Did/do I support the Russian war in Ukraine?
When it started, I did support it – but that was on the expectation of “Kiev in three days” and a bloodless conquest in which Russian troops would be “greeted with flowers”. I do not think what has actually been going on there, beyond the first couple of weeks, makes any sense or proves any point that we all collectively thought we had. Therefore, currently – no, I do not support it.
However, nor do I think that Ukraine should “win” it, whatever that means. Nor do I want to partake in any support of Ukraine, or any other military force, that does or shall fight in any war against an army comprised of people who identify as Russian. I might not be a Russian citizen anymore, but I was born and raised in that country and I do not wish to support and even less partake in, any killing of its citizens, even just. I have been to Ukraine many times, but have no connection to it. I think this war should stop immediately, because Russians are dying in it, not because I care for the cause of Ukraine any more than the cause of Palestine, Afghanistan, Syria or Iraq.
Have I called for a nuclear bombing of Kiev?
I have not called for it – all I said in March 2022 was, that if they did nuke Kiev, most Russians would probably be behind it, and so would I. In the face of realising belatedly that there would not be a “Kiev in three days”, this would have been the only move that could resolve the conflict quickly. At that time, no NATO country had skin in the game yet, no one would have come to Ukraine’s aid by way of retaliating against Moscow, and overall less people would have died, than have died in this war since. Obviously, the moment for that has come and gone by April 2022. The take-home from this, I think, is that if you decide to be a villain, at least be prepared to really be one and admit it.
Do I support the government of Vladimir Putin?
I did for longer than most, but no longer do. It does not, however, mean that I support the regime change by means of one of Ms. Nuland’s infamous interventions. That change must come from within the Russian elites, for what it’s worth – and even at the expense of potential fundamentalism or nationalism emerging, as it would have done if my former friend Alexei Navalny was alive and led such change. The reason I no longer support Putin is not the war in Ukraine, but the verdict-happy paranoid concentration camp he, initially at the instigation of Mr. Patrushev, but now presumably by inertia, has instituted inside the country.
I no longer support Putin’s government because everyone and their grandmother is being arrested for no valid reason at all, and those arrested are treated inhumanely and die in prison for no apparent reason. Consequently, it is no longer safe for foreigners from the US and the UK, like myself, to visit, lest we become “trading chips” in a future exchange, having likewise been arrested for nothing at all. It will be 20 years since my mother died in May 2025, and I cannot visit her grave. On those grounds, I no longer support the government of Mr. Putin. I’d like some government in Russia that would both allow me to visit, and make it so it will be safe for me to do so.
What do I think of Tucker Carlson’s interviews with Putin and/or Lavrov?
I have mixed feelings. I think Tucker should have paid attention earlier, and visited Moscow – and maybe done the Putin interview – when things were still normal, instead of calling it a “cold, vodka-soaked place”, as he then did. In the Spring of 2022, all of it changed. I do not see a point of Tucker going and declaring that Moscow is brilliant and nice, precisely as the rest of us had been excluded from visiting it. I think that, since the start of the war, it no longer mattered what Putin says, or even thinks, or what he thinks that he thinks. Putin is a hostage held in the prison of his own device, but he is undeniably in a state of derangement, and not necessarily as much in control as he himself, or anyone – apparently, including Tucker – wants to believe. Putin’s ramblings, which have included nothing new for the last 3 years, no longer matter.
The whole thing is just more complex now, than Russian fleet in Sevastopol, Moscow’s shiny metro and the price of beef in Auchan supermarkets. The year 2021, when I wrote What Russians Think, was the time to talk about those things, not 2023. It is absurd that Tucker now goes to Moscow all the time and extolls its virtues, while ignoring the fact that I can’t do the same anymore, and the reasons for that. I am always the first to despise the political emigre diaspora, but I think basic journalism right now would require of Tucker, Glenn and others to acknowledge that there IS a problem with Russia. There is a problem IN Russia. Never mind the war with Ukraine, there is a bigger problem with what’s going on in the rest of the country. A problem for Russians. Including those “pro-Russian”, “patriotic” Russians who supported the whole thing for a very long time and would agree with much of Putin’s or Lavrov’s view of history. That simply isn’t what matters anymore. It is the country-sized concentration camp, the arrests, the fear that matters at least as much, and for some of us – matters more.
