Vladimir Putin on Russian nuclear doctrine: what was new in his Q&A at the Valdai Discussion Club?
October 7, 2023
Thursday, 5 October, was the high point in the 20th edition of the Valdai Discussion Club annual meeting when President Putin delivered a 30 minute address to the Plenary Session and then held a 3 hour long Q&A with the 140 invited guests. It was moderated by the Club’s program director, the widely published international affairs analyst Fyodor Lukyanov, though Putin himself intervened from time to time to designate the next questioner from among those he recognized in the audience.
This featured event in the President’s autumn agenda was first held in the resort village of Valdai, hence the name. Valdai is located midway between Petersburg and Moscow and was beloved by Putin at all times for a few days of secluded rest except in April-May when the birch trees, to which he is allergic, are in bloom. A special train spur would take him to the edge of the property made available to him there. The Discussion Group event quickly outgrew the on-site facilities in Valdai and was moved down to Sochi, the Russian president’s equivalent of Camp David in the USA, to which foreign statesmen and other highly distinguished guests can be invited for talks.
To be more precise, the actual venue this past week was in nearby Krasnaya Polyana, a ski resort in the mountains overlooking Sochi that has been developed for year-round recreation. We are told that the participants came from 42 countries, including those nowadays designated as “unfriendly.” As is customary, not everyone invited was a ‘friend of Russia,” without reference to where they come from.
As is customary, the entire group consisted mostly of university people, think tank research fellows and diplomats. With the exception of the last-named, they are not the President’s regular interlocutors, who are now more commonly government officials, business people, soldiers and officers, and schoolchildren at Russia’s cutting edge educational establishments. But he has no difficulty breaking the ice and finding common ground with intellectuals.
It would be reasonable to assume that there is no pre-agreement with participants over what they will ask the President. However, each of them has a record of publications or of previous appearances at the Valdai conferences, which means that their questions can be anticipated and Putin prepares accordingly. Nonetheless, a few used the occasion to pose hostile questions, and I mention this below. No matter; Putin handles them all with aplomb. He speaks extemporaneously and without notes, all of which is enormously impressive to anyone with an objective eye.
The entire event was broadcast live on Russian state television and has been made available online by various Russian news portals. I have consulted the following from Komsomolskaya Pravda: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-GYbhHVOPVo
For those who want an English language transcript of the Valdai proceedings, I refer you to the President’s website, which is putting up the translation in segments:
http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/transcripts/72444
Putin’s introductory speech and the questions posed touched upon a great number of separate issues. It is interesting to note that yesterday’s Financial Times and New York Times did not have a word to say about Putin’s appearance before the Valdai group. By contrast, CNN and Euronews did report on it yesterday morning, but they both focused on just one item from the Q&A, while ignoring everything else. What they found newsworthy was Putin’s answer to a question about the fate of the Wagner Group following the fatal air crash several months ago that killed Dmitry Prigozhin and several others from among its founders and leading personalities. Their coverage homed in on Putin’s revealing the finding by the official investigation into the accident, namely that the recovered bodies had in them fragments of a hand grenade. Putin said that this indicated the plane was not brought down by some external factor. Let us remember that Western media had suggested soon after the crash that it had been hit by a missile fired by the Russian Army, that Prigozhin was a victim of the President’s revenge for his mutiny.
But within the topic of Wagner, Western media missed entirely other important revelations and Putin’s own speculation on the incident. He said he regretted that the investigators had not checked for the presence of alcohol or narcotics in the corpses. And in this connection he said that 5 kilograms of cocaine had been found by police when they searched Wagner Group offices after the plane crash. The clear intimation was that the explosion that brought down the plane was due to someone on board, acting ‘under the influence,’ and pulling the pin on a grenade.
What the Western media also missed with respect to the Wagner story was Putin’s overall remarks on how Russia had no laws sanctioning a ‘private military company,’ that this was a big mistake because those who fought valiantly within Wagner on the Ukrainian front were given no social protection by the state and were being paid in cash with no control over how fairly compensation was allocated. He said it was still not clear whether any such operation would be allowed in the future, but that in the meantime several thousand Wagner fighters had now joined the regular Russian army under normal contracts like other volunteers.
And with respect to the regular Russian army itself, Putin said the past several months of its successfully repelling the Ukrainian counter-offensive and dealing out massive losses to the enemy showed that it was fully capable of ensuring the success of Russia’s Special Military Operation without mercenary groups like Wagner at its side.
In what follows, like Euronews, I also will focus on one of the many topics that were discussed in the Valdai event yesterday, namely the subject of Russia’s nuclear doctrine, which Putin clarified in a very important aspect for relations with the United States. I doubt that officials in the Pentagon or the State Department will have overlooked what he said yesterday. Unlike Euronews, I will close this essay with a brief overview of Putin’s introductory speech, as well as some of what I consider to have been the most interesting answers to other questions.
*****
Sergei Karaganov is a well-known Russian political scientist who for many years allowed himself to be cultivated and flattered by admirers abroad. They enjoyed his novel and frequently changing models of a future world order, as well as his talents as a public speaker. And he was careful to distance himself from the Putin regime. I saw him in person when he was one of the favored guests at an annual conference of a Social Democratic Party think tank in a fashionable suburb of Frankfurt to which I was also invited, mistakenly I would say, by the organizers.
