The second exodus of Russians in a year. What Russia loses and why it’s good for Ukraine

Author

Kirill Danilchenko

It turns out that the Russians dreamed of repeating after their grandfathers and being proud of their powerful motherland while staying on their sofas. Once mobilization was announced in Russia, tens of thousands of people suddenly found they had urgent business in Finland, Norway, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Turkmenistan.

Even Russian television cannot explain how come the Ukrainians are threatening residents of an apartment building in Moscow’s district of Biryulyovo or an aul in Dagestan mountains by having liberated the major part of the Kharkiv region.

At the same time, despite Skabeeva’s and Solovyov’s hysterical squeals, they are coming to the subconscious realization that the goodwill gestures near Sumy, Kyiv, Chernihiv, Kharkiv, and Zmiinyi somehow disturbingly coincided with the urgent mobilization. When even students receive call-up letters, it shows that everything goes according to plan.

The Russians aren't willing to die at war in Ukraine

They also come to the realization that the Russians destroyed all the HIMARS and air defense systems at Ukraine’s disposal only in the TV reality, while in actual reality, Russia is forming military units out of vagabond conscripts, prisoners, and other people randomly assigned military occupation regardless of their prior training. They are told to buy winter uniforms and underwear for themselves and shove tampons into their bullet wounds.

It’s called "wound tamponade'' for a reason, right? That’s what you call the world’s second-best army.

Here, a conscript gets an insight: there’s a possibility he’ll be sent to war and will eventually rot in some grove, despite the "limited fitness for military service" certificate he might have bought. The propaganda adds insult to injury by describing mercenaries and Polish and African American fighters riding tanks in Ukraine. This can be called the worst investment ever: albeit war wasn’t declared, one can nevertheless be drafted without any training and having already spent their money on a fake certificate.

Perhaps it’s no coincidence that Russia’s deputy defense minister in charge of logistics was fired, since first aid kits, warm clothes, backpacks, and sleeping bags are lacking not only in their army but even in stores. And while you can clear rust off an assault rifle, stolen radio sets and rotten vehicles aren’t an easy fix.

Is it, in effect, the territorial defense of Moscow and the Northern Fleet? Smells like trouble.

At this point, many Russians start looking to hit the gas and make themselves scarce.

Those who are smarter and have an open Schengen visa head for Kirkenes to get lost in northern Norway, a quiet, beautiful, and wealthy place.

Those who don’t, make tracks for the Caucasus, telling border guards they urgently need to take therapeutic mud baths for their prostatitis at Azerbaijan’s lakes, or for Kazakhstan to attend a traditional strings festival.

Cunning ones avoid the shortest routes like the one to Astana and choose devious tracks toward Aktobe or Caspian coastal cities. Buryats go to Mongolia, which by far is quiet and not overly crowded.

This is what the Lars border crossing in Georgia looks like — all these Russian men have suddenly felt the urge to drink Borjomi and matsoni and eat khachapuri.

A gigantic queue at the Lars border crossing in Georgia

It makes such a striking contrast with border crossings between Ukraine and Poland after February 24: the Ukrainians were saving women and children, while the Russians are saving their asses.

However, the latter is also good for Ukraine, as it will result in fewer tax revenues, fewer savings, and more panic in the aggressor country.

"Apartments for rent, Asians only" — an advertisement in Central Asia perfectly mirroring the racism and humiliation people from these countries have been facing in Moscow and St. Petersburg for years. However, former Soviet neighbors also see their profits.

It’s not only men who are liable for military service fleeing, but they also bring their families with them, pay rent, and then start buying property after they realize in a couple of months that a place overlooking the sea in Georgia or Caspian resorts is no worse than an apartment building in Russia’s non-black earth zone.

Many will stay.

Those $10,000 they’re allowed to take with them would suffice for a while, and then they can rent out the apartments they’ve left in Russia. This migration will bring significant money, jobs, and human resources to countries that in the last few decades have seen only outflows.

Moreover, the numbers are substantial. After February 24, up to 400,000 specialists have left Russia, among whom there are 200,000 IT professionals. Some came back, and some didn’t — it’s impossible to tell since there are no reliable statistics. In Uzbekistan, a hub for programmers from Russia and Belarus was created, which already numbers a few thousand people. Meanwhile, professors from Russia are suddenly tempted by an academic career in Kazakhstan.

Turkey, Armenia, Georgia, Central Asia — it’s obvious that people don’t go there for recreational purposes in February and March, as well as it’s not the case now. On the other hand, they allow visa-free entry.

Georgian Border Police reported 35,000 Russian nationals who crossed the border in March, and then statistics went obscure. The order of magnitude can be understood, though, from the reports of Georgia’s Ministry of Tourism, which showed a three-times increase in the last six months, or 1.6 million visits.

These are not visitors from Ukraine, because there are no direct flights from here. Whether the tourists have stayed or left the country is still a mystery, and much more about the places they left for. Russians can enjoy a year-long visa-free stay in Georgia, which makes them hard to track. However, it is known that most tourists come from Turkey and Russia.

Besides migration waves because of tourists and emigrants, transportation flows show a considerable change, as westbound cargo routes disturbed by the war in Ukraine and the de-facto blockade in the Baltic countries have been redirected to the southern transportation corridor through the Black Sea ports.

The semi-annual cargo turnover of the Batumi port amounted to 2.5 million tons, which is 0.7 million tons more compared to the same period last year. In the same way as there were shrimp from Belarus, we’ll see electronics from Georgia, as Lukashenko’s regime was stripped of its role as a transit hub because of sanctions.

As a result, Georgia’s economy has grown by 9.7% in 7 months of 2022. Construction and decoration works are seeing a tremendous rise of 20% for a 3.7-million-strong country.

In the second migration wave that’s now underway, 260,000 Russian men have left the country in a few days, which also implies up to half a million of their family members, their savings, their consumption, closed businesses, and capital withdrawal. Instead of enjoying last year’s surge in oil prices and selling record harvests, the Russians are jostling at border crossings to save their lives and health from a war they didn’t choose to fight.

This exodus of a million people is the second one in a year, and how many have there been in the last few generations? Considering the 19th century emigration to the U.S., which was comparable to the Irish and Italian ones, the 1990s, when whole neighborhoods moved to the United States, the great Jewish exodus to the Promised Land, and the post-war and white emigration, this migration wave is the seventh one.

This time it’s comprised of qualified workers, IT professionals, doctors, journalists, and anyone else who doesn’t want to be put through the mill of Russian mobilization.

However, those who vote with their feet and wallets against the Kremlin’s policy won’t prevent it from amassing the required number of poor and duped conscripts from the 140-million Russian population. But at least they have finally decided they’re not the Kremlin’s pawns, despite having little interest in politics before.