The Russian regime, like many other autocracies, methodically forces its political opponents into exile while simultaneously working to eliminate any remaining support base they might have inside the country. The result is that political émigrés are left with little choice but to seek backing from external actors if they are to sustain their opposition work and retain any credible claim to a role in shaping the country’s political future.
Some of these émigrés are counting on a military defeat of the autocracy—or even its violent overthrow. Yet even if such a scenario materializes, the political prospects of émigré groups in the post-authoritarian domestic political process are far from guaranteed.
Abrams Tanks on Red Square
Dictatorships are sometimes indeed brought down by external military intervention. The classic examples are Nazi Germany in 1945 and Iraq in 2003. In both cases the regimes were dismantled by force, their leaders were put on trial (or killed), and the ruling parties—the NSDAP and the Baath Party—were formally banned. After that, under the supervision of occupying forces, the construction of a new state began, with sovereignty gradually handed over to local authorities.
At the same time, neither in Germany nor in Iraq was it possible to create an entirely new elite and bureaucracy with no ties to the old regime. It is telling that, within a relatively short time, the Allies turned a blind eye to the involvement of former Wehrmacht generals in building the new West German armed forces within NATO. One can also recall the rhetorical question posed by West Germany’s first chancellor, Konrad Adenauer: «Does NATO really need twenty-year-old generals?»
In Iraq in 2003 the occupiers took a more radical approach: they essentially disbanded the old regime’s security structures and bureaucracy entirely. Yet the occupation forces proved unable to assume responsibility for maintaining order and security. That decision helped destabilize the country and greatly complicated the later task of building a stable democratic state.
In the end, it proved impossible to form a new government without any representatives of the old regime. Of the 97 politicians who held ministerial and other top state posts in Iraq between 2003 and 2006 (the period of transition from occupation to free elections and the formation of a democratic government), 38 percent were émigrés—Iraqis who had lived outside the country for at least ten years—while another 19 percent were Kurds and other politicians from northern Iraq, which had been beyond Saddam Hussein’s control. A further 26.8 percent were «internal» figures who had lived under the regime right up to 2003.
The situation in West Germany was even more complex. Only Adenauer’s first cabinet was completely free of Nazi Party members or World War II veterans. All subsequent governments, right up to the late 1980s, included people with a Nazi past or Wehrmacht service records. Yet both a political émigré—Willy Brandt, who spent the war years in Norway and Sweden—and Helmut Schmidt, a former Luftwaffe anti-aircraft artillery officer who had taken part in the blockade of Leningrad, went on to serve as chancellor.
The examples cited above are in many ways extreme. The price of defeat and subsequent occupation for Germany ran into millions of lives—not only military but civilian—and brought widespread destruction of cities and infrastructure, the temporary loss of sovereignty, and the division of the country for more than four decades. In Iraq the invasion itself claimed fewer lives, but the internal wars and chaos that followed Saddam Hussein’s overthrow killed at least 134,000 people.
What is noteworthy, however, is that in both cases elements of the old bureaucracy and military were partially integrated into the new postwar elite. Thus, returning political émigrés who entered government found themselves sharing power with former Nazi Party members and World War II veterans.
The events of World War II or the 2003 Iraq campaign cannot be transferred directly to today’s Russia for a number of obvious reasons. First, Russia possesses the world’s largest nuclear arsenal, which could be used in the event of an existential threat—something that would almost certainly lead to mutual nuclear destruction. Second, no international coalition currently exists whose declared aim is a military invasion of Russia and the forcible dismantling of its political regime. It would be incorrect to equate any hypothetical such coalition with the countries supporting Ukraine: since 2022 neither European nor American politicians have listed regime change as an objective of their Russia policy.
Even if one imagines a notional NATO coalition entering Moscow and removing the current regime, it would face the impossible task of maintaining order across a vast country. No one would voluntarily assume such a burden. The result would be negotiations with the old elite and the construction of a managed power transition. In such a transitional period, political emigration could play a certain role, but it would still be impossible to sideline the previous elite entirely.
Falklands 2.0?
Sometimes a dictatorship, after military defeat, is forced to make concessions and gradual liberalizations without waiting for foreign occupation.
A vivid example is Argentina’s military junta. By the early 1980s the regime was already badly weakened by deep economic crisis, growing mass protests, and internal conflicts within the military high command. In an attempt to restore legitimacy, the generals seized the Falkland (Malvinas) Islands in 1982. Yet their swift defeat by Britain destroyed what little support the junta still enjoyed.
After the fall of General Leopoldo Galtieri, power passed to General Reynaldo Bignone, under whom the gradual dismantling of military rule began: restrictions on political parties were lifted, trade-union rights were partially restored, censorship was eased, mass political rallies were permitted, and free elections were announced. In the autumn of 1983 the country held its first competitive presidential and parliamentary elections in many years.
Power was transferred on 10 December 1983, when the elected president, Raúl Alfonsín of the Radical Civic Union, was sworn in and the era of military rule came to an end. The new government launched an investigation into the dictatorship’s crimes: a National Commission on the Disappearance of Persons was created that collected testimony on thousands of abductions and murders and produced the report Nunca Más («Never Again»). On the basis of that material, the leaders of the military juntas were put on trial in 1985. Several key regime figures, including Jorge Videla and Admiral Emilio Massera, were convicted of crimes against humanity and sentenced to long prison terms.
