I'm surrounded by left wing friends and acquaintances in Italy who truly believe that Russia is liberating their oppressed country-people in east Ukraine and that Ukrainians deserve what's happening to them because they voted Zelenski.
I'm a little depressed by how easy it seems for people to spin all this on its head.
It's not about the wing. You have to be brain-dead to believe in liberation when 6M+ refugees (out of 40M total population), good deal if not majority Russian-speaking, fled to Europe instead of just going where Russia wanted them to or staying in occupied areas.
The brain is often used to rationalize whateverideology wants.
Right leaning people I know naturally sympathize for Putin because they like his ability to decide what he wants; the allure of the strong man.
Left leaning people in Italy sympathize for Putin because they are so used at hating American imperialism that by definition whatever is challenging it (better if its natural old enemy) must be good!
It's often easy to conveniently select the facts that support whatever your bias is, and when you can't just throw some whataboutism and you're back safely in your worldview. On top of that you add your social media bubble that reinforces your position, feeding you with arguments that you can cherry pick.
I don't know but I find it very hard ti effectively counter that when discussing with people who hold such positions. (Insulting their intelligence doesn't accomplish much)
What Russia and Russians are doing in Ukraine is pure evil.
They are well and truly the bad guys in this war - afterall, they started it.