Executive Summary
Debate about Russia’s strategic deadlock on the front in Ukraine has spilled beyond the Z-community of pro-war bloggers and is now making itself felt among Kremlin-aligned experts. Against this backdrop, the Z-community itself simultaneously shows signs of narrative testing around a possible suspension of hostilities – alongside fierce criticism of any hint of Kremlin defeat, even within an “unconditional victory” frame, apparently sanctioned by the Presidential Administration.
The narrative campaign around the possibility of halting the war, whose testing became clearly visible in the second half of May, is simultaneously part of the Kremlin's pre-election strategy, which requires dampening Russians' frustration with a war that has dragged on for years, and part of an intra-elite confrontation between the "party of pause" (Chemezov, Deripaska, the economic bloc, and others) and the "party of permanent war" (Sechin, Patrushev, the security and political blocs). Within this confrontation, the Presidential Administration does not so much take sides as perform a servicing function for the Kremlin's requirements, calibrated to whichever position is gaining priority in Putin's thinking. The First Deputy Chief of Staff of the Presidential Administration, Kiriyenko himself (together with his patrons, the Kovalchuk brothers), has accumulated considerable institutional weight precisely because of the war, which gives him a vested interest in the continuation of Russia's militarist foreign policy, while simultaneously working to contain domestic discontent within the country.
Within the confrontation described above, and amid the leaks that both parties use as instruments of internal struggle, it emerged in early May that the Presidential Administration had this past winter prepared a plan (1) for narrative management in the event of a halt to hostilities in Ukraine. According to the plan, which was presented by Kiriyenko, the most problematic audience would be the "armchair ultra-patriots" – members of the Z-community, who by default would reject the Kremlin campaign's key narratives: "The peace achieved by Putin is a tremendous victory" and "Hurrah! Russia has won. This is beyond dispute." The plan provides for working with this audience through the Presidential Administration's traditional approach of buying off Z-bloggers and amplifying moderates in the media space, as well as repression against the most radical voices.
The first signs of narratives identical to those in the leaked document being promoted appeared from 18 May onwards: the Z-channel Bayraktar Witnesses (run by military bloggers from the state outlets RIA Novosti and RT) published a post "We won! Yes, you heard that right. In the war of will and steel, the Russian military machine has ground down the West's proxy forces in Ukraine" (2). On 21 May, Oleg Tsarev, a former Ukrainian politician who defected to Russia, published a text containing all the narratives from the Presidential Administration leak: "By holding out, we have won. We must proceed from the understanding that we have already won. <…> All the plans to 'bury' Russia have failed. We paid a heavy price. But we held out and brought home our land and our people. For the country, that is victory" (3). The post was actively amplified by two Z-channels: MIG of Russia, which is close to the security services, and Operation Z: Reporters of the Russian Spring, one of the largest Z-resources. On 25 May, the prominent Z-political commentator Aleksei Chadaev published a piece with similar arguments: "In all honesty, I am in favour of taking a pause and properly 'regrouping', preparing for the inevitable next round. Nobody has given up on the idea of resetting us, dismantling us, and carving us up…" (4) – a piece that MIG of Russia reposted approvingly, prompting Z-blogger Roman Alekhin, designated a foreign agent for his criticism of the Russian authorities, to call it "public opinion preparation" (5).
At the same time, debate about the strategic deadlock on the front in Ukraine broke out beyond the Z-community: at the Assembly of the Council on Foreign and Defence Policy (SVOP), which met on 22–24 May and is one of the Kremlin's major think-tanks on foreign policy matters, participants actively debated "the interpretation of the SMO's objectives and the time horizon within which they can be achieved" (6). Several scenarios were named: "a determined push for the swiftest possible resolution, the patient wearing-down of the adversary, or a pause in which to prepare for a prolonged, multi-layered confrontation." Notably, scenarios uncomfortable for the Kremlin were not only discussed behind closed doors but were also actively covered by propaganda outlets. The discussion was written up (7) by the national newspaper Moskovsky Komsomolets (seventh by citation rate in the Russian Federation), which devoted considerable attention to the article "The cast-iron prose of reality," (8) published in Russia in Global Affairs, SVOP's leading specialist journal, the day before the Assembly opened, by Vasily Kashin, Director of the Centre for Comprehensive European and International Studies at the Higher School of Economics. In it, the author states plainly that "there are no grounds to expect the positional deadlock in the war in Ukraine to be broken in the foreseeable future", and that the objectives of "eliminating the anti-Russian regime", "annexing large new Ukrainian territories", and "militarily occupying the entire country" are technically impossible. The Moskovsky Komsomolets piece also notes that "whereas in previous years the hawks set the tone and held the floor at the sessions, this time they were pleading, defending themselves, and fighting back," and its conclusion is particularly striking, conveying a gentle irony towards "the state leadership's own understanding of reality."