As I wrote several months ago, in the current very patriotic mood of Russia, Karaganov clearly felt it was appropriate to polish his credentials as a native son. He created a storm at home and abroad with his proposal to do the unthinkable and put the fear of Russia back into the West by actually using tactical nuclear weapons to demonstrate their raw power, whether on a test field or against the weaker but more aggressive NATO member states Poland and Romania, where the United States has built missile bases directed at Russia. Talking heads in Washington were sounding alarms and some of Karaganov’s peers within Russia who were outraged by his irresponsibility issued a public rebuke to him.
When Putin identified Karaganov in the audience yesterday and invited him to ask a question, one didn’t have to think twice what that question would be. Indeed Karaganov enquired whether it was not time for Russia to change its approach to nuclear arms and restore their deterrent strength in the eyes of Western elites who repeat endlessly that Russia is weak.
Vladimir Putin took his time and gave Karaganov and the audience a very complete answer, beginning with a summary of the two principal points of the doctrine guiding Russia’s possible use of nuclear arms.
First, Russia will launch a nuclear attack against any country which, according to radar indications, has launched one or more missiles against Russia. The response will be instantaneous, said Putin. And those in power abroad understand perfectly well that Russia will be launching hundreds of missiles coming at them from all directions so that the end result will be their total destruction. There is no need for Russia to say or do more to make its deterrence respected.
Second, Russia will launch a nuclear attack against any country or countries that threaten its continued existence as a sovereign state, regardless of whether the threat posed is by nuclear arms or conventional arms. Since there is no such existential threat to Russia today, there is no reason to brandish nuclear arms.
There would be no news here if Vladimir Putin did not proceed to a further explanation of what changes in nuclear policy are now being prepared with respect to one of the few remaining set of “handrails” that were established in past decades to prevent an all-out nuclear arms race between the super powers: the test ban treaty.
As he explained, this treaty was concluded long ago between the United States and Russia. It was both signed and ratified by Russia. However, the United States only signed it and never ratified it. Now some in the Russian military are demanding that testing be restarted and the treaty becomes inconvenient. They want to conduct tests to be sure that new cutting-edge strategic weapons systems like the very heavy ICBM Sarmat or the global range Burevestnik cruise missile which Russia is about to make the mainstays of its nuclear missile forces actually will deliver the punch as intended. Moreover, Russia assumes that the very same question has been advanced in the United States by its armed forces, which are not de jure restrained by a treaty which the country did not ratify. For all of these reasons, Vladimir Putin is about to put before the Duma a bill to revoke Russia’s ratification of the test ban treaty. Washington was put on notice yesterday: we are on the cusp of an unrestrained nuclear arms race in which Russia presently has a vast lead in delivery systems.
Did any of our mass media notice? Apparently after a delay, they did: Bloomberg posted a video on the subject on their youtube account late very early in the morning yesterday; NBC did the same in the afternoon.
*****
The theme of this year’s Valdai Club conference was “Fair multipolarity: how to ensure security and development for everyone” and this was what Putin spoke to in his introductory address. His speech was intellectually challenging, but clumsy because it put together unrelated ideas.
The speech represents the latest state of Putin’s thinking processes about Russia’s relations with the West that he first made public at his address to Munich Security Conference in February 2007. In that speech, he set out Russia’s rejection of U.S. global hegemony based on the false notion of its exceptionalism. What he announced yesterday was Russia’s rejection of the West in its entirety, meaning not only the hegemon but also the hegemon’s “satellites,” the former colonial powers of Europe which, in his view, derive their prosperity from centuries long plundering of the rest of the world.
There were echoes in this speech of what Putin had said in his address to the Business Group of the BRICS summit in South Africa a little more than a month ago when he condemned the West for the neocolonial mindset in its treatment of the rest of the world. Now he went a step further and conflated neocolonial thinking with ‘bloc’ mentality, i.e., the creation by the United States of military alliances in Europe, in Asia that promote a ‘we versus them’ spirit, that identify an enemy for the sake of rallying the bloc members around the boss country and for the purpose of maintaining control over the populace within their countries. Russia, China, India and others are named as the enemy when it suits the United States for their refusal to be subservient and to sacrifice their national interests to the interests of Washington. I assume that the mention of ‘bloc mentality’ comes from his talks with President Xi, for whom this is a regular talking point. Or it was an attempt to catch the attention of the Chinese public.
In the Valdai Discussion Club, Putin is speaking to intellectuals, as I noted above, and the greater part of his speech was philosophical, setting out his cultural relativism views which are in direct contradiction with the present day universalism of the West and with the End of History story that Francis Fukuyama popularized at the beginning of the 1990s when the United States and others were looking for a new road map, for a new ideology to guide and justify the U.S.-led world now that the bipolar world of the USSR and the USA had come to an end and mankind seemed to have settled on a single common ideology, which we now would call “neo-Conservative.”
There also was in Putin’s speech a reflection of ideas that Sam Huntington popularized in his 1990s book Clash of Civilizations. After all, Huntington was saying that there are a number of different civilizational models operating in the current world. In Putin’s speech that diversity is precisely what needs to be cultivated for there to be fair multipolarity in the incoming world order. However, his notion of civilization is identified with single nations rather than with clusters of nations, as in Huntington, or in the 19th century political thinkers from whom Huntington borrowed the concept.
Per Putin, no civilization is better or worse than others. Each is self-sufficient and thereby sovereign while at the same time having some interdependence with others. Each civilization rests on the national traditions and values of its bearers. Each deserves to feel secure, which is possible only when one state is not trying to enhance its own security at the expense of others.
