russians are onto what Putin is doing and are aware of the propaganda being spewed out to the masses. Thousands of people have already gone out onto the streets in Russia to protest and sadly have been arrested by police and hauled off to police stations and even sent to jail. So, the bravery of many Russians cannot be understated.

Before we continue, though, I thought I'd cover a few points about the hypocrisy from Putin in relation to his claims of Nazism and Ukraine.

Firstly, Putin has been shown to have hired the Wagner Group who are connected to actual white supremacist Nazis in order to try and assassinate the Jewish president of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelensky, whose own relatives died in the Second World War at the hands of the Nazis.

Two. The stylised Z symbol that Putin is using is clearly reminiscent of the Nazi swastika.

Three. Putin is already starting to transport huge numbers of Ukrainians from cities like Mariupol to camps in Siberia, echoing the horrifying acts of the Nazis in World War Two.

And four. Lastly, Putin recently gave a speech where he referred to political opponents within Russia as, "national traitors". A line taken directly from Hitler's Mein Kampf and also compared them to insects, again, echoing the rhetoric of Nazis towards the Jews in World War Two.

So clearly, Putin's claims of Nazism and genocide in Ukraine are a complete fiction. And ironically, he is using Nazi tactics in order to wage his war and is arguably subjecting Ukrainians to genocide themselves. Sadly, with news only coming from the state run Russian media, many Russians believe this propaganda to be true.

Some advice I can give you if you have friends or family who believe the Russian propaganda or any propaganda about any specific topic, for that matter, is to not get into heated arguments, but instead use the following kinds of questions to hopefully lead the person or people to question their own beliefs.

One. Why do you believe a certain idea is true?

Two. What evidence do you have for that claim and what is its source?

Three. Have you evaluated if the source is trustworthy?

Four. Have you considered opposing claims.

And, five. What information would you need to see to have your mind changed?

You can obviously ask yourself these same questions when trying to evaluate claims that you believe to be true.

Let's move on to part two in this episode where I ask the following question. What are your thoughts on the conflict and what are the thoughts of the people around you on it?

My opinion is that war, conflict, and killing other nations when we had a lot of bad conflicts, the Second World War, of course, everyone knows and remembers. It's disgusting. And I believe so. If politicians wanted, they would... They would find a... some negotiations and diplomacy, so they would be able to overcome this conflict without any weapons.

99% [of the] people around me, I mean, my colleagues, my friends, people who I talk to, they don't support this war. I hope most of [the] Russian people don't support this war, but I'm not sure about most of people, unfortunately.

People around me are divided in two groups. Some of them think that it was really necessary and there were no choice, and some of them think that it was an act of horrible aggression and it's terrible. People are scared, really scared.

People around me don't support this war. However, people that I know in Russia, they tend to listen to what [the] propaganda tells them and have an opinion that they think is justified. The war is justified and we will save the people of Donbas from eradication. They tell me, "Where have you been all these eight years when Ukrainians massacred our people, Russian speaking people, in Donbas region?". Well, what I typically respond is that Putin is the only reason that started this conflict and provoked this conflict. But yeah, I mean, it's really hard to debate someone that has been brainwashed. And usually they think that it's me who has been brainwashed, not them. So, yeah.

Many Russians and Ukrainians share family. So both my mom and dad are Ukrainian-born and family always visited each other. I spent my summers in Ukraine. And every second or third Russian has the same story. So, we are all very interconnected. Family members, friends. We have always been like Aussies and Kiwis.

Many famous people recorded appeals to answer [the] war. However, some well-known people support the current policy and believe that Russia is forced to behave in this way as there's a direct threat from NATO in Ukraine. I believe that neither Russians nor Ukrainians nor Europeans know the true causes of the conflict as the need to misinform people and shows the conflict in different ways to residents of different countries. Perhaps this conflict is not between Russia and Ukraine, but between Russia and the United States, which actively influence the politics of Ukraine and Europe. But the worst thing is that ordinary people who are not involved in politics suffer. I want the military action in Ukraine to stop and the politicians to come to a peace agreement. But I want to underline that nobody of my friends or people I know wants this war.

So, a very interesting message from the last voice of Russia there about how perhaps none of us truly know the real reason for this war.

Firstly, let me be the first to admit that I'm no expert in the international relations between Russia and the West. But that said, I have dived deeply into this recently, watching dozens of hours of interviews with experts, academics, military leaders, journalists, writers and more.

Secondly, I'm acutely aware that none of us are psychic and know what goes on in the mind of Putin himself.

But in a nutshell, here is what I've sort of gathered from the research I've done online and the interviews and many interviews that I've watched from experts about what Putin is doing and what he wants.

One. Putin wants to rebuild a Russian empire and fundamentally redefine the status quo inside Europe so that it aligns with his own personal vision and where Russia will have much of the control globally.

Two. He recently wrote a 19-page essay last year entitled 'On The Historical Unity of Russians and Ukrainians', which he ends with the line "For we are one people." clearly indicating that he doesn't consider Ukraine as separate from Russia.

Three. He wants to overrun Ukraine, which he sees as being run by Western-allied politicians and depose its government to prevent it from joining the West Defensive Alliance, NATO.

