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      How the Kremlin Is Forcing Ukrainians to Adopt Russian Life

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      In Russian-occupied regions in Ukraine, local leaders are forcing civilians to accept Russian rule. Next come sham elections that would formalize Vladimir V. Putin’s claim that they are Russian territories.They have handed out Russian passports, cellphone numbers and set-top boxes for watching Russian television. They have replaced Ukrainian currency with the ruble, rerouted the internet through Russian servers and arrested hundreds who have resisted assimilation.In ways big and small, the occupying authorities on territory seized by Moscow’s forces are using fear and indoctrination to compel Ukrainians to adopt a Russian way of life. “We are one people,” blue-white-and-red billboards say. “We are with Russia.”Now comes the next act in President Vladimir V. Putin’s 21st-century version of a war of conquest: the grass-roots “referendum.”Russia-appointed administrators in towns, villages and cities like Kherson in Ukraine’s south are setting the stage for a vote as early as September that the Kremlin will present as a popular desire in the region to become part of Russia. They are recruiting pro-Russia locals for new “election commissions” and promoting to Ukrainian civilians the putative benefits of joining their country; they are even reportedly printing the ballots already.Any referendum would be totally illegitimate, Ukrainian and Western officials say, but it would carry ominous consequences. Analysts both in Moscow and Ukraine expect that it would serve as a prelude to Mr. Putin’s officially declaring the conquered area to be Russian territory, protected by Russian nuclear weapons — making future attempts by Kyiv to drive out Russian forces potentially much more costly.Annexation would also represent Europe’s biggest territorial expansion by force since World War II, affecting an area several times larger than Crimea, the Ukrainian peninsula that Mr. Putin took over in 2014.In a photograph taken during a visit organized by the Russian military, a woman applied for Russian citizenship and a Russian passport in July in Melitopol, Ukraine.Sergei Ilnitsky/EPA, via ShutterstockThe prospect of another annexation has affected the military timetable as well, putting pressure on Kyiv to try a risky counteroffensive sooner, rather than waiting for more long-range Western weapons to arrive that would raise the chances of success.“Carrying out a referendum is not hard at all,” Vladimir Konstantinov, the speaker of the Russian-imposed Crimean Parliament, said in a phone interview this week. “They will ask: ‘Take us under your guardianship, under your development, under your security.’”Mr. Konstantinov, a longtime pro-Russia politician in Crimea, sat next to Mr. Putin at the Kremlin when the Russian president signed the document annexing the peninsula to Russia. He also helped organize the Crimean “referendum” in which 97 percent voted in favor of joining Russia — a result widely rejected by the international community as a sham.Our Coverage of the Russia-Ukraine WarGrain Blockade: A breakthrough deal aims to lift a Russian blockade on Ukrainian grain shipments. But Ukrainian farmers who have been living under the risk of missile attacks are skeptical the agreement will hold.In the South: As Ukraine lays the groundwork for a counteroffensive to retake Kherson, Russia is racing to bolster its troops in the region.Economic Havoc: As food, energy and commodity prices continue to climb around the world, few countries are feeling the bite as much as Ukraine.Explosion at a Prison: A blast at a Russian-held prison in eastern Ukraine killed at least 50 captured Ukrainian fighters. With no clarity on what happened, each country is blaming the other.Now, Mr. Konstantinov said, he is in constant touch with the Russian-imposed occupying authorities in the neighboring Kherson region, which Russian troops captured early in the war. He said that the authorities had told him a few days ago that they had started printing ballots, with the aim of holding a vote in September.Kherson is one of four regions in which officials are signaling planned referendums, along with Zaporizhzhia in the south and Luhansk and Donetsk in the east. While the Kremlin claims it will be up to the area’s residents to “determine their own future,” Mr. Putin last month hinted he expected to annex the regions outright: he compared the war in Ukraine with Peter the Great’s wars of conquest in the 18th century and said that, like the Russian czar, “it has also fallen to us to return” lost Russian territory.At the same time, the Kremlin appears to be keeping its options open by offering few specifics. Aleksei Chesnakov, a Moscow political consultant who has advised the Kremlin on Ukraine policy, said Moscow viewed referendums on joining Russia as its “base scenario” — though preparations for a potential vote were not yet complete. He declined to say whether he was involved in the process himself.Ukrainian troops fired on a Russian target last month in the Donetsk region.Tyler Hicks/The New York Times“The referendum scenario looks to be realistic and the priority in the absence of signals from Kyiv about readiness for negotiations on a settlement,” Mr. Chesnakov said in a written response to questions. “The legal and political vacuum, of course, needs to be filled.”As a result, a scramble to mobilize the residents of Russian-occupied territories for a referendum is increasingly visible on the ground — portrayed as the initiative of local leaders.The Russian-appointed authorities of the Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regions, for instance, announced this week that they were forming “election commissions” to prepare for referendums, which one official said could happen on Sept. 11 — a day when local and regional elections are scheduled to be held across Russia.The announcement invited residents to apply to join the election commission by submitting a passport copy, education records and two I.D.-size photographs.Officials are accompanying preparations for a vote with an intensified propaganda campaign — priming both the area’s residents as well as the domestic audience in Russia for a looming annexation. A new pro-Russian newspaper in the Zaporizhzhia region titled its second issue last week with the headline: “The referendum will be!” On the marquee weekly news show on Russian state television last Sunday, a report promised that “everything is being done to ensure that Kherson returns to its historical homeland as soon as possible.”“Russia is beginning to roll out a version of what you could call an annexation playbook,” John Kirby, the spokesman for the U.S. National Security Council, said this month, comparing the referendum preparations with the Kremlin’s moves in 2014 to try to justify its annexation of Crimea. “Annexation by force will be a gross violation of the U.N. Charter and we will not allow it to go unchallenged or unpunished.”In Kyiv, Ukraine’s capital, officials say any referendum on merging with Russia or forming a Russian client state in occupied areas would be illegal, riddled with fraud and do nothing to legitimize land seizures.“Together With Russia,” a billboard proclaimed in Crimea before a 2014 referendum on joining the Russian Federation, which was widely rejected by the West as a sham.Sergey Ponomarev for The New York TimesFor Ukrainian civilians, the occupation has been accompanied by myriad hardships, including shortages of cash and medicine — a situation the Russians try to exploit to win allegiance from locals by distributing “humanitarian aid.”Those seeking a sense of normalcy are being incentivized to apply for a Russian passport, which is now required for things like registering a motor vehicle or certain types of businesses; newborns and orphans are automatically registered as Russian citizens.“There’s no money in Kherson, there’s no work in Kherson,” said Andrei, 33, who worked in the service department of a car dealership in the city before the war. He left his home in the city with his wife and small child in early July and moved to western Ukraine.“Kherson has returned to the 1990s when only vodka, beer and cigarettes were for sale,” he said.After taking control in the Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions, Russian forces sought out pro-Kremlin Ukrainian officials and installed them in government positions.At the same time, they engaged in a continuing campaign to stifle dissent that included abducting, torturing and executing political and cultural leaders who were deemed a threat, according to witnesses interviewed by The New York Times, Western and Ukrainian officials, and independent humanitarian groups like Human Rights Watch.Russian occupiers cut off access to Ukrainian cellular service, and limited the availability of YouTube and a popular messaging app, Viber. They introduced the ruble and started changing the school curriculum to the Russian one — which increasingly seeks to indoctrinate children with Mr. Putin’s worldview.A top priority appears to have been to get locals watching Russian television: Russian state broadcasting employees in Crimea were deployed to Kherson to start a news show called “Kherson and Zaporizhzhia 24,” and set-top boxes giving access to the Russian airwaves were distributed for free — or even delivered to residents not able to pick them up in person.Ihor Kolykhaiev, the mayor of Kherson, at his office in April 2021.Brendan Hoffman for The New York TimesIn an interview late last month, Ihor Kolykhaiev, the mayor of the city of Kherson since 2020, said the Russian propaganda, coupled with the feeling of being abandoned by the government in Kyiv, was slowly succeeding in changing the perceptions of some residents who have stayed behind — mainly pensioners and people with low incomes.“I think that something is changing in relationships, probably in people’s habits,” he said, estimating that 5 to 10 percent of his constituents had changed their mind because of the propaganda.“This is an irreversible process that will happen in the future,” he added. “And that’s what I’m really worried about. Then it will be almost impossible to restore it.”Mr. Kolykhaiev spoke in a video interview from a makeshift office in Kherson. Days later, his assistant announced he had been abducted by pro-Russian occupying forces. As of Friday, he had not been heard from.Mr. Putin has referred to Kherson and other parts of Ukraine’s southeast as Novorossiya, or New Russia — the region’s name after it was conquered by Catherine the Great in the 18th century and became part of the Russian Empire. In recent years, nostalgia in the region for the Soviet past and skepticism of the pro-Western government in Kyiv still lingered among older generations, even as the region was forging a new Ukrainian identity.Ukrainian flags and a banner that reads, “Kherson is Ukraine,” during a rally in March against Russian occupation in Kherson.Olexandr Chornyi/Associated PressEarly in the occupation this spring, residents of Kherson gathered repeatedly for large, boisterous protests to challenge Russian troops even if they provoked gunfire in response. This open confrontation has largely ended, according to a 30-year-old lifelong Kherson resident, Ivan, who remains in the city and asked that his last name be withheld because of the risks of speaking out publicly.“As soon as there is a large gathering of people, soldiers appear immediately,” he said by phone. “It’s really life-threatening at this point.”But signs of resistance are evident, residents said.“Our people go out at night and paint Ukrainian flags,” said another man, Andrei. “In yellow and blue letters they paint, ‘We believe in the Ukrainian Armed Forces.’”Andrew E. Kramer More