The ideas in Putin’s speech are not his final word on the subject. He has put the blame for the confrontation with the West on elites, while insisting that Russia has many friends in Europe and fellow believers in the Christian civilization that they once shared with Russia, before they tore up their own cultural roots and lost their sense of reality. The colonialists may yet be forgiven their past plundering if they give up their arrogance today and lend support to the incoming multipolar world order.
*****
Putin was on firmer ground in his answers to questions from the audience.
A case in point was his response to a question from Margarita Simonyan, director of RT in which, speaking as an ethnic Armenian, she harshly criticized prime minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan for his betrayal of fellow Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh that enabled the Azeri armed occupation of the territory and consequent flight of the 120,000 ethnic Armenians in this enclave across the border into Armenia proper. She insinuated that Pashinyan was put in power by the West and that he had sold out the Armenian population of Nagorno-Karabakh from the beginning.
Putin did not hesitate to dispute these allegations from one of Russia’s most senior journalists. Per Putin, Pashinyan was fairly elected by his nation and for a long time had taken no action that would compromise the interests of the Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh. Putin said that from his several meetings with Pashinyan, he knew that the Armenian leader had no intentions to do harm to his compatriots living in Azerbaijan. The problem arose when Pashinyan met in Prague with President of the European Council Charles Michel who persuaded him to publicly acknowledge that Nagorno-Karabakh is an integral part of Azerbaijan, and that the country’s borders dating from the break-up of the USSR in 1991 are recognized by Armenia. Regrettably, Michel and Pashinyan did nothing to prepare for the likely consequence of such recognition, namely the attempt by President Aliyev of Azerbaijan to exercise control over the rebel province by using armed force.
The likelihood of ethnic cleansing or voluntary departure of the Armenian population should have been anticipated and measures put in place to deal with it. Though Putin did not go into what these measures could have been, it would have been logical for Pashinyan to demand that Baku provide a financial settlement to allow the Nagorno-Karabakh population to resettle with dignity and with lodgings should they depart. As it is, the Azeris will now take over all the houses and apartments left behind by the refugees without any compensation being paid. Relatively rich Azerbaijan could have afforded this. Relatively poor Armenia cannot afford it. And the EU has not offered a single euro to help with this. It has only offered some fighter jets to Armenia, which would be useless in a war and can only aggravate relations with Baku, while it cackles over how Russia has lost its influence in the region.
What I have said about Putin’s likely thinking on Armenian resettlement comes directly from what he said at the Valdai meeting about a similar problem that Russia itself experienced at the close of the Cold War when President Yeltsin withdrew Soviet armed forces from the Warsaw Pact countries. No provision had been made for taking in the several hundred thousand soldiers, officers and their families upon their return to Russia. As a result, they returned to live “in open fields” under beggarly conditions. This disastrous failure is seen today as one of Yeltsin’s greatest crimes against the nation. There are those who believe that Moscow should have kept its troops in Germany, Poland and elsewhere until an agreement was made on real, as opposed to token compensation to defer the expenses of resettlement.
Of course, his own introductory speech and the Q&A provided Putin with an opportunity to comment on the Ukraine war, a war which he said was not at all about territorial ambition but about defending the Russian world, meaning the ethnic Russians and Russian speakers in the Donbas regions of Ukraine. They had been subjected to constant military aggression by the armed forces of Ukraine for nine years, with thousands of civilian deaths beginning in 2014. These atrocities attracted no interest in the West, until Russia decided to intervene militarily on their behalf by initiating the Special Military Operation in February 2022.
Another aspect of the SMO came up elsewhere in the Q&A when a German participant posed a rather aggressive, shall we say hostile question to Putin. He asked how Russia can condemn Ukraine for fascism when they themselves maintain friendly relations with the Alternativ für Deutschland party (AfD), which is openly fascist. Putin asked him a question in turn: please be more concrete so we don’t talk in generalities; what exactly makes you think that the AfD is fascist?
The German questioner responded that you just had to look at a recent AfD rally in a town in East Germany where openly demonstrative neo-Nazis were in attendance.
Putin then responded with full blast, saying first that Russia’s friendship was with the AfD party leaders who are not fascist minded in any way. If some objectionable people show up at a rally, that tells you nothing. Moreover, looking at AfD developments in the past week it appeared that the party leaders themselves were victims of classic fascist style physical attack not perpetrators. Indeed, at a pre-election rally in Bavaria this past week one of the two principal leaders was attacked and sent to hospital in intensive care.
Putin then redirected this discussion to Ukraine and the incident in the Canadian parliament a week ago when the entire House, led by its Speaker, hailed a former Waffen SS unit member for his fighting against Soviet Russia during WWII in defense of Ukrainian independence. The man, now 98 and a Canadian citizen, had necessarily participated in the butchery of Jews, Poles and other Untermenschen under guidance of Nazi German officers. The episode took place on the occasion of President Zelensky’s visit to Canada, and Zelensky himself was one of those applauding this Nazi, who was, Putin emphasized, not a Nazi sympathizer but an active Nazi collaborator in war crimes.
And Putin went on to drive home his point as it relates to the Ukraine war. Here you had Zelensky, who has Jewish blood flowing through his veins, publicly applauding a man who took part in the Holocaust. It is precisely for this reason that Russia is fighting the Kiev regime, to de-Nazify Ukraine.
One questioner from the floor asked Putin for his thoughts on what seems to be a historic turning point in Russian history as it breaks with a tradition of close integration with Europe established by Peter the Great when he established his “window on Europe,” St Petersburg.
