But Moscow has treated sports as a crucial instrument of state prestige and soft power for decades, making Russia’s full return to the international competition a major political priority, said Ukraine’s former Greco-Roman wrestling champion Fevzi Mamutov, who left Crimea after its annexation in 2014.
“Since the USSR’s sporting success,” he told POLITICO, “medals, flags and anthems have been heavily integrated into Russian state propaganda.”
However, attending the Olympic Games requires Russia to make compromises to international organizations, while state propaganda has cultivated a growing number of ultra-patriotic influencers, who have become “part of the regime’s patriotic infrastructure” and will not stand for such concessions to take place.
“This is what sabotage and subversion at a state level can look like — especially given the current circumstances: the statement of our president and his press secretary, Kyiv burning two days in a row, enemy drones flying over Omsk. This is an act of collaboration with the enemy and anti-state subversion. It’s not the Russian Olympic Committee but a Committee of traitors,” wrote popular pro-war Telegram channel InfoWar.
Russian Sports Minister Mikhail Degtyarev, who spearheaded the negotiations with the IOC, has particularly become a target, with many blaming him for the “diplomatic failure.”
“So, the Russian Olympic Committee has confirmed in writing its refusal to support sports in Donetsk, Lughansk and Crimea? Then what is the much-hyped ‘victory’ point of Comrade Degtyarev?’” asked military blogger Dmitry Konanykhin in his Telegram channel. “Whose is Crimea, Degtyarev?” echoed popular pro-war Telegram channel “Verum Regnum.”