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      Draghi’s Fall Reverberates Beyond Italy

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      The downfall of Italy’s prime minister has raised concerns across Europe about the power of populist movements and whether they will erode unity against Russian aggression.ROME — Just over a month ago, Prime Minister Mario Draghi of Italy boarded an overnight train with the leaders of France and Germany bound for Kyiv. During the 10-hour trip, they joked about how the French president had the nicest accommodations. But, more important, they asserted their resolute support for Ukraine in the face of Russian aggression. The pictures of the men tucked in a cabin around a wooden conference table evoked a clubby style of crisis management reminiscent of World War II.The mere fact that Mr. Draghi had a seat at that table reflected how, by the force of his stature and credibility, he had made his country — one saddled by debt and persistent political instability — an equal partner with Europe’s most important powers. Critical to that success was not only his economic bona fides as the former president of the European Central Bank but also his unflinching recognition that Russia’s war presented as an existential challenge to Europe and its values.All of that has now been thrown into jeopardy since a multi-flanked populist rebellion, motivated by an opportunistic power grab, stunningly torpedoed Mr. Draghi’s government this week. Snap elections have been called for September, with polls showing that an alliance dominated by hard-right nationalists and populists is heavily favored to run Italy come the fall.Mr. Draghi’s downfall already amounts to the toppling of the establishment that populist forces across Europe dream of. It has now raised concerns, far transcending Italy, of just how much resilience the movements retain on the continent, and of what damage an Italian government more sympathetic to Russia and less committed to the European Union could do to the cohesion of the West as it faces perhaps its greatest combination of security and economic challenges since the Cold War.“Draghi’s departure is a real problem for Europe, a tough blow,” said Gianfranco Pasquino, professor emeritus of political science at Bologna University. “Draghi had a clear position against the Russian aggression in Ukraine. Europe will lose in compactness because the next prime minister will almost certainly be less convinced that the responsibility for the war lies with Russia.”If there was any question of where the sympathies of European leaders lie in Italy’s power struggle, before his downfall Mr. Draghi received offerings of support from the White House, President Emmanuel Macron of France, Chancellor Olaf Scholz of Germany and others.Mario Draghi, left, and French President Emmanuel Macron examining debris as they visited Irpin, outside Kyiv, Ukraine, last month.Pool photo by Ludovic MarinPrime Minister Pedro Sanchez of Spain wrote “Europe needs leaders like Mario.” When Mr. Draghi made his last-ditch appeal to Italy’s fractious parties to stick with him on Wednesday, Prime Minister Antonio Costa of Portugal wrote him to thank him for reconsidering his resignation, according to a person close to Mr. Draghi.But now, with Mr. Macron lamenting the loss of a “Great Italian statesman,” anxiety has spread around the continent about what will come next.Mr. Draghi’s rebalancing of Italy’s position on Russia is all the more remarkable considering where it started. Italy has among Western Europe’s strongest bonds with Russia. During the Cold War, it was the home of the largest Communist Party in the West, and Italy depended on Russia for more than 40 percent of its gas.Mr. Draghi made it his mission to break that pattern. He leveraged his strong relationship with the U.S. treasury secretary, Janet Yellen, to spearhead the sanctions on the Russian Central Bank.By the example of his public speeches, he pressured his allies, including Mr. Macron, to agree that Ukraine should eventually be a member of the European Union.In the days before the fatal vote in the Senate that brought down his government, Mr. Draghi visited Algeria to announce a gas deal by which that country will supplant Russia as Italy’s biggest gas supplier.Those achievements are now at risk after what started last week as a rebellion within his coalition by the Five Star Movement, an ailing anti-establishment party, ended in a grab for power by conservatives, hard-right populists and nationalists who sensed a clear electoral opportunity, and went for the kill.They abandoned Mr. Draghi in a confidence vote. Now, if Italian voters do not punish them for ending a government that was broadly considered the country’s most capable and competent in years, they may come out on top in elections.Prime Minister Draghi speaking to ministers and Senators on Wednesday, the day his national unity coalition collapsed. Andreas Solaro/Agence France-Presse, via Getty ImagesThe maneuvering by the alliance seemed far from spontaneous.Ahead of the vote, Matteo Salvini, the leader of the hard-right League party, huddled with former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi over a long sweaty lunch at the mogul’s villa on the Appian Way and discussed what to do.Giorgia Meloni, the leader of the Brothers of Italy, a party with post-fascist roots who has incessantly called for elections from the opposition, said she spoke with Mr. Berlusconi a few days earlier and that he had invited her to the meeting as well, but that she demurred, saying it was better they meet after the vote. She said she spoke on the phone with Mr. Salvini only after Mr. Draghi’s speech in parliament.“I didn’t want them to be forced to do what they did,” she said, referring to Mr. Salvini and Mr. Berlusconi, who abandoned Mr. Draghi and collapsed the government. “I knew it would only work if they were sure about leaving that government.”Each has something to be gained in their alliance. Mr. Salvini, the hard right leader of the League party, not long ago the most popular politician in the country, had seen his standing eroded as part of Mr. Draghi’s government, while Ms. Meloni had gobbled up angry support from the opposition, supplanting him now as Italy’s rising political star. Mr. Berlusconi, nearly a political has-been at age 85, was useful and necessary to both, but also could use their coattails to ride back to power.Together, polls show, they have the support of more than 45 percent of voters. That is worrying to many critics of Russia. Mr. Salvini wore shirts with Mr. Putin’s face on them in Moscow’s Red Square and in the European Parliament, his party signed a cooperation deal with Mr. Putin’s Russia United party in 2017.Ms. Meloni, in what some analysts see as a cunning move to distinguish herself from Mr. Salvini and make herself a more acceptable candidate for prime minister, has emerged as a strong supporter of Ukraine.League leader Matteo Salvini and Brothers of Italy leader Giorgia Meloni meeting with with Silvio Berlusconi, right, in October 2021.Guglielmo Mangiapane/ReutersMr. Berlusconi used to host Mr. Putin’s daughters at his Sardinian villa and was long Mr. Putin’s closest ally in Western Europe. But now, some of Mr. Berlusconi’s longtime backers say, he has forgotten his European values and crossed the Rubicon to the nationalist and Putin-enabling side.Renato Brunetta, Italy’s Minister for Public Administration, and a long time member of former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi’s Forza Italia, quit the party after it joined with the populist League party in withdrawing support from Mr. Draghi and destroying the government.He said he left because Mr. Berlusconi’s decision to abandon the government was irresponsible and antithetical to the values of the party over the last 30 years. Asked whether he believed Mr. Berlusconi, sometimes shaky, was actually lucid enough to make the decision, he said “it would be even more grave” if he was.Italy, long a laboratory for European politics, has also been the incubator for the continent’s populism and transformation of hard-right movements into mainstream forces.When Mr. Berlusconi entered politics, largely to protect his business interests in the 1990s, he cast himself as a pro-business, and moderate, conservative. But in order to cobble together a winning coalition, he had brought in the League and a post-fascist party that would become Ms. Meloni’s.Now the situation has inverted. Ms. Meloni and Mr. Salvini need Mr. Berlusconi’s small electoral support in order to win elections and form a government. They are in charge.“It is a coalition of the right, because it is not center-right anymore,” said Mr. Brunetta. “It’s a right-right coalition with sovereigntist tendencies, extremist and Putin-phile.”Supporters of Mr. Draghi take some solace in the fact that he will stick around in a limited caretaker capacity until the next government is seated, with control over issues related to the pandemic, international affairs — including Ukraine policy — and the billions of euros in recovery funds from Europe. That money is delivered in tranches, and strict requirements need to be met before the funds are released.Supporters of Mr. Draghi acknowledged that major new overhauls on major problems such as pensions were now off the table, but they argued that the recovery funds were more or less safe because no government, not even a hard-right populist one, would walk away from all that money, and so would follow through on Mr. Draghi’s vision for modernization funded by those euros.But if the last week has shown anything, it is that political calculations sometimes outweigh the national interest.Supporters of Prime Minister Draghi demonstrating in Milan on Monday.Mourad Balti Touati/EPA, via ShutterstockThe government’s achievements are already “at risk” over the next months of Mr. Draghi’s limited powers, said Mr. Brunetta, but if the nationalist front won, he said, “obviously it will be even worse.”Mr. Brunetta said Mr. Draghi arrived on the political scene in the first place because there was a “crisis of the traditional parties” in Italy. He said that the 17 months in government, and the support it garnered in the public, showed that there was “a Draghian constituency,” which wanted moderate, pragmatic and value-based governance.The problem, he said, was there were “no political parties, or especially a coalition, to represent them” and he hoped one could be born before the election but “there was little time.”And in the meantime, he said, some things were for sure. Italy had lost influence in Europe and the continent would suffer, too, for the loss of Mr. Draghi.“Europe,” he said, “is weakened.”Gaia Pianigiani More