In the light of that, I wish Tucker had gone in 2021, but I wish he hadn’t gone in February 2024, and I certainly hope there was some unseen actual reason for him to do so in December 2024. Even though I still agree with most of what Lavrov had to say, it clearly being not all there is to say, made it a glaring farce.
What can I say about the death of Navalny?
I disagreed with Alexei, but he was once my friend, and always a patriot of Russia. I think he surrounded himself towards the end with a rag tag bunch of chancers, and got himself involved in things that were always beyond his self-defined remit – the West, EU Parliament, sanctions, international arena etc. I think that, once he found himself in Berlin, and at the behest of aforementioned chancers and many others who did not have his own best interests at heart, Alexei started to believe himself to be a notional messiah, whose inevitable liberation would portend change in Russia with the aid of the West – or at least he started to think that they, the West, actually believe it.
I do not think he expected to stay in prison as long as he did, or to die – nor do I think he would have gone back, if he had any notion that this is what would happen. If anything or anyone external killed him, the war in Ukraine did – all bets were off, and his handlers in the West were on to a shinier bigger problem that they were even less capable of doing anything about. Navalny was abandoned. Situation inside Russia quickly turned to an all-alarm fire, everyone else was quickly in jail too, everything has changed.
Do I think he was killed? Not directly, no. This is absurd. But he was a middle-aged man who languished for a considerable time in harsh conditions – if he had been free, he would have been alive today. I was shocked by Alexei’s death, and do partly blame myself for it. I wish I had not briefed against him in the West while he was in prison in Russia, regardless of how few minds I may have actually changed while doing so.
Do I have any family or property in Russia?
No. My maternal Grandfather Georgiy, familiar to the readers of What Russians Think, died in Moscow on March 5, 2022, aged 97. I was able to be there, and to arrange a military funeral he always wanted. His ashes are interred at the Moscow Pyatnitskoe cemetery, alongside those of Grandma Clara, her father and one of her brothers. In 2024, both of my maternal grandparents would have turned 100 years old. Before his death, my grandfather lived in a Veterans Home, albeit a fancy one – we sold off the last property in Russia in 2018. Grandpa Georgiy’s passing leaves me without blood relatives in Russia. My father lives in France, and all of my children are in England.
Do I have a Russian/Soviet flag in my house?
Outside of my house in England, I have an American flag. Inside, I have a vintage Soviet banner in the living room and a current Russian flag on the wall in my bedroom. But it is not some random flag, it is one in which my Grandfather’s casket was wrapped at his military funeral – they folded the flag and gave it to me, so I brought it back with me. I consider it a family heirloom, rather than a political statement. I never had any flags on any of my homes in America – not since 9/11 anyway – but if I did today, it would probably be a British flag.
When have I last been to Russia?
December 4, 2022.
Am I a Russian citizen?
No, I went through the formal relinquishment process in 2021 and hold a letter from the Russian Embassy in London confirming that Russia does not consider me its citizen anymore. My last visits to Russia were on a visitor visa.
Am I currently involved in any social, political or Russia-related projects?
No. I have no current interest in Russian politics, diaspora affairs, or Russia-related foreign policy. The only thing I want, is to one day be able to safely visit my home town (Moscow) and the graves of my family members. To that limited end, I’d strongly prefer it if Moscow wasn’t destroyed in a nuclear apocalypse, please (thank you!).
Contact? Telegram to @olgachilds or email to olga@ this domain (sagareva.com).
Social media? Nope. I have none, except the twitter handle @olgavchilds and a Telegram channel t.me/sagareva. I don’t use them, but would probably do if I ever have a reason to believe that anyone cares what I think, apart from people whom I can tell directly.
Photos? Click here. Credit to olgachilds.com
Copyright – Olga Childs (c) 2024