Extreme Right ‘Russian Community’ Becoming Active in Circassian Areas

Russians were Shocked by Ukrainian Advance into Kursk Oblast but Now Mostly have Taken It in Stride, Levada Center Head Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Oct. 7 – When Ukrainian forces began their intervention in Kursk Oblast in early August, Russians overwhelmingly were in a state of shock having convinced themselves that such an event was impossible given the pressure the Russian forces have put on Ukrainian forces inside Ukraine, Denis Volkov says.

            But in the weeks since, most Russians have come to terms with this Ukrainian military action and view it within the context of the broader fighting inside Ukraine rather than as a separate problem, the head of the independent Levada Center polling agency says (forbes.ru/mneniya/520270-privycnaa-trevoga-cto-dumaut-rossiane-o-nastuplenii-vsu-v-kurskoj-oblasti).

            That does not mean that Russians have accepted this Ukrainian action as a fait accompli. Rather, it is the product of Moscow propaganda and its insistence that Russia has everything in hand  and will soon expel the Ukrainian forces from Russian territory, Volkov says polling data show.

            There have been, however, two consequences of the Russian reaction to Kursk that have been less widely noted but may prove more important. On the one hand, there is no ever less talk about the possibility of any peace negotiations with Kyiv to end the war. And on the other, Russians have become more angry about social and economic problems.

            If the reasons for the first of these are obvious, those behind the second are less so, Volkov suggests. They involve increasing cynicism in the population about Russian government declarations and a sense that the war is likely to drag on for some time if Ukraine is able to mount such operations.   

Extreme Right ‘Russian Community’ Becoming Active in Circassian Areas

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Oct. 5 – The extreme right Russian nationalist organization, the Russian Community, already the largest Russian nationalist group in the country, involved in suppressing non-Russian groups across the country, and the source many fear for complecting the regional militias Moscow is allowing is now becoming active in Circassian areas.

            (For background on this group and the fears it is provoking among non-Russians, see windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2024/09/russian-community-now-largest-extreme.html, windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2024/08/clashes-between-ethnic-diasporas-and.html and windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2024/09/moscow-gives-heads-of-all-federal.html.)

            The Circassian National Front reports that “the first branches of this nationalist group have opened in Kabardino-Balkaria (Nalchik) and Karachayevo-Cherkessia (Cherkessk). In Krasnodarsk Kray and Adygeya (Maikop), the Russian Community has already been functioning for several years” (t.me/cirnatfront/50).

            Some members of the Russian Community in these regions are flying the notorious Bakalanov flag which was used by Russian irregulars at the end of the Circassian war, and the Circassian National Front fears that the appearance of this group with such flags means that Russian nationalists hope to “extinguish” the Circassian nation on its homeland.

            However that may be, the appearance of the Russian Community in Circassian areas almost certainly is going to spark more conflicts in the binational republics of the central North Caucasus, republics that in recent months have seen a significant rise in ethnic tensions (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2024/09/islamist-radicalism-continues-to-spread.html).