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      Discontent Leads to Calls for New Third Parties

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      More from our inbox:‘Hearts and Minds’: The Stakes in the Ukraine WarThe Football Coach, the Prayer and the Supreme CourtWith Trump, Money Wins Every Time Melanie LambrickTo the Editor:Re “A Viable Third Party Is Coming,” by Representative Tom Malinowski (Opinion guest essay, July 10):Ronald Reagan famously said that he didn’t leave the Democratic Party. The Democratic Party left him. For moderate New Jersey Republicans, it is clear that the Republican Party has left them. Big time. Donald Trump’s MAGA radicals have taken over. And so desperate times call for desperate measures.The newly announced Moderate Party seeks to provide a safe home for all reasonable folks in the state, not only disaffected Republicans but unaffiliated and other voters too. Let’s face it. The two-party lock on nominations and ballot access is just not working. Fusion voting — in which other political parties endorse and place on the ballot candidates who also run as Democrats or Republicans — works very well in New York, and it needs to come to New Jersey immediately.Mr. Malinowski personifies what we all want in our congressional representatives. He works for all the people in his district. Country before party. Imagine that.For all those disaffected Republicans and others who cringe at voting on the Democratic line, fusion voting needs to come to New Jersey.Harlin ParkerLebanon Township, N.J.To the Editor:The Moderate Party in New Jersey makes me hopeful. I’m tired of voting for the lesser of two evils. The far-right-wing extremists have even put a stain on Christianity.The majority of Americans are honest, hardworking moderates, as am I. Living in Texas has been very difficult for moderates, yet even in Texas many of the citizens are moderates. Honestly, I never thought about moving to New Jersey, but the Moderate Party movement has caused me to consider it. Is there any hope of the Moderates organizing in all 50 states?Nancy EvansLittle Elm, TexasTo the Editor:Tom Malinowski’s guest essay about a new Moderate Party, composed of “Democrats of all stripes” and Republicans fed up with Donald Trump, sounds like an old-fashioned anti-Trump party. A real Moderate Party leader must declare opposition to the failed Pelosi/Schumer agenda as forcefully as it condemns the extremism of QAnon.A true center-driven party could lead to balanced debate and legislation on the environment, energy, crime, guns, health care, homelessness and immigration, and it might even lead us out of the desert created by the Supreme Court’s attack on women’s rights.Mark McKeefrySeward, AlaskaTo the Editor:Since 2000, I have been a third-party voter. I have often said, “I hope I live long enough to see any third party gain power, yet I don’t think God will let me live to the age of 200.” Since the overturning of Roe v. Wade, living two lifetimes might not be necessary.Allow me to suggest a new third party called the Women’s Rights Party USA. A large percentage of women, now feeling like second-class citizens, would join it. Many conservative men might vote for Women’s Rights Party USA candidates out of empathy for the moms/wives/daughters in their lives.If this new political party is started, maybe I would not have to live to age 200 to see real change in our society.Tony MathisonWichita Falls, TexasTo the Editor:Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger, please start a third party. As a lifelong Democrat, I would vote for either of you in a heartbeat for one reason that should be the criterion for any candidate — character! They have both sacrificed everything for the Jan. 6 hearings.I think that the Democratic and Republican Parties have been hijacked by extremists. Whom can I vote for in 2022 or 2024? Should I sit it out? It would be the first time.Carol ShurmanNew York‘Hearts and Minds’: The Stakes in the Ukraine War Sefa Karacan/Anadolu Agency vía Getty ImagesTo the Editor:Re “Putin Believes He’s Winning,” by Tatiana Stanovaya (Opinion guest essay, July 19):To win, you must win more than square meters, you must win people — that is, hearts and minds. That war Vladimir Putin has already lost, as the world slowly comes to understand what is at stake here: the hard-fought but imperturbably found identity of a real people — the Ukrainians — and their fierce desire to defend and express that identity.The Ukraine war embodies this struggle better than anything else I know.Jeffrey McCabeOrdu, TurkeyTo the Editor:With an uncertain outcome to the Ukraine war, it is shaping up as a contest between Russian energy and sanctions. Should the war continue into the winter and if the sanctions have not seriously damaged the Russian economy, Vladimir Putin will be in a position to apply his “energy weapon.”This will be a severe test for the Europeans, who Mr. Putin is betting will seek an agreement to end the conflict on his terms.Ed HoulihanRidgewood, N.J.The Football Coach, the Prayer and the Supreme Court Illustration by Danielle Del Plato; photographs by David Lee/Shutterstock, Chris Clor/Getty Images and Ben Pigao/iStock/Getty ImagesTo the Editor:Re “I Don’t Want to See a Football Coach Praying on the Field,” by Anne Lamott (Opinion guest essay, July 11):As a Christian pastor I pray and believe in the power of prayer. I also value U.S. constitutional protections for free exercise of all religions. The Supreme Court’s majority opinion on Coach Joseph Kennedy’s midfield postgame prayers distorts reality and belies power differentials in high school.A coach’s sincere religious practice midfield immediately after a game is a leader’s public act. Mr. Kennedy’s power over lives of students, his role as teacher and his unique access to that public space reinforce that act’s power.A coach saying “This is a free country” while much of the team joined him is a form of evangelism that many of us who teach in public classrooms and on fields have refrained from out of respect for the religious freedom of all.Let’s not forget the freedom, agency and voice of students who are of other religious traditions or none. Do you remember high school?(Rev.) Odette Lockwood-StewartBerkeley, Calif.To the Editor:Anne Lamott’s kinder, gentler, Sermon on the Mount type of Christianity hasn’t a prayer against white Christian nationalists, the Southern Baptist Convention, evangelicals, assorted other theocratic “sword or the cross” groups and their enablers in the Republican Party.Theocracy is the deadly enemy of democracy, and one of the main defenses against this kind of tyranny is a very high and very thick wall between church and state, not a Southern border wall or the Second Amendment.Bruce LiptonNew YorkWith Trump, Money Wins Every TimeDonald J. Trump’s private golf course in Bedminster, N.J., is set to host the LIV Golf tournament.Laura Moss for The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “9/11 Families Call on Trump to Cancel Saudi-Backed Golf Event” (nytimes.com, July 17):The families are asking Donald Trump to choose between money and a sense of compassion and patriotism?Silly people, it is no contest at all. Money and his personal interests win every time.Bruce HigginsSan Diego More

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      An American’s Murky Path From Russian Propagandist to Jan. 6

