Moscow has Spent Billions Protecting Putin from Coronavirus Infection

Paul Goble

            Staunton, March 31 – The Russian government has spent upwards of 10 billion rubles (1.4 billion US dollars) protecting Vladimir Putin from the coronavirus. Most of the money appears to have been devoted to paying the costs of keeping officials scheduled to meet the Kremlin leader in quarantine facilities before they did so (bbc.com/russian/features-56581095).

            Russian officials today said they had registered 8275 new cases of infection and 408 deaths from the pandemic, as it continued to ebb and flow across the country (t.me/COVID2019_official/2689  and regnum.ru/news/society/3226201.html).

            The Russian government announced that the healthcare system has now returned to normal, pre-covid operations, but the Kremlin conceded that the threat of a third wave of the pandemic remains (https://echo.msk.ru/news/2814268-echo.html and regnum.ru/news/3230431.html).

            On the vaccine front, the health minster announced he had been vaccinated (regnum.ru/news/3229662.html), and the defense ministry said it had vaccinated Russian military personnel in Kazakhstan (regnum.ru/news/3229714.html). But distribution problems and the reluctance of Russians to be vaccinated remain problems.

            Emblematic of this is that vaccinations have been so slow in the Altay Kray that officials there would have to increase the tempo of shots by a factor of ten to meet Moscow’s goal of 60 percent immunization by July 1 (vesti22.tv/news/altayskomu-krayu-predstoit-bolee-chem-v-10-raz-uskorit-tempy-vaktsinatsii-ot-koronavirusa/).

            One news item may make Russians even less willing to get the shots: Moscow city officials announced that approximately a thousand Muscovites had come down with the covid infection after they had received the vaccine (regnum.ru/news/3230792.html).

            For many Russian outlets, the big news of the day was that a Russian laboratory has produced the first coronavirus vaccine for animals, continuing in the words of one commentator “the success of Russian science” (egnum.ru/news/3230452.html).

            On the economic front, the World Bank revised upwards its prediction for Russian economic performance in 2021, from 2.6 percent growth to 2.9 percent (regnum.ru/news/3229738.html).

            Meanwhile, in other pandemic-related developments in Russia today,

·         A VTsIOM poll found that Russians are divided on the introduction of a vaccine passport, with 54 percent favoring it and 29 opposing the measure (regnum.ru/news/3230154.html and  egnum.ru/news/3230089.html).

·         A new Higher School of Economics study found that during the lockdown, Russian women drank more, ate more, and smoked more but also acquired new computer skills (iq.hse.ru/news/433793871.html).

·         Russia’s higher educational institutions have coped well with shifting over to distance instruction, scholars report; but their students have experienced a series of negative psychological reactions to the arrangement (https://www.umj.ru/jour/article/view/1286/1076).

Moscow has Some Truly Disturbing Reasons for Backing Myanmar Junta, El Murid Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, March 30 – The Putin regime’s cooperation with the most vicious and inhumane regimes on earth is usually explained either by its desire to gain allies among those the West because of its principles have made outcasts or by its interest in selling weapons to those who can’t get them easily elsewhere, Anatoly Nesmiyan says.

            Those interests can’t be ignored, of course, the Russian commentator who blogs under the screen name El Murid says, but tragically, there are some additional reasons that are even more fateful and disturbing, all of which involve Moscow’s interest in studying the repressive techniques others use for adoption in Russia (kasparov.ru/material.php?id=6062F477D5E2F).

            The Putin regime’s proclivity for cooperating with the worst regimes on earth has just been highlighted by its decision to send a deputy defense minister to attend a parade in Myanmar on the occasion of the anniversary of that country’s military, a parade all other countries chose to boycott because of the Myanmar military’s repression.

            These other countries acted on principle, Nesmiyan says; but “the Russian regime doesn’t have principles and in support of its interests, it will cooperate with any cannibal.” And despite what many think, these interests are not just military sales or geopolitical competition. They involve learning from others the most effective means of repression.

            Having increasingly turned to the use of force against its own people, the Putin regime “with deep interest studies the advanced experience of its partners in such questions.” Putin himself admitted as much about Syria which he describes as “a testing ground;” one that is first and foremost about the destruction of the civilian population.

            The army of Myanmar has shown again and again that it is ready, willing and able to kill that country’s population in the name of keeping the generals in power, and that alone makes it particularly interesting for the Russian defense ministry and its bosses in the Kremlin, Nesmiyan says.

