Putin under pressure to declare war on Ukraine

Telegraph

7 hours ago

When Ukraine smuggled dozens of drones into the back of freight trucks and launched a surprise attack on Vladimir Putin's prized nuclear bombers, Russia's most radical voices were furious.
'Shock and outrage' is how one high-ranking Russian official described the mood in the Kremlin the day after the strike.
Another Russian official told The Telegraph: 'Like every thinking patriot, I took it as a personal tragedy.'
The fury ran so deep in some quarters that there were renewed calls for Putin to 'declare war' on Ukraine – a demand that may seem baffling to Western observers, given that the conflict is already Europe's bloodiest since the Second World War.
But amongst Russia's hardline nationalist elite, there is growing belief that Putin has not gone far enough, that he should formally declare war, recruit a million more men, and wipe out Volodymyr Zelensky's government with daily missile strikes on Kyiv.
The Telegraph spoke to Kremlin insiders to assess whether Ukraine's drone attack – dubbed Operation Spider Web – might push Russia to escalate even further. All agreed to speak on condition of anonymity.
'Explosions, drones, sabotage, and possibly even terrorist attacks are what the future may hold for us if the Zelensky regime is not completely destroyed,' said a current high-ranking Russian government official.
He described himself as hawkish and admitted sympathising with Yevgeny Prigozhin, the Wagner warlord who led a failed mutiny against Putin in June 2023 and was later killed in a plane crash.
'If Ukraine ceases to exist in its current form, the criminal underground will be demoralised,' he claimed.
Yet despite the scale of Ukraine's strike, which damaged at least 20 Russian nuclear bombers, according to US estimates, the Kremlin has so far stuck to a more cautious approach.
'This did not catalyse a political discussion or a change in the format of military operations,' said a former senior Kremlin official who once directed operations against Ukraine. 'In the Russian power system, where inertia and preserving the current balance are essential, that speaks volumes.'
Another source, based in an analytical centre close to Russia's defence ministry was blunt: 'Could the president declare war on Kyiv? Right now, unlikely. As cynical as it may sound, the leadership is satisfied with the current situation.'
The hawkish opposition
Traditionally, opposition to Putin has come from liberal critics. But since the invasion, a new breed of nationalist opposition has emerged – figures who claim the Russian president is too cautious.
The roots of this anger go back to 2014, when some hardliners accused Putin of failing to fully support Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine. One of the most prominent is Igor Girkin – also known as Strelkov – a former FSB officer and leading figure in the 'Angry Patriots', a faction demanding Ukraine's total destruction.
After criticising Russia's handling of the war, Girkin was jailed for extremism in 2024. 'I serve the Fatherland!' he shouted after the verdict.
Such figures may be marginal, but they wield outsized influence inside Russia's security apparatus.
'The fact they're the guys with the guns means the Kremlin has to at least be aware of them,' Mark Galeotti, a British historian and expert on Russian security, told The Telegraph.
Why declare war?
To most in the West, the conflict is clearly a war. But Putin still refers to it as a ' special military operation ' – a distinction that matters to Russia's hawks.
They argue that only a formal war declaration would permit full-scale escalation – daily inter-continental missile strikes, mass mobilisation, and perhaps even the use of tactical nuclear weapons.
Earlier this month, the nationalist podcast Russians with Attitude argued: 'Liberal Putinism has its perks – comfortable, modern, and nearly sanction-proof. A true 21st-century experience. But the cons are clear – soft-glove warfare, sparing enemy leadership, and burying failure.'
Currently, most Russian soldiers are volunteers attracted by pay packets of about 200,000 roubles (£1,900) a month – a significant sum in rural areas. Declaring war could enable the mobilisation of two million reservists.
'The government and the authorities would essentially be given carte blanche to move the country on to an explicit war footing,' said Emily Ferris, Russia analyst at the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI).
But even as the bloodshed continues, the Kremlin has been careful to shield most Russians from its effects. At the outset of the invasion in 2022, Putin banned the words 'war' and 'invasion' from the media.