In his response, Putin said that it was not Russia which closed a window on Europe, but Europe which has lowered a new Iron Curtain against Russia. And in any case, Europe itself is no longer what it was. It has voluntarily abandoned its sovereignty and become a dependency of the United States. The result of the U.S. directed sanctions has been Europe’s loss of competitiveness. Why do we need such a partner, he asked rhetorically. We have redirected our efforts to connect with rising Asia. If Europe does not want us, we will not force our way in.
I also wish to call out Putin’s remarks in the Q&A with respect to the North Stream bombings and who was responsible. Putin’s point number one in finding those responsible is to remember Joe Biden’s words long before the bombing, that the North Stream pipelines would be stopped one way or another. And then whose interests are served by the destruction of these pipelines: clearly it is U.S. interests because the U.S. is now the biggest supplier of natural gas to Europe. Meanwhile, the European investigation into the bombing is going nowhere and the results are unlikely to be made public.
But the most interesting part of his response was his statement that one of the Nord Stream II pipelines was not damaged in the terror attack and is fully functional. This is generally overlooked in the West. Said Putin, if Germany gives the go-ahead, then gas can be shipped via this surviving pipeline tomorrow, bringing 27 billion cubic meters of gas to Europe each year.
Finally, I note Putin’s response to a question from an Iraqi guest who asked what would be the subject of discussions during the soon awaited visit of the Iraqi premier to Moscow.
Putin said that, of course, cooperation in energy matters would be high on the list. Major Russian oil and gas companies are already very active in the country, with significant investments in production already made. But there would be other key topics, especially in the domain of logistics, meaning setting up new trade routes that will benefit both nations and the region.
There were in the three hours of Q&A many other interesting exchanges which readers can discover for themselves by consulting the transcripts and video as I mentioned above.
Putin’s stamina and mental focus over this long session were remarkable. It would be unfair to ask the same of readers of this newsletter.
©Gilbert Doctorow, 2023
https://gilbertdoctorow.com/2023/10/07/ ... sion-club/
Russia today
Re: Russia today
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."
Re: Russia today
Information and hybrid wars for a cleaner's salary
October 11, 10:17
Information and hybrid wars for a cleaner's salary
Sad news has arrived from Moscow State University: the teachers of Russia's first unique master's program "Information and Hybrid Wars", opened in May 2022 for the Special Military Operation, are not paid wages. Unique practitioners who have worked for more than 20 years in law enforcement agencies, deliberately misleading them, were assigned to the laboratory assistant position. As a result, their salary is several times lower than the salary of a cleaner at Moscow State University. Moreover, the program is commercial; in the 2022-23 academic year alone, it brought MSU 10 million rubles. Of this money, contract students could not even be provided with markers in the classrooms. Attached is a scan of an open letter to the rector of Moscow State University, Academician V.A. To the gardener.
And then we have someone complaining that there is a huge shortage of trained specialists in information and psychological operations in the country.
If they are not cooked or prepared in this way, then you should not be surprised. And then all the "Russian stratfors, Russian stratfors..."
https://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/8695775.html
Google Translator
This, along with the closing of hundreds of schools and hospitals is the result of the neoliberal agenda imposed upon the former Soviet peoples when the Soviet Union was dissolved, courtesy US and British advisors. To his credit Putin did slow, but not stop, that process. It was and is much worse in Ukraine.
******
Peculiarities of Russian television reporting on the Hamas-Israeli war
October 11, 2023
A couple of days ago, I mentioned how Russian state television news was providing viewers with information about aspects of the ongoing armed conflict between Hamas and Israeli armed forces that you would not find in Western media during the first days of reporting. In particular, it was immediately evident from the news briefings on Vesti that Russian emphasis was on the military side rather than on the humanitarian catastrophe side.
BBC, Euronews, CNN have all focused attention on the slaughtered Israeli citizens and the apparent savagery of the Hamas fighters including today’s revelations about the hundred or more men, women and children who were killed in a Hamas raid on a kibbutz in the South of Israel. Russian news from day one showed pictures of the latest generation Israeli tank destroyed by a grenade dropped by a drone and of Hamas fighters approaching Israeli shores from the sea on paragliders. On two successive Evening with Vladimir Solovyov shows, images of the destruction to Israel’s billion dollar wall around Gaza and similar engineering feats by the insurgents as they moved deep into Israel proper. Solovyov’s panelists also provided expert analysis of the military threats Israel faces from the neighborhood if the war in Gaza escalates.
Why is this difference in what is reported important? Because coverage of the slaughter of civilians by Hamas fighters and interviews with relatives of those taken captive to Gaza as hostages plays into the hands of the Hamas strategists: it places enormous pressure on Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu to proceed with a land invasion of Gaza which will result in many thousands of deaths among Israeli Defense Force soldiers as well as deaths of civilians in Gaza that may be an order of magnitude higher. The violence of an Israeli invasion may be so shocking as to justify outside Palestinian forces, namely Hezbollah in Lebanon and Arab fighters in Syria, in Iraq, in Yemen to send contingents of armed men to join the battle on the side of Hamas in Gaza.
The Western reporting has provided a wealth of material for those who would denounce the Hamas fighters as “sub-human.” However, considering the great sophistication of the Hamas methods to overcome Israeli technical devices at the border and the wall itself intended to prevent such a raid from the enclave, considering the 5,000 or more missiles sent by Hamas into Israel that overwhelmed the “Iron Dome” Israeli defenses, it is unreasonable to speak of the executions and hostage taking as spontaneous or expressions of raw anger by Arab youths. No, it had to be planned in advance and handed over to disciplined fighters for implementation with a certain military objective in mind: namely to provoke the Israeli government and draw it into the lair of urban, guerilla warfare in Gaza.