            In addition, and adding to its attractiveness as an object lesson for Moscow, the commentator continues, the Myanmar military has been involved in the brutal suppression of ethnic and religious minorities, a challenge that the Russian siloviki also faces; and it has had to come up with a way to field a force in an ethnically diverse country, another Russian challenge.

            The military in Myanmar “in fact is a military corporation of the ethnic majority,” something that has led ethnic minorities to form their own force structures, a prospect Moscow fears but,in the future, may not be able to prevent. And thus, the way the dominant army manages is of no small interest to Myanmar’s Moscow backers.

 

Russian Citizens Will Be Able to Declare Mixed Nationality in Upcoming Census, Zorin Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, March 30 – For the first time in Russian history, those surveyed by the upcoming Russian population census will be allowed to declare that they are of more than one nationality, Vladimir Zorin says, who suggests that there are likely to be many who do so because of the many ethnically mixed marriages in the country.

            But the ethnographer and head of the Social Chamber’s Commission on Harmonization of Inter-Ethnic and Inter-Religious Relations, does not say how their declarations will be reported, raising the possibility that political considerations may drive how these identities are declared in census publications (nazaccent.ru/content/35421-vladimir-zorin-kolichestvo-narodov-rossii-mozhet.html).

            One risk is that they will be used to reduce the number of non-Russian groups if the mixed marriages within them are with Russians by the simple expedient of assigning those who declare they have two nationalities only to the Russian nation rather than keeping them in a separate category or including them within the non-Russian group.

            But there are others as well, especially in cases where there are controversies between two or more non-Russian groups, such as the Tatars and Bashkirs, each of which includes people who believe that the political elites of the other are trying to reidentify members of their group to boost the other.

            Unless and until there is transparency about how the declarations of those who claim two or more nationalities will be treated, there almost certainly will be suspicions that Moscow is distorting the situation to favor ethnic Russians or those non-Russian groups who cooperate most closely with it.

            In a related comment, Zorin said that he expects the number of nationalities that will be reported after the upcoming census to rise. In 1989, the last Soviet census, 125 different nationalities were listed. In 2002, that number rose to 182; and in 201, it rose again, this time to 193.

            The ethnographer says that the numbers in Soviet times were relatively stable because there was a nationality line in the passport and people declared the nationality listed there. In fact, that is not completely true. Studies have shown that many people had one nationality in their passports but declared a different one to census takers.

            Many observers are likely to conclude and certainly to be encouraged to do so by Moscow government media that this increase in the number of nationalities reflects a growing sensitivity on the part of the Russian authorities to ethnic differences. But again, the facts of the case are not nearly as neat as that.

            While some of the increase reflects new attention to and willingness to list the smallest groups, some of which many would not view as separate, much of the increase reflects the reality that many people in Russia are uncertain about their nationality at least as far as telling officials about it.

            Moreover, for all the much-ballyhooed liberalism of the Russian census, in fact, the authorities work hard to ensure that some groups the authorities don’t want to see emerge aren’t recorded or at least reported even as they promote often much-smaller ones to show how sensitive the authorities are.

            Thus, the Russian authorities have worked hard to reduce the number of people who declare themselves to be Cossack by nationality or at least to reduce the number who are reported; and they have also sought to limit declarations or reports about those among the Circassians who want to declare a common nationality in place of the divisions Moscow favors.

 

‘Civic and Ethnic Identities Must Not Be Competitors,’ Putin Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, March 30 – Speaking to the Presidential Council on Inter-Ethnic Relations, Vladimir Putin said “civic and ethnic identities often are viewed as competitors” but shouldn’t be, especially in the case of Russia, lest tensions between them lead to the kind of problems other countries have (kremlin.ru/events/president/news/65252).

            At the same time, the Kremlin leader indicated which one has primacy as far as he is concerned. “Nothing is more important for our country or for any country of the world than the strengthening of civic identity,” lest focus on smaller ethnic identities divide people and lead to conflicts of one kind or another.

            “For enormous, multi-national Russia, the solidarity of people and their feeling of attachment to the fate of the Fatherland and responsibility for its present and future has a principled, one can say decisive importance,” Putin continued. Viewing the civic and ethnic as being at odds undermines that possibility and is “absolutely unacceptable.”

            “An individual can belong to this or that ethnic group, but all of us have one country, Great Russia.” And the experience of other countries shows that while conflicts have their roots in economics and politics, ethnic and religious differences often contribute to their exacerbation if they are mishandled.