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      Charles Bausman, a former financial executive who runs websites that promote far-right views, recorded footage in the Capitol for a Russian television producer. Soon after, he fled to Moscow as a “political refugee.”In security footage from Jan. 6, it is easy to overlook the thin man wearing a red Trump hat who filters into the U.S. Capitol Building to record the mayhem with his phone.He blends in with the mob, seemingly unexceptional by the chaotic standards of that day. But what he did afterward was far from routine.Within 24 hours, the man, Charles Bausman, gave his recordings and commentary to a Russian television producer for a propaganda video. He then decamped to Moscow, where, appearing on a far-right television network owned by a sanctioned oligarch, he recently accused American media of covering up for neo-Nazis in Ukraine.“We must understand that in the West,” Mr. Bausman told Russian viewers, “we are already in a situation of total lies.”For Mr. Bausman — an American alumnus of Phillips Exeter Academy and Wesleyan University who speaks fluent Russian — it was the latest chapter in a strange odyssey. Once a financial executive who voted for President Barack Obama, he emerged in 2014 as a public critic of the left and of the United States, boosted by Russian state-sponsored organizations through speaking invitations, TV appearances and awards.Central to his transformation was a series of websites he created pushing anti-America, pro-Russia themes, as well as racist and homophobic messaging. Some of his posts have racked up millions of views, and his 5,000-word screed on “the Jewish problem” has been hailed by antisemites around the world and translated into multiple languages.Mr. Bausman’s path in some ways tracks a broader shift on the political right that embraces misinformation and sympathy toward Russia while tolerating an increasingly emboldened white nationalism. For its part, the Kremlin has sought to court conservatives in the United States and sow discord through a network of expats, collaborators and spies.People who have written for Mr. Bausman’s websites or promoted his work have come under scrutiny by American intelligence, and the founder of a pro-Russia forum that hosted him and others was charged in March with being an unregistered agent of Moscow.Mr. Bausman initially gained some prominence as a Russia apologist, but he has lowered his profile in recent years as he has espoused more extreme views. Yet he has been Zelig-like in exploiting cultural and political flash points, racing from cause to cause.After surfacing as a voluble defender of Russia’s 2014 invasion of Crimea, Mr. Bausman became an outspoken Trump supporter. With white nationalism on the rise, he threw himself into promoting it, relocating to rural Pennsylvania and hosting neo-Nazis at his property. He joined Republican protests against coronavirus restrictions and the 2020 election and most recently has reappeared in Russian media to criticize the West’s response to the war in Ukraine.Mr. Bausman attended a 2015 conference hosted by RT, a news channel tied to the Kremlin.Mikhail Voskresenskiy/Sputnik, via APKonstantin Malofeev, an influential oligarch indicted by the United States over alleged sanctions violations, said he had asked Mr. Bausman to appear on his television network because Mr. Bausman was one of the few Russian-speaking Americans willing to do it.“Who else is there to invite?” Mr. Malofeev asked.Mr. Bausman, 58, did not respond to multiple requests for comment. No charges have been brought against him related to the events of Jan. 6, though he appears inside the Capitol in video clips introduced in court cases against others. When a Russian TV host referred to him as “a participant” in storming the Capitol, Mr. Bausman interrupted to say that the description could get him into trouble, and that he was a journalist.Better Understand the Russia-Ukraine WarHistory and Background: Here’s what to know about Russia and Ukraine’s relationship and the causes of the conflict.How the Battle Is Unfolding: Russian and Ukrainian forces are using a bevy of weapons as a deadly war of attrition grinds on in eastern Ukraine.Russia’s Brutal Strategy: An analysis of more than 1,000 photos found that Russia has used hundreds of weapons in Ukraine that are widely banned by international treaties.Outside Pressures: Governments, sports organizations and businesses are taking steps to punish Russia. Here are some of the sanctions adopted so far and a list of companies that have pulled out of the country.Stay Updated: To receive the latest updates on the war in your inbox, sign up here. The Times has also launched a Telegram channel to make its journalism more accessible around the world.But, on other occasions, he has described himself differently. Speaking on a white nationalist podcast in April, in which he attacked critics of Russia as “evil pedophile globalists” who control the “enslaved West,” he explained why he was back in Moscow:“I’m a political refugee here.”Connecticut to MoscowPresident Vladimir V. Putin had just invaded Crimea in 2014 when Mr. Bausman said he had an idea. He would create an alternative news source to counter what he called Western media’s “inaccurate, incomplete and unrealistically negative picture of Russia.”The website, Russia Insider, was directed at an English-speaking audience and offered stories like, “Putin to Obama: You’re Turning the U.S.A. Into a Godless Sewer,” and “Anti-Christian Pogrom Underway in Ukraine.” Content was often aggregated from other pro-Russia sources, including RT, the Kremlin-funded television network.The role of online agitator was not an obvious one for Mr. Bausman, who grew up in the wealthy suburb of Greenwich, Conn., attended prep school and went on to earn a history degree from Wesleyan and study business at Columbia. His experience with Russia dates to his childhood, when his father served as the Moscow bureau chief for The Associated Press.Mr. Bausman with his father, who worked in Moscow for The Associated Press.As a college graduate in the late 1980s, he returned to Russia, and, with help from his father’s connections, worked briefly for NBC News. But when the Soviet Union collapsed, Mr. Bausman found a new role: as a multilingual fixer for entrepreneurs scrambling to cash in on the emerging economy.A. Craig Copetas, a former Wall Street Journal correspondent who wrote a book about the post-Soviet business era, said Mr. Bausman worked with Russians who “were the forerunners of the oligarchs.”“Charlie speaks excellent Russian,” he said, “so he was a valuable asset — he was like the young American prince of Moscow.”Mr. Bausman’s early success was not to last. There are gaps in his résumé, and U.S. court records show that he filed for bankruptcy in 1999.A former business associate recalled Mr. Bausman’s father beseeching people to “help my son” with his career. This person — one of several who did not want to be identified because of Mr. Bausman’s ties to extremists — described him as “just this lost guy” who seemed to struggle professionally despite impressive qualifications. He worked a succession of Russian private equity jobs, never staying in any position longer than a few years.Mr. Bausman’s last role was with the agribusiness investor AVG Capital Partners. A 2012 company presentation, which listed him as director of investor relations, boasted of “strong partnerships” with Russian authorities and included a photo of Mr. Putin.The exact timing of Mr. Bausman’s switch to propagandist is murky, but two profiles on the Russian social media platform VK offer a clue. The first, from 2011, is a sparse page featuring a wan Mr. Bausman in a suit and a link to a group interested in tennis.In the second profile, from two years later, he looks tan and confident in an open-collared shirt. The VK groups he joined were strikingly radical, including a militant Russian Orthodox sect and another called the Internet Militia, whose goal echoed what would soon become Mr. Bausman’s focus: “to protect and defend our native information field” against American attack.Oligarch ConnectionsPublicly, Mr. Bausman turned to crowd funding to pay for Russia Insider. Behind the scenes, however, he was in contact with Mr. Malofeev, a promoter of Orthodox nationalist propaganda.Leaked emails made public in 2014 revealed Mr. Bausman corresponding with a Malofeev associate, saying “we published your Serbia info” and asking for money. In an email to Mr. Malofeev, the associate praised Mr. Bausman’s site as “pro-Russian” and noted that he “wants to cooperate.”Mr. Malofeev was backing another media project at the time with a similar agenda: Tsargrad TV, which he created with a former Fox News employee, John Hanick. Both Mr. Hanick and Mr. Malofeev were charged by the United States this year with violating sanctions imposed in 2014.Mr. Bausman has appeared on the television network of Konstantin Malofeev, a Russian oligarch indicted by the U.S. for alleged sanctions violations.Tatyana Makeyeva/ReutersIn an interview, Mr. Malofeev said he believed Mr. Bausman “has done a great job and that he is a very brave person,” but he denied they had “a financial relationship.”Mr. Bausman has always said he did not receive support from Russian authorities. But there is little doubt that his emergence as an American salesman of pro-Kremlin views was aided greatly by entities controlled by or tied to the Russian state.After Russia Insider went live, Mr. Bausman began appearing on RT and other Russian media, and a news crew from a major state-owned TV channel traveled to his parents’ home in Connecticut to film him discussing his new website. On Facebook, he boasted that “our traffic exploded after this aired.”He was invited to join panel discussions at another state-owned outlet, received an award in 2016 named after a pro-Russia journalist killed in Ukraine, and spoke at a Kremlin-sponsored youth conference in newly captured Crimea. He gave interviews to Russian Orthodox figures, speaking approvingly of Mr. Malofeev.In April 2016, Mr. Bausman’s work was promoted by a Russian website, RIA FAN, that has been linked to Yevgeny Prigozhin, an oligarch indicted by the special counsel Robert S. Mueller. The website initially shared an address with the Internet Research Agency, the Russian government “troll factory” accused of using fake social media accounts and online propaganda to disrupt the 2016 U.S. presidential election.Russia analysts who have followed Mr. Bausman’s work say it has the hallmarks of a disinformation project. Olga Lautman, a senior fellow at the Center for European Policy Analysis who researches Russian propaganda campaigns, said his messaging merged seamlessly with that of Mr. Putin’s government.“The initial purpose of his outlet was to muddle the truth in American circles about Crimea,” she said. “And then you see his outlet and others repurposed to support the Kremlin narrative about Syria, and then the 2016 U.S. elections.“It appears,” she said, “to be a classic Russian influence operation.”Hard-Right TurnWith Donald J. Trump’s 2016 presidential victory, Mr. Bausman’s media outlet began to promote more extreme views. In a celebratory post after the election, he struck a militant chord that shocked old friends.“Trump’s election is perhaps akin to Luther nailing his theses to the door, but now the demons are wakened, and they know they must fight or be killed, and as in the 16th century, they will not go quietly,” he wrote. “And there will be blood. Let us hope that it is the figurative, digital kind, and not the real, red, hot, sticky stuff.”A turning point came in January 2018, when Mr. Bausman posted a lengthy polemic, “It’s Time to Drop the Jew Taboo,” that was both an antisemitic manifesto and a call to action for the alt-right.“The evidence suggests that much of human enterprise dominated and shaped by Jews is a bottomless pit of trouble with a peculiar penchant for mendacity and cynicism, hostility to Christianity and Christian values, and in geopolitics, a clear bloodlust,” he wrote.It was welcomed by white nationalist figures like Richard Spencer, who called it “a major event.”Outside the far right, Mr. Bausman’s embrace of antisemitism was widely condemned. The U.S. State Department flagged it in a report on human-rights concerns in Russia, and the diatribe prompted a disavowal from RT.After the death in August 2018 of his mother, who left an estate valued at about $2.6 million, Mr. Bausman bought two properties in Lancaster, Pa., where his family had roots.His older sister, Mary-Fred Bausman-Watkins, said last year that her brother “was always short on money” and that their parents frequently helped him out, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center, which has compiled several reports on his activities. Ms. Bausman-Watkins died in May.“They funded his whole life,” she told the center, “and then he inherited their money when they died, and they’re still funding his life.”The InsurrectionWhile living in Lancaster with his Russian wife and two young daughters, Mr. Bausman turned his attention to two new websites devoted largely to white nationalist content. Headlines included: “Out of Control Black Violence” and “Jewish Intellectuals Call on Gays to Perform Sex Acts in Front of Children.”Mr. Bausman concealed his ownership of one of these sites, National Justice, through a private registration, which The New York Times confirmed by reviewing data leaked last year from Epik, a web-hosting service favored by the far right. The site has the same name as a white nationalist organization and featured posts by one of its leaders, though it is not the group’s official site, according to its chairman, Michael Peinovich.In an interview, Mr. Peinovich said Mr. Bausman had hosted party members at his farmstead for an inaugural meeting in 2020 (a large event first reported by a local news outlet, LancasterOnline). But afterward, he said, his group “went our own way” because it did not agree with Mr. Bausman’s preoccupation with supporting Mr. Trump.Three days before Jan. 6, 2021, Mr. Bausman allowed Rod of Iron Ministries, a gun-themed religious sect led by a son of the Rev. Sun Myung Moon, to meet at his property, according to photos on social media. Members of the sect had been active in “Stop the Steal” rallies, some of which Mr. Bausman had also attended, and were at the Capitol on Jan. 6.On Facebook, Mr. Bausman posted an appeal for people to go to Washington “to support Trump.” At various points during the riot, Mr. Bausman can be seen inside the Capitol, often using his phone to record the chaos.Mr. Bausman, right, has said he entered the Capitol in the capacity of a journalist.via YouTubeAfterward, he returned to Lancaster and gave a lengthy interview for a video about the insurrection produced by Arkady Mamontov, a Russian television host known for splashy pro-Kremlin propaganda pieces. The video also included footage of Mr. Bausman outside his home that appears to have been filmed months earlier. Mr. Mamontov did not respond to a request for comment.In the video, Mr. Bausman suggested, without evidence, that federal agents had instigated the violence at the Capitol to “discredit Trump,” and he painted a dystopian, conspiratorial picture of American society. It is a theme that he has carried forward to more recent appearances on Mr. Malofeev’s television network, in which he has accused Western media of lying about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.It is not clear when Mr. Bausman left the U.S., but he was in Moscow for a TV appearance on the day of President Biden’s inauguration, two weeks after the insurrection at the Capitol. In the white nationalist podcast interview he gave in April from Russia, he said he had not been back home since.When asked by the host if he was still a Trump fan, Mr. Bausman said he was not, before adding with a laugh that there was one thing that could restore his loyalty.“When he pardons me for Jan. 6,” he said.Anton Troianovski More