A couple of days ago, in my geopolitical analysis of the conflict, I mentioned that the dispatch of a U.S. naval force led by the aircraft carrier Gerald Ford to the waters adjacent to Israel was likely intended to intimidate Iran and possibly to prepare for an American attack on Iran under accusations that Teheran had aided and guided the Hamas attack. However, the Biden administration has now stated clearly that it has no evidence Iran was involved in preparing the Hamas action. This confirms what the supreme religious leader of Iran said yesterday in a public speech, namely that the Palestinians themselves are fiercely independent and that they alone prepared the assault on Israel. He insisted that in the West people under-appreciate the skills and determination of Palestinians. It is only individual American politicians like would-be Republican candidate for the presidency Nikki Haley and the ever saber rattling Republican Senator Lindsey Graham who are calling for Iran to be attacked now.
Based on the information about the military capabilities of pro-Hamas forces in the neighborhood aired on the Solovyov show last night by first quality Russian experts, it is far more likely that the United States military presence is intended for use against Hezbollah in Lebanon than against Iran. This organization is now said to be the strongest pro-Palestinian force in the region with tens of thousands of fighters, with advanced military equipment including perhaps one hundred thousand missiles ready for use against Israel at any time. Israel’s last incursion into Lebanon to crush Hezbollah in 2006 ran into serious difficulties when enemy strength surprised them. Some fifty Israeli tanks were said to have been destroyed then. There is no question that Hezbollah has become more powerful since. Its war hardened forces received battlefield experience very relevant to the present Hamas-Israel conflict when they fought in the civil war in Syria.
One of the Russian experts who spoke at length about the situation in Israel on Sunday night was Yevgeny Satanovsky, who is a professor attached to two centers of Near East studies in Moscow. He appeared in the past on Russian television talk shows when the subject was Russian-Turkish relations but his core specialty is in fact Israeli politics and the economy. It was difficult to follow Satanovsky’s remarks in detail because he was speaking as if to academic friends over a cup of coffee and there was a lot of jargon. But his appraisal of the Israeli military’s degraded state was clear enough. The deplorable discipline within their army compounded the initial problems from the intelligence failures of Mossad. The common denominator both in intelligence and in military command was hubris, undeserved self-confidence, lulled by technological superiority over the enemy. But just as Hamas outfoxed Israeli intelligence by returning to 19th century methods of communications, couriers and face to face meetings in place of electronic means that Israel can intercept, so fairly rudimentary bulldozers were sufficient to break through the Israeli wall and a combination of firearms and drones neutralized the sensors and cameras protecting Israel from Gaza raids.
Said Satanovsky, the Israeli military has suffered an additional debilitating flaw, namely the succession of second quality generals who rose to the premiership of Israel over the past thirty years and the politicization of military ranks. He blamed in particular the 2005 decision by then prime minister Ariel Sharon to withdraw all Israeli presence from inside Gaza and to secure the enclave from its perimeter.
For those who want to know more about who Satanovsky is, he has a large entry in the Russian language edition of Wikipedia. Suffice it here to say that he calls himself an atheist as well as a “Russian Jew,” and for several years at the start of the new millennium he helped to create the Russian Jewish Congress and served as its president for three years. He has a teaching affiliation with the International Center of University Instruction on Jewish Civilization in the Jewish University of Jerusalem.
I mention this aspect of the man’s past and present because it brings us to the special relationship that Russia has with Israel. More than one million Soviet and Russian Federation Jews emigrated to Israel. These included people from every walk of life, including some scandalously wealthy crooks who evaded Russian justice for crimes including murder and are not extradited. Since the start of the Special Military Operation, their numbers have risen with the arrival in Israel of Russia’s ‘fifth column’ personalities in the entertainment industry, in finance, in government. With the Hamas attack some of those, like the billionaire banker Mikhail Fridman, took the first plane out of Israel for Moscow this past Sunday, as reported in a feature article of The Financial Times.. The scoundrel who assisted Yeltsin’s fraudulent election in 1996 and then stayed on in power to enrich himself, serving in a succession of high positions, Anatoly Chubais, also slithered out of Israel the same day, but not to Moscow, where he would face arrest. Their compatriots in Russia snigger over the cowardice and selfishness of these high visibility characters.
Of course the vast majority of Russian settlers in Israel are normal, hard working folks and it is they to whom the Vesti journalists turn now for first-hand accounts of the impact of the Hamas attack. They can be doctors receiving the wounded at hospitals or officials in the mayor’s office of one or another Israeli city. You will not see them on CNN.
On the other side of the coin, Russia has and needs excellent relations with the Arab world. Fifteen per cent of the Russian population is Muslim, with their cultural and religious center in Kazan, some 860 km southeast of Moscow, in a wealthy oil-producing region. Chechnya is also a Muslim center in the Russian Federation and its leader Ramzan Kadyrov is well known in the Middle East. More to the point, Russia is a highly valuable partner of Saudi Arabia in Opec+ in which they jointly set production targets and price targets for the global oil industry. And Russia has close relations with the United Arab Emirates, particularly financial arrangements. The UAE dirham is now used as a currency for settling import-export transactions by Russia. Of course, Russia is closely aligned with Iran as a fellow member of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization and, as from 1 January 2024, BRICS. The close ties to Syria need no explanation, since Russia singlehandedly saved the government of Bashar Assad from the radical fundamentalist fighters that Washington was arming. The closeness of Russian ties with Iraq was in full evidence yesterday during the state visit of the Iraqi prime minister to Moscow. Russian companies Lukoil, Gazpromneft and others have already invested $16 billion in production assets in Iraq.
