Putin's chilling warning to Russian 'traitors' and 'scum' is a sign things aren't going to plan

Now, an apparent pause in the advancement of Russian troops has the West guessing: Has Russia's war effort stalled? Or is it a tactical regrouping?

Either way, an incendiary Stalinesque speech on Wednesday night in which Putin called Russians opposing the war "traitors" marked a change in tone and a sign that not all is going to plan, experts said. Perhaps more worrying, many observers saw it as a sign that the head of the Russian state, facing setback in Ukraine, would take a vengeful turn at home and crack down more forcefully than ever on any sign of dissent.

While some Russians support the war, many others are protesting against it in the streets, fully aware they will be rounded up by heavily armed police even for the most peaceful of demonstrations. The Russian state has made mass protests illegal, and now, insulting the military is against the law. Still, people show up in groups, while others demonstrate entirely alone. Even lone protesters have been detained, social media videos have shown.

A journalist who jumped on camera on a state-controlled news program, holding an anti-war sign, has become a cause celebré for free speech in Russia. A renowned ballerina has left the Bolshoi. Russian prisoners of war are calling Putin out for using propaganda to justify the war.

Putin, who has enjoyed consistently high ratings in Russia, is now turning to a strategy of intimidation to keep Russians on side, experts said. His speech Wednesday hinted darkly that those Russians who do not side with him were, in essence, traitors -- chilling words in a country where mass political repressions and the Gulag system are still within living memory.

"The West will try to rely on the so-called fifth column, on national traitors, on those who earn money here with us but live there. And I mean 'live there' not even in the geographical sense of the word, but according to their thoughts, their slavish consciousness," Putin said. The "fifth column" usually refers to sympathizers of the enemy during a war.

"Such people who by their very nature, are mentally located there, and not here, are not with our people, not with Russia," Putin said, mocking them as the type that "cannot live without oysters and gender freedom."

"But any people, and even more so the Russian people, will always be able to distinguish true patriots from scum and traitors, and simply spit them out like a gnat that accidentally flew into their mouths, spit them out on the pavement," he said.

For Tatiana Stanovaya, founder of the political analysis firm R. Politik, Putin's speech proved the leader's plan has derailed.

"It seems to me that everything is starting to crumble with Putin. This speech of his is despair, strong emotion, impotence," she wrote on her official Telegram account.

Pointing to the situation in Russia, Stanovaya argues that Putin is losing the battle of popularity too.

"This is the beginning of the end. Yes, they will twist everyone's elbows, lock them up, imprison them, but it is already all without a future ... Everything will crack and slip."

Elisabeth Braw, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, said Putin's speech reflected how isolated the Russian leader had become.

"What we saw as the war began, and what we have seen since -- including last night's speech -- is really the result of a man whose entire world takes place inside his head," Braw told CNN, explaining how Putin had isolated intensely during the pandemic and was now more cut off as Western sanctions batter the Russian economy.

READ MORE: CNN