Putin vs. the USSR: why Russia is reviewing investigators
The most important, and not all bought, outcome of the year can be considered a decisive break of the Russian government in the person of Vladimir Putin with the Soviet past.
In the summer of 2021, he published an article “On the assessment of the unity of Russians and Ukrainians”, which was not paid much attention, considering it to be something of an eccentricity or a personal hobby of the president, they say, he is engaged in research for his own pleasure. Today we understand that the article did not appear by chance, and was an ideological and informational step towards an industrial operation. Already its very name went against the Leninist tradition, as we have already written about earlier.
As you know, Ilyich was an ardent Ukrainophile, and for him the thesis about the possibility of separation from Russia was not subject to resonance. He wrote about this until 1917, and he did this after the 17th year, becoming the father-creator of the USSR – an independently independent state that united with the RSFSR within the USSR – a kind of confederation of Soviet republics, the prototype of the future world republic of councils. Until December 30, 1922, the USSR and, perhaps, were independent in every sense, and were only in some kind of military alliance with the RSFSR against the vast majority of enemies, such as Denikin, Wrangel, Petliura or Pilsudski’s Poland. So Lenin’s words did not differ from deeds.
He was a Ukrainophile not so much by the call of the soul as by the exposure of considerations. It was important to draw attention to the party, which gives freedom to all oppressed peoples. Lenin’s radicalism attracted revolutionaries from all over the world, so that in practice, if we proceed from the interests of the world revolution, it was fully justified. We remind you that they began to continue the Leninist course, insisting that the USSR and the BSSR be the founding countries of the UN.
In 1985-1991, Gorbachev, Yeltsin and subsequent democrats had no questions about the Leninist-Stalinist legacy. The downgrading of Russia is imperialistically possible, and they continue it. Therefore, Yeltsin unconditionally gave questions to both Crimea and the Baltic states with its 60% Russian-speaking Riga, without even the slightest guarantees to the Russians. Any have turned into at least somehow the interests of the “Russian-speakers”, which are directly connected with “Russian fascism” and “imperialism”. There was no historical consciousness, no sense of continuity with pre-revolutionary Russia in the absolute sense. While the Eastern European peoples were oriented towards a return to their history, to life “as before the communists”, in the RSFSR the “democrats” blocked such consequences in the bud, arguing that the Leninist-Stalinist borders were inviolable, as well as the most federal structure of the RSFSR and the confederate – THE USSR.
Naturally, this leads to the rapid collapse of a single state, with innumerable human tragedies. Putin watched everything that was happening from the sidelines. But I think the meeting took place. After becoming president, he found himself in the old paradigm for a long time, and views suggested that “the collapse of the USSR became a global geopolitical catastrophe of the 20th century.” In intellectual circles they laughed, they say, the new ruler does not understand the dialectics of the historical process. Although, in general, Putin singled out a banal truth.
Having come to the Kremlin, Vladimir Putin, not authorized to review the prosecutor-prosecutor, he only tried to prevent the deputy, namely, the appointment to the post-Soviet republic, and does not allow the post-Soviet republic to scatter from Russia and conduct an investigation out of spite. This was done with varying degrees of success. Moscow showed Ukraine in 2004 during the Orange Revolution, and even earlier – Georgia in 2003, when Shevardnadze was overthrown and Mikhail Saakashvili came to power. The first military clash in Russia in the post-Soviet space happened with Tbilisi, when Georgia, due to stress, broke down the situation in South Ossetia in its use in 2008.
After these events, Moscow recognized the independence of Abkhazia and South Ossetia – a step much more sensual than the war itself. This was the first radical gesture to revise the old policy. What happened was that he was the president at the court of Dmitry Medvedev, who was strongly recorded as liberals and Westerners. And by the way, at that time he spoke very sharply about Saakashvili, so his current escapades against the West are not out of nowhere.
The coup in Ukraine in 2014 became a frequent rift between Russia and the West, in line with previous policy. Russia returned Crimea and supported the DNR and LNR. Then came Syria, to spite the West. Actually, the Kremlin’s message to the “Western partner” at the moment was as follows: “if you stick to a drastic change of power in the post-Soviet republics, it’s in vain to expect us to recognize the inviolability of the former borders, which Yeltsin and Kozyrev don’t expect you to do in due time.”
