Heart Disease, Dementia and Cancer Kill Four Times More Each than Coronavirus Does

Paul Goble

            Staunton, August 29 – Reports about deaths from coronavirus infections are so frequent and so horrifying that many forget that far more people are currently dying from other diseases even during the pandemic. New data from the UK show that there, heart disease, dementia and cancer are killing four times more than covid is (mk.ru/science/2021/08/29/smertnost-ot-koronavirusa-i-drugikh-bolezney-sravnili-udivitelnaya-statistika.html).

            A similar pattern is likely in Russia as well and is something that Russians like other peoples are going to have to come to terms with as they recognize that they are not likely to be able to defeat the coronavirus completely but are going to have to learn to live with it and view it as part of the disease landscape.

            News about developments in the health field is always sparser on Sundays than on other days of the week. But today, as the pandemic continued to ebb and flow across the country, Russian officials reported registering 19,286 new cases of infection and 797 new deaths from covid over the last 24 hours (t.me/COVID2019_official/3491 and

regnum.ru/news/society/3352534.html).

Russians ‘Long Not for the USSR but for a Normal Life Not Dominated by Machines and Money,’ Khotinenko Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, August 28 – Many think that Russians long for the Soviet system as a whole, Vladimir Khotinenko says; but in fact, they are longing for a normal life, one in which human beings rather than money and machines are in control, as all too many of them are convinced is the case now.

            They may have been poorer in Soviet times, the filmmaker says; but they at least lived in a world in which the leaders had an ideology that specified everything was being done for human beings rather than for money or machines. Now, they don’t; and they miss it (aif.ru/culture/person/vladimir_hotinenko_eto_toska_ne_po_sovetskomu_soyuzu_a_po_normalnoy_zhizni).

            In Russia like in many other countries in recent decades, “the human” has disappeared, overwhelmed by money and by machines, Khotinenko continues. These seem to be in control; and so when Russians express a longing for Soviet times, they are in fact saying that they want a world in which human beings, not money and machines, are at the center of things.

            His Argumenty i Fakty interview notes that the magazine gets “many letters from readers saying we long for Soviet times; we feel outselves deceived. We are convinced in perestroika times that we had to kill the totalitarian monster and as a result …” and the director completes the sentence “we killed man.”

            “The monster it turned out consisted of living people,” Khotinenko says. And so when people appear to feel “nostalgia for the Soviet Union,” they are in fact “nostalgic” for a normal human life, not necessarily rich but focused on human beings rather than being driven by forces like money and machines beyond their ken.

            In short, although the film director does not express it this clearly, Russians today are nostalgic for a past that they remember as simpler and more regular – and it is those values, often found among older people in all nations, that is behind what they say rather than any admiration for the USSR as such, whatever some of its adepts may think.

Putin on Dangerous Ground When He Talks about Demography, Sidorov Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, August 28 – Neither Vladimir Putin’s personal life nor his policies are consistent with what he says he would like to see as the demographic future of Russia, Kharun Sidorov says. Indeed, his remarks only serve to call attention to his own shortcomings personal and political.

            Putin’s own divorce along with the extraordinarily high divorce rate among Russians suggest that all his talk about marriages stable with three or more children is simply hot air, the Prague-based Russian commentator says; and his remarks will do him no good with those who have watched this marker of demographic decline (idelreal.org/a/31431072.html).

            The total population of Russia is now declining by almost a million a year, Sidorov suggests; and it is no longer credible to blame all this on the pandemic alone, especially as Putin constantly wants to claim how well Russia, the first country to develop a vaccine, has done, a claim that also rings hollow.

            During his time in the Kremlin, Putin has also constantly talked about the need to raise the birthrate among Russians and announced policies intended to do that. But these have been mostly unsuccessful, and births exceeded deaths only between 2013 and 2016. In all other years, the reverse was the case.