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      La víctima cultural de la guerra de Putin en Ucrania

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      La guerra en Ucrania es una catástrofe interminable. Las fuerzas rusas, concentradas en el este, siguen infligiendo un daño terrible en los soldados y civiles ucranianos. Una infinidad de vidas han sido perdidas y trastornadas. Una vez más, el mundo debe afrontar la posibilidad de una guerra nuclear y lidiar con unas crisis de refugiados y del costo del nivel de vida que están empeorando. Este no es el “fin de la historia” que habíamos esperado.Se está dando otra transformación, aunque menos violenta: luego de tres décadas de intercambio, interacción e involucramiento, la puerta entre Rusia y Estados Unidos se está cerrando. Casi todos los días otra compañía estadounidense —incluyendo la más simbólica de todas, McDonald’s, cuyos arcos dorados anunciaron una nueva era hace 30 años— sale de Rusia. Los diplomáticos han sido expulsados, los productos han sido retirados y las visitas personales pospuestas. En los consulados cerrados, nadie está emitiendo visas y, aunque lo hicieran, el espacio aéreo estadounidense ahora está prohibido a las naves rusas. La única interacción significativa parece ser la emisión de sanciones y contrasanciones.Para una rusaestadounidense como yo, cuya vida se ha forjado en los intersticios de las dos culturas, es un cambio de circunstancias doloroso y desconcertante. Hay que ser claros: las medidas para reducir la capacidad de agresión del Kremlin son necesarias en lo político y en lo moral. Pero el daño colateral es una ruptura de vínculos que está destinada a reavivar estereotipos perjudiciales y a cerrar el terreno para la polinización intercultural. Sobre todo, la actual ruptura marca el fin definitivo de un periodo en el que la integración de Rusia con Occidente, por más conflictiva que fuera, parecía posible y el antagonismo entre superpotencias ideológicas era cosa del pasado.Al menos eso fue lo que sentí un cálido día de marzo de 1989 en Krasnodar, la ciudad provincial al sur de Rusia, cerca del mar Negro, donde crecí. Mi escuela iba a recibir a un grupo de estudiantes de último año de una preparatoria en Nuevo Hampshire: estaba por cumplir 17 años y hasta ese momento Estados Unidos solo existía en mi mente como un concepto abstracto. Era el villano de un espectáculo para las fiestas de fin de año, el objeto de la misión de Nikita Khrushchev de “Alcanzar y sobrepasar a Estados Unidos” y el hogar del programa de La guerra de las galaxias, solo uno de los muchos diseños de los imperialistas para acabar con la Unión Soviética.Pero esos chicos y chicas que llegaron al patio de la escuela vistiendo sudaderas y pantalones de mezclilla no parecían imperialistas ni amenazantes en ningún sentido. Eran como nosotros, pero mejor vestidos: tímidos, con buenas intenciones y fascinados. Tan solo unas horas antes, durante nuestra clase de entrenamiento militar habíamos estado montando rifles kalashnikov para usarlos contra agentes enemigos. Y aquí estaban, de pie frente a nosotros. Nos quedamos mirándonos los unos a los otros. Entonces, alguien sonrió, otra persona saludó. En cuestión de minutos, la desconfianza entre nosotros había desaparecido. “Estoy leyendo Crimen y castigo para las vacaciones de primavera”, me dijo un tipo alto con un arete de plata. “¡Raskolnikov es genial!”.Tengo un cuaderno verde en el que he guardado los nombres de ciudades estadounidense, junto con una carta de amor, un clavel seco y un montón de fotografías en blanco y negro, recuerdos de la magia de 1989: el muro de Berlín desmantelado, la cortina de hierro cayendo, el temible “nosotros” y “ellos” esfumándose en el aire que finalmente era libre. Al cantar “Goodbye America, where I have never been” (Adiós, Estados Unidos, a donde nunca he ido), un himno popular, nos estábamos despidiendo de Estados Unidos como enemigo, de Estados Unidos como un mito y anticipábamos el descubrimiento del Estados Unidos real. Las palabras como “fronteras” e “ideología” ya no eran relevantes. Los dos países parecían estar unidos por un anhelo compartido de paz.Los años que siguieron generaron una buena voluntad inmensa entre nuestras naciones. Como rusa en Estados Unidos, conocí a innumerables personas que la construyeron: un médico californiano que ayudó a crear centros de cardiocirugía infantil en toda la Rusia postsoviética, un director de cine del área de la bahía de San Francisco que organizó el primer festival de cine judío en Moscú y un capitán de Seattle que creó empresas marítimas conjuntas con pescadores en el lejano oriente ruso. Los graduados universitarios rusos, por su parte, acudieron en masa a Estados Unidos, aportando su cerebro y talentos a todo tipo de actividades, desde películas de Hollywood hasta la secuenciación del ADN. Hubo muchos matrimonios. En los años noventa, una popular banda rusa de mujeres plasmó ese espíritu cuando le imploraron, con los acordes de la balalaika eléctrica, a un hipotético “American Boy” que se las llevara.Esa fue la ruta que yo tomé. Dado que al casarme entré en una familia de antiguos disidentes protegidos por Estados Unidos, yo también fui testimonio del flujo de personas e ideas. El dinero también fluyó. Por ejemplo, mi primer trabajo remunerado en Estados Unidos, en 1998, consistió en traducir para el segundo simposio anual sobre inversiones ruso-estadounidenses, organizado por la Universidad de Harvard; participaba un gran elenco de estrellas de la banca internacional que se disputaban la atención de los invitados rusos, entre ellos el magnate Boris Berezovsky y Yuri Luzhkov, entonces alcalde de Moscú.Sin embargo, en algún punto del camino, la buena voluntad se frenó. Después de haber expresado su entusiasmo por el primer presidente ruso postsoviético, Boris Yeltsin, los líderes estadounidenses consideraron que su sucesor forjado en el KGB, Vladimir Putin, no era tanto de su agrado. Putin dejó en claro que eso no le molestaba. “Hegemonía estadounidense”, una frase de mi infancia soviética, empezó a aparecer en los medios de comunicación rusos pro-Kremlin. En Occidente, los rusos ya no eran vistos como rehenes liberados de un régimen totalitario, villanos reformados de las películas de James Bond o emisarios de la gran cultura de Tolstói y Dostoievski, sino como personas que compraban lujosas propiedades en Manhattan y Miami pagando en efectivo. El encanto entre los países y sus ciudadanos se atenuó, pero los intereses compartidos y los vínculos sociales se mantuvieron.La anexión de Crimea en 2014 fue un punto de inflexión. Es cierto que Putin ya había dado rienda suelta a su agresividad en Georgia y, de forma devastadora, en Chechenia, pero fue su pretensión de reclamar el territorio ucraniano lo que dio a Occidente la llamada de atención. Las sanciones subsecuentes impactaron fuertemente en la economía rusa. También proporcionaron al Kremlin amplios medios para azuzar el sentimiento antiestadounidense. Culpar a Estados Unidos de los problemas del país era una narrativa familiar, casi nostálgica, para los rusos, más de la mitad de los cuales nacieron en la Unión Soviética. La simple cantinela “la expansión de la OTAN”, “la agresión occidental”, “el enemigo en la puerta”, se repetía, haciendo creer a los rusos que Estados Unidos pretendía la destrucción de su patria. La propaganda funcionó: en 2018, Estados Unidos volvió a ser considerado como el enemigo número 1 de Rusia, con Ucrania, su “títere”, en segundo lugar.En Estados Unidos, las cosas no estaban tan mal. Pero la llegada de Donald Trump a la escena política mundial complicó la ya tensa relación ruso-estadounidense. Trump se encariñó con el abiertamente autoritario Putin, reforzando el sentimiento antirruso que había ido en aumento desde la intromisión del Kremlin en las elecciones presidenciales estadounidenses de 2016 y que rara vez distinguía entre