COVID Infections Again on the Rise in Russia

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Sept. 12 – With the start of the school year, COVID infections are again on the rise in Russia as in many other countries, with more than 8,000 new infections and eight deaths in the city of Moscow alone last week. Experts expect this wave to peak in a month or two but prove far less widespread and lethal than was the case three and four years ago.

            A major problem in both the diagnosis and treatment of COVID now, Russian health specialists say, is that the symptoms are so varied and often so mild that many cases are misdiagnosed as something else and that new vaccinations may not work because the virus is mutating so quickly (svpressa.ru/society/article/429221/).

            Many of the vaccine boosters now being offered, Russian officials say, protect people against only a few of the strains out there. That message will likely keep many Russians from seeking the vaccine, just as was the case three and four years ago, and mean that there is a risk that the growth in the number of COVID cases could be far larger in Russia than elsewhere.

            The Moscow specialists insist that there is no chance that the number of new cases will rise to the level of 200,000 a day as was true in 2020; but if Russians don’t get vaccinated and do not adopt healthy practices like washing their hands frequently and getting enough sleep, there is a real danger of an epidemic in Russia that could fuel the rise of COVID elsewhere. 

As Part of Its War against Ukraine, Moscow Seeks to Erase Popular Memories about Mass Repressions in Soviet Times

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Sept. 13 – Not only is Moscow planning to revisit the rehabilitations of some victims of Soviet repressions thus allowing the Kremlin to reverse specific findings (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2024/09/moscows-plan-to-revisit-rehabilitation.html), but it is eliminating from the list of such repressions many of the greatest Soviet crimes.

            This summer, the Russian government released an amended concept of its policy document on memorializing victims of political repression to erase in an Orwellian manner popular memories about those events (forbes.ru/forbeslife/520462-iz-koncepcii-o-pamati-zertv-politiceskih-repressij-ubrali-upominania-rada-repressij).

            The new edition of this concept paper drops the declaration that “Russia cannot fully become a state governed by the rule of law and assuming a leading role in the world without perpetuating the memory of the many millions of its citizens who became victims of political repression.”

            It also drops all references to the persecution of religious groups and representatives of the pre-revolutionary elite who remained in the Soviet Union, collectivization and the famine associated with it, the Great Terror and the GULAG and the peoples who were deported in whole or in part. 

            The new document also fails to say that these and other repressions were illegal and that those who were victims have a right to rehabilitation. Moreover, all data about political repression has been removed as have the characterization of Soviet repressions as having a mass character.

            Irina Shcherbakova, one of the founders of the Memorial Society, says that it is clear that the Kremlin now wants to send a message that “the state is stronger than the individual and htat anyone who does not agree with this is either crazy or an enemy or both” (svoboda.org/a/ochenj-podlaya-istoriya-v-rf-stirayut-pamyatj-o-massovyh-repressiyah/33117449.html).

            She adds that this latest Moscow action is part of the Kremlin’s “propaganda war against Ukraine” and is intended to “show our population once again that the Soviet government was good and that all those who opposed it” – including the Ukrainians – “were always Nazis” who must be destroyed.

‘Russia’s Easily Accessible Mineral Deposits Almost Exhausted,’ Resources Minister Kozlov Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Sept. 11 – The Russian Federation has immense natural resources, but the most “easily accessible deposits” from which Moscow now extracts them will run out in five to 15 years, the country’s natural resources minister says, forcing geologists to explore new ones in far less accessible parts of the country.

            Much of Russia east of the Urals and especially in the far north has not even been explored by geologists, Aleksandr Kozlov says; and many of the places where new deposits are likely to be found are far from roads, railways or shipping lines (tass.ru/ekonomika/21839257, ria.ru/20240911/minprirody-1972131144.html and themoscowtimes.com/2024/09/12/russias-easy-to-reach-mineral-deposits-nearly-depleted-minister-says-a86349).

            Consequently, the minister suggests, Russia will have to build expensive new infrastructure to allow the country to gain access to this mineral wealth, face the prospect of critical shortages or seek to import from abroad minerals that it is used to getting from domestic sources.

            Environmental groups are concerned that Moscow will build such new infrastructure without much regard for either the environment or the population living in these regions and thus inflict serious damage on both (kedr.media/news/minprirody-legkodostupnye-mestorozhdeniya-poleznyh-iskopaemyh-v-rossii-pochti-ischerpany-za-nimi-pojdut-na-neosvoennye-zemli/).

            That is especially likely given the melting of the permafrost that underlies nearly all the territory where new deposits of minerals are likely to be found. As a result, the costs of building infrastructure will rise dramatically, possibly beyond Moscow’s ability to fund them (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2023/09/global-warming-threatens-russian.html).

            China might be able to afford to pay for such infrastructure, but its approach to Russia in the past concerning such a possibility suggests that Beijing would want concessionary access to and prices for such resources, thus limiting their flow to Russia and increasing Moscow’s dependence on China.

Moscow Suppressing Religious Groups in Occupied Ukraine Except Those ROC MP Controls, Specter Press Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Sept. 12 – The Russian government is currently conducting a worldwide campaign against Kyiv for a new law that requires religious groups there headquartered in countries attacking Ukraine to break those ties or face the prospect that they will be closed down by the authorities.

            But Moscow has not acknowledged and international media have not paid attention to what has been going on in Russian-occupied portions of Ukraine since 2014. There, the Russian authorities have been actively suppressing all denominations except those subordinate to the Russian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate.

