As more Russians turn against the war, the United States and its allies ramp up oil sanctions that hit the Kremlin war machine, as well as gas prices at the pump in Russia.

Wars often do not end on the battlefield but from a desire for peace in the hearts and minds of a people. In Russia, nearly four years into a faltering invasion of Ukraine, the people might soon determine how that war ends.

Only 27% of Russians support the war, down 13 percentage points from a year earlier, according to an August poll by the Levada Center, Russia’s only independent pollster. Meanwhile, the number of people saying the war had personally “affected them a lot” keeps rising. Gasoline prices, for example, are up nearly 10% this year, a result in part from recent Ukrainian attacks on Russian oil refineries.

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