Putin y el país que gobernaba. Los lazos económicos y culturales empezaron a debilitarse a medida que se hacía más difícil obtener visas y financiación. Aun así, hubo intercambios de estudiantes, se proyectaron películas y se realizaron visitas familiares, aunque a intervalos más largos.Los misiles rusos que atacaron ciudades ucranianas el 24 de febrero extinguieron esa luz parpadeante. Estados Unidos ahora proporciona miles de millones de dólares en armas para usarse contra Rusia y el objetivo declarado de Rusia es poner fin a la dominación global “irrestricta” de Estados Unidos. Los dos países, que en su día fueron aliados en la guerra contra la Alemania nazi, están librando una guerra indirecta. Mientras veo videos de padres rusos incitando a sus hijos a destruir iPhones o leo sobre las amenazas contra una venerable panadería de Seattle conocida por sus productos horneados al estilo ruso, me invade, sobre todo, la tristeza. Nuestro sueño postotalitario de un futuro pacífico y amistoso ha terminado.Aparte de causar un horror físico, la guerra de Putin en Ucrania está borrando muchos activos intangibles, entre ellos la buena voluntad colectiva de Occidente hacia Rusia. En el futuro de mis hijos no veo ningún milagro cultural parecido al que yo viví en 1989. Es una pérdida para ambos países y la de Rusia será mayor si Putin sigue redoblando la carnicería y el aislamiento. Pero ese futuro no está tallado en piedra. Al fin y al cabo, los años de la perestroika, cuando la Unión Soviética se embarcó en reformas a gran escala en nombre de la apertura, demostraron que Rusia es capaz de cambiar.Por ahora, empero, cada explosión en Ucrania también ataca las bondades de la relación entre Estados Unidos y Rusia. En la tierra de Putin, “Goodbye America”, que antes era una canción irónica llena de esperanza, se ha convertido en una oscura profecía autocumplida.Anastasia Edel (@aedelwriter) es la autora de Russia: Putin’s Playground: Empire, Revolution, and the New Tsar. More

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      Sorting Out Blame in the Ukraine War

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      More from our inbox:‘Heart-Wrenching Testimony,’ but a Doomed Gun BillU.S. Inaction on Climate ChangeAn Insult to Poll WorkersUkrainian fighters of the Odin Unit, including some foreign fighters, survey a destroyed Russian tank in Irpin, Ukraine, in March.Daniel Berehulak for The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “U.S. Helps Prolong Ukraine War” (Opinion guest essay, June 4):Christopher Caldwell essentially suggests that Russia has a claim to Crimea, that the U.S. should have let the Russians seize Ukraine to reduce destruction and loss of life, and that calling Vladimir Putin a war criminal made him commit more war crimes.This nonsensical self-flagellation ignores the prior Russian attacks on Georgia and the Donbas region of Ukraine, and the history of Mr. Putin’s desire to restore the U.S.S.R., at least geographically.Ukraine gave up its nuclear weapons in exchange for protection. Allowing the country to be ripped apart is morally corrupt and emboldens countries like Russia, and possibly China (regarding Taiwan) and others, by demonstrating that there are few real consequences to seizing territory.David J. MelvinChester, N.J.To the Editor:Christopher Caldwell is mistaken in blaming the United States for prolonging the war by sending advanced weapons to the Ukrainian military. The real responsibility for extending this conflict lies not with the U.S. but with the Ukrainians themselves.They have decided that it is better to suffer death and destruction than to succumb to a Russian effort to destroy their independence and freedom. In so doing, they have earned much of the world’s admiration while dealing a grievous blow to the cause of autocracies everywhere.Rather than “sleepwalking” into a conflict with Russia, America is enabling a brave people to take a stand against aggression now, making it less likely that the U.S. would have to face a far more costly war in the future.Steven R. DavidBaltimoreThe writer is a professor of international relations at Johns Hopkins University.To the Editor:Christopher Caldwell writes most convincingly that prolonging the war in Ukraine is a recipe for disaster. With the United States fueling the war with weapons and logistics, Ukrainians are duped into thinking they can win.As Mr. Caldwell observes, U.S. policy has only resulted in thousands more deaths. If the Biden administration is to do the right thing, it will start by acknowledging the truths of Mr. Caldwell’s words.Jerome DonnellyWinter Park, Fla.‘Heart-Wrenching Testimony,’ but a Doomed Gun BillMiah Cerrillo, a fourth grader who survived the carnage in Uvalde by covering herself in a classmate’s blood and pretending to be dead, shared her ordeal in a prerecorded video.Jason Andrew for The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “House Passes Bill to Impose Limits on Sales of Guns” (front page, June 9):So the House has passed a modest bill that seeks to stop ready access of weapons of war to people too young to drink, and it faces almost certain defeat in the Senate.It is my fervent hope that the doomed Senate vote is shown on prime-time television. Americans need to see how their senators vote; senators need to be held to account. Next time there is a mass shooting, and there will be a next time, we will know exactly who was complicit.Remember, America, we can change this. We are greater in number and influence than the N.R.A.Christine ThomaBasking Ridge, N.J.To the Editor:As I listened to the heart-wrenching testimony of the latest victims of gun violence, my thoughts turned to my energetic 21-month-old granddaughter. Not yet old enough for school, she has her whole life ahead of her, filled with birthdays, graduations, college, a career and, if she chooses, marriage and children.I’m 68 years old, and I’ll not likely live long enough to celebrate all of these milestones. My only question is: Will she?Robert D. RauchQueensTo the Editor:Re “Man With Pistol, Crowbar and Zip Ties Is Arrested Near Kavanaugh’s Home” (news article, June 9):The contrast is striking. A Supreme Court justice is threatened, but safe, and Mitch McConnell urges Congress to pass a bill to protect justices “before the sun sets today.”The same day, families of gun violence tell of personal tragedies that will never fade, children’s lives lost, and yet nothing but platitudes from the Republicans.Peter MandelsonBarrington, R.I.U.S. Inaction on Climate Change Ritzau Scanpix/Via ReutersTo the Editor:Re “Trump’s Policies Held Back U.S. in Climate Ranking” (news article, May 31):You report that the United States has moved from 15th to 101st place in the climate metrics used in the Environmental Performance Index, thanks to the refusal by Donald Trump and the Republicans to take action on climate change. Out of 177 nations we rank 101st.As a result we risk cities flooding, unprecedented heat waves, terrifying storms, widespread water shortages, the extinction of a million species of plants and animals, and severe food shortages.What is wrong with our country, our government leadership and our people? The window to avert catastrophic climate change is quickly closing. Look around you!Is it going to take huge amounts of human tragedy for us to act?Lena G. FrenchPasadena, Calif.An Insult to Poll WorkersElection workers in Philadelphia sorting through ballots the day after Election Day in 2020.Kriston Jae Bethel for The New York TimesTo the Editor:Continuing Republican claims of widespread voter fraud are insults to the honest, hard-working poll workers and volunteers who know the procedures and observe the laws that ensure that ballots are valid and counted properly.Those insults should be met with outrage, not only from those workers but also from the American public at large.David M. BehrmanHouston More