            In a detailed, 4500-word article, investigative journalist Dmitry Durnyev of the Specter news portal describes how Russian occupation officials have closed down all churches not linked to the ROC MP since 2014 and especially since Putin began his expanded invasion of Ukraine in 2022 (spektr.press/bog-porugaem-ne-byvaet/).

            A handful of independent churches do survive, Durnyev acknowledges, but only on sufferance. Such churches must profess their unquestioning loyalty to Moscow given that the threat they too will be closed down hangs over them, especially as the war, now approaching its 1000^th day continues. 

            There are legitimate reasons to be concerned about Ukraine’s law on religious group, but attacks on it by Moscow are hypocritical given that what Moscow has been doing in Russian-occupied areas is far worse than anything that could even potentially happen occur in Ukraine (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2024/08/whats-next-for-moscow-church-in-ukraine.html).

            At the very least, those who are critical of Ukraine's legislation need to be even more critical of what Moscow has actually done rather than viewing Russian critics as its allies regarding Kyiv's handling of a church whose leaders have repeatedly shown themselves not only ready to take orders from Moscow but to work against Ukraine.

Russians are Protesting a Lot about Many Things Even If They Aren’t Taking to the Streets to Denounce Putin’s War, ‘NeMoskva’ Reports

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Sept. 11 – The image the Putin regime wants to present and that many reports about Russia today reflect is that Russians aren’t protesting, either because they support what Putin is doing, the Kremlin’s view, or because they have been cowed into silence because they fear the consequences, the view of many outside observers.

            But in fact, as the Nemoskva portal points out, Russians continue to protest across the country against many things just not those connected with Putin’s own policies and thus likely to get them into trouble (nemoskva.net/2024/09/11/v-rossijskih-regionah-protestuyut-protiv-krematoriya-vysotok-i-hrama/).

            In its latest weekly roundup on protests, the portal which covers developments outside of the Russian capital that are typically ignored by the Moscow media says that Russians have protested against the construction of new crematoriums, the lifting of restrictions on the height of buildings, and the construction of new churches.

            Such actions are seen by most Russians as “non-political” and thus unlikely to land them in difficulties with the authorities, but they are an indication that the willingness of Russians to go into the streets on things of importance to them has not disappeared but only been put on hold by fears of repression.

            That helps to explain why Putin continues to increase repression across the board. He and his entourage are certainly aware that if he ever loosens up, Russians now taking to the streets to protest about building heights or the construction of churches in their neighborhoods will quite prepared to demonstrate against him and his regime as such. 

Nearly a Third of Russians Aren’t Having Children Because of War in Ukraine, Poverty, and Unhappiness with Putin’s Political Course, Higher School of Economics Poll Finds

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Sept. 10 – A new survey by Moscow’s Higher School of Economics reported in Voprosy ekonomiki finds that nearly a third (30.6 percent) of Russians have decided to postpone or not have children at all because of the war in Ukraine, poverty, or unhappiness with Putin’s political course (t.me/moscowtimes_ru/25537).

            That helps to explain why the number of children born during the first half of 2024 is far below that of the last pre-war year and in fact is now at the level this statistic was in 1999, the year before Vladimir Putin came to power. But tragically, independent demographer Aleksey Raksha says, Moscow seems intent on making the situation worse.

            According to him, a draft law the Duma is considering that would require psychological counseling before a divorce could be granted even if both parties agree to that would have the effect of driving down the number of marriages and the birthrate as well (pointmedia.io/story/66e183a9dc48800406e0f4c6).

            That is because such counseling would inevitably delay not only the granting of divorce by Russian courts but also the formation of new marriages likely to result in additional children. Raksha says that the experience of China confirms this but that Russian lawmakers are ignoring that and thus making further declines in the number of births likely.

            According to another Russian demographer Dmitry Zakotyansky, the best way to boos the number of children born is not placing such limits on divorce but rather addressing problems of poverty, increasing the rights of women, and lowering the level of force and tension in society by changing the direction Russia is moving in.

            The entirely reasonable focus on family values that Putin and others regularly talk about should not lead to the preservation of marriages “at any price,” he says. Instead, it should be about improving conditions within the family and the social and political environment in which Russian families currently live. 

 

Moscow’s Plan to Revisit Rehabilitation of Soviet Era Repression Victims Likely to Prove Explosive, Grashchenkov Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Sept. 10 – Russian prosecutors plan to reopen the question of the rehabilitation of victims of Soviet era crimes, a plan that will at the very least reopen old wounds because so many people were directly or indirectly involved and because many will draw parallels between repression then and repression now, Ilya Grashechenkov says.

            The director of the Moscow Center on Regional Politics argues that the plan, which is intended to ensure that no one who supported the Nazis was rehabilitated (rbc.ru/politics/09/09/2024/66df460a9a79473380608274) will inevitably raise questions about others as well (rosbalt.ru/news/2024-09-10/ilya-graschenkov-k-chemu-privedet-peresmotr-del-o-reabilitatsii-zhertv-repressiy-5190631).

            According to historians, on the order of 20 million people were repressed during Soviet times, but only a few more than 630,000 have been rehabilitated since the end of Soviet times, the scholar says. The cases of 340,000 more were considered but the authorities decided not to rehabilitate them.

