Publicist and political expert Andrei Piontskovsky in a publication on the website radio "Freedom" draws parallels between recent months Stalin's rule and the current pre-election situation, noting that Vladimir Putin is not going to voluntarily give up power, since any successor will face criminal prosecution.
"Stalin I.V. at the plenum of the Central Committee on October 16, 1952:" I ask you to release me from my duties as General Secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU. I'm already old. It's hard for me. Tired. Choose another secretary for yourself." He said all this, looking attentively into the hall. On Malenkov's face, I saw a terrible expression that a person who has realized mortal danger. Malenkov's face, his gestures, his expressively raised hands were a direct plea to those present to refuse Comrade Stalin's request. And from behind Stalin came his hurried words: "No! Please stay!" And the audience buzzed: "Please, please stay..." I remember how in some performance based on Brecht's play, the faces of the murdered were smeared with white paint. And they stood motionless on the stage until the end of the action, frightening with white faces..
From the memoirs of Konstantin Simonov
65 years later
The imposing and charming petrel of the Russian Revolution, Professor Valery Solovey, gained in the fateful moments we are experiencing noticeable public fame by dosed leaks from the feasts of the all-good second or third category, to which he, apparently, is regularly invited - as an interesting interlocutor. The most quoted chip of all the leaks was the constantly exaggerated by Nightingale (not without some even flaunting his awareness) judgment about the unpredictability of the action, called in Russia the presidential elections of 2018. Some entertaining events caused by force majeure are announced to the intrigued public for August-September 2017.
This openwork intellectual game of beads was unexpectedly vulgarized two uncouth peasants who, in the presence of the sovereign-emperor himself, entered into a plebeian dispute between economic entities regarding the protection of the rehabilitation sanatorium "Rus". In the 1990s, similar subjects blew each other up in dozens of memorial cemeteries, and now they have swung at our everything - at the intimate process of transferring sacred state power, trying to use it to arrange their small affairs.
As a result of the scandalous fight of the “Afghan bulldogs” under the Kremlin carpet, a curious text fell out for viewing by the public, a denunciation of the highest name, in which a striking phrase stood out: “Dear Vladimir Vladimirovich, the political projects led by Volodin V.V. as yours were under the threat of discredit. assignee".
Such blasphemous words could only be written on paper after they were first uttered repeatedly by Putin himself. That is, we have received important information: Putin made it clear to his entourage that he did not plan to run for another term, and for greater persuasiveness he even introduced the brigade of his chosen successor. The ancient pastime of Russian tsars, from Ivan the Terrible to Joseph the Bloody - the sacrifice of a successor - was revived by Michal Ivanovich not by chance.
The failure of the mythologemes of "Russian World" and "Novorossiya" became the largest foreign policy defeat Putin's regime. And he undermined its economic foundations, exacerbating relations with Western partners that control the common funds of the rulers of Russia. The volume of the utilized bubble has sharply decreased, which inevitably provokes a war of all armed structures against each other. Even the National Guard of 400,000 bayonets can no longer protect the leader who has lost his mystical luck from the wrath of frustrated accomplices and popular indignation."
« The feeling of hopelessness intensifies precisely when the hated regimes have already outlived their acme and their life cycle is coming to an end. It's like a sign of the beginning of the end, a feeling of hopelessness – a sign that the end is near" .
Dmitry Furman.
With this epigraph, Russian political expert Andrei Piontkovsky begins his magnificent article for Radio Liberty today.
The alpha male of the pride, godfather, Tsapok of All Russia - these are very difficult professions, tragic in their own way, dooming to endless loneliness.
The power of any dictator, even the most cruel, is never absolute. It is always conventional, that is, it remains a conditional agreement of his environment: a few dozen top civil, police, media, and military officials. The reasons why notables are subordinate to the monarch, the president, the leader of the tribe differ in different cultures: tradition, animal fear, selfish interest, loyalty to the oath, sincere respect for the outstanding personality of the leader, religious fanaticism, or a combination of several of these.
Revolutions, upheavals, mutinies occur when a critical mass of these key characters lose their motives for subjugation, and the most resolute ones reach for a snuffbox, some for a scarf. The power of a dictator is far more fragile than that of an elected leader in a stable democracy.
