Translated material
War
1571st day. Today the Kremlin has spent 65 billion rubles on the war. There was the same amount yesterday, the same amount there will be tomorrow. Total spending is already close to half the state budget
Since February 24, 2022, Meduza has been broadcasting live about the Russian-Ukrainian war. We publish your letters every day because we are sure that we need to continue talking about the war. Share with us your thoughts about the war. What feelings are you experiencing? How does war affect your life and your attitude towards the world? If you have a story related to the war, tell it . The feedback form is at the end of this article. You can read the previous day's review here .
Russia
In the first quarter of 2026, Russia’s spending on war reached a new record level of 5.908 trillion rubles, calculated Janis Kluge, a researcher from the German Institute for International and Security Affairs, based on data from the Ministry of Finance.
Compared to the first quarter of 2025, expenses increased by 30%. Spending on the war, Kluge points out, was increased through classified budget items. Over the year, growth in these items amounted to 43% - from 3.4 trillion rubles to 4.9 trillion rubles. Military needs account for about 85% of spending under classified budget items.
Total federal spending in the first quarter amounted to 12.8 trillion rubles. Thus, military spending accounted for 46% of all budget spending during this period. Almost every second ruble spent from the federal budget was spent on war, Kluge emphasizes.
Russian budget revenues in the first quarter of 2026 amounted to about 8.3 trillion rubles. That is, two-thirds of what went into the budget during this period was allocated to the war.
The Moscow Times, based on the researcher's calculations, writes that in the first quarter Russia spent 65 billion rubles a day on the war - an amount comparable to the annual budget of the Novgorod or Orel regions (69 billion and 61 billion rubles, respectively).
At the same time, Kluge notes that the increase in spending on classified budget items can be explained by “accounting acrobatics.” It is possible, he notes, that the Ministry of Finance of the Russian Federation could transfer part of the 2025 expenses to the first half of 2026 in its reporting, so as not to exceed the planned budget deficit. Whether we are talking about such a scenario, Kluge writes, it will be possible to say only after the publication of reports for the second quarter of 2026.
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How we choose letters
Meduza's readers live in different countries and have different attitudes towards the war. We publish your letters to see this event through your eyes. Our editors try to present all points of view, even if they do not coincide with the editorial position. However, in accordance with the Meduza code, we do not publish messages that contain “hate speech,” justify the murder of civilians, or express direct support for an aggressive war.
Anonymous reader (Moscow) . Hitting each other with drones and missiles, thinking that this can make the right impression on someone, is the height of idiocy in any case and from any side.
People in Russia who previously took a neutral or negative stance towards the war will only become angry - or scared and angry. This is how it was, is and will be in any war, unless one of its participants is a banana republic that can simply be bombarded with bombs. And this is obviously not the case.
What difference does this make? More fear, more hatred, more death - and no solution.
I'm not afraid since I realized that I can't change anything in my life. We are all hostages and suicide bombers of this war from its beginning on both sides of the border. There are people around me who feel and think about this no more than on its first day. In the morning we will wake up and go to work - unless, of course, we die at night. Everything is ok with everyone, especially since summer is ahead and we need to spend it somehow.