There were long lines at gas pumps, turning each fill-up into an ordeal. Flights to vacation destinations were canceled, delayed or rerouted. Online orders were disrupted as e-commerce hubs were set ablaze by buzzing drones.
It’s been a difficult summer for Russians — a season of almost daily turmoil, frustration and anxiety.
The war that President Vladimir Putin unleashed on Ukraine 4 1/2 years ago has come home and is harder to ignore. Nightly swarms of drones closed Russian airports, struck oil refineries or set ablaze the warehouses of retail giants Wildberries and Ozon.
Over 43,300 Ukrainian drones were intercepted over Russia and illegally annexed Crimea in June, July and August, according to Defense Ministry data compiled by The Associated Press, although some clearly hit their targets. In the same period last summer, about 7,700 were intercepted, the ministry said.
“We were living a normal life, and then suddenly it’s like this,” retiree Margarita Terekhova said about having to wait in line to fill up her car in Moscow, part of the nationwide fuel crisis from attacks on refineries that persisted into August.
As the calendar turns toward autumn, increased awareness of the war and its consequences comes at a challenging time for the Kremlin. A parliamentary election takes place Sept. 18-20 — the first since the full-scale attack.
While there’s little doubt about the outcome of the tightly controlled balloting that features few opposition candidates for the State Duma, analysts say it still holds potential for political volatility.
“Elections are a time when people should reflect on themselves, the country, where it’s going and what to do about it,” said Nikolay Petrov, senior research fellow at the NEST Centre, founded by exiled tycoon and opposition figure Mikhail Khodorkovsky.
Even in a strictly controlled environment, “things that are unexpected, inconvenient (and) painful for the authorities” can happen, Petrov said.
The summer’s first major attack came June 3, when an oil terminal outside St. Petersburg was struck just as Putin’s signature economic forum there got underway. Since then, Ukraine hit refineries, along with Wildberries and Ozon warehouses — from Moscow to Yekaterinburg in the Ural Mountains, to Omsk in Siberia.
That intensified campaign — with its expanded geography and a growing number of drones — shocked Russians, says Denis Volkov, director of the country’s top independent pollster, the Levada Centre.
