Russia’s war in Ukraine is usually explained in terms of ideology, territory, and regime survival. But there is another driver that becomes more important the closer any “endgame” looks: domestic security. For the Kremlin, a post-war Russia is not automatically “peace.” It is a country that may have to absorb a huge, heavily militarized population, including men socialized into extreme violence, some recruited directly from prisons, and many returning into an economy that cannot offer them