            But these are miniscule figures given that specialists say that as many as 11 million Soviet citizens could qualify for rehabilitation. Consequently, any effort to review even the small number who have been rehabilitated to ensure they followed Moscow’s approach on fascism will touch a nerve among the twice that number of Russians today with direct links to them.

            Perhaps still more dangerously, such a review, Grashchenkov suggests, will reopen questions about the Soviet state and its role in all this, questions that will soon grow to include others about the actions of its successor Russian state as well.

Decolonization Far More Likely to Happen in Russia if Its Backers Focus on Ethnic Russians who’ve Become Regionalists and not Just on Non-Russians Alone, Kuban Regionalist Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Sept. 10 – There are two widespread misconceptions about the future of Russia, one of which holds that that country can continue in its current borders but be transformed into “’the beautiful Russia of the future” and the second that the only people who should be involved in decolonization are indigenous non-Russians, Vladimir Miroshnichenko says.

            The Kuban regionalist who now lives in Chile says that the first of these misconceptions has been widely examined and criticized but that the second has not. That is a tragedy because history suggests that there are very few cases when indigenous peoples on their own have achieved the goals of de-imperialization (region.expert/creoles/).

            In the case of Russia, Miroshnichenko continues, the exclusive focus on the non-Russians ignores that in many non-Russian areas, ethnic Russians form a significant portion or even a majority of the population and that in the Russian Federation as a whole, the ethnic Russians form at least a two to one majority over the non-Russians.

            Ignoring them is a serious mistake, because such an approach ignores the fact that many ethnic Russians who have moved into non-Russian areas in fact have become “creoles, descendants of immigrants from the empire for whom regional self-identification now takes precedence over ethnicity.

            Such people should be viewed as potentially important allies of the cause of de-imperialization rather than its inevitable opponents, Miroshnichenko says. If they are not, then the process of de-imperialization will be harder and more bloody and may even become impossible if such people come to view those seeking de-imperialization as their enemies.

            It is entirely natural that the Kuban is the region within the current Russian borders where talk like Miroshichenko’s about creoles is most natural because there ethnic Russians, Ukrainians and Cossacks have intermarried and often changed identities (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2022/03/tradition-of-ukrainian-and-cossack.html, windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2023/02/moscow-insists-not-only-that-kuban-isnt.html and windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2022/07/faced-with-repression-in-1920s-many.html).

            That has sparked ever-increasing attention by Kyiv to the Kuban which Ukrainians refer to as “the crimson wedge” (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2024/06/kyiv-must-devote-more-attention-to.html), attention that alongside the growth of regional identities there (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2022/11/crimson-wedge-activist-says-kuban-seeks.html ) has alarmed Russia and led the Kremlin to attack this development (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2023/02/moscow-insists-not-only-that-kuban-isnt.html and windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2024/07/moscow-declares-two-ukraine-wedge.html).

            As I and others have argued in the past, Russian federalism has been at risk from the outset because too few people either in Moscow or the regions and republics paid attention to the Russians both in predominantly ethnic Russian areas and in non-Russian areas as well (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2020/02/tragedy-of-russian-federalism-now.html and windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2022/12/russias-regions-not-just-its-non.html).

            And as both I and others have argued as well, the real disintegration of the Russian empire will occur when and only when the supporters of the coming apart of the Russian state focus as much on the ethnic Russians and their role in this process as they do now on the non-Russians (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2023/06/real-disintegration-of-empire-will.html).

Barbarous Actions of Russian Forces in Ukraine Product of Continuing Influence of Soviet Ideology, Savin Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Sept. 9 – Many observers blame the barbarity of Russian military actions in Ukraine on Putin, Dimitry Savin says. He certainly bears responsibility for these horrors, but their real source lies in the Soviet tradition of “ideologically motivated sadism and barbarism,” a tradition that the Russian Federation has continued as something that binds it together.

            The editor of the Riga-based conservative Russian portal Harbin says Russian liberals and the West generally want to blame anyone or anything else other than Soviet leaders and their approach to opponents but that this approach has horrific consequences both within Russia and in Moscow’s relations with others (harbin.lv/istoki-antifashistskogo-sadizma).

            From the outset, Soviet leaders blamed and targeted for attack not individuals responsible for specific actions but rather entire groups whose very existence was deemed unacceptable and thus whose destruction by any means including sadism and looting was held to be the highest good, Savin continues.

            That approach, which continues in Ukraine, thus has its roots in Soviet ideology rather than in fascism, Savin says. Soviet leaders talked about fascism long before Hitler and World War II and long after it as well. And Putin is using this longer tradition in Ukraine rather than only taking ideas from the war against Hitler as many assume.

            Neither Russian liberals nor the West understands this, he says. On the one hand, most Russian liberals think about the world around them in terms heavily informed by this Soviet approach of believing that once an enemy group has been identified, all means are justified in destroying it. They disagree with the Kremlin only about which group that is.

            And on the other, European and American liberals don’t want to blame the Soviet system as a whole for anything. Instead, they prefer to separate out “’bad’ Stalinism’ from ‘good’ communism and socialism” and thus to blame all of Moscow’s crimes on longer Russian historical traditions “but not on Marx, Lenin and communism.”

            “As a result, those forces which appear to be trying to fight the Kremlin in fact act as its defense lawyers.” But “the price of this is too high,” Savin argues. Moscow remains a threat to the Russian population and to outsiders as well, a trend that is likely to continue and expand unless the true sources of “Russian barbarism” are recognized and attacked.

