Soldiers are also confused over their country’s war aims in Ukraine, citing a range of reasons for Russia’s invasion, according to the survey of more than 100 servicemen on the front lines conducted by independent Russian outlet Verstka, now based outside Russia, between February and April.
“The worst peace is better than a good war,” a machine gunner who fought with mercenary groups was quoted as saying.
A Russian soldier in the Malaya Loknya settlement in the Kursk region, which was recently retaken by Russian forces (Photo: Russian Defence Ministry/Reuters)
Polling in wartime Russia is compromised by regime oppression but the study is credible and supports previous evidence of soldier discontent, said Anton Barbashin, editorial director of the UK-based Russian political analysis journal Riddle.
Forty-four per cent of respondents to the survey said the United States and Europe should be involved in peace talks, with 22 per cent favouring other mediators, and 15 per cent against any negotiations, amid Donald Trump’s ongoing peacemaking efforts.
Donald Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff meets with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow on 25 April (Photo: Kremlin/Reuters)
Slightly more than a fifth – 21 per cent – said they were fighting for demilitarisation and “denazification” of Ukraine, the original justifications given by Vladimir Putin before the invasion of February 2022.
Only 2 per cent of those surveyed cited corruption and personal enrichment as the main factor. One respondent from Russia’s far east, a region subject to heavy mobilisation, said they thought the goal was “to make money from the war”.
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A comparative survey by Verstka of the general public found 68 per cent said operations were successful, with 17 per cent saying not.
But Russia has been able to maintain recruitment of about 30,000 soldiers a month, according to Western assessments, partly through relatively generous financial packages.
Abbas Gallayamov, a former Kremlin aide, said the researchers behind the new survey were “credible” but said the sample size was too small to draw firm conclusions.
Signs of discontent in the military were not yet significant enough to be a major concern for the regime, he added. “But the army is a structure that is so hierarchical and closed that usually you don’t see it until it explodes.”
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