Since February 24, 2022, Meduza has been broadcasting live about the Russian-Ukrainian war. We publish your messages every day because we are certain that we need to keep talking about war. Share with us your thoughts about war. What emotions are you feeling? How does war affect your life and your attitude to the world? If you have a war story, 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 war spending reached a new record high of 5.908 trillion rubles. counting Based on data from the Ministry of Finance, researcher from the German Institute for International and Security Affairs Janice Kluge.
Compared to the first quarter of 2025, expenses increased by 30%. Klug points out that war spending was increased through secret budget items. Over the year, the growth in these items reached 43% – from 3.4 trillion rubles to 4.9 trillion rubles. Military needs represent about 85% of spending within the secret budget items.
Total federal spending in the first quarter amounted to 12.8 trillion rubles. Thus, military spending accounted for 46% of total budget spending during this period. Kluge asserts that almost every second of the ruble spent from the federal budget was spent on the war.
Russian budget revenues in the first quarter of 2026 amounted to about 8.3 trillion rubles. That is, two-thirds of what was included in the budget during this period was allocated to the war.
Moscow Times, based on researcher’s calculations. He writesThat in the first quarter Russia spent 65 billion rubles per day on the war – an amount similar to the annual budget of the Novgorod or Oryol regions (69 billion and 61 billion rubles, respectively).
Meanwhile, Klug points out that the increase in spending on secret budget items can be explained by “accounting acrobatics.” He notes that it is possible that the Ministry of Finance of the Russian Federation will shift part of 2025 expenditures to the first half of 2026 in its reports, so as not to exceed the planned budget deficit. Kluge writes that it will be possible to determine whether we are talking about such a scenario only after the publication of reports for the second quarter of 2026.
War in pictures
War through the eyes of Medusa readers
Medusa’s readers live in different countries and have different attitudes toward war. We publish your messages to see this event through your eyes. Our editors try to represent all viewpoints, even if they do not match the editorial position. However, in accordance with the Medusa Law, we do not publish messages that contain “hate speech,” justify the killing 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 stupidity in any case and from any side.
People in Russia who previously took a neutral or negative attitude toward the war will become angry or afraid and angry. This is, and will be, the case with any war, unless one of its participants is a banana republic that can simply be bombed. This is clearly not the case.
What difference does this make? More fear, more hate, more death – and there is no solution.
I am not afraid since I realized that I cannot change anything in my life. We are all hostages and suicide bombers of this war since its beginning on both sides of the border. There are people around me who feel this and think about it no more than on its first day. We will wake up in the morning and go to work – unless, of course, we die at night. Everything is fine with everyone, especially since summer is coming and we have to spend it somehow.