Buddhist temple in Russia. Image by Vello Väärtnõu via Wikimedia Commons. CC BY-SA 3.0.

This article by Alexey Voloshinov was written for the online Russian media outlet 7 x 7. Global Voices translated it, edited for clarity, and is republishing with permission.

Russian Buddhists, a significant portion of whom reside in three Russian regions: Buryatia, Tuva, and Kalmykia, were also affected by the Russian war with Ukraine. Brutal mobilization and the horrors of war have caused a rift in the Buddhist community. Many are making anti-war statements and emigrating abroad. Others are going to the front lines, despite Buddhist values.

The most anti-war religion at war

The authorities of Buryatia and Kalmykia, two out of three Russian regions with a lot of Buddhists, conducted the emergency military draft in 2022 particularly harshly. According to Buryat activists, in three days from September 21, 2022, about 7,000 men were taken to military enlistment offices in Buryatia, with the Ministry of Defense’s mobilization plan set at 300,000 people for the entire country.

Kalmykia became one of the few regions of Russia where the mobilization quota was exceeded. Instead of the required 1 percent, they managed to call up between 2 and 3 percent of reservists, according to various reports.

At the same time, according to a joint analysis by Mediazona and the BBC, at least about 1,500 residents of Buryatia — with a regional population of 972,000 — died in the war in Ukraine. In Tuva, with a population of 338,000, at least 618 soldiers died.

On September 22, the day after the emergency military draft began, eyewitnesses started posting videos of long queues at the Russian–Mongolian border.

The first to arrive were residents of border settlements in Buryatia and Tuva, regions that border Mongolia. Later, Mongolia's capital Ulaanbaatar also became a popular destination for Kalmyks. Besides the geographical location, the reason lies in the fact that Kalmyks, Buryats, Tuvans, and others are part of the Mongolian peoples living in Russia. In Mongolia, they are considered ‘their own’ and are welcomed as at home, explain locals.

It is difficult to assess the scale of the Buddhist emigration from Russia against the backdrop of the war. According to fragmentary data provided by the state, we are talking about thousands of people. According to Mongolian authorities, in the 10 days following the mobilization announcement, 6,200 Russians entered the country. At the same time, the Russian side reported that in 2022, Russians broke a five-year record for entries into Mongolia and several other neighboring countries.

Combat lamas: How Buddhist spiritual leaders support the war in Ukraine

In the war zone in Ukraine, Buddhism is not represented only by mobilized Buddhists from Buryatia, Tuva, Kalmykia, and other regions. For instance, in the summer of 2023, Russian state media began actively reporting on the only ‘military lama’ in Russia, who arrived at the front to support the soldiers. This refers to a member of the public council of the Russian Ministry of Defense, Lama Bair Batomunkuev from Buryatia.

The Ministry of Defense describes Batomunkuev’s work at the front in its press releases as follows: “He helps military personnel strengthen their faith, answer complex spiritual questions, and mobilize when tackling tasks to defend their homeland.”

In the winter of 2023, media wrote about the opening of two field temples in the ‘special military operation zone’ [this the way the Russian government allows reference the war in Ukraine]: one Orthodox and one Buddhist. “Buryats do not flee from the battlefield if there is still a yurt that has become a dugan [temple],” said the head of the Buddhist Traditional Sangha of Russia, Pandito Khambo Lama Damba Ayusheev.

The Chairman of the Central Spiritual Administration of Buddhists, Geshe Yonten (Sergey Kirishov), congratulated Vladimir Putin after the March 2024 elections. He did not directly support the war in Ukraine but was pleased that the Russian state in recent years has “paid special attention to preserving and strengthening our traditional spiritual and moral values.” [The Russian state ideology of “preserving traditional values” plays a major role in the governments’ justification of the war in Ukraine and internal repressions].

In a conversation with the publication People of Baikal, a soldier from Buryatia recalled how Orthodox priests and Buddhist lamas visited his field camp in the combat zone before battles.

I first went to the priests, and then to the lamas. Because at the front, you believe in everything, to be honest. Our lamas read prayers and told us to go to the enemy without anger and aggression. Well, like, you shoot at a Ukrainian soldier and don’t rejoice if you hit him, but feel compassion for him. Because that’s the Buddhist way.

In the same article, People of Baikal quoted Lama Oleg Namzhilov from Buryatia:

Now we, ordinary Buddhists, find ourselves in a situation where we don’t decide anything. Our guys went to war out of necessity. Our task is to support them. If we turn away from them, say they are traitors and scum, then who are we after that?

Baldan Bazarov, a former abbot of the Kuren Datsan in Buryatia who left Russia for the United States in the summer of 2022 due to his anti-war beliefs, believes that the opinions of Buddhist lamas influence Russian Buddhists’ attitudes toward the war. Those who support military actions, in his view, benefit in some way. In a conversation with 7×7, Bazarov said:

Let’s say the Khambo Lama cannot ask for anything personally [Buddhist monks are forbidden to use money], but, for example, he asked Putin in the Kremlin to build a datsan in Moscow, which Buddhists themselves have not been able to do since the last millennium. Some lamas went to the war in Ukraine to support their compatriots. They [the lamas] are given money for the trip, so they can go there and back, stay in a hotel in Moscow — these are also ‘perks’ for them. They show that they care about the state, and after that, they can ask for something for their datsan.

‘Helping soldiers is negative Karma’: Anti-war Buddhists

Bazarov himself, as he says, planned to move not to the United States, but to Ukraine, to “help Ukrainians defend their home, their children, and loved ones.” “I wanted to get to Ukraine to tell the truth to my compatriots — Buryats and Mongols — who believed in Putin’s propaganda,” the lama said.

He believes there is no contradiction between the anti-war spirit of Buddhist faith and the desire to go to one of the warring countries:

War is a manifestation of samsara [the world of suffering, passions, and lack of freedom, inseparably linked with the repetitive cycle of births and deaths in Buddhism]. Buddha explained that one must distance oneself from any manifestations of samsara. But at the same time, if someone comes to kill you in your home, you must protect your family, your loved ones…  But in our case, our relatives went to kill, and we have to support this for the sake of some ephemeral state. This is wrong.

However, Bazarov asserts that helping Russian mobilized troops does not align with Buddhist principles:

People went to Ukraine to kill people, and any help to them is negative karma

Perhaps the most striking anti-war statement in Russian Buddhism was made by the president of the Association of Buddhists of Kalmykia, Telo Tulku Rinpoche (Erdeni-Basan Ombadykov). He said in September 2022 in an interview with the YouTube channel “Alchemy of the Soul.”

The Ukrainian side is, of course, right. They are defending their country, their land, their truth, their Constitution, their people,

A few months later, Russian authorities added Rinpoche to the list of foreign agents (he is a US citizen), and he resigned as the supreme lama of Kalmykia. Ombadykov, commenting on his resignation, said:

To the people of Kalmykia and all followers of Buddhism in these difficult times, I wish courage, resilience, and commitment to the ideals of compassion, love, and non-violence, on which our teaching of Buddha is based

The Ministry of Internal Affairs of Kalmykia revoked the supreme lama's residence permit in Russia.

In February 2023, Tenzin Choedak, the abbot of the main Buddhist temple of the republic, was appointed as the new supreme lama of Kalmykia. Nothing is known about his political views.