At the same time, several State Duma deputies made statements about the war in Ukraine developing along a trajectory unfavourable to Russia: on 19 May, Renat Suleimanov, a deputy from the Kremlin-controlled Communist Party, stated (9) that "The earliest possible end to the SMO is simply essential. <…> It is perfectly obvious that the economy cannot sustain a prolonged continuation of the SMO." This statement was flagged by the Telegram channel Nezygar, known for its proximity to the Presidential Administration (10); and on 1 June, Lieutenant General and Duma deputy Andrei Gurulev published a post (11) acknowledging that "the SMO has definitively settled into the format of a brutal positional deadlock <…> – a harbinger of our exhaustion, if the initiative is not recaptured in time." He subsequently claimed that the texts were being "spread by enemies" and that his Telegram account had been hacked, a claim that some Z-bloggers met with conspicuous sarcasm (12, 13).
The high-water mark of the narratives under test was a piece entitled "Astonishing defeats: when geopolitical setbacks can be more useful than brilliant victories," published on 24 May in Moskovsky Komsomolets, in which Moscow Public Chamber member Dmitry Krasnov advances the narrative that "every military defeat, by way of reform, secured new victories for us." The piece was deleted a few days later (it remains accessible in a web archive (14)), which may indicate either that the contractor implementing the Presidential Administration's narrative test did so clumsily, or that the scale of the backlash from Z-bloggers exceeded the Presidential Administration's expectations: the great majority expressed outrage and openly described the piece as "public opinion priming" for a "defeatist outcome." Notably, the bloggers who had previously been observed promoting "Russian victory" narratives from the Presidential Administration's plan made no response whatsoever.
All these signals – transmitted through a number of opinion leaders controlled by the "party of strategic pause," as well as the sporadic testing of Presidential Administration narratives designed to channel public discontent into managed messages ahead of the parliamentary elections and in the event that Putin opts for a suspension of hostilities – point to a single conclusion: the intra-elite struggle over how the war in Ukraine should develop further is ongoing. For Putin, however, this conflict is not a problem but a resource: back in April, rather than resolving it tactically in favour of one of the warring factions, he effectively institutionalised it by assigning responsibility (15) "for ensuring the uninterrupted operation of key internet services <…> during periods of internet restriction" simultaneously to the civilian power vertical (the Government) and to the FSB. Previously he had, in similar fashion, publicly supported first one side of the confrontation, then the other – effectively operating according to a divide-and-rule logic against a backdrop of a deteriorating situation in the country and, consequently, of his own standing.
Signs of a campaign in the Z-community: “We won! Yes, you heard that right”
In the pro-war Z-Telegram sector, signs emerged from mid-May of a campaign being prepared around narratives similar to those in the Presidential Administration’s leaked playbook, which Russian independent outlets had reported on several weeks earlier (16).
This document, which according to the sources cited by the reporting outlets was shown to a narrow circle of associates of Sergei Kiriyenko, First Deputy Chief of Staff of the Presidential Administration, sets out the core logic of information management and the full range of talking points to be deployed in the event of a possible halt to the current phase of the war. The Kremlin's de facto defeat, its inability to achieve its objectives by either political or military means, is to be presented by propaganda as an unconditional victory: "Hurrah! Russia has won. This is beyond dispute" and "The peace achieved by Putin is a tremendous victory." The document places particular emphasis on the problematic audience of "armchair ultra-patriots," whom its authors propose labelling as marginals demanding the continuation of the war, and also framing "the proximity of their position to European maximalists as hostile to Russia." Proposed approaches to managing this audience include: (1) the "emotional pivot" of frontmen – that is, having them promote narratives favourable to the Presidential Administration and less aggressive in tone, whether on a commercial or a coercive basis; (2) signalling the unacceptability of "discrediting" the course of the war – that is, de facto censorship of ultranationalist bloggers under threat of repression; (3) rationalisation – adapting state propaganda narratives to the demands of this target audience; and (4) amplifying "moderates" in the media space, so as to marginalise the most intransigent "nuclear turbo-radicals."
The first signs of the narratives described in the document being promoted appeared between 18 and 21 May: the Z-channel Bayraktar Witnesses, run by military bloggers Sergei Shilov (state outlet RIA Novosti) and Aleksandr Kharchenko (state outlet RT), published a post on 18 May "We won! Yes, you heard that right. In the war of will and steel, the Russian military machine has ground down the West's proxy forces in Ukraine" (17). Although the post does not call for a halt to hostilities and is in fact quite critical of Russian military command – its central conclusion being that "under the old military paradigm we risk falling permanently behind in the battle for our future" – its register stands markedly apart from other posts by virtue of drawing final rather than interim conclusions about the war, an exercise Z-bloggers undertake with some regularity.