            Unfortunately, the conservative commentator says, the chances that Russian and Western liberals will come to their senses are not great and thus the chances that more such crimes will continue in the future is “very high” indeed. 

 

China Plans to Expand Its Presence in Norway’s Svalbard Archipelago, Helping Moscow Now But Challenging It Later

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Sept. 9 – Beijing plans to work with Russia on scientific research on Svalbard, according to Marc Lanteigne at Norway’s Arctic University, a move that will set off alarm bells in the West now because of Russia’s attention to Norway’s archipelago and in Moscow later because it is another sign that China is becoming senior partner to Russia in the Arctic.

            Lanteigne told Thomas Nilsen of The Barents Observer that Svalbard is increasingly more important to China as a research center because Beijing has largely been frozen out of Canada and Greenland (thebarentsobserver.com/en/arctic/2024/09/svalbard-research-becomes-more-important-china-professor-says).

            Building on its cooperate with Russia in the Antarctic and responding to Moscow’s call for BRICS countries to work together in the Arctic, the Norwegian research continues, China is ready to expand its activities on Svalbard and more generally with Russia in other parts of the Arctic region.

            In the short term, Moscow will certainly welcome China’s increased involvement, especially since Beijing agrees with the Russian government that Norway is violating the spirit of the Svalbard Treaty by limiting the focus of research there and thus may help Russia advance its broader goals in the region (https://jamestown.org/program/moscows-first-move-against-nato-could-take-place-in-norways-svalbard-archipelago/)

            But over the longer haul, Moscow along with the West will have much to worry about if China’s role expands to the point that even at the Western end of the Northern Sea Route Beijing becomes the paramount power and pushes Russia aside (jamestown.org/program/china-helping-russia-on-northern-sea-route-now-but-ready-to-push-moscow-aside-later/).

            According to Lanteigne, China has “the unusual luxury” of working with Russia but “not slamming the door” to cooperation with other countries while advancing its own interests.

Orenburg Corridor Arose Because Kazakhs Wanted a More Ethnically Kazakh Capital City, Kazakh Journalist Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Sept. 9 – Orenburg was the capital of the Kazakhstan Autonomy between 1920 and 1924 because Moscow viewed this predominantly Russian city as a way to maintain central control there, but it was handed over to the RSFSR largely as at the insistence Kazakhs that their republic have a more ethnically Kazakh capital, Bakyt Zhanabergen says.

            The Kazakh journalist who specializes in historical questions says that the archives show that Kazakh communists repeatedly asked Moscow to move the capital of their autonomy from Orenburg to more Kazakh cities because they believed that would improve the administration of their autonomy (spik.kz/2002-kak-orenburg-perestal-byt-stolicej-kazahstana-i-vernulsja-v-sostav-rossii.html).

            Zhanabergen’s findings are part of an ongoing debate about what has come to be known as the Orenburg Corridor, the Russian oblast separating Kazakhstan from the Middle Volga. Some Kazakhs now want it back (jamestown.org/program/kazakh-nationalists-call-for-astana-to-absorb-orenburg-outraging-moscow/), and  many in the Middle Volga want it joined either to them or to Kazakhstan to open way for the independence of that republic and others (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2023/02/tatars-and-bashkirs-must-recover.html).

            Moscow has been alarmed by such calls and by the suggestions of Ukrainian analysts that the Orenburg Corridor threatens Russia’s territorial integrity more than almost any other issue (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2022/01/ukrainian-interest-in-orenburg-corridor.html and windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2018/11/orenburg-corridor-threatens-russia-more.html).

            Zhanabergen’s article appears to be an effort to damp down Kazakh interest in the corridor by pointing out that the Kazakhs had good reason to give up Orenburg; but however that may be, it will do little or nothing to limit interest in the corridor in the Middle Volga (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2023/02/tatars-and-bashkirs-must-recover.html and jamestown.org/program/the-orenburg-corridor-and-the-future-of-the-middle-volga/).

            And it certainly challenges the view, held by many in the Middle Volga that Moscow created the Orenburg corridor to block the republics of that region from achieving independence, something they say would have happened in 1991 had that Russian corridor not existed (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2023/05/if-tatarstan-had-bordered-foreign.html).

            But the result of the appearance of this article is likely to have the unintended consequence of boosting attention to the Orenburg Corridor given that activists in all three places, Kazakhstan, the Middle Volga and Ukraine see it as increasingly fateful for the future (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2024/03/tatars-stress-turkic-and-muslim.html and windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2023/10/bashkir-activist-ready-to-give-up.html).

Navalnaya’s Comments about Common Culture of Russians and Non-Russians Only Deepen Divide between Them, Radicalizing Both

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Sept. 7 – Speaking in Slovenia, Yuliya Navalnaya, the widow of the Russian opposition politician, suggested that those calling for the independence of the non-Russian republics of the Russian Federation were ignoring “the shared backgrounds and culture” of Russians and non-Russians alike.

            Her words which echo those of Kremlin propagandists have outraged non-Russians who see the world in an entirely different way and beyond question have deepened the divide between Russian liberals and non-Russian activists, Gulnara Shuraleyeva, one of the latter, says (themoscowtimes.com/2024/09/06/navalnayas-decolonization-critique-proves-that-russias-liberal-opposition-hasnt-been-listening-to-indigenous-voices-a86280).