            “We in Russia must not allow and will not allow aggressive and disrespectful attitudes toward representatives of any nationality” or allow the kind of ethnic and religious conflicts seen elsewhere to cross our borders, Putin continued.

            “Today,” he said, “more than 80 percent of the citizens of Russia positively assess the state of inter-ethnic relations within the country. But these questions require constant, I would even say, daily work” to ensure that things do not go in the wrong direction.

            Any division of people into “us” and “them” is “not the best example for the rising generation. ‘Civic self-consciousness, like patriotism, is not given by birth; it is formed” by life itself; and that formation is something which must be carefully tended lest it become distorted and dangerous.

            Putin’s suggestion that civic and ethnic identities must not be viewed as in contradiction is likely to provide support to two groups of analysts, politicians and activists. One group will want to reduce the importance of all ethnic identities except the Russian in pushing for a common civic identity, one in which Russian would remain central.

            But another group will certainly argue against the promotion of a common civic identity beyond very restricted limits lest it compromise the ability of non-Russians and even some ethnic Russians to maintain and develop their own distinctive national identities. In short, Putin hasn’t offered a solution to the ongoing debate but simply raised the stakes concerning its outcome.

Putin’s Plans to Buy Off the Population Before the Duma Elections Won’t Work Now, Zhelenin Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, March 30 – Vladimir Putin has always used a combination of carrots and sticks to win support. He has used carrots especially often in advance of elections he wants to win. But this time around, in advance of the Duma elections, that tactic won’t work, according to Rosbalt commentator Aleksandr Zhelenin.

            In this situation, the Kremlin leader has only two choices, either to launch a military campaign abroad that might unite the population behind him and his party as the 2014 Anschluss of Crimea did or to mobilize support by distributing new benefits to the population as he has done often (rosbalt.ru/blogs/2021/03/30/1894549.html).

            The first variant is improbable now given that Putin has only rarely attacked abroad just before an election, perhaps largely because any failure in such an attack could lead to failures inside the country and because unlike Georgia and Ukraine, there are no countries around Russia’s periphery that aren’t prepared to counter any such move. They are all prepared.

            It is the case, of course, as Lev Gudkov of the Levada Center has pointed out, that support for Putin is based “on confrontational rhetoric.” When confrontation with foreign enemies declines so too does Putin’s ratings. And therefore, the sociologist says, “Putin has no other way out besides constantly creating and supporting the image of an enemy.”

            “But it is one thing to support his rating by exacerbating certain attitudes in society, and quite another to get involved in a real military adventure with unpredictable consequences on the even of elections,” Zhelenin says. Consequently, Putin is unlikely to try anything in this sphere in the next months.

            Distributing new benefits might appear to be a tactic especially likely to succeed given the pent-up demand from the pandemic year, the Rosbalt writer says. But there are good reasons for thinking that such moves won’t work given that they do when the authority of the ruler and his party are high but don’t when they aren’t.

            That was the case in Soviet times. Before the last years of the USSR, the handing out of benefits before elections did boost support for the authorities. But in the late 1980s, such actions had no such impact. People took what they could but didn’t give credit to those providing the benefits.

            Putin and Untied Russia face something like this today, Zhelenin says. In May 2020, Putin gave up 10,000 rubles (140 US dollars) to the parents of each child under the age of 16. But despite doing that, polls showed that his rating stayed where it was. And even if his rating were to go up now, that would not necessarily translate into a boost for United Russia.

            All this taken together means, the commentator sums up, that for United Russia “(and more generally fore the entire Russian powers that be as a whole), one can predict that the present parliamentary campaign will be the most difficult one in a long time.”

Putinism Today a Kind of ‘Half-Baked Fascism,’ Golyshev Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, March 30 – Many have been reluctant to call the Putin regime fascist because they still restrict the use of that term to Nazism rather than recognizing it as a broader category of regimes who use certain techniques to protect the ruler and his class allies against any challenge from the population, Vladimir Golyshev says.

            In 1995, Boris Yeltsin asked the Russian Academy of Sciences for a definition of fascism. The Russian scholars came back with one that made the racial supremacy and genocidal policies of Hitler central to the definition, a choice that meant the term wouldn’t be applied to other regimes, including Russia’s, the commentator says (svoboda.org/a/31168686.html).

