Lost friendships are a painful price of the Ukraine war

One thing you learn about war, if you are close enough for it to touch you, is that it splits the atom. Situations and relationships that have grown over time and seem to have deep roots – a life in fact – can be blown apart in a day. Now, over two years on from the start of Vladimir Putin’s ‘special military operation’ (which came at a time when I was living in Rostov-on-Don, an hour or two from the Ukrainian border), I’m still in touch with several Russians I knew back then. We find common ground, avoid certain topics and continue the conversation. But other friendships were killed stone dead, and for very different reasons.

One was with a young student, Nikolai. Warm and friendly, he was also conservative, ex-military and seemed forever to be searching for a deeper mission in life. He was an imperialist, he told me, at a time when it seemed about as imminently threatening as saying ‘I’m a flat-earther’.