The same Comrade Stalin, for the last twenty-five years of his life, every time he woke up, returned from brief oblivion to the solution of the same dilemma of the day - the Kremlin or the mortuary. Therefore, he constantly shook up his associates until he found himself lying helplessly in a puddle of his own urine on the floor of his ascetic residence in Kuntsevo.“You see that Comrade Stalin is sleeping. Put him on the couch."
In our not so cruel age, the option "Mikhal Ivanycha" is somewhat more attractive: the Kremlin, the morgue, the prison, the thieves' ship. It will not be one hundred million citizens of Russia that will determine his fate (, recognized on January 27, 2015 by the Verkhovna Rada as the aggressor country) in the “elections” on March 18 next year. It will be decided in the coming weeks not by him alone, but by all of today's Politburo - 15-20 most authoritative boys, relying on "popular opinion" (the mood of 60-100 business officials from the second echelon of the Kremlin kleptocracy).
Which does not mean at all that the activities of Alexei Navalny and the FBK are meaningless. Not at all. The headquarters of the movement, I am sure, perfectly understands that the names Putin and Navalny will never appear on the same ballot. Only one of them can appear there, depending on the course of events. So, all the educational activities of the FBK, including trolling the authorities about the registration of Navalny, are now aimed at ensuring that the name of the person who usurped power never appears in any ballot again.
We have no way of predicting how their word will resonate. But it is very significant that tens of thousands of young people in a hundred Russian cities twice - in March and in June - went on marches at the call of Navalny with the slogans "Putin is a thief!" And they come out again on October 7, on the day of the death of Anna Politkovskaya and on the birthday of the man who said that her death brought him more problems than the whole life of this insignificant journalist. And who noticed after 9 years that it is not a fact that Boris Nemtsov should have been killed.
There are clear signs that Navalny's anti-Putin campaign is supported by certain circles in power, including the security forces. Putin's "bunker" is extremely concerned about all this. As evidenced by the new arrest of Navalny, and the appearance on stage as in the days of December 2011, critical for the authorities, Ksenia Sobchak, positioning herself as "ally» Navalny, ready «take up his banner «.
But let's get back to the motives of stable loyalty to the ruler of the key operators of power during the long seventeen years of developed Putinism. Putin's ferrets from the Ozero cooperative were nothing in the late 90s, just petty St. Petersburg swindlers. They came to power and became everything not as a result of some KGB conspiracy or coup. They were brought into power by the hand, as their own guards, by the most liberal of the most liberal politicians, officials, oligarchs and just crooks surrounded by B. Yeltsin. Their names are well known, as are the shameful circumstances of Operation Successor 2000.
Since then, this is their Power, created by them and serving them. "Sislibs" and "siloviki" - Putin's SS - are united and vitally tied by the deepest conviction that in this backward country this wild people should by no means be trusted to choose power in free elections. Otherwise, he will definitely choose terrible people who will jeopardize the further course of market reforms and authoritarian modernization. Or, in other words, they will start asking unpleasant and indecent questions about the origin of the huge fortunes of the SS...
Putin's propaganda icon and legend, Margarita Simonyan, expressed this common concern most frankly and poignantly: "After the first free elections in Russia, we will all be hanged." And the “highbrow intellectual”, one of the leading ideologists of the Putin regime, melancholy once remarked: “In the last 20 years, the world at the top has been based on the fact that it is not customary to discuss who uses their official position and how. There are no clean ones in the elite.”
And now, for the first time in 17 years of his prosperous rule, a life-long putindent faces serious problems in this only reference group that is significant for him. The "elite" doubted Putin's ability to effectively perform in the next 6 years the most important interface function for the brigade in its relations with the eternally hated and eternally loved West, the guarantor of the assets stored there, already measured in trillions (!) dollars. The failure of the neo-imperial adventures, for which Putin vainly assumed personal responsibility, became the regime's biggest foreign policy defeat and undermined its economic "bonds", aggravating relations with the Western "partners" who control the common funds withdrawn from the country.
An existential threat has arisen to the most precious thing for Russian rulers - not just foreign assets, but their entire way of life in the West (education of children, medicine, recreation, well-being of wives, concubines, long happy life, replacement of organs, political and biological immortality, finally), which can provide billions stolen in Russia. All this is called into question by one person who, with his adventurous show-offs, spoiled the mutually beneficial business relations of the "elite" with the West.