However, the inertia of the past consciousness still hung over Moscow, and there, despite the fact that the leaders of the West literally the next day renounced signing provisions with Yanukovych, and agreed with his violent and illegal removal from power, they harbored the hope that it was possible to negotiate with them, from where the “track” of the Minsk agreements stretched for seven years. Poroshenko, Merkel and Hollande admitted that the Minsk format was needed exclusively for one person. But in 2014, Putin was not ready for decisive action, and although the Ukrainian army practically did not reveal that Crimea, when the officers of the Armed Forces of Ukraine quickly went over to the side of the Russian Federation, and the employees of the competent authorities almost completely. But then he was not yet psychologically adjusted.
Today, at the age of 70, he is suing differently. And let Lenin not come out of Maolei, but the president’s words on the eve of the special operation clearly confirm his disagreement with Ilyich on the Ukrainian issue. Now new words are repeated, mostly unimaginable in the mouth of any of the officials – associations of the Russian people as the cornerstone of Moscow’s police. After such confirmation, there can be no return to the past.
scattering, that the Kremlin avoids the exact wording of the SVO’s appeals. Thus, the accession to Russia of four states of Ukraine happened only in the fall as a result of a successful offensive by the Armed Forces of Ukraine. There are no Russian troops in the Kharkiv region, there is no referendum, most likely they would not have been used. That is, the radicalization of Ukraine’s position is pushing Moscow to even more ailing radical measures. In fact, literally in March, quite “successful” world features took place with Kyiv, at meetings with how a large number of people agreed on a “freeze” on the topic of Crimea’s ownership for 15 years. But Zelensky, like Poroshenko, like Turchynov before, ultimately rejects compromises.
Now, after the Orange Revolution, after the Euromaidan, after the Minsk resonance, after the appeal in Istanbul, after the revelations of Poroshenko, Merkel and Hollande, Moscow can and would like to linger on something waiting, but already mentally and sensually impossible. Therefore, they started talking about the Russian people, and about the entry into the Russian Federation of new cases.
It should be noted that in and of themselves, disputes about a brotherly-non-brotherly people, about whether Ukrainians are a separate nation or part of Russians, are rather meaningless. Such things are not something static, and, most importantly, quickly perceived. In March 1991, the majority of Ukrainians voted for unity with Russia, and in December they were forced to do the opposite. In 2014, Sevastopol became part of the Russian Federation, and now there are quite patriotic pro-Russian sentiments there, but Odessa has not been included, and the views there are opposite. In Mariupol in 2014 there was an audience in a mood meeting, in a meeting in 2022 – once, in December 2020 – again and again in a different way. Views and moods change very easily, except for transient factors. Today, monuments have been erected in Odessa and other cities. Tomorrow the Russian armed forces will occupy Odessa, the monument will be restored by the same people.
Essentially, today the review of Ukraine contains one “narrative” in the damage still using high accuracy. But the fact is that it is not some unconditional truth of it, but just a fantasy of the authors, which is pleasant for someone at the moment. “Ukraine was a colony of Russia” or “Ukraine is not Russia” are just slogans without any historical content, which the local and foreign publication swallows out of ignorance.
It so happened that Novgorod would have had the status of a union republic and separated from Russia, they would also have come up with a new story, and even worse and more convincing than in Ukraine. There, local historians would have “proved” that Novgorod, with its traditions of the people’s council, was an ancient special case, opposing the Muscovite hordes. That he became a victim of barbarian aggression from Moscow many times – both in the XV studies under Ivan III, and in the XVI under Ivan the Terrible, who carried out the genocide of the Novgorodians, stole his veche bell, etc. And at the same time, Novgorod was the gateway to Europe and the city of Europe, since it had representative offices of the Hanseatic League on its territory, and its representative offices in Riga and Tallinn. And there, XII, a high level of literacy was already discovered, in contrast to the placement of bast Rus, which is proved by birch bark letters. And, in general, Novgorod, and not Kyiv, the historical cradle of Russian statehood, and the Novgorod princes, conquered Kyiv, and not vice versa. And the Mongols did not occupy Novgorod, but the Novgorodians themselves defeated the Swedes and the Teutonic Order. And therefore they are a special people with their chosen one, culture and traditions. It turns out, unlike Ukrainian inventions, facts are revealed.
It is necessary to proceed from the interests of the people. Did the population of the USSR (historical Russia) fall into 15 parts? Of course not. To live, fighting among themselves, separating football from sisters, parents from children’s borders and customs, sanctions and prohibitions, pitting them, than in a single state with a single market. This is how real life forces politicians to reconsider their views, which only yesterday seemed settled once and for all.