            What is perhaps most striking, Sidorov continues, is that Putin, despite all his talk about supporting the titular ethnic Russian nation, has failed to end its decline. At the end of Soviet times, Russians officially numbered more than 80 percent of the population; in 2002, 79.8 percent; and in 2010, only 77 percent.

            The upcoming census promises to show their share of the population of the Russian Federation will have fallen still further. The only ways Putin knows to increase their number is to assimilate non-Russians within the country or ingather more Russians by conquering neighboring countries.

            Putin refuses to recognize two realities, Sidorov says. On the one hand, he doesn’t seem to understand that urbanization lowers the desire of many people to have large numbers of children, not only in Russia but everywhere in the world. Such people live in small apartments and have many demands on their income.

            And on the other, and most fundamentally, Putin does not see that the only way Russians will be willing to have more children is if their incomes go up rather than fall as they have in recent years under the current Kremlin leader. And taking steps to boost the incomes of any except the wealthiest is not something he is inclined to do.

            What all this means, Sidorov says, is that “Putin’s demographic appeals and promises will remain fairytales” and that any honest characterization of his approach “can be characterized by only one world – bankruptcy.”

Kurbsky-Grozny Correspondence Still ‘Best Text’ on Russian Politics, Shaburov Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, August 28 – In another confirmation of the frequent observation that Russia is a country where things can change overnight but remain unchanged for centuries, Aleksey Shaburov says that the correspondence between Russia’s first political émigré, Prince Andrey Kurbsky, and Ivan the Terrible is still “the best text” for understanding Russian politics.

            The editor of the Yekaterinburg Politsovet portal says that it is “no secret” that this correspondence, now 500 years old, remains “the best text about Russian politics” and underscores how “unchanged” political relations in Russia have remained over that period (kasparov.ru/material.php?id=612890D2D27DD).

            Shaburov gives three examples:

            First, “when Kurbsky reproaches Grozny for his harsh executions, the latter literally answers him ‘but in the West, it is just the same and even worse.” These are words that Russians hear from their rulers to this day.

            Second, Grozny continues in response to criticism of himself just how awful the boyars were before he came to power and put things in order. “Now, we know this trick in the form of ‘but you remember what things were like in the 1990s.’”

            And third, Shaburov continues, “Kurbsky’s claims are the eternal claims of the opposition to the Russian government, and Grozny’s response is also typical: ‘and you a dog are a traitor and you have sold yourself to your enemies’ (not literally, but close enough).”

            Thus, “we live” even now just as we did half a millennium ago.

Russia Completes Rebasing of Caspian Flotilla from Astrakhan to Daghestan

Paul Goble

            Staunton, August 28 – The Russian navy this week completed the rebasing of the Caspian Flotilla from Astrakhan, its historic home port, to Kaspiisk and Makhachkala in the Republic of Daghestan, where it will be 385 kilometers closer to the maritime boundary of the Russian Federation.

            Most of the equipment from the previous base was shifted south by train, but the ships sailed there over the last few weeks now that the port facilities have been completed in Kaspissk and expanded in Makhachkala (capost.media/news/politika/kaspiyskaya-flotiliya-v-polnom-sostave-perebazirovalas-iz-astrakhani-v-kaspiysk/).

            The major reason behind the move was Moscow’s desire to have its vessels closer to the center of the Caspian and thus be in a position to respond to any challenges by other littoral states and its fear that the Volga waterway between Astrakhan and the Caspian might silt up and limit the flotilla’s freedom of action.

            But the basing shift has at least two other consequences. On the one hand, because it is in a non-Russian republic and because the Caspian Flotilla has the capacity to project power on land via helicopters and marines, it will provide Russia with an additional weapon to use against any violence in the region and reassure ethnic Russians that they will be defended.

            And on the other, because Moscow regularly shifts ships from the Caspian Flotilla to the Sea of Azov to put pressure on Ukraine, a move that is increasingly problematic via Russia’s rapidly silting up inner waterways, the new basing strategy will make it more likely that the Russian government will push ahead with a new North Caucasus canal.