Well, besides, Putin is really fed up with everyone. I got it with my petty malice, evasive lies, boundless rat-keeping. See THIS for at least another six years?
The Kremlin corporation is the direct successor of the communist nomenklatura. And she was able in one way or another to eliminate the first person who had lost its adequacy.
But the current ones will have to act in conditions of time pressure (180 days before the epoch-making confiscation!), turning into zugzwang, personnel shortages, a growing systemic crisis and a rapidly narrowing fan of possible scenarios.
With complete contempt for the “people”, they still have to offer him some kind of post-Putin TV chewing gum, some new songs about the main thing to legitimize the continuation of their Great Cut after Putin.
Ride the rising national wave? But then they themselves will have to go at the head of the masses and yell obscene chants about the Caucasus. And how will the business partner, member of the Politburo Ramzan Akhmatovich, and about a dozen million more look at this? Russian citizens"Caucasian nationality"?
Or, on the contrary, to bring Kadyrov's militants into Moscow to clean up all those who disagree? But here they will simply be torn apart with bare hands to national pride Great Russians.
The corporation has no people, no ideas, not even desires. Fukuyamov's end of history has come for her long ago. Time has frozen in a viscous eternity, and our Eurasian original pride - the imperious phallic vertical - for the third time in a century threatens to collapse into another black hole of Russian history.
But if history Soviet Union is a Shakespearean tragedy on a global scale, then the history of Putin's empire is a vulgar and disgusting provincial farce.
The third path to slavery led us to the same Dno station. And the driven Russia-troika is no longer rushing anywhere. And other peoples and states overtake it. The bottom of the regime or the bottom of Russia? The night is darkest just before dawn. There is a catastrophic lack of time and human capital to form a mass protest movement of millions. As happens at critical moments in history, a lot depends on the determination and drive of a very few.
Amputation, which could open a window of opportunity for civil society or gangrene. Motherland or her death.
Tags: ,Today, two reports appeared at once, indicating that Putin, apparently, wants to jump off the ladder of escalating the conflict with the West. First, having already committed a lot of war crimes, the Kremlin finally realized how monstrous its behavior is perceived not only by Western "partners", but by the entire world community. People turn on the TV and see the death of the inhabitants of Aleppo in live.
The Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation announced that the bombing of Aleppo was temporarily suspended from 10 am today. And, secondly, Merkel confirmed that she is still accepting the Normandy Four tomorrow. After a number of her statements that it makes sense to meet only if Russia agrees to implement basic agreements in the field of security and, first of all, a ceasefire on the line of separation of the parties, I think that this point, without which no progress on other issues is possible, and will be primarily discussed at the meeting on 19 October in Berlin.
Watch from the 53rd minute…
Ukraine should seek (and now it is much easier for it) the fulfillment by Moscow of the requirements formulated in the last two PACE resolutions. In my opinion, these texts, which in principle must guide the executive authorities of France and Germany, reflect all the provisions that Ukraine has been insisting on over the past two years.
The PACE resolutions clearly state that Russia is not fulfilling the basic ceasefire agreements, is building up its military presence in the occupied territories, and is not going to transfer control of the border to Ukraine. By the way, all this is now confirmed by the statements of Putin himself. For two years he held the position: "They are not there." But while luring investors to Russia, he blabbed that we were forced to support the Russian-speaking population. That is, he acknowledged military involvement Russia in this conflict.
Putin could not receive any dividends from the aggravation of the conflict. He suffered three fundamental defeats in the confrontation with the West.
First, the most painful is the defeat in Ukraine. Not even military. It is clear that, militarily, Russia is also incapable of a large-scale operation, because it will entail such a level of losses that will be unacceptable for Russian society. But the most fundamental defeat of the Kremlin in Ukraine is metaphysical - the ideology of the "Russian world" was rejected by the Russian population of Ukraine, which remained largely loyal to the Ukrainian state and its European choice. And the Russians are also fighting the aggressor in the ATO, just like ethnic Ukrainians.
Second, the Kremlin's nuclear blackmail over the Baltics failed. Putin threatened the West that if his "little green men" appeared in the Baltics, and NATO came to the aid of the Baltic states, he would use nuclear weapon. The NATO summit in July answered not only in words, but also in deeds, that the alliance would protect the Baltics, and this blackmail failed.
