- 6 days ago
Russia’s strongest war supporters still want victory, but many no longer believe it is coming. Elvira Bary looks inside the pro-war camp and shows how the Z-community, war bloggers, and loyal nationalists are wrestling with shrinking definitions of success, fake frontline reports, and the gap between state television and battlefield reality.
The episode examines Russian media control, the pressure on loyal but noisy supporters, the role of war correspondents, and the quiet retreat of intellectuals who are lowering expectations without admitting the war was wrong. It also explores the keyboard warriors who cheer escalation from safety while the Kremlin tries to keep them obedient, useful, and silent.
Created for viewers interested in Russia and Ukraine war analysis, pro-war propaganda, Kremlin media narratives, military commentary, and current affairs documentary-style commentary. It is especially relevant for anyone searching for Russian war bloggers, Z-community analysis, war correspondents, and political analysis of how supporters of Putin’s war are losing faith in victory.
The episode examines Russian media control, the pressure on loyal but noisy supporters, the role of war correspondents, and the quiet retreat of intellectuals who are lowering expectations without admitting the war was wrong. It also explores the keyboard warriors who cheer escalation from safety while the Kremlin tries to keep them obedient, useful, and silent.
Created for viewers interested in Russia and Ukraine war analysis, pro-war propaganda, Kremlin media narratives, military commentary, and current affairs documentary-style commentary. It is especially relevant for anyone searching for Russian war bloggers, Z-community analysis, war correspondents, and political analysis of how supporters of Putin’s war are losing faith in victory.
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LearningTranscript
00:00At the beginning of the war in Ukraine, Russia's strongest war supporters painted a very comforting
00:06picture for themselves. A Russian flag over Kyiv, a victory parade, grateful liberated citizens,
00:14flowers in the streets, national unity and one giant middle finger to the West, which in their
00:21imagination had stolen something that belonged to Russia by sacred right. That was the dream. But now,
00:30even many of the loudest supporters of the war can see that this dream is not coming true. Kyiv
00:37didn't fall. Ukraine did not collapse. The West did not run away. The Russian army didn't become
00:45the unstoppable force of imperial fantasy. And the longer the war goes on, the smaller the
00:53definition of victory becomes. So, what happens inside the mind of a person who still supports the
01:01war but no longer truly believes in the victory he was promised? That is the private hell operating now
01:09inside Russia's pro-war world. They cannot become anti-war because that would mean admitting they
01:16were wrong from the beginning. They cannot fully trust the state because they see the lies, corruption,
01:24fake reports and military failures. And they cannot stop demanding victory because without victory,
01:32what was all this for? I am Elvira Barry, a writer born in the Soviet Union.
01:38Today, we will look inside Russia's pro-war camp not through official speeches but through the
01:44people who still want Ukraine defeated and yet are beginning to understand that Putin's regime
01:51may not be able to deliver the triumph they imagined. Here is our roadmap for today. The media. The
02:00narratives the state is trying to impose in order to save face. Loyal, noisy and disposable.
02:08How Russia's pro-war bloggers discovered that loyalty does not make them safe.
02:14The war correspondents. The gap between television victory and battlefield reality.
02:20The intellectuals. How serious pro-war thinkers are quietly lowering the definition of victory.
02:28The keyboard warriors. What is happening among the people cheering for war from a safe distance?
02:37Before we begin, please support the channel by subscribing, liking this video and following
02:42the show on Spotify. It helps more people find these conversations. And if you want to support this
02:49work more directly, you can join the think tank, use Superthings, buy me a coffee or donate through
02:56PayPal. All the links are in the description. The media.
03:05In Russia, the main national television channels and large news agencies do not function as independent
03:12institutions. Some are directly owned by the state. Others are controlled through state corporations,
03:20loyal business groups, or media holdings connected to the Kremlin. Formally, they may have different
03:27owners and different editorial teams. Politically, they operate as one system.