Recruitment has been focused on the outer regions, not Moscow or St Petersburg. Russians may be dying in droves, but they do so mostly out of sight.
In Moscow, Artyom, a cybersecurity researcher who did not want to give his real name, told The Telegraph that most young people trust in Putin's decisions as the country 'stands proud' with living standards still high despite the sanctions.
Cracks in the illusion
The Kremlin is forecast to spend 6.3 per cent of GDP on defence this year, which is the highest since the Cold War but not what would be expected of a country on a full war-time footing.
For comparison, Ukraine spent 34 per cent of its GDP on defence last year. British defence spending as a percentage of GDP rose to more than 50 per cent during the Second World War.
'Mobilisation undermines economic stability,' said one current government employee.
According to him, those close to Putin are able to persuade the Russian president that mass mobilisation would be a step towards the war effort's collapse.
'And why is it needed now? We have Kalibr missiles, we have volunteers. Their resources are not yet exhausted,' he added.
A new wave of mobilisation would mean not only economic strain but also a public acknowledgement that the Kremlin is not succeeding in its three-year war against its neighbour.
'That is too costly an admission in a situation where everything hinges on the illusion of control,' noted the former high-ranking Kremlin official.
While that illusion may not last forever, experts believe Putin's military will be able to fight at the current rate into next year, and possibly for years. 'I think next year is when a certain number of economic chickens come home to roost,' Mr Galeotti said. 'But the Russians will be able to fight this war for years.'
The Kremlin appears to agree. Vladimir Medinsky, Putin's chief negotiator, recently told The Wall Street Journal that Russia could continue fighting for 'another 21 years' – invoking Peter the Great's long war with Sweden.
Putin's popularity has surged since the invasion of Ukraine, according to both state-owned polls and those of the Leveda Centre, an independent institution that has frequently drawn the Kremlin's ire.
However, that could change if Putin were to start mass mobilisation.
There's also the question of fear. 'As soon as you call it war, every parent who has got a kid doing national service or going to be soon is going to start getting scared that they are about to be sent to the front,' said Mr Galeotti.
In other words, escalation is not without political risk. While nationalist bloggers and pro-war influencers dominate Telegram and the Z-pilled commentariat, the Kremlin is all too aware of how fragile domestic control might become if the war truly came home.
That explains Putin's brutal repression. There is no longer an organised war party in Russia. The prominent figures of that camp – and liberal opponents – have been removed. Mr Prigozhin, who at one time had been close to Putin, was killed in a suspected bombing weeks after his failed mutiny. Girkin is in prison. Alexei Navalny, Russia's most popular politician, died in a penal colony. This served as a signal from Putin to anyone who might display political initiative.
Simultaneously, the security services are tightening control over radical patriotic and nationalist circles that have become more active after the invasion.
'So far, no power centre inside the country is capable of imposing its will on Putin,' said a Telegraph source close to the State Duma leadership.
Limits of escalation
In any case, for all the hawkish rhetoric, Putin's capacity to escalate is not limitless. That much was exposed by his response to Operation Spider Web.
Given the significance of the attack, warmongers had demanded a massive response. They didn't get one.
There's no denying the horror Ukrainian cities like Kyiv and Kharkiv have faced during massive drone barrages in recent days. But the retaliation was limited, by both Western standards and Russian expectations.
'The response to Operation Spider Web could have been a lot worse. That would've been the time to have a major response, they didn't do it,' Ms Ferris said.
Experts believe Putin's military simply lacks the resources. Despite sabre-rattling over tactical nuclear weapons and strategic missile strikes, Russia doesn't have the capacity to launch the kind of daily missile barrages some of its loudest nationalists fantasise about.
'There's always more room for escalation,' Mr Galeotti said. 'Maybe Putin could fire a few hundred extra drones per day. But that's about it.'
For now, though, the fantasy of full-scale war – of Oreshnik missiles fired daily at Kyiv, of Zelensky's government turned to rubble, remains just that – a fantasy.