Russian President Vladimir Putin decided to go to war with Ukraine at the end of February - beginning of March 2021. This is stated in the investigation of Verstka publication.
Journalists spoke with sources close to the Russian leadership. According to the interlocutors, the reason for the war with Ukraine for Putin was to a large extent some personal grudge and desire for revenge.
The Russian president's negative attitude toward Ukraine has been forming for many years, Verstka writes. The last straw was supposedly the closing of the media assets of Viktor Medvedchuk, a pro-Russian politician and a close acquaintance of Putin.
Preparations for the invasion lasted for almost a year, but all this time the Kremlin was based on incorrect assumptions and calculations, according to the investigation. A decisive role in the fact that Putin decided to launch an invasion was played by his friend, businessman Yuriy Kovalchuk. According to an interlocutor close to the Kremlin, he convinced Putin that Europe is divided by contradictions and now is the best time for a quick operation.
"Verstka" sources claim that Putin was going to threaten Ukraine with war in the article "On the historical unity of Russians and Ukrainians." The Kremlin published it in July 2021, but the threat did not make it into the final version of the text.
Another source told journalists that at the Valdai discussion club in October 2021, one of the representatives of the law enforcement agencies present there claimed in private conversations that Russia wants to change the regime in Kyiv. At the same time, it was about the readiness to achieve this political goal by force, the investigation says.
Another interlocutor claims that in December 2021, three months before a full-scale invasion, Russia discussed how Ukraine would be divided between large corporations.
According to the investigators, Defense Minister Serhiy Shoigu did not argue, and even rejoiced at Putin's decision to invade the territory of Ukraine. One of the interlocutors, whom journalists call "Putin's old friend", said that Shoigu did not understand the state of the army. The head of the Ministry of Defense allegedly thought that the military operation would be no more serious than the annexation of Crimea.
A source in the administration of the Russian president claims that the Russian authorities did not prepare for a long war. A group of 160,000 servicemen was thrown into the war with Ukraine. This is not enough to capture the country, where 44 million citizens live.
In a conversation with "Verstka", a former official of the Kremlin noted that practically the entire political and military elite of Russia opposes the war. At the same time, representatives of the highest echelons of power say in private conversations that they should work as a team. One of the interlocutors of the publication told that the senior official of the State Duma could not resign: after he announced his intention to resign, representatives of the FSB came to his wife and son.
Russia attacked Ukraine on February 24, 2022. According to the UN, by mid-April 2023, more than eight and a half thousand civilians were killed and more than 14,000 were injured as a result of hostilities. These data may be incomplete.