Paul
Goble
Staunton, March 18 – Russia can’t be
a superpower again if Russians remain prisoners of the twin misconceptions that
the Russian Federation is Russia when in fact Russia embraces all the former
Soviet space and that the Soviet Union came apart because of the actions of
other republics when in fact it was the exit of the RSFSR that led to that
tragedy, Mikhail Malash says.
Unfortunately, these
misunderstandings have their roots in the way in which Soviet citizens were
taught about the events of 1917. Too
many Russians think the Bolsheviks overthrew the tsar when in fact that was the
work of the liberals who destroyed the state and were then overthrown by Lenin
and his party, the Eurasianist says (evrazia.org/article/2944).
The confusion in the minds of most
Russians about that revolutionary year was introduced by the Bolsheviks
themselves who recognized that they appeared a fear more serious force if they
overthrew the powerful tsarist regime than if they simply pushed aside the
pathetic liberal Provisional Government.
Historians know the difference
between February 1917 and October 1917, Malash says; but ordinary Russians
conflate the two, thus opening the way for “contemporary Russian liberals to
pretend to be conservatives” because today, the country is ruled by the heirs
of the Provisional Government rather than those of the superpowers, the Russian
Empire and the USSR.
The failure of Russians to
understand this distinction has allowed for another stereotype to arise: the
view that their country is “the historic successor of the Russian Empire and
the USSR,” even though “in Soviet times, they did not take seriously that they were
residents of the RSFSR.”
“In contrast to the residents of
other republics, [the Russians] did not have a republic level of identity.
Uzbeks, Moldovans, and Estonians knew perfectly well that they had their own
republics with capitals in Tashkent, Chisinau and Tallinn and that in addition
there was a Union which was a unity of 15 republics with a capital in Moscow.”
Those who lived in the RSFSR “considered
themselves citizens of the great Soviet Union on the borderlands of which were
union republics. This happened because the Bolsheviks in order to hold power
focused on the territory of the former Muscovite state of the pre-Petrine
period leaving it surrounded with ethno-historical regimes.”
“This territory,” Malash says, “they
called Soviet Russia and then the RSFSR.”
In large part because of this misconception,
he continues, “most Russian residents think that the USSR fell apart because
other republics separated from it as their elites wanted independence. In reality,
however, the Russian Federation arose when the RSFSR declared itself a sovereign
state independent of the union Center.”
That happened on June 12, 1990; and to
this day, it is marked as Russian “independence day.” A more appropriate
understanding, Malash says, is that “the moment when the largest system-forming
republic declared itself a sovereign state, the USSR as a state in fact ceased
to exist.” The Balts and Georgia moved
first, but that is irrelevant.
After the Russian action, “the USSR in
fact became an international organization.” And then in December at
Beloveshchaya, even that ceased to exist, largely because of the actions of the
leader of the RSFSR. Unfortunately,
Russians are still living with the consequences of that on a daily basis.
Their media tells them that everything is
good in the Russian Federation and that everything is bad in the former union
republics. That leads to conflicts which
are unnecessary and which would disappear if Russians would understand how
things came to be and that the Russian Federation is only a small part of
Russia.
Overcoming these two misconceptions – the notion
that the liberals in power are in fact conservative patriots and that all the conflicts
on the post-Soviet space are the fault of the non-Russians – must be the task
of those who want to see the Russian imperial project restored and Russia
become again a great power.
If those ideas are not dispelled, Malash
says, that project will never be realized.
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