            And that in turn has led to the radicalization of many who may have hoped for cooperation and the development of genuine federalism but see Navalnaya’s words as evidence that even if liberals like her came to power, the situation of the non-Russians would remain dire unless they are able to get out from under Moscow’s thumb by securing their own independence.

            (For examples of such commentaries, see idelreal.org/a/narody-uderzhivalis-v-imperskih-kleschah-siloy-ruslan-aysin-o-kritike-navalnoy-dekolonialnoy-povestki/33109265.html, t.me/League_FN/2081, indigenous-russia.com/archives/39545, indigenous-russia.com/archives/39541 and svoboda.org/a/razzhigaet-nenavistj-blogery-posporili-iz-za-slov-yulii-navaljnoy/33108644.html.)

            By backing the territorial integrity of the Russian Federation just as clearly and unqualifiedly as does the Kremlin, Navalnaya may have won plaudits from Russian nationalists and regime loyalists as well as from those in the West who oppose the disintegration of Russia just as they opposed the disintegration of the USSR thirty years ago.

            But gratuitous remarks like hers will do little to slow the coming apart of the Russian Federation just as similar ones at the end of Soviet times didn’t slow a similar process but in fact had the unintended consequence of accelerating its demise, however hard those who made such remarks then now try to take credit for exactly what happened.

Russia has Exhausted the Power Generating Capacity It Inherited from Soviet Union, Energy Minister Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Sept. 9 – Russia has exhausted the reserves of electric power generation left over from Soviet times, Energy Minister Sergey Tsivilyov says, and today it has little chance of replacing it given both Western sanctions that keep Moscow from acquiring needed spare parts and the absence of domestic spending in the sector.

            And despite Vladimir Putin’s assurances that Russia will overcome all problems in this area, the energy minister said the situation in the Russian Far East is now so bad that energy production there is at high risk of collapse (tass.ru/interviews/21798711 and moscowtimes.ru/2024/09/09/glava-minenergo-zayavil-ob-ischerpanii-ostavshihsya-ot-sssr-rezervov-energetiki-a141663).

            Tsivilyov’s pessimism in contrast to Putin’s upbeat optimism rests on the conclusions of Russian experts. According to them, even the Russian capital won’t be able to generate enough electricity in the future with shortfalls seriously restricting economic growth (so-ups.ru/future-planning/public-discussion-genshema/2042/).

            According to one expert, Oleg Shevtsov, head of Trans-Energy, half or more of Russia’s aging power plants and power distribution arrangements can’t be repaired let alone increased in capacity because of sanctions and the absence of domestic funding and supply (newizv.ru/news/2024-07-20/elektroseti-v-rossii-iznosheny-na-50-70-gde-zhdat-novyh-otklyucheniy-elektrichestva-432026).

            Unless something changes and quickly, Russia likely faces brownouts or worse, developments that will limit its ability to maintain existing levels of economic production even in key areas like the military-industrial sector. Putin clearly hopes for better; but as so often in Russia, the result is likely to be otherwise. 

Putin’s Speeches Now Resemble Those of CPSU General Secretaries, Pastukhov Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Sept. 7 – There are many ways in which Russia increasingly resembles the Soviet past, but one of the most intriguing is the fact that Vladimir Putin’s speeches increasingly resemble stylistically and in terms of reaction those of CPSU general secretaries to plenums of the central committee.

            They are of little or no interest to anyone “except those who write them,” the London-based Russian analyst says; and no one listens to them “except those who have to do so because of their positions.” As a result, these public actions are of less moment than many think (t.me/v_pastukhov/1238 reposted at kasparov.ru/material.php?id=66DE94FA9C2B3).

            But even more important, “the vacuum of thought” that such speeches then and now display is unintentionally highlighted by “unnecessary details” that are intended to fill the time and distract attention from genuinely important and much larger issues while suggesting the man in power is really in charge.

            Putin’s latest speech in Vladivostok exemplifies this return to the past, Pastukhov continues. He said nothing about the war and maintained that “everything is calm, that we live as we did, and that we have grandiose plans,” although the specifics of even those were largely absent concealed behind a wave of meaningless newspeak.

            And as was so often the case in Soviet times, the leader’s speeches once again must be analyzed not so much by a consideration of what they contain but what they don’t and how the absence of comment about Ukraine, China or even Belarus is where the real story lies just as was true in Brezhnev’s time.

 

Russian Regions Not Coterminous with Federal Subjects and Must be Recognized, Mikhail Nemtsov Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Sept. 9 – The federal subjects into which Moscow has divided the country are in almost all cases smaller than the regions which residents identify with, a fact of life that makes talking about regionalism difficult and the future of a genuine federal division of the country even more so, Mikhail Nemtsov says.

            The Russian poet and philosopher who comes from the Altai region gives as an example Siberia. That region “in fact does not exist; instead, there are two or three or even four Siberias,” with residents in one place defining their region one way and those in another in quite a different one (nemoskva.net/2024/09/09/pomozhet-li-nam-mestnaya-identichnost/).

            The federal subjects of which these mental regions are a part, such as Altay Kray or Kemerovo Oblast are too small to constitute the basis of a regional identity, all the more so because these were created from the outside by Moscow to address its needs rather than those of the peoples living in them.

