OLGA MALTSEVA/AFP via Getty Images
- Russian tourists need to cross through occupied Ukraine to get to their summer holidays in Crimea.
- The shutdown of the damaged Kerch Bridge has forced tourists to take alternative routes.
- An expert told Insider that Russian tourism in Crimea is a priority for Putin and the Kremlin.
With traffic stalled on the damaged Kerch Strait Bridge, Russia has an alternative route for its tourists to take their summer vacation in occupied Crimea. It's a quite a bit longer and also runs through an active war zone.
On Monday, the 12-mile-long Kerch Bridge that connects Russia and Crimea was damaged by explosions, possibly from cheap-but-effective drone boats. Moscow blamed Ukraine for the so-called "terror attack," and while Ukraine didn't immediately take responsibility, a Ukrainian Security Service source did tell CNN the group and Kyiv's naval forces were behind the incident.
After the bridge was damaged, Russian authorities immediately began advising citizens traveling to and from Crimea to take alternative routes through southern Ukraine past Kherson and Melitopol and through the Donetsk Oblast, the Institute for the Study of War said.
These are areas pretty close to the front lines, areas where Russian forces built defensive lines ahead of Ukraine's long-anticipated counteroffensive, which has been hamstrung by minefields and artillery.
But wait, why have Russian citizens driving to and from Crimea, a target area Ukraine aims to eventually liberate, in the first place?
Karolina Hird, a Russian analyst at ISW, and Evans Hanson, a fellow, told Insider tourism on the peninsula has been a priority for Russian President Vladimir Putin and the Kremlin.
"There's been a huge push on the part of Russian authorities to really sustain and even increase tourism in occupied Crimea for economic reasons, and for an integration of occupied Crimea into the larger Russian system," Hird said. "We've seen Putin himself signaling that the Russian military and the Russian navy needs to get involved in bringing tourists over into Crimea so that they can continue engaging in a kind of summer holiday tourism."
As Hird puts it, this clearly represents a kind of "cognitive dissonance." Crimea is a legitimate military target for Kyiv and among the most important territories Ukraine hopes to reclaim in this war.
Part of Moscow's current push for Russian citizens to visit Crimea could be lower summer tourism numbers in recent years, especially after Russia's full-scale invasion in February 2022.
The tactic also likely stems from Putin and the Kremlin's efforts to avoid bringing "the whole of the war to the domestic population," Hird said. "They don't want to fully mobilize society for war, they won't call it a war, and they won't put the entirety of Russian domestic society in a war footing."
Since the Kerch Bridge's shut down, Russian media released an instruction guide for Russian tourists traveling through occupied Ukrainian territories, Anton Gerashchenko, the advisor to the minister of internal affairs of Ukraine, tweeted.
—Anton Gerashchenko (@Gerashchenko_en) July 18, 2023
Some of the tips include advice like "On the way you will meet military checkpoints. Do everything that the servicemen say. Do not be rude, do not push for your rights" and reminders to only stop at gas stations and not to travel at night.
"Be polite and calm. Everything is built on mutual respect and patience in the special military operation zone," the instructions said.