To wonder what's happening in Moscow?

[OopsAnotherOne]

The Google traffic map shows road closures all around the 2nd-inner ring road around the city of Moscow. Flight Radar shows all flights below 10,000ft are being diverted around the same ring road. I'm hearing whispers of a coup coming from online sources with friends/family in Moscow. Nothing (as of yet) being reported on mainstream media but there is certainly something happening with the roads and airspace. Anyone think this might be the start of the end for Putin?

It’s incredibly difficult to get legitimate views out of Russia. A large part support the War because they’re conditioned to by years of anti western propaganda. Many others may disagree with the actions in Ukraine but would never say as much.

Thank you! I'll have a look.

I also agree that a coup may not necessarily be a good thing for Russia, overthrowing one leader just means they replace him with another one, they'd need to remove the entire government and replace them with one that disagrees with the invasion of Ukraine and I believe that's much easier said than done

Thank you

Would also recommend ukrainecast. Also good is Doomsday watch (don’t be put off by the name) and Ukraine the Latest (telegraph podcast).

Putin (bbc R4 podcast) is also fascinating for background.

I'm sure I read the other day that Putin had gone to one of his mansions in the country instead of meeting with his generals?

There have also been a few "accidental" deaths amongst his supporters in the last few weeks. Lots of them seem to fall out of windows.

I do hope we are coming to the end of the Putin era. Though I'm sceptical that any replacement would be any better.

Interesting, we do seem to have had some reports of open dissent recently

He doesn’t need to be in Moscow for a coup to happen. Gorbachev wasn’t in Moscow in 1991, and nor was Khrushchev when he faced coups. To gain power you’re going to seize control of the White House (the russian one) and Kremlin. They do need him though. The failure to arrest Yeltsin was significant to a coup failure in 199, but then Yeltsin rallied support.

As I understand things standing now, the coup is likely to come from the war hawks side, it won't be a popular revolution that overthrows the dictator in the name of democracy.

I've seen nothing really substantial reported on this, outside a few tweets. But the timing is interesting if so. The most significant developments since the start of the Ukraine war have been happening over the past week, and our media has barely seen fit to report on any of them. You'd think the whole world had stopped.

Ukraine's counteroffensive and Russia's subsequent retreat is mainly a worry in terms of what Putin might do in the face of a defeat. I doubt it would take anything as dramatic as a repeat performance of the revolution, but I'd not be remotely surprised if he were quietly offed by one of his own.

Posting a screenshot from Flight radar to placemark.

There appears to be NO flying over the city as marked by the ring roads but I have no idea if this is normal or not.

Probably quite a good time to stage a coup then 😀

Oooh good spot OP. We live in interesting times!!

The Xi Putin meeting is interesting.

Vladimir Putin to Xi Jinping: "The foreign policy tandem of Moscow & Beijing plays a key role in ensuring global & regional stability. We jointly stand for the formation of a just, democratic & multipolar world order based on international rules & the central role of the UN"

Moscow had banned fly overs below 8km 10 years ago or so.

Oh OK thanks.

Thanks for confirming this - I wasn't able to find anywhere else stating this but it means that the lack of planes over Moscow isn't unusual then.

I think no overflight of Moscow at lowish altitude is fairly normal.

Following, thanks for the heads up.

Flight radar can be fascinating at times if upheaval. Not withstanding the appalling events that lead up to it I was rather delighted to see the ultimate u-turn in real time 16/8/21 when commercial flights decided it was best not to fly over Afghanistan.

Does that mean nothings happening then?

This’ll sound bonkers, but Snapchat is a good way to see what is going on in a certain place. If you go into the map view you can see posts from just an area.

Nothing seems untoward in Moscow currently.

I agree! I'm usually able to find out the source of the loud music I can hear in the distance some evenings from this very method. I agree, nothing unusual so far on Snapchat or their live webcams.

Twitter has people saying that their relatives in Russia are confirming that the National Guard are blocking/closing the roads around Moscow, but again this is completely unverified and I cannot confirm what this Tweet has claimed.

If anything is indeed happening, it might just be a resistance against the possibility of a coup, rather than a coup itself. Maybe Putin is beginning to understand that the Russian people are losing faith in him.

I see what you mean about the no fly zone. No aircraft flying over Moscow. Very suss. Something is going on.

No idea, but I've have had a few business trips to Moscow over the last decade. Traffic there was typically beyond awful (for taxis, or if a work colleague driving, I did not drive), and ended up getting familiar with metro system and reading Cyrillic place names as a result.

Btw, if you use the Tor browser, you can read the state Russian rt and sputnik news sites, so you can see what you locals are consuming.

I work with some Russian colleagues (based in the west), and know many of them for many years. As with all these things there are a variety of opinions. Not much outright support for how the war is being carried out, but certainly the prevalent view is that Ukraine is and always has been part of Russia. Overall very different points-of-view to what you'd see in our mainstream media (for the record, I'd be firmly on the Ukrainian side in all this!!).