The official position with respect to the war now raging between Israel and Hamas was stated yesterday on television by President Putin: it can be solved only with implementation of the UN resolution on creation of a fully sovereign Palestine state, i.e. the “two state solution” that has been so long discussed but never brought to fruition. However, what will follow the creation of such a state is equally important and remains terra incognita: which world powers will guarantee the security of these two states?
©Gilbert Doctorow, 2023
https://gilbertdoctorow.com/2023/10/11/ ... raeli-war/
October 11, 10:17
Information and hybrid wars for a cleaner's salary
Sad news has arrived from Moscow State University: the teachers of Russia's first unique master's program "Information and Hybrid Wars", opened in May 2022 for the Special Military Operation, are not paid wages. Unique practitioners who have worked for more than 20 years in law enforcement agencies, deliberately misleading them, were assigned to the laboratory assistant position. As a result, their salary is several times lower than the salary of a cleaner at Moscow State University. Moreover, the program is commercial; in the 2022-23 academic year alone, it brought MSU 10 million rubles. Of this money, contract students could not even be provided with markers in the classrooms. Attached is a scan of an open letter to the rector of Moscow State University, Academician V.A. To the gardener.
And then we have someone complaining that there is a huge shortage of trained specialists in information and psychological operations in the country.
If they are not cooked or prepared in this way, then you should not be surprised. And then all the "Russian stratfors, Russian stratfors..."
https://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/8695775.html
Google Translator
This, along with the closing of hundreds of schools and hospitals is the result of the neoliberal agenda imposed upon the former Soviet peoples when the Soviet Union was dissolved, courtesy US and British advisors. To his credit Putin did slow, but not stop, that process. It was and is much worse in Ukraine.
******
Peculiarities of Russian television reporting on the Hamas-Israeli war
October 11, 2023
A couple of days ago, I mentioned how Russian state television news was providing viewers with information about aspects of the ongoing armed conflict between Hamas and Israeli armed forces that you would not find in Western media during the first days of reporting. In particular, it was immediately evident from the news briefings on Vesti that Russian emphasis was on the military side rather than on the humanitarian catastrophe side.
BBC, Euronews, CNN have all focused attention on the slaughtered Israeli citizens and the apparent savagery of the Hamas fighters including today’s revelations about the hundred or more men, women and children who were killed in a Hamas raid on a kibbutz in the South of Israel. Russian news from day one showed pictures of the latest generation Israeli tank destroyed by a grenade dropped by a drone and of Hamas fighters approaching Israeli shores from the sea on paragliders. On two successive Evening with Vladimir Solovyov shows, images of the destruction to Israel’s billion dollar wall around Gaza and similar engineering feats by the insurgents as they moved deep into Israel proper. Solovyov’s panelists also provided expert analysis of the military threats Israel faces from the neighborhood if the war in Gaza escalates.
Why is this difference in what is reported important? Because coverage of the slaughter of civilians by Hamas fighters and interviews with relatives of those taken captive to Gaza as hostages plays into the hands of the Hamas strategists: it places enormous pressure on Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu to proceed with a land invasion of Gaza which will result in many thousands of deaths among Israeli Defense Force soldiers as well as deaths of civilians in Gaza that may be an order of magnitude higher. The violence of an Israeli invasion may be so shocking as to justify outside Palestinian forces, namely Hezbollah in Lebanon and Arab fighters in Syria, in Iraq, in Yemen to send contingents of armed men to join the battle on the side of Hamas in Gaza.
The Western reporting has provided a wealth of material for those who would denounce the Hamas fighters as “sub-human.” However, considering the great sophistication of the Hamas methods to overcome Israeli technical devices at the border and the wall itself intended to prevent such a raid from the enclave, considering the 5,000 or more missiles sent by Hamas into Israel that overwhelmed the “Iron Dome” Israeli defenses, it is unreasonable to speak of the executions and hostage taking as spontaneous or expressions of raw anger by Arab youths. No, it had to be planned in advance and handed over to disciplined fighters for implementation with a certain military objective in mind: namely to provoke the Israeli government and draw it into the lair of urban, guerilla warfare in Gaza.
A couple of days ago, in my geopolitical analysis of the conflict, I mentioned that the dispatch of a U.S. naval force led by the aircraft carrier Gerald Ford to the waters adjacent to Israel was likely intended to intimidate Iran and possibly to prepare for an American attack on Iran under accusations that Teheran had aided and guided the Hamas attack. However, the Biden administration has now stated clearly that it has no evidence Iran was involved in preparing the Hamas action. This confirms what the supreme religious leader of Iran said yesterday in a public speech, namely that the Palestinians themselves are fiercely independent and that they alone prepared the assault on Israel. He insisted that in the West people under-appreciate the skills and determination of Palestinians. It is only individual American politicians like would-be Republican candidate for the presidency Nikki Haley and the ever saber rattling Republican Senator Lindsey Graham who are calling for Iran to be attacked now.
Based on the information about the military capabilities of pro-Hamas forces in the neighborhood aired on the Solovyov show last night by first quality Russian experts, it is far more likely that the United States military presence is intended for use against Hezbollah in Lebanon than against Iran. This organization is now said to be the strongest pro-Palestinian force in the region with tens of thousands of fighters, with advanced military equipment including perhaps one hundred thousand missiles ready for use against Israel at any time. Israel’s last incursion into Lebanon to crush Hezbollah in 2006 ran into serious difficulties when enemy strength surprised them. Some fifty Israeli tanks were said to have been destroyed then. There is no question that Hezbollah has become more powerful since. Its war hardened forces received battlefield experience very relevant to the present Hamas-Israel conflict when they fought in the civil war in Syria.
