Dugin Envisions Post-War Russia as Return to Guarded Rural Villages in Sobchak Interview

Aleksandr Dugin described Russia after the war as an enormous exodus from the cities to the countryside, like the Jews from Egypt, in an interview last week with Ksenia Sobchak. He said Russian cities would turn into neo-ancient ruins and people would communicate through an internet of Russian villages closed off and guarded from the toxic incursions of the enemy.

Dugin called the sport of surfing evil and said its practitioners should be purged.

He also expressed hatred toward the cartoon character Cheburashka. More than 1 million Russians have been killed or badly wounded in the war. Ukrainian drones pummel industrial targets across Russia nightly.

Russian advances in eastern Ukraine stalled this spring, with commanders sacrificing tens of thousands of soldiers a month without gaining significant territory. Ukrainian drones blew up military convoys on the main road from Russia to Crimea. Authorities in Crimea began to ration fuel as shipments from Russia ran dry.

Putin hosted the annual Victory Day parade early last month. The parade was scaled back due to the threat of Ukrainian drone strikes. The Kremlin called for a brief cease-fire to allow the festivities to proceed with support from President Trump.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky issued a decree allowing Russia to hold its parade on Red Square. In the second half of May, Russia launched dozens of ballistic missiles and hundreds of drones against Kyiv on some nights. Ukraine retaliated with strikes against Russia’s energy infrastructure.

A video complaint to Putin about corruption and censorship by lifestyle blogger Viktoria Bonya, who lives in Monaco, attracted tens of millions of viewers. Putin’s popularity ratings reached their lowest point since he ordered the invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

At the end of last month, Dugin wrote on social media that with the present elites, Russia’s chances not only of achieving victory but simply holding the country together are critically low.

The annual economic forum opened in St. Petersburg a few days after Dugin’s social media post. On the opening day of the St. Petersburg economic forum, a fleet of Ukrainian drones attacked the city, damaging a warship in the nearby port of Kronstadt and setting an oil terminal on fire.

Zelensky published an open letter to Putin the evening after the drone attack on St. Petersburg, stating the drones had traveled more than 600 miles. In the open letter, Zelensky promised more attacks on Russian cities unless Putin agrees to a cease-fire and begins negotiations.

At the St. Petersburg economic forum, one panelist predicted Russia would remain at war for the next two generations. Another panelist said the positive scenario for Russia’s future would require the use of nuclear weapons to break the stalemate in Ukraine.

Putin said that Zelensky’s letter contained elements of rudeness and turned down the offer to negotiate a deal to end the war. This year at the St. Petersburg economic forum, Putin shared the stage with the presidents of Uzbekistan and Tanzania, the only heads of state who attended.