The next manifestation of the narratives described above came in a piece by Oleg Tsarev, a former Ukrainian politician who defected to Russia in 2014. He called for abandoning the maximalist, inflated demands imposed by prominent Russian propagandists and for acknowledging that Russia's current "acquisitions" already constitute a victory. His post assembles all the propaganda talking points in the same register as those listed in the leaked Presidential Administration document, summarising as follows: "By holding out, we have won. We must proceed from the understanding that we have already won. Our task is to end the war, hold on to our acquisitions, and build a prosperous Novorossiya. <…> All the plans to 'bury' Russia have failed. We paid a heavy price. But we held out and brought home our land and our people. For the country, that is victory" (18). The post was shared by MIG of Russia, a Z-channel aligned with the security services, which endorsed the text and reproduced a number of its formulations verbatim: "We would not be at all surprised if it soon transpires that the cultivation of those very 'inflated expectations,' followed by mass disappointment, is part of an enemy strategy to destabilise the situation in Russia. We held out. All the plans to 'bury' Russia have failed. And no one will allow irresponsible armchair loudmouths to turn our country into a perpetually warring Afghanistan" (19). The central arguments of Tsarev's post were published (20) the following day by one of the largest Z-channels, Operation Z: Reporters of the Russian Spring (approximately 1.5 million subscribers).
On 25 May, a post with similar arguments was published by Aleksei Chadaev, an adviser to the Minister of Transport and a prominent Z-political commentator: "If the war in Ukraine ended tomorrow, I would only be glad. I have none of that 'on to victory and the flag over the Reichstag.' <…> The adversary has shown us our weaknesses and helped us reassess in a new light what we thought was our strength. In all honesty, I am in favour of taking a pause and properly 'regrouping,' preparing for the inevitable next round. Nobody has given up on the idea of resetting us, dismantling us, and carving us up…" (21). This piece was subsequently reposted (22) by the Telegram channel MIG of Russia with the comment that "the tendency towards sober and clear-eyed analysis of the situation in its full scope will spread ever more widely" (23). Z-bloggers critical of the authorities noted the systematic character of this narrative promotion: Roman Alekhin, designated a foreign agent by the authorities, described Chadaev's piece as "public opinion preparation" (24).
Kremlin experts: “There are no grounds to expect the positional deadlock in the war to be broken”
In conditions of severe wartime censorship, any "defeatist" or SMO-critical statements by Russian officials and experts, or content published in Kremlin-controlled media, are unambiguous signals from the Presidential Administration that it is "testing the ground" and gauging likely public reactions. The possibility of such statements being unsanctioned by the Presidential Administration is remote: independently made critical remarks carry an inevitable risk of losing one's post and subsequent criminal prosecution. Against this backdrop, at least four "defeatist" cases became known in the second half of May.
On 25 May, the propaganda outlet Moskovsky Komsomolets (MK; seventh by citation rate in the Russian Federation – March 2026, Medialogia (25); average single-issue readership 632,200, September 2025 – February 2026, Mediascope (26)) published a piece headlined "'The cast-iron prose of reality': Russia's expert community divided over the SMO's further scenarios" (27). It reviews the discussion held on 22–24 May at the Assembly of the Council on Foreign and Defence Policy (SVOP) (28), one of the Kremlin's prominent think-tanks on international affairs. The event's announcement stated plainly that "the interpretation of the SMO's objectives and the time horizon within which they can be achieved are generating lively debate in the fifth year of hostilities: a determined push for the swiftest possible resolution, the patient wearing-down of the adversary, or a pause in which to prepare for a prolonged, multi-layered confrontation?" (29). The event, as is customary, was attended by senior experts closely affiliated with the Kremlin, as well as current and former Russian officials, including Sergei Lavrov, Yevgeny Primakov Jr, Leonid Slutsky, Konstantin Zatulin, Sergei Karaganov, Fyodor Lukyanov, Andrei Bezrukov, and Yevgeny Minchenko, among others.
