According to RBC interviewers, the president's interior political bloc needs people who in future will be liable for communicating with participants in the war in Ukraine.
— If people returning from the front have questions to the authorities and an average authoritative answers to them, they can say to him: “Who are you? You did not fight.” Therefore, people are needed who will inspire their respect and with whom they will be able to talk as equal as they are – explained 1 of the callers of the service. In June 2024 Russian president Vladimir Putin declared that nearly 700,000 Russian soldiers were active in the war in Ukraine.
The Time of Heroes Program was created after Putin in a message to the national Assembly in February 2024 stated that the participants of the war in Ukraine should join the elites of the country and take positions in both authorities and large corporations. In May of the same year, 83 people were selected for the first tour of the program.
In December Putin at a convention of 1 Russia stated that the task should be expanded and launch akin programmes in regions. Alexey Komissarov, rector of the Russian Academy of National Economy and Public Administration at the president of the Russian Federation, who oversees the program, expressed his willingness to support the regions on this issue. In many of them, however, they have not yet been launched.
Risk plan
Until now, only 18 graduates of the national program have received positions in state structures. The ultimate took over Artem Żoga, a erstwhile commander of the Sparta separatist battalion — he became an envoy of the president at Ural.
According to RBC sources, uncovering war participants who are fit for state service, is not as simple as the Russian authorities expected. One reason — possibly the most crucial — is that they are not besides curious in specified work. In addition, they frequently deficiency the experience and motivation to deal with the state administration. There are besides limitations on the number of possible participants in the training – programme organizers can trust mainly on those whose contract has expired or who have left the front due to the wounds suffered.
By incorporating war participants into state structures The Kremlin intends to make their community easier to control and more predictable, says political scientist Alexey Makarkin. In his opinion, the Russian authorities will be prepared to respond to the initiatives of the participants in the armed action, and sometimes they may even request to have an initiative come from them.
— Therefore, there is simply a request for communicators who will work with them and direct their actions in a constructive direction. Then specified veteran communities will become partners of power, says Makarkin.
Many observers point out that the engagement of military veterans in civilian administration activities there is simply a hazard involved. In Russian state agencies or corporations there are not adequate jobs to separate them from all soldiers who fought in Ukraine. The only realistic form of support can so be a strategy of different benefits, but they can further exacerbate tensions between veterans and civilians. There is besides no 1 to direct veterans returning from the front, unsuited to civilian life, due to the fact that the Kremlin eliminates anyone who could endanger Putin's position. So his experimentation could destruct Russian society.
