Paul Goble
Staunton, Jan. 12 – Despite Putin’s efforts to combine the values of the Stalinists and the Black Hundreds, Zakhar Prilepin says, a clash between the two is inevitable; and on its outcome will depend not only how Russia is internally ordered but also how Moscow relates to the former Soviet space.
In the course of a wide-ranging 9,000-word article in Kazan’s Business-Gazeta, the writer and nationalist politician argues that the world as a whole is engaged in a choice about what civilizational project it will seek to realize in the future both at home and abroad (business-gazeta.ru/article/659600).
In Russia, Prilepin says, this choice is between those who want a post-war Russia to be “a mono-ethnic Russian state with minimal national autonomies so that the country will never again disintegrate” and those who want Russia to play a central role in the creation of a new international order “so that we again stand at the head of a great anti-colonial revolution.”
The former, which may be called the Black Hundreds vision, needs little to do with the former Soviet republics or other neighbors, while the latter, which is Stalinist in its orientation, wants to dominate them and expand Russian influence far beyond the current borders of the Russian Federation.
“These two concepts are already starting to fight each other. I think that in Russia there will be a clash between these two ideas,” Prilepin says. “The left, Leninist-Stalinists, on the one hand, and the neo-White Guards, Black Hundreds, on the other, are already gathering in two large flocks, and a clash between them seems inevitable to me today.”
Putin has a foot in both camps. Thus he has restored the Soviet anthem but talks about Ilyin, brought back the red banner but also Solzhenitsyn, and promotes How the Steel was Tempered as well as The Gulag Archipelago. But “the entire political system can’t be that complex and people are being increasingly pulled to one pole or another.
Consequently, the direction Russia will take will depend on the outcome of this clash, Prilepin suggests.
Sunday, January 12, 2025
Clash in Russia Over Country's Future between Stalinists and Black Hundreds ‘Inevitable,’ Prilepin Says
FSB Designates 172 Ethnic and Regional Groups ‘Terrorist’ Organizations
Paul Goble
Staunton, Jan. 11 – The FSB has designated 172 ethnic and religious groups associated with the Forum of Free States of PostRussia “terrorist organizations” because that group has called for its followers to work for the decolonization of Russia and to take part in defending Ukraine against Russian aggression.
Among those so described are Asians of Russia, Free Buryatia, Free Yakutiya, New Tyva, the League of Free Nations, the Association of Indigenous Peoples of the Russian Federation, Free Idel-Ural, Free Bashkortostan, the Congress of Peoples of the North Caucasus, the All-Tatar Social Center, and the Karelian National Movement (zona.media/news/2025/01/10/spisok-172 and nemoskva.net/2025/01/11/fsb-dobavila-v-spisok-terroristicheskih-172-obedineniya-vklyuchaya-naczionalnye/).
This move follows a decision by the Russian General Procurator to declare the Forum an “undesirable” organization in March 2023 and a ruling by the Supreme Court upholding that position (novayagazeta.eu/articles/2023/03/17/genprokuratura-priznala-nezhelatelnoi-organizatsiiu-forum-svobodnykh-narodov-postrossii-news and t.me/genprocrf/4472).
Among the other institutions the FSB has now declared a “terrorist organization” is the Komi Daily, even though it has no relationship with the Forum. Its leaders are now seeking legal redress against the FSB move (t.me/komi_daily/706 and moscowtimes.ru/2025/01/12/vrossii-vpervie-priznali-smi-terroristicheskoi-organizatsiei-a152081).
This new enumeration of terrorist groups includes some about which nothing has ever been heard and it is entirely possible that the FSB has done more to advertise the existence of such trends than any of those involved could have achieved on their own (e.g., the case of the hitherto unheard of Oryol Autonomous Republic (t.me/orlec/2195).
Russian Monastery Near Kazan Publishes Booklet Declaring Opponents of War in Ukraine ‘Cowards’ and ‘Traitors’
Paul Goble
Staunton, Jan. 10 – The Raifa Bogoroditsky Monastery, a Russian Orthodox outpost in Tatarstan, has issued a booklet declaring that Russians who oppose the war in Ukraine are “cowards,” “traitors” and consumerists more concerned about their own well-being than that of Russia.
The booklet urges Orthodox parishioners to show “deep respect … for those who have gone to fight” because Russia is “certainly right” in carrying out “a special operation” given that on occasion, war is “the only possible manifestation of active love” (nemoskva.net/2025/01/11/net-vojne-krichat-trusy-i-veshhelyuby-potrebiteli-tak-napisano-v-bukletah-duhovnye-smysly-svo-ih-razdayut-v-hramah/).
According to the booklet’s authors, who are not specified by name, war has other advantages because the experiences with death it provides those who take part in it, helps the faithful to decide whether “you are a believer or an unbeliever.” And it warns that “radical pacifism contradicts not only Christian traditions but elementary human logic.
There are likely many such publications being put out by ROC MP branches, and their extreme militance shows yet again the wars in which the Moscow church is becoming ever more the ideological arm of the Kremlin as the war in Ukraine progresses (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2024/10/moscow-patriarchate-set-to-follow.html).
That militarist stance of the Russian church undoubtedly pleases the powers that be, but there is growing evidence that it is driving away many who had attended its services because its current message is so at odds with the Biblical traditions of Christianity (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2025/01/only-about-half-as-many-russians.html).
Belarus to Open Embassy at the Vatican
Paul Goble
Staunton, Jan. 10 – The Belarusian government has announced that it plans to open an embassy at the Vatican later this year, a reflection of the facts that six to ten percent of the Belarusian population, centered in Grodno Oblast, is Roman Catholic and that the Vatican is one of the few foreign states that has hosted Belarusian dictator Alyaksandr Lukashenka.