03:34This system does not need daily written orders to stay aligned. Everyone inside it understands the
03:42rules. The purpose of federal media is to maintain a version of reality in which the state is always
03:50rational. Russia is always defending itself and any problem can be blamed on someone below the
03:57president or outside the country. This is why Russian television does not give viewers a serious picture
04:05of the problems on the front line. It may mention attacks, fires, drone strikes, or difficult areas
04:12of combat, but these events are framed as isolated incidents. Ukrainian strikes on refineries or military
04:20infrastructure are described as terrorism. Problems in Crimea or occupied territories are presented as
04:28temporary disruptions. Battlefield setbacks are softened through vague language, regrouping, difficult
04:35situation, enemy activity, measures are being taken. The message is everything is under control. At the same
04:46time, Russian media avoids presenting the war as a direct conflict between Russia and Ukraine. That comparison
04:53is too uncomfortable. If Russia is fighting Ukraine, then viewers may ask why a much larger country has failed
05:02to defeat its neighbor after years of war. So, the official narrative expands the enemy. Russia is fighting
05:12NATO, the collective West, and a global campaign to destroy Russia. This framing turns failure into proof of
05:21importance. If the war is long and costly, it is not because Moscow miscalculated. It is because Russia is
05:30facing a huge historical enemy. Basically, it is moral management. Viewers are given enough information to
05:39feel that Russia is under attack, but not enough to understand the scale of the damage. They are encouraged to
05:46feel anger, pride, endurance, and fear, but not curiosity. The moment a viewer asks, why did this happen? The next
05:56question may be, who is responsible? And Russian federal media exists to make sure that question never reaches
06:05the top. Loyal, noisy, and disposable. Besides the official media, there is a big pro-war movement
06:14on social media platforms. In Russian internet slang, these people are called the Z-community or Z-community.
06:22The name comes from the letter Z, one of the symbols painted on Russian military vehicles
06:29during the invasion of Ukraine. Over time, it became a tribal mark, a sign of loyalty to the war,
06:37to the army, to the imperial fantasy that Russia was finally rising from its knees and teaching the
06:44West a lesson. But the Z-community is not one single group. It is a messy ecosystem of war bloggers,
06:51telegram channels, voluntary fundraisers, military commentators, propagandists, angry veterans,
06:59amateur strategists, and ordinary people who spend their evenings cheering for missiles from their sofas.
07:08These people do not see themselves as propaganda. They see themselves as the real voice of patriotic Russia.
07:17In their own imagination, they are the state's loyal helpers. They raise money for drones,
07:24socks, body armor, vehicles, medical kits, and other supplies for the front. They write about problems
07:31in the army. They criticize corruption. They mock lazy generals. They complain that soldiers are being
07:39abandoned, that logistics are a mess, that commanders are incompetent, that the war is not being fought
07:47seriously enough. And because they are criticizing from a patriotic position, they genuinely believed
07:55they should be protected. This is where their tragedy begins. They thought the Kremlin wanted the same thing they
08:04wanted. Victory. But an autocracy does not think this way. An autocracy does not need citizens. It needs
08:14subjects. It does not like independent energy even when that energy is loyal. Especially when that energy
08:21is loyal but noisy. Because every request made to power is already a problem. A Z-blogger says,
08:31I support you and therefore you must listen to me. For the Kremlin, that second part is intolerable.
08:41This is why their relationship between the Z-community and the Russian state has become bitter and
08:47confused. They watched Prekozhin rise as a brutal patriotic hero and then disappear. They watched
08:54Igor Gyrkin, also known as Strelkov, go to prison after criticizing the military leadership from an
09:01ultra-patriotic position. They watched military bloggers get pressured, restricted, investigated,
09:09labeled, or silenced. They watched the state begin to attack the platforms that gave them their power.
09:18Still, many of them cannot make the final leap. They cannot admit that there is no such thing as
09:26selective freedom of speech or selective repression or selective security services that punish only the
09:34people who are disloyal. The moment you give the state the right to punish people for an opinion,
09:40the question is no longer whether that weapon will be used. The only question is when it will be
09:47pointed at you. This has happened in Russian history many times. Stalin's supporters also believed that
09:54repression was for someone else and then the machine came for them too. If you are curious to see this
10:01mechanism in action, this is one of the central themes of my novel The Prince of the Soviets. You can
10:09find
10:09the link in the description. Here's a short book trailer.
10:28Find out who he really is. Officially, Klim Rogoff's biography read like something safe and
10:34respectable. A journalist from New York, a foreign correspondent working for a prestigious news agency.
10:41In reality, Klim Rogoff was a white hemigre.
10:49And if that troop were ever exposed, he would be arrested on the spot.
10:55Very interesting.
10:56He came to the Soviet Union for one reason only. To find his wife abducted by the Bolsheviks.
11:11And he did find her. Just not where he expected. It turned out she had caught the attention of the
11:19only red
11:20of the Soviet Union in the Soviet Union in the Soviet Union.