One of the Russian experts who spoke at length about the situation in Israel on Sunday night was Yevgeny Satanovsky, who is a professor attached to two centers of Near East studies in Moscow. He appeared in the past on Russian television talk shows when the subject was Russian-Turkish relations but his core specialty is in fact Israeli politics and the economy. It was difficult to follow Satanovsky’s remarks in detail because he was speaking as if to academic friends over a cup of coffee and there was a lot of jargon. But his appraisal of the Israeli military’s degraded state was clear enough. The deplorable discipline within their army compounded the initial problems from the intelligence failures of Mossad. The common denominator both in intelligence and in military command was hubris, undeserved self-confidence, lulled by technological superiority over the enemy. But just as Hamas outfoxed Israeli intelligence by returning to 19th century methods of communications, couriers and face to face meetings in place of electronic means that Israel can intercept, so fairly rudimentary bulldozers were sufficient to break through the Israeli wall and a combination of firearms and drones neutralized the sensors and cameras protecting Israel from Gaza raids.
Said Satanovsky, the Israeli military has suffered an additional debilitating flaw, namely the succession of second quality generals who rose to the premiership of Israel over the past thirty years and the politicization of military ranks. He blamed in particular the 2005 decision by then prime minister Ariel Sharon to withdraw all Israeli presence from inside Gaza and to secure the enclave from its perimeter.
For those who want to know more about who Satanovsky is, he has a large entry in the Russian language edition of Wikipedia. Suffice it here to say that he calls himself an atheist as well as a “Russian Jew,” and for several years at the start of the new millennium he helped to create the Russian Jewish Congress and served as its president for three years. He has a teaching affiliation with the International Center of University Instruction on Jewish Civilization in the Jewish University of Jerusalem.
I mention this aspect of the man’s past and present because it brings us to the special relationship that Russia has with Israel. More than one million Soviet and Russian Federation Jews emigrated to Israel. These included people from every walk of life, including some scandalously wealthy crooks who evaded Russian justice for crimes including murder and are not extradited. Since the start of the Special Military Operation, their numbers have risen with the arrival in Israel of Russia’s ‘fifth column’ personalities in the entertainment industry, in finance, in government. With the Hamas attack some of those, like the billionaire banker Mikhail Fridman, took the first plane out of Israel for Moscow this past Sunday, as reported in a feature article of The Financial Times.. The scoundrel who assisted Yeltsin’s fraudulent election in 1996 and then stayed on in power to enrich himself, serving in a succession of high positions, Anatoly Chubais, also slithered out of Israel the same day, but not to Moscow, where he would face arrest. Their compatriots in Russia snigger over the cowardice and selfishness of these high visibility characters.
Of course the vast majority of Russian settlers in Israel are normal, hard working folks and it is they to whom the Vesti journalists turn now for first-hand accounts of the impact of the Hamas attack. They can be doctors receiving the wounded at hospitals or officials in the mayor’s office of one or another Israeli city. You will not see them on CNN.
On the other side of the coin, Russia has and needs excellent relations with the Arab world. Fifteen per cent of the Russian population is Muslim, with their cultural and religious center in Kazan, some 860 km southeast of Moscow, in a wealthy oil-producing region. Chechnya is also a Muslim center in the Russian Federation and its leader Ramzan Kadyrov is well known in the Middle East. More to the point, Russia is a highly valuable partner of Saudi Arabia in Opec+ in which they jointly set production targets and price targets for the global oil industry. And Russia has close relations with the United Arab Emirates, particularly financial arrangements. The UAE dirham is now used as a currency for settling import-export transactions by Russia. Of course, Russia is closely aligned with Iran as a fellow member of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization and, as from 1 January 2024, BRICS. The close ties to Syria need no explanation, since Russia singlehandedly saved the government of Bashar Assad from the radical fundamentalist fighters that Washington was arming. The closeness of Russian ties with Iraq was in full evidence yesterday during the state visit of the Iraqi prime minister to Moscow. Russian companies Lukoil, Gazpromneft and others have already invested $16 billion in production assets in Iraq.
The official position with respect to the war now raging between Israel and Hamas was stated yesterday on television by President Putin: it can be solved only with implementation of the UN resolution on creation of a fully sovereign Palestine state, i.e. the “two state solution” that has been so long discussed but never brought to fruition. However, what will follow the creation of such a state is equally important and remains terra incognita: which world powers will guarantee the security of these two states?
©Gilbert Doctorow, 2023
https://gilbertdoctorow.com/2023/10/11/ ... raeli-war/
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."
Re: Russia today
RUSSIA’S POLLSTERS REFUSE TO REPORT PUBLIC FEELING TOWARDS THE PALESTINE-ISRAEL CONFLICT
By John Helmer, Moscow @bears_with
The leading Russian opinion pollsters said today they are “not planning” to survey nationwide opinion towards the Palestinians, the Israelis, and the current fighting “in the near future”.
The blackout on public opinion comes as President Vladimir Putin gave his first direct interview on the conflict to the Arab press. “The issue is complex, very sensitive,” Putin told the Jordan-based al-Ghad television channel. “But at the moment, of course, it is necessary to refrain from harsh statements and, no matter what, it is not necessary to offend the feelings of people who are involved in this conflict”, the Kremlin website recorded.