This announcement has attracted the attention of Moscow commentator Vsevolod Shimov because the Catholics of Belarus have been among the most active participants in demonstrations against Lukashenka while the Catholic hierarchy in his country has been loyal (fondsk.ru/news/2025/01/09/belorusskaya-katolicheskaya-cerkov-mezhdu-polshey-i-vatikanom.html).
Whether the opening of an embassy will affect that or the balance between Polish and Belarusian sympathies among Belarusian Catholics remains uncertain, but one thing is likely: when there is a transition in Belarus, the Catholic leadership is likely to play a major role and involve both the embassy and the nuciature (there since 1992) as well as the clergy.
Saturday, January 11, 2025
War in Ukraine Slowing Moscow's Drive to Regain Blue Water Navy Able to Challenge the West
Paul Goble
Staunton, Jan. 10 – A decade ago, Russia was on its way to losing any pretense to having a blue water navy, that is a stock of capital ships capable of operating far from the Russian coast (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2016/12/russian-blue-water-navy-in-reality-now.html, windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2017/04/moscow-can-no-longer-afford-blue-water.html and windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2017/12/russias-surface-navy-on-its-way-to.html).
Now, given Putin’s geopolitical ambitions, Moscow is seeking to recover that capacity under the direction of Nikolay Patrushev, former secretary of the Russian Security Council who now heads the Naval Collegium (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2024/11/patrushev-denounces-western-moves-on.html).
One sign of this is that the Russian navy is sending its still restricted number of capital ships on ever longer voyages in order to show the flag while it works to overcome the problems in this sector and especially its shipbuilding branch given both corruption and sanctions (thebarentsobserver.com/news/northern-fleet-gives-priority-to-faraway-voyages/422736).
Another indication is its refitting of older ships with nuclear power and more modern electronic systems, although that approach can only go so far given the age of the ships involved like the Admiral Nakhimov in drydock since 1999 (meduza.io/news/2025/01/11/na-kreysere-admiral-nahimov-zapustili-yadernyy-reaktor-korabl-remontiruyut-s-1999-goda).
As long as the war in Ukraine continues, Moscow has little choice but to use this tactic, yet another indication that that conflict by itself is preventing the Kremlin from developing the kind of deep water navy that could challenge the US and other Western powers in key parts of the world’s oceans.
By Talking about Annexing Greenland, Pro-Kremlin Bloggers Say, Trump has Legitimized Moscow’s Actions in Ukraine and is leading Other Countries to Think about Seizing Neighboring Lands
Paul Goble
Staunton, Jan. 9 – Pro-Kremlin bloggers are delighted with US President Elect Donald Trump’s suggestion that he will annex Greenland, not only because in their view it undermines the past international order and divides the West but first and foremost because it legitimizes what Moscow is doing in Ukraine and led other countries to talk about expanding borders.
And if Trump then absorbs Canada, one of their number asks, “why then can’t we do the same with the Baltic countries?” (business-gazeta.ru/article/659409, meduza.io/en/feature/2025/01/10/america-has-legitimized-redrawing-the-world-map and meduza.io/paragraph/2025/01/10/tramp-govorit-o-prisoedinenii-kanady-i-grenlandii-z-blogery-v-vostorge-vot-on-dolgozhdannyy-novyy-mir-gde-vse-reshaet-pravo-silnogo).
The bloggers are most pleased with the say in which Trump’s words can be used to legitimize Putin’s actions but some of them are delighted as well that other world leaders are picking up on the idea of annexation and considering moving against their neighbors as well (e.g., vz.ru/opinions/2025/1/9/1307669.html).
There is of course on limit to such Russian delight: no one must seek to absorb part of Russia regardless of available precedents. Those who even hint at that are already being denounced in the strongest terms as when Lithuania spoke about its traditions in Kaliningrad (eadaily.com/ru/news/2025/01/10/zaharova-nausede-uchi-istoriyu-durilka-kartonnaya).
Ukrainians Won’t Despair Unless US Cuts Off Support, Top Kyiv Sociologist Says
Paul Goble
Staunton, Jan. 9 – The share of Ukrainians confident that their country will defeat Russia has declined from more than 90 percent in November 2022 to 67 percent in November 2024, while the share of those who think that the future of their country overall is “rather hopeless” has risen from “only two percent” to 15 percent in a survey last fall, Yevhen Holovakha says.
The director of the Institute of Sociology at the Ukrainian Academy of Sciences says that he doesn’t expect “widespread despair” in the next year unless Trump tells Kyiv to “’accept Putin’s demands or we’ll cut off your lifeline’” (pravda.com.ua/rus/articles/2025/01/9/7492626/ and https://meduza.io/feature/2025/01/09/kak-menyaetsya-otnoshenie-ukraintsev-k-voyne-i-peregovoram-s-rossiey-k-ishodu-tretiego-goda-vtorzheniya).
Were such a message to be delivered, Holovakha continues, it “could significantly impact public sentiment.”
As far as a negotiated settlement is concerned, he says, in May 2022, only 10 percent of Ukrainians were ready to give up some territory for peace, while 82 percent were opposed. A month ago, those ready to make territorial concessions had risen to 38 percent, but 51 percent remained against any such agreement.
“In my opinion,” Holovakha says, Ukrainian “reliance will hold through 2025,” adding that he also “believes it will last into 2026 when Russia will begin to crumble because it won’t be able to sustain itself with enough weapons and manpower.”