The Moskovsky Komsomolets piece itself focuses on what its author calls "the new realism", understood as an assessment of the actual state of affairs at the front, rather than its propagandistic framing. This assessment draws on an article (30) by Vasily Kashin, Director of the Centre for Comprehensive European and International Studies at the Higher School of Economics, published on 21 May in SVOP's specialist journal Russia in Global Affairs, which states directly that "The objective of 'eliminating the anti-Russian regime' in Ukraine is, at the current stage, fundamentally unachievable without a full military occupation of the entire country (including its western part) for an extended period. This is technically impossible for Russia. <…> For the same reason, hopes for the annexation of large new Ukrainian territories by Russia in the event of a hypothetical collapse of the Ukrainian front are hard to fathom. Russia does not have the capacity for the sustainable control and administration of such territories, with their destroyed economies and deeply hostile populations. <…> There are no grounds to expect the positional deadlock in the war in Ukraine to be broken in the foreseeable future." The Moskovsky Komsomolets piece also cites the assessment of Kremlin-aligned expert Alexander Nosovich, editor-in-chief of the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU) information portal Eurasia. Expert and the Baltic-region analytical portal RuBaltic.Ru: "The [political analysts'] professional community is split between those who favour continuing the SMO until its declared objectives are achieved, and those who believe it is time to end it – because the worst of all possible scenarios is not defeat but an endless SMO. And whereas in previous years the hawks set the tone and held the floor at the sessions, this time they were pleading, defending themselves, and fighting back." The conclusion of the piece is particularly noteworthy, conveying a gentle irony towards "the state leadership's own understanding of reality," something inconceivable in a propaganda-aligned national newspaper in present-day Russia: "Vasily Kashin refrains in his text from any direct political recommendations to the senior Russian leadership. And that is, probably, a very mature position. It is, probably, a very mature and correct position. Experts assess and advise. And state leaders take decisions on the basis of their own understanding of reality."
This episode is significant for two reasons. First, the strategic deadlock has become sufficiently apparent that debate about it has broken out beyond the Z-community, where it had been conducted over recent months; it is now being debated openly even in Kremlin expert circles. Second, these debates are not being conducted behind closed doors: reporting on them, including the key arguments being articulated, is appearing in specialist publications and national newspapers alike, which unambiguously requires the consent of those responsible for Russian propaganda within the Presidential Administration.
Officials and propaganda test runs: “Unfortunately, things will only get worse from here”
On 19 May, State Duma deputy Renat Suleimanov, representing the Kremlin-controlled Communist Party, stated in an interview with a regional outlet: "The earliest possible end to the SMO is simply essential. The special operation has already been going on longer than the Great Patriotic War. God willing, it will end in victory and not some interim result. <…> It is perfectly obvious that the economy cannot sustain a prolonged continuation of the SMO" (31). This episode was ignored by propaganda outlets and Z-bloggers alike; however, the Telegram channel Nezygar, known for its proximity to the Presidential Administration, reposted the news (32) with the comment "This is practically a mutiny" and included the event (33) in its digest of key events for 18–24 May.
On 1 June, the Telegram channel of Lieutenant General and Duma deputy Andrei Gurulev published a post (34) criticising the approach to managing the Russian army, describing the actual situation along the front line, and acknowledging that "the SMO has definitively settled into the format of a brutal positional deadlock <…> – a harbinger of our exhaustion, if the initiative is not recaptured in time." The post also claims that a decision has already been taken on a new large-scale mobilisation this autumn, which, the author states, "will produce no breakthrough whatsoever; we will simply receive a manifold increase in casualties." "Unfortunately, things will only get worse from here." Gurulev subsequently claimed (35) that his channel had been stolen and that "texts from it are being spread by enemies." Even this prompted a mocking response from some Z-authors: the military blogger Yuri Kotenok (36), who regularly publishes dry analytical assessments of the front-line situation, and the ultranationalist blogger Yana Poplavskaya (37) reposted the original post with the sarcastic comment "Surely the enemy's CIPSO apparatus [Centre for Information and Psychological Operations] does not expect to convince us that eye-washing, passivity, and all the other characteristic traits of the Soviet army are still flourishing in our military-political leadership? Fools! We will only rally more closely around the sovereign."
On 24 May, Moskovsky Komsomolets (the same outlet whose other significant piece is discussed above) published a column by Moscow Public Chamber member and honorary advocate Dmitry Krasnov, entitled "Astonishing defeats: when geopolitical setbacks can be more useful than brilliant victories." The central narrative advanced in the article, drawing on historical material, is that "every military defeat, every 'shameful peace,' did not destroy Rus or Russia but made it stronger and led in time to the expansion of its borders and the consolidation of its positions," and that "by way of reform it secured new victories for us." The piece was removed from the website a few days later (it remains accessible in a web archive (38)), most likely because the Presidential Administration's attempt to "probe public opinion" by sporadically placing test narratives in compliant media ran up against poor execution on the part of a contractor who made the emphasis far too obvious. The piece also provoked a notably angry response from prominent Z-bloggers: military blogger and foreign agent Roman Alekhin (39), Voenkor Kotenok (Yuri Kotenok) (40), Romanov Lite (Vladimir Romanov) (41), Colonelcassad (Boris Rozhin) (42, 43), Yana Poplavskaya (44), and Alex Parker Returns (45) – all concluded unanimously that the piece was not a private opinion but "preparation," "probing," and "priming of public opinion" for a "defeatist outcome." It is worth noting that no response whatsoever to the piece was forthcoming from the Z-channels previously observed promoting the “Russian victory” narrative: Bayraktar Witnesses, MIG of Russia, and Operation Z: Reporters of the Russian Spring.