It has been four years since Russia invaded Ukraine and changed my life. I happened to be in Moscow on the day of the “special military operation”, a catchphrase used by Russian authorities in place of the word “war,” which was quietly erased from public rhetoric. The night before the invasion, my roommate and I were frantically scrolling through Telegram, trying to make sense of the recognition of the Donbas republics. As students at Russia’s top diplomatic academy, we were also asking ourselves a quieter question: what did this mean for our future?
The following morning, I woke up to footage of Russian troops crossing into Ukraine. I remember sitting in disbelief. I felt deceived. For years, I had developed a habit of treating information from both Russian and Western sources with caution. That instinct suddenly felt insufficient. As I made my way to campus on that dark, freezing morning of February 24th, one question followed me persistently. Who should I believe and what is actually happening?
When I arrived, I could sense that many of us were asking the same thing. Some professors were cautious and subdued. That did not surprise me. Many of them were former diplomats who had spent long careers inside the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. One reaction, however, stood out for its sheer absurdity. It was my first class of the day: Global Security Issues, taught by a senior diplomat from the foreign policy planning department. More than 50 students joined the class on Zoom, but it felt less like a lecture and more like a confrontation.
“How do our country’s actions comply with the international law we study so diligently?” I asked.
Others followed. The chat quickly filled with sharp, critical remarks.
“I don’t want NATO missiles to land on my kids’ heads,” the professor replied. “I feel ashamed of you for picking Swiss cheese and French wine over the safety of our people.” Her voice sounded defensive and emotional.
For the first time, it felt freeing to argue.
Meanwhile, friends from Finland and the United States flooded me with messages about bombings and civilian casualties. I dismissed many of them. I did not want them to be true. Studying in an environment where Western reporting was routinely labeled foreign propaganda made it easier to doubt, harder to confront reality. But reality has a way of breaking through.
At that time, I was working part-time for a Swedish language school online. I had always believed that languages build bridges. They help create trust and a sense of belonging. As a teenager, I set out to learn six foreign languages to better understand the world around me. I did not expect that Swedish would one day reshape my understanding of peace.
In 2022, Sweden became one of many European states that welcomed Ukrainian refugees. Through my teaching, I met doctors, factory workers, and business owners who spoke my language and had a familiar sense of humor. The difference was that they had been forced to leave their homes. I had not. Listening to their stories made the war tangible in a way no news article ever could. While I was teaching them language, they were teaching me resilience and kindness. Their stories spoke louder than any political narrative. Those conversations shifted something in me. They clarified my values. They also gave birth to an idea: a campaign that could promote peace and disarmament through personal connection and stories.
As the war continued, I was living in a context where nuclear rhetoric became increasingly visible in public discourse. References to nuclear escalation were used to frame the conflict as existential and to deter deeper Western involvement. At the same time, there was virtually no domestic space for meaningful nuclear disarmament dialogue. That absence pushed me to look outward.
I found such a space in Youth Fusion, a network of young professionals committed to educating the next generation about nuclear disarmament and broader peace and security issues. At a time when most international projects involving Russia were mothballed, it was refreshing to participate in intergenerational dialogue with policy practitioners and advocates working on risk reduction.
Out of that environment, the Youth Hotline was created.
The Hotline is a network-based educational initiative designed to connect young people from the United States, Russia, Ukraine, and beyond. In its first iteration, it brought together 21 participants from 15 countries. Over four intensive weeks, participants worked alongside academics, researchers, and diplomats to examine what peace means. Not as an abstract ideal, but as a responsibility. More importantly, we built relationships across political divides. Human connection became the foundation.
It has been humbling to see how the project opened new opportunities for some participants in peace and security work globally. At a time when my own career aspirations in Russia were quietly crumbling, building the Hotline gave me a renewed sense of purpose.
This year, the program entered its second iteration, focusing on nuclear risk reduction. The new team took the project further and introduced modeled diplomatic simulations, equipping participants with negotiation skills and practical tools. The aim was not only discussion, but preparation.
The generation growing up today is witnessing war unfold in real time. The narratives they absorb now will shape the decisions they make in the future. If they grow up sealed within rigid and propagandistic worldviews, the divisions of today may harden into the conflicts of tomorrow. If instead we connect them early across borders, expose them to dialogue, and equip them with the tools to think critically and empathetically, we create a different possibility.
Ivan Siluianov, from the Russian Federation, is a graduate student at the Georgia Institute of Technology pursuing a M.S. in international relations with concentration on emerging technologies and nuclear non-proliferation. In 2023, he founded “Youth Hotline”, an educational networking campaign for youth in Russia and the West on nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation. Ivan was a summer research fellow at the Nuclear Nonproliferation Education and Research Center at KAIST, Republic of Korea, where he conducted research on the implications of 3D printing for the non-proliferation regime. He works alongside the Abolition 2000 Coordinating Committee as Secretary. Previously, Ivan interned with the Center for Foreign Policy and Peace Research in Ankara, Türkiye, and served as a project manager for the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network Youth Russia. His interests lie in the intersection of policy and emerging disruptive technologies, as well as peace and disarmament education. Ivan holds a B.A in Regional Studies from Moscow Institute of International Relations.