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      Russia and America Are Parting Ways

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      The war in Ukraine is a never-ending catastrophe. Russian forces, concentrated in the east, continue to inflict terrible damage on Ukrainian soldiers and civilians alike. Countless lives have been lost and upended. Once again, the world must confront the possibility of nuclear war and grapple with a compounding refugee and cost of living crisis. This isn’t the “end of history” that we hoped for.Less violently, another transformation is taking place: After three decades of exchange, interaction and engagement, the door between Russia and America is slamming shut. Practically every day another American company — including the most symbolic of them all, McDonald’s, whose golden arches heralded a new era 30 years ago — pulls out of Russia. Diplomats have been expelled, concerts canceled, products withdrawn, personal visits called off. In the shuttered consulates, nobody is issuing visas, and even if they were, American airspace is now closed to Russian aircraft. The only substantive interaction left seems to be the issuing of sanctions and counter-sanctions.For a Russian American like me, whose life has been forged in the interstices between the two cultures, it’s a bewildering, sorrowful turn of events. Measures to curtail the Kremlin’s capacity of aggression are, to be clear, politically and morally necessary. But the collateral damage is a severing of ties that is bound to revive harmful stereotypes and close down the space for cross-cultural pollination. More profoundly, the current parting of ways marks the definitive end of a period when Russia’s integration with the West, however vexed, appeared possible — and the antagonism between ideological superpowers was a thing of the past.That’s certainly how it felt on a warm March day in 1989 in Krasnodar, the provincial southern town near the Black Sea where I grew up. My school was hosting a group of seniors from a high school in New Hampshire: I was about to turn 17, and until that day America existed in my mind only as an abstract concept. It was the villain of a New Year’s holiday show, the object of Nikita Khrushchev’s quest “To catch up and overtake America” and home to the “Star Wars” program — just one, we were told, of the imperialists’ many designs to take down the Soviet Union.Only those boys and girls in jeans and sweatshirts who appeared in our schoolyard didn’t look like imperialists, or appear to be threatening at all. They looked like better-dressed versions of us: shy, well-meaning and fascinated. Just a few hours ago, during our military training class, we had been assembling Kalashnikov guns to be used on enemy agents. And here they were, standing in front of us. We stared at each other. Then someone smiled, someone said hello. In a matter of minutes, the wariness between us was gone. “I’m reading ‘Crime and Punishment’ for spring break,’” a tall guy with a silver earring told me. “Raskolnikov is cool!”Over the next five days of mutual discovery, we learned that the Americans were also afraid of nuclear war, only in their version, it would be waged by us. That when transcribed, the lyrics of “Ice Ice Baby” didn’t make much sense. That “pot” had a meaning other than a kitchen item, as explained by the Raskolnikov fan. And that when a boy tells a girl that she’s “special,” that’s, well, special. Together we roamed the streets, snapping photos next to Lenin statues — or rather, as the Americans put it, we “hung out.” Before a tearful goodbye, we traded addresses and promised to be friends for life.I’ve kept a green notebook filled with the names of American towns, along with a love letter, a dried carnation and a stack of black and white photographs, tokens of the magic of 1989: the Berlin Wall dismantled, the Iron Curtain coming down, the scary “us” and “them” disappearing into the finally free air. Chanting “Goodbye America, where I have never been,” a popular anthem, we were bidding farewell to America the enemy, America the myth — and anticipating the discovery of the real thing. Words like “borders” and “ideology” were no longer relevant. America and Russia seemed to be united by a common yearning for peace.The years that followed generated immense good will between our nations. As a Russian in America, I met countless people who built it: a Californian doctor who helped set up children’s heart surgery centers across post-Soviet Russia; a Bay Area filmmaker who organized the first Jewish film festival in Moscow; a Seattle captain who set up joint maritime ventures with fishermen in Russia’s far east. Russian college graduates, meanwhile, flocked to America, giving their brains and talents to everything from Hollywood films to DNA sequencing. There were a lot of marriages. A popular Russian all-female band captured the spirit in the 1990s when they implored, to electric balalaika chords, a hypothetical “American Boy” to come and whisk them away.That happened to be my route. Having married into a family of former dissidents sheltered by America, I too was a testament to the flow of people and ideas. Money flowed also. My first paid job in America back in 1998, for example, was translating for the second annual U.S.-Russian Investment Symposium, hosted by Harvard University and featuring an all-star lineup of international bankers vying for the attention of the Russian guests, among them the tycoon Boris Berezovsky and the mayor of Moscow at the time, Yuri Luzhkov.Yet somewhere along the way, the good will slowed. After expressing enthusiasm for Russia’s first post-Soviet president, Boris Yeltsin, America’s leaders found his K.G.B.-fashioned successor, Vladimir Putin, less to their taste. Mr. Putin made it clear that he didn’t care. “American hegemon,” a phrase from my Soviet childhood, began popping up in Russia’s pro-Kremlin media. In the West, Russians were no longer viewed as liberated hostages of a totalitarian regime, reformed villains from James Bond movies or emissaries of the great culture of Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky, but rather as all-cash buyers of luxurious properties in Manhattan and Miami. The enchantment between the countries and their citizens dimmed, yet shared interests and social bonds held.The annexation of Crimea in 2014 was a turning point. True, Mr. Putin had previously given vent to his aggression in Georgia and, devastatingly, in Chechnya, but it was his claiming of Ukrainian territory that gave the West its wake-up call. The sanctions that followed hit the Russian economy hard. They also supplied the Kremlin with ample means to stoke anti-American sentiment. Blaming America for the country’s troubles was a familiar, almost nostalgic narrative for Russians, more than half of whom were born in the Soviet Union. The simple tune — “NATO expansion,” “Western aggression,” “enemy at the gate”— played on repeat, keying Russians to believe that America aimed for their motherland’s destruction. The propaganda worked: By 2018, America was once more regarded as Russia’s No. 1 enemy, with Ukraine, its “puppet,” coming second.In America, things weren’t nearly as bad. But Donald Trump’s arrival on the global political stage complicated the already strained Russian-American relationship. Mr. Trump cozied up to the openly authoritarian Mr. Putin, strengthening anti-Russian sentiment that had been rising since the Kremlin’s meddling in the 2016 U.S. presidential election and rarely distinguished between Mr. Putin and the country he ruled. Economic and cultural ties began to wilt as it got harder to secure visas and funding. Still, student exchanges happened, films were screened and family visits paid, if at longer intervals.The Russian missiles that struck Ukrainian cities on Feb. 24 extinguished that flickering light. America now provides billions of dollars’ worth of weapons to be used against Russia, while Russia’s stated aim is to put an end to America’s “unfettered” global domination. The two countries, once allies in the war against Nazi Germany, are effectively fighting a proxy war. As I watch videos of Russian parents egging on their children to destroy iPhones or read about threats against a venerable Seattle bakery known for its Russian-style baked goods, I’m gripped, above all, by sadness. Our post-totalitarian dream of a peaceful, friendly future is over.Apart from wreaking physical horror, Mr. Putin’s war in Ukraine is erasing countless intangibles, among them the collective good will of the West toward Russia. In my children’s future, I see no cultural miracles akin to the one that I experienced back in 1989. This is a loss for both countries, and Russia’s will be greater if Mr. Putin continues doubling down on carnage and isolation. That future isn’t set in stone. After all, the perestroika years, when the Soviet Union embarked on wholesale reforms in the name of openness, showed that Russia is capable of change.For now, though, each explosion in Ukraine also strikes at what was good in the relationship between America and Russia. In Mr. Putin’s land, “Goodbye America,” once a tongue-in-cheek song suffused with hope, has become a darkly self-fulfilling prophecy.Anastasia Edel (@aedelwriter) is the author of “Russia: Putin’s Playground: Empire, Revolution, and the New Tsar.”The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram. More

