Despite ongoing peace talks, there appears to be no end in sight to Russia’s war on Ukraine.

As Ukrainian cities are attacked, a quieter pressure is building in Russia, which is becoming increasingly isolated on the international stage.

Sanctions are being imposed, and dissent – which authorities are determined to crush – is on the rise, reportedly even within the Kremlin.

As the war rages on, observers wonder if Vladimir Putin’s position is shaky.

The Russian president has strong legislative support, as evidenced by a recent vote to recognise the separatist, self-proclaimed Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics of Ukraine just days before the war began.

The move was supported by 351 of the 450 members of the Duma, which corresponded to Putin’s approval.

Simultaneously, Putin’s United Russia party has been accused of vote rigging, which has kept him in power for more than 20 years.

However, some observers believe that with sanctions wreaking havoc on the economy, a push to depose Putin may gain momentum.

Volodymyr Ishchenko, a Ukrainian sociologist who has studied post-Soviet revolutions, disagrees.

“I don’t think the sanctions are likely to result in a revolution,” he told Al Jazeera, arguing that increased grievances are insufficient to spark a revolt.

Rather, “a split among the elites, opposition unity, coordination and mobilisation structures” were required.

The Russian Empire experienced two revolutions in the early twentieth century, both linked to unpopular wars: one in 1905 following the humiliating defeat in the Russo-Japanese war of 1904-05, and another in 1917 during World War I.

Following the fall of the Soviet Union, other newly independent republics experienced a wave of popular uprisings, with governments overthrown in Georgia, Armenia, and Moldova. Kyrgyzstan experienced three revolutions, and Ukraine experienced three more.

Putin has spent much of the last two decades preparing for a so-called “colour revolution,” such as the Orange Revolution in Ukraine in 2004, which he believed was being orchestrated from Washington.

This includes marginalising opposition figures such as the now-incarcerated Alexey Navalny, whose political movement has been outlawed but is still active and is assisting in the organisation of the protests.

“As for the opposition,” Ishchenko said, “it’s in bad shape.” “The Navalny movement is suppressed.” Furthermore, the war has splintered the opposition. The Communists and many other parties that could form an alliance with the opposition now strongly support the war.”

According to Ishchenko, the exodus of mostly anti-war Russians – estimated at over 200,000 people since February – has made a mass revolt even more unlikely.

Exiles would need to maintain effective contact with their homeland in such a scenario, which may be difficult given that travel is restricted and Russians without VPNs are blocked from social media.

“The palace coup is more likely than a revolution now. Although, I am not sure that a possible elite conspiracy against Putin would make a move before a major defeat in Ukraine.

“So, in the end, the balance of forces on Ukrainian battlefields would determine the possibility of either a coup, or revolution, or the survival and consolidation of Putin’s regime. Not the other way around.”If not a general strike, perhaps the oligarchs and officials in Putin’s inner circle, frustrated by the sanctions and unable to enjoy their yacht cruises off the coast of France, will try to depose the president.

‘Everyone knows what Putin does to traitors’

On March 1, independent Russian journalist Farida Rustamova reported that sources close to Putin in Russia’s elite told her that they were as surprised as everyone else when the war began, with one describing the situation as a “clusterf**k.”

According to the sources, Putin has lost touch with reality over the last two years, isolating himself in a bunker and only meeting face-to-face with his closest confidants.

However, Rustamova, who has worked for the BBC Russian service as well as independent outlets TV Rain and Meduza, told Al Jazeera that after the initial shock, Russian elites are accepting the new reality.

“Many people have come to terms with it,” she said. “There’s a sense that there’s nothing that can be done, and they need to survive in some way until this ends.” They can’t leave because resigning or refusing to work during wartime makes you a traitor, and we all know what Putin does to traitors.”

Putin quickly repressed the oligarchs who had dominated Russian business, media, and politics in the 1990s. He summoned the country’s top business leaders to a meeting and warned them to stay out of politics.

Those who refused to comply, such as Mikhail Khodorkovsky and Boris Berezovsky, were either imprisoned or forced to leave. Those who made their fortunes in the 1990s and were permitted to stay mostly accepted the status quo. They wield little power in the Kremlin.

“While it’s logical to expect an anti-war position from the liberal side of the Russian elite, Putin has thoroughly cleansed them over the years and keeps them on a tight leash, and they certainly won’t step forward,” Rustamova said.

Instead, Putin, an ex-KGB officer, surrounded himself with security officials and installed loyalists in key positions, such as Viktor Zolotov, the head of the National Guard tasked with domestic security. However, he has ensured that none of these so-called siloviki, or “men of force,” become overly powerful: the Federal Security Service (FSB) and military directorate (GRU) handle intelligence, while the Federal Protection Service serves as the president’s bodyguards.

“There is a kind of political sect that consists of some generals and other high-ranking officers around Putin and they believe in the restoration of the Russian Empire – it is a type of religion for them,” says political scientist and Russian armed forces expert Pavel Luzin.

“Then, there are acting and former law enforcement officers who were engaged in mid-level business within the state-owned and formally private corporations before the Russian aggression, and they are losing almost everything today; there are the armed forces, who were not happy about the aggression because they understood the awful consequences; and the police, who do not have much influence.”

He said that the Kremlin was “scared” of the army and the police, and does not trust either one.