11:22A man inexplicably allowed to run a private business in a state supposedly devoted to building
11:29socialism. A man powerful enough to break the rules in Stalin's Moscow.
11:36A man powerful enough to break the rules in the Soviet Union in the Soviet Union.
11:51Will you catch him?
11:57We'll catch them all.
12:05The Z-bloggers keep telling themselves the president must not know.
12:10But officials are misleading him. The army is good, but the generals are corrupt. The war is sacred,
12:18but the bureaucracy is incompetent. This is one of the oldest Russian political fairy tales.
12:25The good czar and the bad bayars. As if the bayars had somehow appeared around the front by accident.
12:34As if it was not the czar himself who chose them, promoted them, protected them and kept them by his
12:42side for years.
12:44This is where the Z-community is trapped. They see the war going badly and Russian promises shrinking,
12:51but they cannot say the obvious thing. Maybe the Kremlin can't win this war.
12:59To admit that would destroy their whole identity. They would no longer be brave patriots helping the
13:06motherland. They would be volunteers in a disaster created by the very people they worshipped.
13:13So they remain stuck between loyalty and humiliation. But the Kremlin wants something much simpler.
13:22For them to stay loyal and quiet and stop creating problems.
13:28War Correspondents
13:32If federal media tells Russians that everything is under control, the volunteer war correspondents are
13:39saying something very different. They look at the situation near the front and see a dangerous shift.
13:45Ukraine is no longer only striking Russian positions. It is attacking the system that keeps
13:50the Russian army alive. Roads, fuel, logistics, transport routes, and the so-called deep rear.
13:59One Z-bloggers summarized the mood with a brutal line.
14:03If you read our work respondents, it feels like we have already lost. That may be exaggerated,
14:12but the anxiety is real. Across the Z-channels, the same fear appears again and again. Ukraine is cutting
14:22roads, threatening in supply routes, and making movement unsafe far behind the line of combat.
14:29The immediate focus is the land corridor to Crimea, especially the R-280 highway, the route connecting
14:38Russia to occupied southern Ukraine and Crimea. For years, Russian propaganda presented this corridor
14:46as proof that the occupation had become permanent. Now, pro-war channels described it as vulnerable.
14:55Several work respondents describe the same picture. Burned-out vehicles on the roads,
15:01drivers refusing to take cargo into dangerous areas, fuel shortages, and growing fear around travel to
15:09Crimea. One account from Donetsk says drivers are already avoiding certain routes. A truck driver reportedly
15:17counted five burned vehicles along the roadside on one trip. Logistics companies are warning that
15:26if the drone campaign continues, the region may face shortages of fuel, food, children's goods,
15:33and basic supplies. This is the central point. The war respondents understand that logistics,
15:41not-patriotic slogans decide war. Ukraine's drone campaign is not just psychological. It is practical.
15:50It aims to make road unreliable, slow down supply, force detours, create fuel shortages,
15:57and make Russian movement expensive and dangerous. Tsargrat, a strongly pro-Kremlin nationalist outlet,
16:04asked the question directly. The corridor to Crimea has become a target. Why is the land corridor to
16:12Crimea no longer safe? Their answer is unusually blunt. Ukraine made a major leap in drone technology.
16:21Russian forecasting was poor, decision-making was slow, and of course officials continued sending
16:29beautiful reports upward. This phrase, beautiful reports upward, appears again and again in different
16:38forms. The war respondents believe the people at the top are not being told the truth or do not want
16:46to hear it. They complain that the Kremlin receives optimistic reports while the situation on the ground
16:53deteriorates. The channel Ghost of Novorossia describes the problem in military terms. The front moves much
17:03more slowly than Ukraine expands the zone of drone control destruction into the Russian rear. Areas,
17:11once considered relatively safe, are no longer safe. Donetsk, Makiivka, the Mariupol Highway and other routes
17:21are now exposed. Its conclusion is grim. If the trend continues, the situation may become close to
17:30critical for deployment and logistics. Another channel, Archangel of Spitsnas, writes that Ukrainian
17:37strikes have reached the area around Berdyansk. It calls the situation critical because logistics have been
17:43suffering for nearly a month, affecting not only rear areas, but also the front line. Other pro-war
17:51voices discuss remote mining of roads from drones. This would make the problem even worse. It is one
17:58thing to hit individual vehicles. It is another to force road closures, inspections, and demining operations
18:07again and again. That is how a transport problem becomes a transport collapse. But there is one question
18:16almost none of them can ask. Why continue the war at all? Every problem they describe comes from the same
18:25source. Russia invaded Ukraine, occupied territory, and is now trying to hold it under conditions of modern
18:33drone warfare. Yet in their worldview, ending the war is not an option. The only acceptable solutions are
18:42more escalation, retaliation, better drones, harsher strikes, more air defense, and more competent
18:50commanders. That is why their analysis is sometimes accurate and still politically blind. They cannot
18:57accept the simplest conclusion. Russia created the battlefield on which it is now being beaten.