            Nemtsov gives as an example the creation of Byransk Oblast in 1944. It was set up not because there was any natural Bryansk region but in order to simplify the coordination by Soviet officials of Moscow’s struggle against the large anti-Soviet underground that existed there at that time.

            Regional identities, he continues, involve larger territories that have become part of the mental maps of people over a long period of time. And despite Soviet and more recently Russian efforts at ethnic engineering and redivision of the administrative territorial map of the country, “these regions exist in the minds of the people there” and must be taken into account.

            Moscow typically divides the country into three levels, the federal, the regional and the local (municipal); but in addition to these, Nemtsov argues, “there is a fourth level, that of large regions” – and this level is “perfectly obvious and quite strong,” however much it is downplayed or ignored at the center.

            If Russia is to become a genuine federation, then it must take these regions into account rather than assuming that the existing divisions that Moscow has imposed are the only ones that matter. 

Another Signal of Moscow’s Intentions: Ethnic Buryat who Doesn’t Know Buryat Now Republic Head Replaced Ethnic Russians who Did Know that National Language

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Sept. 9 – It is common ground that the survival of minority languages depends not only on the availability of and access to instruction in them but also and in many ways even more on the use of those languages in public spheres. Where they are widely used, they will be respected and survive; where they are not, they almost certainly will disappear.

            One of the clearest signs of their likelihood of survival is when ethnic Russians who live in these areas and especially those who are sent in to occupy key positions feel that they must learn the non-Russian languages – and when they don’t feel such a need, then the future of those languages is at risk regardless of whether they are taught in schools or survive in homes.

            That makes a development Aleksandra Garmozhapova, the head of Free Buryatia  , points to especially significant. She points out that earlier Russian rulers of her homeland learned Russian but now an ethnic Buryat doesn’t even speak the language of his own people (nemoskva.net/2024/09/09/pomozhet-li-nam-mestnaya-identichnost/).

            When the head of the republic who is a member of the titular nationality doesn’t think he must know and use the language of the republic, that sends a powerful signal to his co-nationals that they don’t need to learn it and use it, she explains, a sharp contrast to the situation in which even ethnic Russians feel that it is important that they know and use the titular language.

            In the 1990s, the head of Buryatia was an ethnic Russian, Leonid Potapov, even though an ethnic Russian, spoke Buryat well; now, Aleksey Tsydenov, an ethnic Buryat who heads the republic, doesn’t, although some ethnic Russians in the republic leadership, including the speaker of its parliament, Vladimir Pavlov, do.

            This pattern undoubtedly extends to other non-Russian areas where Russians have been inserted as leaders such as Dagestan and signals in the clearest possible way Moscow’s real intentions for the non-Russian languages and their peoples. But in addition to that, it calls into question the approach of many analysts to ethnic issues in the Russian Federation.

            Many of them are inclined to count the number of non-Russians in top positions in the republics as an indication of Moscow’s tolerance for and support of the titular nationalities; but in fact, installing a member of the titular nationality who does not speak the national language is a much more serious attack on such nations than even having an ethnic Russian there who does.

 

To Compensate for Labor Shortages and to Meet War-Time Demand, More than Half of Russians are Working Overtime – and Many Aren’t Happy, Head Hunter Poll Finds

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Sept. 9 – One of the ways Russian employers are trying to compensate for the shortage of workers at a time of increasing demand for output to support Putin’s war in Ukraine is to force their employees to work overtime, a practice that is boosting incomes but isn’t especially welcome by many workers, a Head Hunter survey finds.

            Almost a third of all Russians of working age (29 percent) are working overtime every day or almost every day, the survey found, with another quarter (23 percent) doing so two to three days a week (rbc.ru/society/09/09/2024/66de514c9a794717bfac197a and moscowtimes.ru/2024/09/09/rossiyane-massovo-pozhalovalis-na-pererabotki-a141652).

            Among the others, 12 percent of workers say they are required to work overtime “not less than once a month,” and 17 percent say they work overtime twice a month. Only about one Russian employee in four – 23 percent – says that he or she has never had to work beyond the normal work week.

            Nearly half of those surveyed – 48 percent – said they weren’t adequately compensated for overtime, and almost the same share – 49 percent – said that overtime work was having a negative impact on their health, with 20 percent saying it has had a serious impact in that regard and leaving them with less time for family, friends and hobbies.

            If the Russian government drives out more migrant workers or if more Russians leave the country because of Putin’s war, pressure on employers to pressure their workers to put in overtime hours will likely increase, something that will undoubtedly anger many of them even if their incomes rise as a result.   

Muscovitism Must Be Rooted Out if Russia is to Cease to Be a Threat to Itself and Others, Eidman Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Sept. 7 – Those who believe in “a beautiful Russia of the future” often cite the case of Germany after 1945 when its defeat in war did not lead to its disappearance, Igor Eidman says. But they ignore that the allies liquidated the source of German militarism– Prussia – and that Russia which has its own Prussia – Muscovy – must undergo something similar.

            By eliminating Prussia, the Russian analyst now living in Beelin, the World War II allies also eliminated “the spirit of Prussianism: chauvinism, imperialism, militarism, and authoritarianism” and as a result the new Germany could become a democratic and genuinely federal state (t.me/igoreidman/1722 reposted at  charter97.org/ru/news/2024/9/8/609857/).