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      Warning Signs of a Future Mass Killer

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      More from our inbox:The Republican Checklist After Another ShootingNew York Mayor’s Rejection of Covid MandatesVoters, Defend DemocracyEstonia’s Tough Voice Against Russian AggressionAbortion Funds Already ExistA crowd gathered Sunday outside Tops Market for a vigil the day after the shooting in Buffalo.Joshua Rashaad McFadden for The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “Before Attack, Solitary Teen Caused Alarm” (front page, May 16):In the days after the mass shooting in Buffalo we have witnessed a heightened focus on the mental health of adolescents. A few months ago, after the Michigan school shooting, we heard a similar concern.In each case the youths, when confronted with their potentially homicidal “behaviors,” denied them. They offered explanations that were accepted by school authorities and mental health professionals.Having worked in an emergency room where individuals were brought by the police for “behavioral issues,” I needed after assessing each of them to decide whether they should be hospitalized or discharged. These assessments frequently occurred in the middle of the night. In all cases the individuals I assessed assured me that they were fine and would harm no one. Some I hospitalized and some I allowed to leave the emergency room.One morning when my rotation was completed, I was afraid to turn on my car radio for fear I would hear of a shooting by two young men I let leave. I did not.Mass shootings are not simply a mental health problem that mental health workers can fix. They are also societal problems fueled by the availability of guns and the ubiquity of prejudice.Sidney WeissmanChicagoThe writer is a clinical professor of psychiatry and behavioral science at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine.To the Editor:Re “Others Joined Chat Room With Suspect Before Attack” (news article, May 18):I’m a 70-year-old tech dinosaur. I don’t understand what an algorithm is, but I do know that we have a significant problem if a racist openly discussed in chat rooms his plans to carry out an atrocity and no one did anything to stop it.Robert SalzmanNew YorkTo the Editor:Pages and pages about the recent tragic shooting in Buffalo. And in newspapers across the country, other incidents of gun violence involving young people as shooters. In schools, churches and places where people shop. The beat goes on, and the conversation remains the same. Hate. Gun control. Political bickering. And inaction.What’s missing in all too many of these gun tragedies are parent controls. Parents asleep at the wheel or parents being complicit or enabling seems to be a common thread. But not much discussion about that, by either journalists or political leaders. Maybe there should be.George PeternelArlington Heights, Ill.The Republican Checklist After Another ShootingTo the Editor:The Republican checklist after a mass shooting:Thoughts and prayers: Check.This is not the time: Check.Let’s not politicize: Check.Guns are not the problem: Check.Just enforce the laws we have: Check.More mental health care: Check.(Repeat.)Jon MerrittLos AngelesNew York Mayor’s Rejection of Covid MandatesSuzette Burgess, 79, of Morris Heights in the Bronx, gave out free masks on Thursday as part of her own personal campaign to fight the virus.Dave Sanders for The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “Adams Resists New Mandates as Covid Rises” (front page, May 20):We just don’t get it. Every time we “open up” and remove protective measures, Covid soars. Over a million Americans have died from the virus, depriving their loved ones of their presence. And needless hospitalization costs more than prevention and taxes the health system, already enormously overwhelmed.As physicians, we aim to prevent disease. New York City’s mayor thinks that it is better to treat Covid (with expensive drugs that don’t always work and can cause serious side effects) than to take the necessary steps to avoid it. And it may be more than just the mayor’s “tickle in my throat” if you wind up in the I.C.U. or get long Covid.Yes, the economy is vital, but more disease makes fewer people able to shop or eat out or go to work. And we don’t yet know the long-term effects on the brain and body. So prevention is key, and we need to follow the advice of public health experts who should be in control of this, not politicians.It is not a burden to get vaccinated and boosted and wear a good-quality mask. It is a responsibility to our fellow citizens and ourselves. We used to care about each other. Taking these steps would help us finally emerge from this scourge.Stephen DanzigerBrooklynThe writer, a physician, is a member of the Covid-19 Task Force of the Medical Society of the County of Kings (Brooklyn).Voters, Defend Democracy Jason Andrew for The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “In Primaries, G.O.P. Voters Reward a Lie” (news analysis, front page, May 19):In November, voters must decide to cast their ballots either for congressional candidates who view fidelity to the rule of law as sacrosanct or for those who consider the oath to “support and defend the Constitution” a hollow pledge. The outcome may determine whether or not our constitutional republic survives.John Adams pessimistically asserted: “Democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself.” If, as Adams suggested, our form of government is on a path toward suicide, then we must look to the electorate for intervention.To prove Adams wrong, the electorate must once again rise to the occasion as it did in the 2020 presidential election when it ousted Donald Trump for undermining democratic governance.Jane LarkinTampa, Fla.Estonia’s Tough Voice Against Russian AggressionPrime Minister Kaja Kallas of Estonia in Brussels just after Russia invaded Ukraine in February.Pool photo by John ThysTo the Editor:Re “Estonian Leader Warns Against Deal With Putin” (news article, May 17):As an American living in Estonia, I have watched with great admiration Prime Minister Kaja Kallas’s leadership on all issues related to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. She has been a firm and unyielding voice urging tough measures against Russian aggression.Estonia is a small country, but it punches well above its weight in terms of its commitment to NATO, its commitment to helping Ukraine, including taking in a huge number of refugees relative to its population, and its commitment to freedom and democracy.Ms. Kallas has advocated a 21st-century strategy of “smart containment,” appropriately building on the 20th-century Cold War “containment” policy first advocated by George F. Kennan. She has insisted on Western resolve to stop Russia before Vladimir Putin’s desire to re-form the Soviet Union through war is realized.The West should heed Ms. Kallas, especially her forceful argument that Russia must lose this war, and any result short of that is unacceptable. Tragically, if her policy of “smart containment” had been largely implemented before the Russian invasion, Mr. Putin would have never invaded.It’s not as if the war in Ukraine was a surprise — certainly not to those in the Baltics who through history and proximity know Russia well.Michael G. BrautigamTallinn, EstoniaAbortion Funds Already ExistTo the Editor:Re “An Abortion Fund” (letter, May 16):We appreciate Jack Funt’s interest in a national fund that would support people traveling for abortion after the Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson. Mr. Funt will be delighted to learn that a network of more than 80 abortion funds already exists.Legal abortion has never meant accessible abortion. The cost of a first-trimester abortion averages $575, but can exceed $1,000. Three-quarters of abortion patients are low income. Even with Roe in effect, many Americans struggle to pay for their abortions and travel to clinics. Since before 1973, abortion funds have helped people access care that would otherwise have been out of reach.We encourage people to learn about and support the work already being done to ensure abortion access. Readers can find their local abortion fund by visiting the website of the National Network of Abortion Funds.Rhian LewisAriella MessingThe writers direct the Online Abortion Resource Squad, which connects people to high-quality information about abortion. More