Russia has ‘a Deep State’ Too and Putin has Long Been Part of It, Khaldey Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, April 3 – The term “deep state,” Aleksandr Khaldey says, “has firmly entered into the arsenal of [Russian] commentary and analysis” of countries like the United States and Turkey; but given that the phenomenon exists in all countries where elites pursue expansion in order to secure their national interests, “it is hard to assume that there isn’t one in Russia.”

            Indeed, the Russian commentator writes on Modest Kolerov’s Rex news portal, the existence of a deep state since Soviet times is the only way “to explain the phenomenon of Putin,” who along with others opposed the “comprador” behavior of those who it is customary to call “liberals” (iarex.ru/articles/56949.html).

                “This can be explained only by the presence in Russia of its own deep state whose activity did not cease for a single minute even in the period of the collapse of the USSR, the period of Yeltsin’s administration and of the surrender of all government and national interests,” a group who has allowed Russia to come back.

            According to Khaldey, “a deep state in Russia exists and the results of its activity are evident to the unaided eye.”  No one outside its ranks knows whether it is structured like an order, but it is clear that there are several levels within it, a certain center as well as peripheral groups, and that it includes people in a wide variety of places.

            “The goal of the deep state in Russia is the expansion of Russia, economic, informational, political and military. That is, the deep state in Russia pursues imperial coals and considers this the only form of the survival of the country … Not every country is in a position to set such goals. There are only a few such states in the world [but] Russia is among their number.”

            Various institutions can serve to mobilize the population around such an idea, Khaldey continues. “For example, in the USSR, the CPSU organizationally and ideologically secured expansion but when these instruments turned out not to be suitable, they were dispensed with” by the deep state.

            “Now,” the commentator says, “the deep state in Russia secures the organization of the fulfillment of the goal of expansion through a multitude of institutions such as the government, the Duma, the ruling and opposition parties … [as well as] key figures in the media” and in other walks of life.

            On the whole, he continues, “the deep state mastered the situation after the disintegration of the USSR and its customary institutions of administration. The direct agent network of the enemy was expelled form the organs of legislative and executive power, the agents of influence were taken under control and localized, and their activity neutralized.”

            “But the chief signs of the deep state in Russia are the return of Crimea and the victory in Syria,” and the inability of the West to threaten Russia “with financial collapse …. Sanctions have not worked and the elites have not split apart.”   And as a result, the West has had to choose between nuclear conflict with Russia or “organized retreat. It has chosen the latter.”

           

            And the West has at last come to understand that “victory over Russia is a misconception and that Russia is winning back what it earlier lost.”

            In this, he says, it is important to remember that “any return to lost positions is an attack, and any attack is expansion and involves the extension of borders.”  The West is horrified by that and is doing all it can to block Russia, but Russia is succeeding because of the power of its own “deep state.”

            Indeed, all of Russia’s moves in this direction would be “impossible without the strengthening in Russia of the deep state, of that group of people who created the conditions for the transformation of society and the achievement of new milestones of development,” Khaldey argues.

            “The deep state of Russia has entered into an unseen mortal conflict with the deep state of the US. The forces as usual are not equal, but in Russia from the time of Suvorov, people fight not on the basis of numbers but ability. And judging by results, they have not done all that badly.”