Some thoughts on the scenes we're seeing on social media of armed Russians, confronted by unarmed, protesting Ukrainians, being pushed back. Again, these are just insights from someone watching from afar, who just happens to know Ukrainians and Russians and Soviet mythology 1/
In the lead-up to this invasion of Ukraine, Russian state media was wall-to-wall all about how the Russian forces were going to be welcomed by ordinary Ukrainians. Like when the Soviets liberated European nations from the Nazis, freed concentration camps. 2/
Genuinely, I think, many of these young, unhardened Russian soldiers expected a heroes' welcome from ordinary Ukrainians who were being oppressed by an evil government. 3/
Instead, they are finding ordinary Ukrainians who are responding to them like they are the bad guys. Now, if you think Americans glorify their military - folks, you ain't seen nothing yet. The Soviet troops who fought the Nazis in WW2 are absolutely deified in Russia. 4/
These kids in uniforms thought they were going to be welcomed by similar scenes.
This was the expectation ... 5/
This was the expectation ... 5/
This is super confusing for the soldiers. They believed they were the good guys, coming to liberate oppressed Ukrainians from their Nazi overlords. They believed the Kremlin, which said they'd be welcomed, thanked. Instead, they are being berated as "оккупанты" - occupiers. 7/
And all of this is very confusing. To shoot someone, to kill them - it can't be that easy. In war, the other side is usually demonised as the enemy, as different, as other, as evil. That makes it easier to kill them. But Ukrainians aren't others for Russians. 8/
Particularly in the areas we're seeing these images coming out of, these Ukrainians speak Russian. They look Russian. The streets look like home. The shops look like home. Probably, some of these Russian forces have family in Ukraine. They've holidayed in Odesa ... 9/
... They've swum in the Black Sea. How do you shoot someone point-blank, who is unarmed, who is looking you in the eyes and telling you "Go home" and "What are you doing here?" That's suddenly a very difficult question for the Russian troops to answer. 10/
I wrote in my previous long thread that Putin miscalculated. As a result of that, the propaganda arm of the Russian state has been feeding Russians the wrong messaging. They have been telling Russians they are the defenders of Ukrainians. 11/
https://twitter.com/zoyashef/status/1497378894529589250
Now, these troops' eyes and ears are showing them that's a lie. So how do you get infantry - key to wars that are waged in heavily populated and built up areas like these modern metropolises of Kyiv and Kharkiv - to shoot people they've been told they're there to defend? 12/
The Kremlin's other propaganda message was that Ukraine posed an existential threat to Russia. That they needed to create a buffer between NATO (a proxy for the US) and the EU. But there's a problem with this line of messaging: Russian exceptionalism. 13/
Russian exceptionalism was at its height after WW2. It took a big hit when the USSR collapsed. Putin's whole schtick, his selling point to Russians is that he has Made Russia Great Again. So how do you sell to MRGA Russians that their tiny neighbor is a real threat to them? 14/
It's like trying to convince Americans that Canada is going to attack. Or Australians that New Zealand is about to take over. 15/
Hence the need to make Ukraine a proxy for the US and NATO. That argument is more powerful, it rings a little truer. And it no doubt helps fighter pilots drop cluster bombs on Kharkiv. 16/
But so far, this war hasn't been fought so much from a distance. It's being fought face to face. And it's hard to remember that the Ukrainian granny, who looks just like your Russian granny, with a kerchief around her head and tears in her eyes, is some Western proxy. 17/
And this Ukrainian granny, in this Ukrainian town where maybe your own granny was born, she's asking you: "What are you doing here?" She's telling you to go home. And RT didn't prepare you for this. 18/
It's hard to shoot babushka in cold blood. 19/19
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