“I have a feeling that someone is trying to provoke Russia,” said Ms. Bukhteyeva, who is studying to be an elementary school teacher. “I don’t understand who this would be good for, but I feel like it would be good for America.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin has said that Western powers are goading Moscow into attacking Ukraine. He says the U.S. and its allies are threatening Russia’s security with their military support of Kyiv and military exercises in the Black Sea. Moscow has amassed more than 100,000 troops on Ukraine’s border.

The West counters that Russia is illegally occupying part of Ukraine, that it is arming and financing proxy Russian forces that have occupied swaths of its industrial east, and that its troop buildup is aimed in part at pressuring Ukraine to return to Moscow’s sphere of influence.

With the Kremlin having stifled political opposition in Russia after a year-long crackdown on dissent, there are few voices left to challenge Mr. Putin’s hard-line message, which, according to pollsters and analysts, is key to winning the tacit support of a Russian population worn down by the Covid-19 pandemic and a stagnant economy.

In recent weeks, state-run media has increasingly echoed Mr. Putin’s depiction of Russia as a victim in the standoff. Television has accused Washington of bringing Ukrainians for military training run by the Central Intelligence Agency, sending U.S. mercenaries to Ukraine and helping transport chemical weapons to the Donbas, an area in eastern Ukraine where Russia fomented a separatist uprising against Kyiv in 2014.

Moscow, which denies backing the rebels, says it is coming to the aid of Russian speakers who suffer discrimination by Kyiv.

“Ukraine is being pumped with lethal weapons and whipped into a mass psychosis while Russia is cast as the main aggressor,” Dmitry Kiselyov, host of a prime-time news broadcast, said last week. “All possible provocations can be expected at any moment.”

In December, Mr. Putin compared events in the Donbas region to a “genocide,” playing on public prejudice and fears. Days later, the popular Russian TV talk-show 60 Minutes amplified the claim, suggesting that CIA operatives had flown in from the U.S. to sow discord in Ukraine.