And, finally, the imaginary victory of Putin in Syria, where yes, indeed, he smeared the Americans on the wall, the unfortunate Carrie ran after Lavrov and persuaded him about something. And Putin, meanwhile, consistently destroyed and continues to physically destroy the opposition, which was oriented towards the West and which the Americans tried to support. But this so-called victory marked him as a war criminal. Actually, not only for him, but for the whole of Russia.
Three major defeats in foreign policy... Blackmail failed. The Kremlin billionaires do not want a real nuclear war. This is not what they collected their treasures for. So, we need to jump off and look for, as analysts close to the Kremlin write about it, some kind of “new peaceful coexistence”.
It is important that in bargaining for this "coexistence" the West does not make any concessions at the expense of Ukraine. We will be following the talks on October 19 in Berlin very carefully.
Palena and Beria with trembling hands
In the article by Sislib's "observer under the editor-in-chief" Mikhail Rostovsky "US resentment against Russia because of Syria creates the risk of a Third World War" three contradictory motives are read.
Firstly, the author, starting from the title, lies like a gray gelding, following all the canons of the Kremlin propaganda. This is an obligatory introduction in such texts, an oath of allegiance to the godfather Dzyudoheriya and his “ foreign policy". Then the smooth enumeration of the geopolitical victories achieved thanks to this wise course, unexpectedly ends with a loyal, humble, but nonetheless completely real possibility a direct military clash between the Russian Federation and the United States, similar to the Caribbean missile crisis of 1962.
I would not be distracted by the complexes of a petty opportunist if I were not sure that this article in MK is an instant snapshot of the collective consciousness and subconsciousness of the vast majority of the Kremlin inhabitants and their "intellectual" servants. And those who are in boots, and those who are in Gucci shoes.
So well everyone sat on such grandmas and spread their fingers like a fan in front of the Pindos with hatred and love. The weak-willed Obama ate everything and passed on through the iPhone that it would be even more accommodating for the second term. The seasoned dominant male Ribbentropische bent over the unfortunate Kerry, using the entire Kama Sutra.
And suddenly the words "war crimes", "barbarism", "terrorism", "rogue state" were heard at the Security Council. The Chinese ambassador delicately stepped aside, not wanting to cover up the Kremlin's shame with his veto for the fifth time in a row. And only one war criminal remained in the arena - a leper with a speaking surname Churkin.
He was illiterate, did not overcome the diplomatic alphabet salt. But he slept with Lenin. And he knew everything.
And in the morning, the world started talking about other ways to stop the live 24-hour execution of Aleppo.
The madness of the emperor is not a new story in Russian history. Approximate somehow coped. Including in Soviet times.
The situation is very similar recent months life of Comrade Stalin (winter 52-53 years), the gloomy atmosphere of that time. Stalin then quite seriously prepared for an atomic war. And this was not very liked by all the other members of the Politburo. Fortunately, they found a way to solve this problem, and in March, Soviet citizens learned about the existence of Cheyne-Stokes syndrome.
As for the current state of affairs, I can only express regret that the Russian “establishment” does not have such an institution as the Politburo at its disposal.
It was customary to underestimate him and even laugh at him. But the Politburo was a fairly meaningful institution. Its task was to limit as far as possible the power of the first person. Members of the Politburo imprisoned Lenin in Gorki, poisoned Stalin, and removed Khrushchev.
In fact, this was a defense mechanism against the madness of the first person. In the political system modern Russia there is no such mechanism. And in Putin's environment there are no large-scale people who would think about their own own fate, and at least a little about the fate of the state they are going to lead.
There is an objective request for the removal of Putin in connection with his progressive dementia, but there is neither an institutional mechanism nor decisive people capable of carrying out the sanitation necessary for the survival of Russia, and possibly the whole world. And don't talk to me about his "legitimacy". He is an absolutely illegitimate usurper. In 2012, he flagrantly violated the constitution, which barred him from holding the presidency more than twice in a row. In addition, all elections with his participation were accompanied by large-scale fraud.
It remains to be hoped that the unpleasant choice between the Hague Tribunal and the nuclear apocalypse will force the potential Palens and Berias to concentrate and drag the insane dwarf away from the nuclear button in the last hour.
Providence often makes good out of evil. And what else is it to be made of in today's Russia?