            But as others, including Leon Trotsky, understood already in the 1930s, fascism is defined not by racialism but by the methods the dominant economic strata use to maintain their position when they are at risk of losing power. Differences among them, including Hitler’s anti-Semitism, are only superficial. Otherwise, “they are all the same,” these analysts said.

            These methods include, Golyshev suggests, the suppression of political opponents by “openly terrorist methods,” the spread of an ideology that suggests class conflicts are not important, and promoting a growth in the standard of living of the majority by loans, theft, or wars of conquest.  Or by all three “as in Hitlerite Germany.”

            Russia showed some signs of a move to that direction in 1917 but all the potential leaders lacked one or another of the qualities needed to impose fascism. After the Soviet period, Russia “again became a bourgeois country, and the real masters of life became the class of major property holders whom it is customary to call ‘the oligarchs.’”

            Their behavior outraged “the exploited majority,” and not surprisingly, the large owners, fearful that they would lose what they had stolen, promoted measures designed to prevent any “’revision of the results of privatization.’” Not surprisingly, some of these looked to “good old fascism,” not as a goal in itself but as a means of self-defense.

            “In the fall of 1993,” Golyshev continues, “we observed if not Hitlerite than completely Pinochet-style methods of suppressing political opponents, not because Yeltsin was a cruel man but because the threat was too great and the newly born bourgeoisie liquidated it as this has always and everywhere been done – by shots from tanks.”

            “But when the threat passed, [these people] shifted to ‘administration and rule with the assistance of democratic mechanisms.’” Putinism represents a further development “in the theory and practice of fascism.” He “invented fascism lite or as the people say ‘half-baked fascism,’” one that uses fascist techniques in a preventive fashion to block challenges.

            Again and just as was the case with Yeltsin, Putin did so not because he is “an evil man” but because he “defended himself in the only possible way” given the power arrangements in Russia in the first years of his rule. Now, that the main threats have passed, he like Yeltsin has turned away from fascism as the defining element of his rule.

            “In recent years,” Golyshev insists, “elements of fascism [in Putinism] have become ever less and less. Putin already isn’t happy to display his fare torso, ‘spiritual bindings’ are forgotten, and the police have become polite.” In short, “Putin has gradually learned ‘to manage and rule’ without fascism.”

            But if he is to succeed in moving away from fascism completely, he must do what the silent majority of Russians want: he must attack those in the regime who have stolen from the population rather than rely on them as allies. “Otherwise,” Golyshev concludes, “the present period of stability is only the calm before the storm.”

In Response to Biden’s Remark, Putin has Left His Bunker But Returns Unchanged, Shelin Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, March 30 – After US President Joe Biden agreed with the statement that Vladimir Putin is a murderer, the Kremlin leader dramatically changed course in terms of his public activities but on the other showed that he is no different than he was before fears of infection during the pandemic drove him into what many call his bunker, Sergey Shelin says.

            In the first half of March, before Biden’s words, Putin engaged in standard meetings with officials that were so uneventful that they attracted little notice even in government media, the Rosbalt commentator says. In the second half of the month, however, he was active both in what he did and what he said (rosbalt.ru/blogs/2021/03/30/1894645.html).

            What is striking given this change in the level of activity is that Putin remained exactly what he was before he withdrew, someone focused almost exclusively on his relations with foreign leaders, even though he pointedly refused to “ape” them, rather than on the Russian people and their welfare.

            But despite this increase in activity, Shelin says, Putin showed that he was returning to public moves unchanged. Thus, although he finally got the coronavirus vaccine, he refused to do so on camera because he wanted to stress that he wasn’t about to “ape” the behavior of his foreign counterparts and show himself in this way to inspire his own citizens.

            And even the fact that he put out that word shows that he was as before concerned not so much about his own population as about foreign leaders, including “the most hated of them.” And this pivot was so sharp that Putin even had to correct himself. After suggesting he would start a blog, his spokesman said he had no intention of doing so himself.

            Dmitry Peskov said that Putin “says that this will happen but not be his account but that of someone else. The president won’t spend time on it. But he also doesn’t want me, his press secretary, to do so either” (aif.ru/politics/russia/dmitriy_peskov_druzey_u_rossii_gorazdo_bolshe_chem_nedrugov).

            In short, the Rosbalt commentator concludes, “the leader will not change to correspond to reality even in this regard, let alone on more important things. And so out of the bunker has appeared not a new Putin, but the same one who went in” because of the pandemic.