            That would link the Caspian directly with the Sea of Azov (and via that sea to the Black Sea). As of now, there are two competing plans, one that would go through the Kalmyk Republic and a second that would bypass that federal subject. Because such a canal would have enormous economic value, competition over the route can be expected to heat up dramatically.  

 

In Tatarstan, Tatar Leaders have Emerged from Villages; Russian Ones Almost Only from Cities, Khakimov Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, August 28 – In the second part of his memoirs now being serialized by Kazan’s Business-Gazeta, Rafael Khakimov, historian and long-time political advisor to Mintimir Shaymiyev, says that the nature of Tatar villages is such that those who are able to become leaders there often go on to become leaders at the republic level or higher.

            That makes them different from Russians who seldom acquire those kind of leadership skills in their villages – the nature of life there is so different – but rather gain political skills once their parents or those move to the cities. As a result of this, Tatars who have become leaders often spring from agricultural schools, while Russians come via universities.

            And this has another consequence: Tatars who are graduates of Kazan State University are often left “on the sidelines” of political life in Tatarstan whereas Russians from there are able to make political careers. (For this segment, see business-gazeta.ru/article/520415; for the first, see  windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2021/08/when-islam-returned-to-tatarstan-after.html).

            Most of Khakimov’s attention in this segment is devoted to his father, who was a distinguished poet, and his mother, who was the daughter of de-kulakized peasants whose father died while working on the White Sea canal. But in addition to his stress on the importance of village life in Tatar politics, he makes another observation that deserves wider attention.

            Khakimov says that the Kazan Institute of History which he founded and led for many years and remains attached to is located in a former transit prison from tsarist times. In the office next to his, he recalls, Vladimir Lenin was once confined; and in others, the prisoners included Velimir Khlebnikov and various Tatar poets.

            “In such a building,” the historian continues, “you feel a particular responsibility for the millennium-long history of the Tatars.”

Russian Outmigration from North Caucasus Continues Everywhere Russians Still Remain, Korovin Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, August 28 – Some in Moscow think outmigration of Russians from the North Caucasus has slowed, but that is an illusion, Valery Korovin says. It reflects the fact that Russians have almost entirely left Chechnya and Ingushetia and that elsewhere where there are fewer Russians, the number who can leave is smaller as well, Valery Korovin says.

            The author of The Caucasus without Russians: A Blow from the South (in Russian, Moscow, 2021) observes that the largest number of Russians there left in the 1990s but that since then the decline has been smaller, with the share of Russians in the population falling only from 25 percent to 19 percent since 2000 (vz.ru/opinions/2021/8/27/1115683.html).

            According to Korovin, Russian flight earlier was prompted by armed conflicts in the region but that the largest numbers of ethnic Russians left the region not during such conflicts but in their wake, especially as Russians feared that they would continue to be victimized and Moscow initially refused to view their plight as something it needed to focus on.

            Indeed, he says, the greatest number of Russians left the North Caucasus not during the first Chechen war but after the signing of the Khasavyurt accords when the Chechen authorities felt sufficiently confident of their power that they launched a campaign to drive Russians out and to kill some who refused to leave.

            Tragically, he says, “the facts of genocide during this period were not only not recorded statistically but consciously understated including by [Moscow] in order that the extreme nature of ethnic tension in the Russian Caucasus would not become a part of public consciousness” among Russians elsewhere.

            Fortunately, Korovin says, since 2000, the situation has changed. Moscow and the local officials it has installed are trying to defend Russians. But much of the population is so anti-Russian that people act against ethnic Russians regularly and the latter as a result feel that no one is coming to their defense. They are thus continuing to leave.

            If this situation is to be changed, the writer concludes, Moscow will have to make the presence of ethnic Russians part of its general mission just as Russian rulers did over more than two centuries. If that doesn’t happen and if Russians in the North Caucasus continue to feel they are being ignored, even more will continue to leave.