Even so, the new government proceeded with extreme caution. The first trials targeted only the top leadership—this avoided an open confrontation with the armed forces. In 1986−87 judicial proceedings were further limited by two key laws: the Ley de Punto Final («Full Stop Law»), which set a deadline for filing new criminal cases against military personnel for crimes committed during the 1976−83 dictatorship, and the Ley de Obediencia Debida («Due Obedience Law»), which exempted mid- and low-ranking officers on the grounds that they had been following orders. These restrictions were later supplemented by presidential pardons in the late 1980s and early 1990s. In the 2000s the measures were repealed and prosecutions for dictatorship-era crimes resumed in earnest.
Russia has already experienced painful military setbacks in 2022: the retreat from Kyiv, the abandonment of Kherson, and the rapid withdrawal in Kharkiv region. Yet as of spring 2026 it appears that Kyiv is still unable to inflict on Moscow a defeat as comprehensive and unambiguous as the one Britain delivered to Argentina in 1982. Such a scenario would require far more extensive and resolute Western military assistance to Ukraine—something the Western allies have declined to provide, in 2022 or since, largely out of fear of triggering uncontrolled destabilization inside Russia, including possible loss of control over its nuclear arsenal.
At the same time, the economic and social costs of the war and sanctions continue to mount. The probability that parts of the elite might therefore opt for a limited «thaw» under pressure from socio-economic problems remains non-zero. Yet it is far from obvious that even such relaxations would automatically open the door for the opposition’s return to power. And if the authorities do decide to engage the opposition in the framework of a possible power transition, the counter-question arises: to what extent is the opposition itself prepared for negotiations and compromises on key issues—above all, which members of the old elite it is willing to put on trial and which it would grant immunity and amnesty?
February and October 1917?
If one tries to overlay the February 1917 scenario onto contemporary Russian realities, the picture looks roughly like this: spontaneous outbursts of discontent in various districts of the capital, the refusal of some security forces to disperse protesters and their defection to the demonstrators’ side, the subsequent collapse of central authority, and the president’s resignation. Such a variant cannot be ruled out entirely, though it remains highly improbable. In the event of a sudden collapse of the political system a power vacuum would emerge, but that in itself would not guarantee success for the liberal opposition.
The example of Lenin delivering his April Theses from an armored car is more counterproductive than instructive: he returned not to negotiate but to seize power by armed force. With the exception of isolated Russian units fighting on Ukraine’s side, the great majority of the Russian opposition would find such an option unacceptable. If, instead, one speaks of the returning opposition taking part in free elections in post-Putin Russia, an immediate question arises: with what program and what concrete proposals would these «new arrivals» go to the voters?
It cannot be said that the opposition has done no programmatic work between 2022 and 2026. The «One Hundred Days After Putin» project has appeared, and the Free Russia Forum and Yulia Navalnaya’s forums are held regularly; at these gatherings experts draft reform blueprints for the post-Putin period. It is important, however, to keep in mind the context in which these documents are produced: Russia’s ongoing war against Ukraine and the fact that most of the opposition is based in Europe, which actively supports Kyiv. These circumstances largely shape the rhetoric of émigré politicians.
The real issue is how that rhetoric will be received inside the country and what exactly opposition figures can offer Russian elites and voters that would make them listen. One potential asset often mentioned is their close contacts with European partners, which in theory could ease the process of normalizing relations and lifting sanctions once the war ends. In practice, however, the real influence of Russian politicians in exile on EU and Western decision-making is likely to remain very limited. Nothing would prevent Europeans, if the terms suited them, from striking a direct deal with the Russian authorities and bypassing the opposition altogether. The question of what genuine political assets—beyond moral principles and an anti-war stance—the Russian opposition in exile actually possesses is therefore anything but academic.
Conclusions
History offers many cases in which political opposition that found itself in emigration later returned home and re-entered political life. One need only recall the triumphant return of Ayatollah Khomeini to Iran after the 1979 Islamic Revolution: he had spent many years in exile in France before assuming leadership of the new order.
The overwhelming majority of Russian opposition figures in exile do not contemplate armed seizure of power or underground struggle. The most realistic path to their return appears to be the search, within the existing system, for members of the power structure and bureaucracy who would be willing to launch a managed transition and enter into dialogue with the opposition.
For such a dialogue to succeed, at least some segments of the elite must develop a self-interested motive for talks and a clear understanding of the benefits that cooperation with the opposition could bring. At the same time, it is hard to imagine such talks being conducted with the key figures of today’s Russian political elite—those directly responsible for launching the war, for political repression, and for killings.
Nevertheless, without a degree of compromise with parts of the current elite, any managed power transition looks unlikely. The opposition therefore inevitably faces the question of its own «red lines»: with which representatives of the system dialogue is possible and with which it must be ruled out entirely.
Finally, the opposition must be able to offer society a vision of the future that goes beyond a simple return to the pre-war status quo. That vision must take into account Russia’s lived experience of war against Ukraine and of sanctions.
