Sadly, I do not think that the Soviet federation fully appreciated Ludmila's and Oleg's contributions, although the fed certainly capitalized on and took full advantage of the revolutionary balletic approach the Protopopovs brought to pairs skating.
Since you like to discuss..
. re: the phrase in your post which I highlighted. See…. That is a very gray area…
One fact is certain, that the Soviet Union was a police state which did not allow people to travel freely seek employment opportunities or artistic freedom, or many other things. If one’s personal plan, whatever they might have been, did not fit into the soviet system, that person had no options. That is why we left USSR in 1974, and loudly cheered for ANY one who found a way to leave the country, including Protopopovs.
Oleg/Ludmila were absolutely correct to defect in order to purse their plans, whatever they were, regardless how crazy and unrealistic they seemed to some, inside and outside of USSR. Oleg never expected anything from others to compensate for his personal choices. He and Ludmila made a choice, at their own expense, prepared to be fully responsible for their crazy or sane decisions. They were willing to forego financial and other benefits in order to stay true to their style and vision. That alone requires much admiration!
However a statement that “the Soviet federation did not fully appreciated Ludmila's and Oleg's contributions” is not quite correct, as stated.
Most certainly, Portopopovs became personas non-grata the day they defected, and for decades not mentioned in society or skating world. That was a standard situation with any celebrity-defector/s, it could not be any other way. Those who left for none political reasons to seek “artistic/professional freedom” were still considered political defectors, and the issue was treated as a political incident. Political incident = enemy of the state = erased from current history.
However, while Protopopovs lived in USSR, during and after competitive years, they were not just showered with material and social privileges, the best available at the time in USSR, but Oleg’s outbursts, demands and capriciousness was tolerated and often accommodated.
Oleg always acted like a prima-donna; those who liked him found it charming and justified because of his talent, those who did not like him still tolerated it and sometimes complained; but everybody knew he is a prima-donna….
- He asked for an artificial rink from Khruchev, he got a rink, a huge rink!
https://www.yubi.ru/upload/yubi_1920_1080_v2.jpg
- He asked for an apartment, he got the best one in Leningrad, #1 Elite building for party officials, famous athletes and scientists, famous Building #4 on Petrovka Embarcement.
http://photoprogulki.narod.ru/images/ps/peter_emb/DSC03247_a.jpg
- He asked for a car but did not like “standard” Volga (#1 car in the 1960’s, Soviet Cadillac). The dream car of millions was not good enough for him….
http://www.tomlaferriere.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/1961-GAZ-21-Volga-92016.jpg
So instead he was given a Special Edition, GAZ-Volga Station Wagon, which were manufactured mostly for Ambulance and Evacuation services, not for public use. But they gave one to him anyway.
https://s.auto.drom.ru/i24199/c/photos/fullsize/gaz/24_volga/gaz_24_volga_591593.jpg
- He was given the best piece of land to build his summer home, he had unlimited access to any ice rink at any time, he bossed around the rink employees, and in any situation was very high maintenance. People tolerated it exactly because of his talent and accomplishments for the good of the Country.
He/Ludmila were not exactly pushed out of competitive skating because of their “age and style”, although often age was mentioned. Nobody asked Oleg to change his balletic style and switch to more “modern/athletic” as many believe. He was asked to increase technical difficulty of is routines, while keeping his “ballet”, because the sport was progressing. By 1971 his technical difficulty was losing out even to Bazics…..
It was not Russians who started to push him down the pedestal. B/P started to slide down at the International Events, Worlds and Europeans @ 1969 and on, placing 2nd, 3rd, etc.. Yet Oleg refused to work on athletic elements and to learn new ones, claiming “this is Ice Skating, not Ice Jumping”…. He believed strongly that what he can offer artistically, without jumps and throws, is enough to win international competitions. In 1969 in his LP routine, he and Ludmila messed up a number of jumps, yet were surprised by results….. Here is a proof with English commentary.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H5e8SYGyytU
Russians did not know what to say to Oleg to convince him to either leave the competition circuit on his own, or to increase difficulty (while, repeating, leaving his balletic style). When he started to receive lower marks at domestic competitions, he did not get the message, and claimed that he is being pushed out because of “age” and lack of “culture for understanding pure ballet”….
When he ended his competitive career (I’ll say few things about it later), he was still not very flexible, with authorities and with management of Leningrad Ice Ballet. He wanted to travel abroad to perform, travelling abroad was a big privilege, and yet he refused to travel to events where he would have to skate on surface less than Olympic-size rink. That placed Ice Ballet management in very difficult situations with foreign agents. Oleg had the right to demand, and management had a right to kick him out, yet they did not.. It’s was unheard of for a performer to be so difficult when offered a trip abroad, which millions only dreamed of… and yet Oleg’s caprices were tolerated.
As were tolerated some of his other often offensive actions, such as brining bottles with his own urine and offering others to drink it and rub it on the skin, and doing it himself in public to show how it is done, as he himself was practicing urine-therapy, and to this very day.
When in 1968 he discovered he had kidney stones, he refused the surgery and used home remedies to get the stones out. He would then take the stones, carry them with him, and show to people. Many found it disgusting. Once he had to push out a stone before a competition in a public toilet, he still pulled that stone out, washed it, and brought to show. Ludmila often laughed about it in the interviews, so it is not a “dirty secret”.
Western Press highly politicized Protopopovs’ defection, understandably why, and thus we have an image of “victims suppressed by Soviet System, who made a political statement by leaving, in defiance of Soviet Union”. That was not true, per Oleg himself. He insisted that they did not leave Soviet Union for ideology, that he simply wanted to “do things his way and it was not possible”, and if he could do it back home, he would never leave. In several interviews when asked “how do you like Switzerland, do you miss Russia”, he would say (in a sum) “I don’t care where I am at present as long as there is a rink. We do not miss Russia, because we never left! We are Russia and Russia is inside us” (I always liked that…..
)
Not only he was not “underappreciated”, but let’s say people who were less mad and crazy than he was ended up in Soviet insane-asylums…
Russian Journalist, Elena Vaytsekhovskay, whose articles you often read on this board in Tanka’s translations, devoted a whole section in her book “Tears on Ice” to her encounters with Oleg and Ludmila. It’s in Russian, but takes to “google translate” fairly well. What is written is not very complimentary to Oleg and his conduct.
The key phrase in this writing is a comment
“You can love a skater, yet detest the person he is”…
http://www.ngebooks.com/book_7526_chapter_20_*_*_*.html
Vaytsekhovskay also just published a post-mortem for Ludmila. Works ok in google-translate.
“Ludmila Belousova: “A Silent Ferry of Permanent Recusant (troublemaker)”
https://rsport.ria.ru/blog_rian/20170930/1126498874.html
.... Protopopovs's stories are not black and white......
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Their lines were to die for. 
and quite good one, music, space and style, and all..... If anyone in the Bay Area or who is visiting likes to Roller Skate, here it is "pray to Skating Gods"...
You can bring your own skates, or rent, and people are cool, no pushing or shoving, and there are skating lessons too.
