FROM a Western perspective, it’s often hard to understand why the Russian people would support a man like President Vladimir Putin and fail to protest the mounting death toll caused by the invasion of Ukraine.
Some say it’s because they’ve been brainwashed by propaganda, while others claim it’s because Russia has always been totalitarian and is destined to stay that way.
These “overly simplistic” views sparked a quest by Edinburgh-based writer Howard Amos, who has lived and made friends in Russia, to dig deeper in an attempt to better understand the Russian people.
The results are revealed in his new book, which has been hailed for its insight into the lives and thoughts of both the powerful and powerless Russian people.
Unusually, rather than concentrate on the centres of Russian power in the major cities, he chose to return to an overlooked region which, since the collapse of the Soviet Union, is on the frontier of the country where it meets the EU and Nato.
Pskov is an ancient Slavic land where the people have suffered Stalinism, Nazi occupation and a terrific economic collapse in the 1990s following the end of the Soviet Union.
Once a thriving nexus of trade and cultural exchange, today it is one of the poorest and most rapidly depopulating areas of the nation.
Amos first visited the area in 2007 as a volunteer at a state-owned orphanage, where he made friends with the people who lived nearby.
Since then he has often returned, most recently after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022 when he made a point of seeking out voices that are often unheard, or dismissed as irrelevant.
From the last inhabitants of a dying village to the long-term residents of a psychiatric hospital and a museum curator fighting local opposition to chronicle Pskov’s forgotten Jewish heritage, Amos uncovered compelling stories shaped by violence, tragedy and loss.
He also looked at the troubling legacy of those who have held sway in the region, from far-right politicians to Putin’s personal priest.
“One of the reasons I wrote the book is because I am always being asked why the Russian people have let all this happen,” Amos told the Sunday National.
“You get a lot of simplistic answers such as Russians are all just brainwashed by propaganda but there are reasons why people believe this stuff – they are not just stupid.
“It is much more nuanced and there are a lot of historical, cultural, social, political and economic reasons why propaganda finds a fertile audience and, to me, exploring them is more interesting than easy answers.”
Amos believes that to understand Putin, the answer lies in how the Soviet Union fell apart and the enormous suffering caused by its demise.
“The economic collapse was mind-boggling, with the GDP of the Pskov region halving between 1991 and 1995. People saw their life savings disappear which I think is not often appreciated,” he said.
At the time, the Soviet border was much further to the west of Pskov, then suddenly the international border was on its doorstep, making travel and trade much harder.
As a result, there is still much nostalgia in Russia for the Soviet period.
Now, due to the war, the Russian economy is growing much faster than the UK’s (Russia’s GDP growth last year was 4.1%, compared to 1.1% in the UK), with wages rising considerably among blue-collar workers in areas with industry linked to the defence sector. Enormous sums of money are also being paid to army recruits and huge payouts are promised if they are killed or injured.
Western sanctions on Russia have had an effect but, despite this, the economy is still functioning fairly well, although Amos predicts huge problems when the war ends.
One of the people he interviewed for the book is a war widow with two young children, whose husband volunteered to fight in Ukraine and was killed within a week of being deployed.
“She said he did not seem to believe any of the propaganda such as the Ukrainians being Nazis or Nato being about to invade Russia and he wasn’t particularly interested in the money paid to volunteers,” said Amos.
“It seemed to be more about the total lack of opportunities in his life and the low expectations of him. I think he saw the army as something exciting to do and a way out. There was definitely a sense that this was a manly thing to do and some of the Russian recruiting campaigns play on this.”
The region as a whole is extremely poor and sparsely populated, with most of those left scraping a living from tourism and agriculture.
Russia has an enormous problem with depopulation but Pskov has been struck particularly hard and is now a third of the size it was a century ago.
Only 650,000 people now live in an area of forest, bogs, rivers and small towns with the younger ones first drawn to the regional capital, also called Pskov, then to St Petersburg or Moscow which are relatively close in Russian terms.
Yet even though the region has its own distinct character, the book as a whole draws a picture of modern Russia and its people, with each chapter a profile of one person linked to a different aspect of Russian life such as religion, or the historical legacy of the Second World War and the collapse of the Soviet Union.
“Then there are some about the politics, culture and the war in Ukraine so that it adds up to a portrait of modern Russia and is not just about this one place,” said Amos.
He admits the book is “not particularly uplifting” but shows that people are generally warm and welcoming.
“There is always a suspicion of foreigners which has got worse in the last few years, but even so people invite you into their homes and are incredibly open and kind,” he said.
The book opens with an elderly couple Amos has known and liked for 15 years but who support the invasion of Ukraine.
“There are a few characters like that in the book,” he said. “They explain what they have been through and are very nice but then you learn they support the war and that was difficult for me to process.
“You like these people instinctively, then you discover they support the war and the regime and you don’t quite know what to do with that.”
Amos does not think a peace deal will be thrashed out any time soon, even if the US withdraws all support from Ukraine.
“I don’t think Ukraine will cave even if it is much harder for them to continue fighting,” he said. “But Russia is a much bigger country with more resources so the two of them could slug it out for years.
“Trump apparently believes Putin will offer some concessions but I don’t think that’s likely. Russia has the upper hand and they think Ukraine might buckle so they may as well carry on.
“The other way it could go is that if Trump gets angry and frustrated with Putin he might put more sanctions on Russia. I think the Russian elite are worried that is how it will end up,” Amos said.
Russia Starts Here: Real Lives In The Ruins Of Empire by Howard Amos is published by Bloomsbury.