            Russia to this day has “its own Prussia and Prussianism: Muscovy and its spirit of Muscovitism,” a fact of life which reflects that Russia was formed around the Muscovite principality just as Germany was formed around Prussia in the 19^th century. As a result, Eidman says, “present-day Russia is a broadened variant of the Muscovite principality.”

            Muscovitism is “not the log of Muscovites alone, but rather of all those who associate themselves with the Moscow empire of the Russian Federation. In short, its entire ruling elite. Putin and most of his circle “aren’t Muscovites – just as Hitler was not a Prussian.” But they are “infected with the spirit of Muscovitism.”

            That set of ideas involves “imperial pride and unrestricted territorial expansion, contemptuous xenophobia, a primitive morality in which my seizure of the territory of others is good but their seizure of mine is evil, legal nihilism, contempt for human rights and freedoms, slavery from top to bottom, police brutality, systemic corruption and theft.”

            Eidmean concludes that “if the contemporary Moscow-centric empire and the spirit of Muscovitism aren’t destroyed along with the Putin regime, then, the global threat of Muscovite expansion will remain in place and Moscow will remain a source of war and aggression toward its neighbors.”

‘Russia for the Russians’ Sounded after Moscow Soccer Match ‘Outrages Dagestanis and Highlights Broader Problem

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Sept. 5 – After an August 27 soccer match between Moscow’s Spartak and Makhachkala’s Dynamo teams, someone posted the slogan “Russia for the Russians” online. Dagestanis were outraged and have become more so because Moscow officials have done nothing to rein in those responsible even though this phrase was declared extremist in 2010.

            When Moscow wants us to go to war, some Dagestanis are now saying, “we are equal citizens of Russia, but the rest of the time, then we are second-class,” the result of the Kremlin’s  effort to present itself as a multinational state and at the same time to appeal to the feelings of the ethnic majority (kavkazr.com/a/rossiya-dlya-russkih-pochemu-lozung-natsionalistov-vernulsya-v-futbol-na-matche-s-komandoy-iz-dagestana/33105070.html).

            One Dagestani political activism, Madina Ibragimova, deputy head of the LDPR party in that republic said that those manipulating young Muscovites to say such things are “just as much terrorists as those who inspired the terrorist act at Crocus City Hall, the attacks in Makhachkala and Derbent, and the hostage taking in Rostov” (t.me/MadinaIbragimova77/1554).

            The most senior political figures in Dagestan, almost all of whom have been appointed by Moscow, so far have kept silent, a failure to speak out that other Dagestanis have noticed and that likely is having the effect of calling still more attention to the failure of Moscow officials to take any serious action against those who scandalized the Dagestanis with this slogan.

            Indeed, Gleb Trufanov, a specialist in conflict studies, compares what has happened in the wake of the Moscow match with what happened 14 years ago when fans shouted openly “Russia for the Russians.” That couldn’t happen now unless there was official approval. That some have put out this slogan suggests that there are those in power who now favor testing the waters.

            But the reaction in Dagestan to the inaction of the Russian police suggests that someone in Moscow is now playing with fire and that unless the central authorities come down hard on anyone attempting to mobilize people on the basis of “Russia for the Russians” is playing with fire that could trigger a conflagration.

‘Essence of Soviet Nationality Policy’ was Creation of Small Republics that wouldn’t Unite and Challenge Moscow, Bolshevik Ally of Stalin Said in 1919

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Sept. 5 – The essence of Soviet nationality policy, Ruslan Masagutov says, was the creation of small republics without enough resources to challenge Moscow on their own and creating tensions among them so that they couldn’t form alliances that might threaten the territorial integrity of the country.

            The senior scholar at the Kazan Institute of History makes that point at the end of a detailed article about Stalin’s first great act of ethnic engineering, the destruction of a Tatar drive to create a large autonomous formation in the Middle Volga with enough power to serve as a basis for real federalism (milliard.tatar/news/stoletnii-tatarstan-kak-sozdavalas-tassr-6099).

            To drive it home, he quotes Ismail Firdyevs, a Crimean Tatar Bolshevik who worked closely with Stalin in the wake of the revolution but later fell afoul of the Soviet dictator and was executed in the Great Terror, to the Second All-Russian Congress of Muslim Communist Organizations of the Peoples of the East in December 1919:

“Of course, we must support the national movements but only by creating small republics. Such movements must not be allowed to unite, extend over a huge territory and acquire economic resources” that will give them the basis for challenging Moscow or exiting from the Soviet state. Having created such small republics, Firdiyevs continued, the Bolsheviks will be able to “link them to ourselves and not give them the chance to unite.”

That this is what Stalin did first in the Middle Volga and then in the Caucasus and Central Asia is common ground. But what makes the Firdyevs’ observation so critical is who said it and when, an ally of Stalin’s at the time and as early as 1919, and also the fact that it is being recalled now by a Tatar historian, perhaps the first target of such Bolshevik ethnic engineering.

Norway Rejects Russian Proposal to Build Prison for Terrorists on Svalbard

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Sept. 5 – Norway has rejected the suggestion of a Russian parliamentarian that a special prison for terrorists be constructed in Svalbard. That would violate the provisions of the Svalbard Treaty that gives Norway sovereignty over that archipelago even though it allows other signatory countries the right to engage in economic activities there.