Four. He hates that ex-Soviet Union countries are veering towards the West, both the EU and Nato. And Putin really wants to reverse that as he sees it as the disintegration of historical Russia. Western democracy is a threat to Putin and his oligarchs because if Russian people gradually become more enticed by it and democracy, it would be much harder for autocrats like Putin to steal massive wealth from their own country, just like he has over the last two decades.

And lastly, five. He doesn't want Ukraine in NATO as it would mean that NATO's troops could be stationed in Ukraine and they would be within missile striking range of Moscow.

So, to understand a little more about what Putin wants and his motivations, I really recommend checking out the video 'What does Putin want?' By journalist Johnny Harris. And I also really recommend checking out the PBS interview series 'Putin's Road to War' and 'The Putin Files', particularly the interviews with Russian journalists Julia Ioffe, Masha Gessen and Vladimir Kara-Murza. I'll add the links in the show notes for this episode.

So, With Putin's potential motivations laid out above, I also want to recognise that the way in which the US and NATO's has flirted with Ukraine since the annexation of Crimea in 2014 deserves a great deal of criticism too.

The West has been well aware of Ukraine's tumultuous position as a neighbour to Russia, which Putin has had his eyes set on for a very long time. And I feel like they've definitely stirred up the hornet's nest whilst not following through with doing what's best for Ukraine and Ukrainians. It feels like until this war broke out, the West had definitely been using Ukraine as a sort of pawn in a dangerous game of chess with Russia, the results of which we're watching on TV in real time.

Anyway, let's move on to the third and final question for the voices of Russia in this episode, where I asked them, how is the conflict impacted you and your life?

As regards to some impacts. So sanctions, etc.. Right now, I don't feel it. And my family too, but we see that there [is] already lack of some foreign medicaments and I don't know what will be with people whose health depends on these medicaments, like [those] who has cancer, for example. But I am afraid in [the] long term it just will be worse. I mean, in the economic situation, yes. But I hope soon it will be finished.

A lot of foreign companies has left out my country and [the] ruble has fallen down and the price of everything has frozen. And the economic situation in Russia is very bad now because of [the] conflict. For example, I studied English on iTalki and I pay for it by dollars and before the 24 February $1 cost 75 rubles. But now $1 costs 135 rubles.

I can't visit France where my daughter's father live[s]. I wanted to go there this summer, but now I understand that it will be impossible. Prices have already begun to rise, and most likely the well-being of Russians will get worse.

It impacted business and my relationship with relatives and friends suffered. And yes, it made me sad that these things can still happen today in 2022.

Now, I just see that prices are increasing and I live not far from Kharkiv and we have lots of refugees in my home city.

Now, for example, they banned MasterCard and Visa and my cards are basically plastic garbage. I cannot transfer my money from Russia and now it's just impossible. So a lot of questions of what are we doing. So, the sanctions are quite funny because the oligarchs, we have like several yachts, we have several castles in Russia, they have a lot of a lot of money and a lot of ways of saving the money, for example, via cryptocurrency and via offshores [accounts]. But normal people, they can't afford that.

I have two kids in Russia and I worry about them. I'd like to bring them to Australia, but the problem is that their mother is too patriotic and she doesn't tell them to leave Russia. I'm afraid that the government might block the internet if they block the media, Facebook, etc. and I won't be able to call them. My plan was to bring them here when they finish school in five years, but now the borders are closed and I do not know what might happen in the next two years. Also, I left some comments on social media, and I'm afraid that if I go to Russia, I might face some problems with the Russian law.

We've got half of our team in Kyiv and we've been trying to relocate them. And I'm trying to look at pathways for my family because unfortunately Australia isn't granting any humanitarian visas. They're just giving tourist visas out at this stage. So, my family members won't be able to work. At the same time, it's really traumatic for the Russian side as well because obviously they are not, my family is not, supporting any of this. They are deeply traumatised. They've been helping relatives in Ukraine and they've been quite vocal. They put like little Ukrainian flags out on their socials and things like that are criminal activity in Russia at this stage. So, you can get 15 to 20 years in prison for supporting Ukraine or for being against the war. It is really scary what is going to happen to people there that have the courage to speak out and not support this absolutely outrageous criminal act by Mr. Putin? I pray and hope that it will, and the sooner the better for everyone. And they can negotiate a ceasefire at one point or another. And I honestly hope that Ukraine would be something Mr. Putin finally chokes on, and that will be it for him.

Finishing up. I want to state that this episode was not created in order to defer sympathy from Ukrainians onto Russians, but to instead allow Russians to share their voices and experiences of this war so that we can better understand their situation.

What have we learnt today?

Firstly, most Russians are completely unaware of what's really going on in Ukraine or globally due to how controlled information is at home in Russia.

Secondly, many Russians don't support this war. They're ashamed of their leader's illegal war in Ukraine, and they want it to end immediately.

And thirdly, their lives are being impacted in countless ways due to sanctions, first and foremost, as well as the deep interconnectedness many Russian and Ukrainian families have.

I want to say a massive thank you to everyone involved in today's episode. I really appreciate you guys taking the time out of your days to be a part of this project. And I wish the best for you, your loved ones, and your country in the future. Spasiba.