19:05The intellectuals. Worker respondents describe what is happening near the front. Intellectuals try to
19:15explain the war as a whole, what it was supposed to achieve, why it has not gone according to plan,
19:23and what
19:25Russia should expect next. A useful example is Vasily Kashin's article, The Iron Prose of Reality, published in
19:34Russia in Global Affairs. Kashin is trying to define what Russia can realistically achieve after the
19:42larger political fantasy of 2022 has failed. His main point is that Russia cannot simply destroy the
19:49Ukrainian state or force a complete political transformation of Ukraine. To do that, Russia would
19:57need to occupy the entire country for a long time, including Western Ukraine. Kashin admits that this is not
20:05realistic. He also notes that absorbing large hostile territories would create enormous security and economic
20:14problems. This is already a major retreat from the original imperial dream. At the beginning of the war, supporters
20:24imagine a quick collapse of Ukraine. Now, the serious pro-war argument is much narrower. Russia should try to
20:33secure a limited result that can be presented as victory. In other words, the goal is a formula that allows
20:43the
20:43Kremlin to save face. Kashin also rejects the popular patriotic demand to start fighting for real. This phrase is
20:52common among Russian hardliners. They believe Russia is losing momentum because it has been too soft, too
21:00restrained or too bureaucratic. Their solution is always the same. Mobilize harder, strike harder, escalate harder.
21:10Kashin argues that there is no obvious reason to believe these measures would produce a fundamentally
21:17different result. Russia cannot simply wheel its way back to the fantasy of a fast victorious campaign.
21:25But Kashin still does not reach the conclusion an outside observer might reach. If the original goals are
21:32impossible and escalation will not magically solve the problem, then the rational answer would be to stop the war.
21:46The last group is the keyboard warriors. People who support the war from the safety of social media.
21:58Their basic position is the war must continue, but someone else should pay the price.
22:06For keyboard warriors, escalation is not a strategy. It is an emotional reflex. Their language is often
22:15more radical than that of official television, war correspondents or intellectuals. They want visible
22:22proof that Russia is still powerful. That is why Ukrainian strikes on Russian infrastructure
22:29and settle them. They support attacks on Ukrainian cities, but when consequences reach occupied territories
22:38or Russian regions, they speak as if Russia has been attacked for no reason. From the stance,
22:46war looks simple. The enemy must be crushed. The leadership must show will. The army must advance.
22:56Anyone who doubts this is a coward or a traitor. The keyboard warrior can demand nuclear threats in the
23:04morning, complain about gasoline prices in the afternoon, and post vacation photos in the evening.
23:13There is no contradiction, because for him the war is not responsibility, it is a performance of
23:19outrage. These people are useful to the state. They create background noise of loyalty and attack
23:27doubters. They repeat official narratives in rougher language and help turn cruelty into patriotism.
23:34But they do not decide anything. If the Kremlin escalates, they will cheer. If the Kremlin freezes the
23:43war and calls it victory, many will grumble first and then adjust. If the Kremlin tells them that a
23:51bad deal is a brilliant strategic move, they will eventually repeat that too. Their aggression should
23:59not be mistaken for power. They are not a political force. They are an audience trained to mistake anger for
24:07action. Before you go, I want to ask you something. Have you ever believed in a person, a movement,
24:14a company, a government, or even a family story, and then slowly realized that the promise was not real?
24:22What did you do when that moment came? If this video helped you understand what is happening
24:31inside Russia's pro-war camp, please like the video and subscribe. Share it with one person who still
24:38thinks Putin's strongest supporters are confident and united. And if you want to support this work
24:46directly, you can join my think tank, leave us super thanks, buy me a coffee, support through paypal,
24:53or tap hype points to help this episode travel further. And for those listening on Spotify, follow the
25:01show so you don't miss the next one. Thank you for watching. See you next time.
25:27See you next time.