            Only Norway has the authority to authorize institutions like prisons on its territory, the region’s governor Lars Fause and John-Erik Vika of the Ministry for Justice and Public Security say. No other country has that right (dagbladet.no/nyheter/vi-har-makta/81902327 and thebarentsobserver.com/en/arctic/2024/09/russian-prison-out-question-svalbard-governor).

            That would appear to kill any possibility that Moscow, which has been testing the resolve of Norway and the NATO alliance of which it is a part to defend Svalbard as part of Norway. (On that, see jamestown.org/program/moscows-first-move-against-nato-could-take-place-in-norways-svalbard-archipelago/ and windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2024/05/norwegian-security-expert-alarmed-by.html).

            Duma deputy Ivan Sukharyov also suggested that Moscow should consider creating a special prison for terrorists on Novaya Zemlya, a Russian possession; and with Norway taking a hard line on such a facility in Svalbard, Moscow could move in that direction (ria.ru/20240903/tyurma-1970113222.html and  thebarentsobserver.com/ru/2024/09/v-rossii-poyavilas-ideya-sozdat-tyurmu-dlya-terroristov-na-svaldbarde).

Kremlin Wants to Compile Complete Lists of Individual Members of Numerically Small Peoples of the North and Far East

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Sept. 5 – Because members of numerically small peoples of the North and Far East are eligible for special benefits, many people have tried to claim that they are members and the Russian authorities have sought to limit their ability to make such claims and get those benefits.

            This has led to corruption and also to court cases in which some individuals have won registration and others have not (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2022/06/moscow-now-compiling-not-just-list-of.html and windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2024/02/russian-courts-rejecting-efforts-by.html).

            Now, Magomedsalam Magomedov, a senior official of the Russian Presidential Administration, says that Moscow wants to compile a full and accurate listing of all the members of such groups to ensure fairness and prevent corruption (forumvostok.ru/programme/business-programme/?day=5.09.2024 and svpressa.ru/society/article/428572/).

            At one level, of course, this is an entirely reasonable measure; but it is likely to involve purging some members from these groups and allowing others, including those with no ethnic ties to them, to gain access to membership and hence benefits. But this step points to an even more serious change in Moscow’s policies regarding nationalities more generally.

            The approach Magomedov is advocating for the peoples of the north and the far east could easily be extended to smaller ethnic communities in the Caucasus and even to larger nations within the current borders of the Russian Federation, a move that would give Moscow even greater powers to control the situation but spark more anger and activism in these groups.

Turning to the East isn’t a Mistake but How Putin is Doing So Is, Pastukhov Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Sept. 5 – Given the growth importance of Chinese and other Asian economies, the reorientation of other countries in that direction is an appropriate even necessary step, Putin is not wrong to do so, Vladimir Pastukhov says; but the way he is doing it is, a pattern that is true of his actions in many other areas as well.

            Putin is right to devote more attention to the East than his predecessors, the London-based Russian analyst says. Indeed, any conceivable leader of Russia including those who are the Kremlin leader’s most committed opponents would be doing the same given new economic realities (t.me/v_pastukhov/1232 reposted at kasparov.ru/material.php?id=66D9ECB5CA97E).

            But the way Putin is doing this “turn to the east” is deeply flawed, involving as it does the launching of a war in the West and trying to cut Russia off from Europe and the Atlantic world, Pastukhov says. And that is part of a far larger problem: Putin does identify many problems Russia really faces but the methods he has chosen to use can’t solve them.

            “Russia cannot go anywhere at all while it is ruled by a bunch of St. Petersburg boys who have clung to power and who have created a northern branch of Cosa Nostra in place of statehood with thousand-year-old traditions,” Pastukhov continues. They do not understand that entrepreneurship isn’t just about building but about taking risks.

            That in turn requires freedom and the conditions under which people can build plans for the longer term. That isn’t possible under Putin; and until a Russian leader replaces him who can open the way for that, “there will be no development” east of the Urals, however much the Kremlin talks about “a turn to the east.”

            Instead, Pastukhov says, there is all too real a possibility that Russia “will lose what we have.”

Explosive Growth of Tajik Cities Likely to Become Make Them Centers of Political Radicalization

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Sept. 5 – The population of Tajikistan is growth more rapidly than that of any other country in Central Asia; and as a result, urbanization is increasing rapidly as well although at present a smaller percent of Tajiks live in cities (27.5 percent) than do the titular nationalities in the other countries of the region.

            The Asian Development Bank predicts that by 2050, the share of Tajiks living in cities will almost double to 46 percent, with many of them concentrated in regional agglomerations around Dushanbe and Khudzhand (adb.org/sites/default/files/institutional-document/961491/tajikistan-national-urban-assessment.pdf).

            This rapid growth is proving to be beyond the capacity of the Tajikistan government to control the situation. There simply aren’t enough high-rise apartments available and so many people are building their own housing, making it difficult if not impossible for the government to extend electricity, water and sewage lines and roads to all.

            Addressing these problems is beyond the capacity of the Tajikistan government unless it receives outside assistance, according to outside experts and even Tajik officials; and so the problems of rapid demographic growth and urbanization are likely to become increasingly critical (ia-centr.ru/experts/ia-centr-ru/tendentsii-i-problemy-urbanizatsii-v-tadzhikistane/).

            Such problems mean that urban centers are likely to become the centers of radicalization in Tajikistan in the years ahead. And it is there rather than in the declining rural areas that Islamist ideas both homegrown and brought in from Afghanistan and elsewhere is likely to become the most significant.