The refusal of the pollsters is not new. It has been thirteen years since the Levada Centre, the independent national polling organisation in Moscow, reported a survey of Russian attitudes towards the Palestine-Israel conflict. “We had such a poll in 2010,” Denis Leven, a Levada sociologist, said in 2021.
“I can’t say exactly if we are going to make another one in the near future. Now we focus on the events in Russia and neighbouring countries.”
This was untrue. Levada has regularly polled Russians on their attitudes towards Turkey, the US, the European Union, China, as well as the states which Russians regard as enemies — Great Britain, Poland, the Baltic states, Germany, France, Japan, and Canada. The most recent Levada poll of this kind was reported a month ago.
In 2021, speaking for the rival national pollster, the All-Russian Centre for the Study of Public Opinion (VTsIOM), Diana Osyanina said: “we aren’t planning to make a poll about this [Palestine-Israel] conflict because now we focus mostly on the domestic issues.” VTsIOM’s last published poll on the conflict appeared in January 2018; it focused on Russian views of whether Tel Aviv or Jerusalem should be the capital of Israel. The majority couldn’t say.
Five years ago, VTsIOM reported there was a deep divide in Russian opinion with support for Israel concentrated in Moscow and St Petersburg, and hostility in the rest of the country. A majority of Russians preferred to avoid taking sides in the conflict.
Read more: https://johnhelmer.net/white-noise-whit ... palestine/
This week the mass circulation Moscow daily Komsomolskaya Pravda (KP) reported a poll of reader subscribers in which the newspaper claimed there was public resistance (in Moscow) to direct Russian involvement in the conflict. 37% of the volunteering responses expressed the view the conflict “should not affect Russia in any way…Both sides are to blame there, so the intention to support someone may harm Russia.” It is unclear how many of KP’s readers participated in the survey; it is clear KP has editorialised the responses to promote the Kremlin’s opposition to engagement on the Arab side.
Another press source claims that in a multinational survey of sentiment, Russians supporting the Palestinians outnumber supporters of the Israelis by five to one; 34% said they were on the Palestinian side, 7% for Israel, while 46% were neutral, saying “this isn’t our war”. The survey, with no identified provenance, suggested that support for the Palestinians was proportionately higher in Russia than in other European countries.
The Kremlin line remains one of equivalence between the Palestinians and Israel, as Putin told an Arab interviewer he does not favour Russian engagement against the US show of force for Israel, or against the Israel Defense Forces plan for invading and destroying Gaza. Instead, Putin said he is ready to negotiate with the US and the European Union, Russia’s adversaries in the Ukraine war.
Source: http://kremlin.ru/events/president/news/72482
“At the moment, of course, it is necessary to refrain from harsh statements and, no matter what, it is not necessary to offend the feelings of people who are involved in this conflict. First. Second. It is necessary to avoid civilian casualties at all costs. All actions, if not without them, should be selective, and it is necessary to minimise threats and losses among innocent women, children, and the elderly. This is a well-known position, I think, that no one doubts. And of course, it is necessary at all costs to avoid the expansion of the conflict. Because if this happens, it will have an impact on the international situation as a whole, and not just on the region.”
Putin criticised the US for provoking the Palestinians with its pro-Israel bias, but he did not challenge the deployment of the US Navy carrier group in the eastern Mediterranean.
“I don’t see any sense from a military point of view…What for? What are they going to do? Strike with the help of carrier-based aircraft? Where, by whom? I just don’t see the point from a military point of view. First. Second. This may be an element of such military-political support. Well yes. But in my opinion, now we need to deal not with the military side of the matter, but with diplomacy, we need to look for a way to stop hostilities, and the sooner the better – the first. And the second is to return to the negotiation process, which, the process itself, should be acceptable to all parties, including the Palestinians.”
By diplomacy, Putin was asked, is he proposing to revive the Quarter formula of Russia, the US, the European Union, and the United Nations, which has been discredited in Moscow since the start of the Ukraine war. “Is it possible to resume the work of this format?” “Vladimir Putin: Why not? We have very stable, business relations with Israel, we have friendly relations with Palestine for decades, our friends know about it. And Russia, in my opinion, could also make its contribution, its contribution to the settlement process. But the severity [of the conflict] is such that, in my opinion, we don’t see anything like this anywhere.”
The only pro-Arab position Putin indicated was a diffident one. Asked to respond to Israeli demands for the Palestinians to leave Gaza for Egypt, Putin replied: “It’s hard for me to give any estimates. The land on which the Palestinians live is their land, historically their land. Moreover, it was supposed to create an independent Palestinian State here. In my opinion, this is not something that can lead to peace.”
NOTE: the lead image is of the public demonstration in support of the Palestinians in Paris this week before the Macron government issued orders to the police to drive the pro-Palestinian groups from the streets and ban anti-Israel demonstrations countrywide.
https://johnhelmer.net/russias-pollster ... more-88671
By John Helmer, Moscow @bears_with
The leading Russian opinion pollsters said today they are “not planning” to survey nationwide opinion towards the Palestinians, the Israelis, and the current fighting “in the near future”.
The blackout on public opinion comes as President Vladimir Putin gave his first direct interview on the conflict to the Arab press. “The issue is complex, very sensitive,” Putin told the Jordan-based al-Ghad television channel. “But at the moment, of course, it is necessary to refrain from harsh statements and, no matter what, it is not necessary to offend the feelings of people who are involved in this conflict”, the Kremlin website recorded.
The refusal of the pollsters is not new. It has been thirteen years since the Levada Centre, the independent national polling organisation in Moscow, reported a survey of Russian attitudes towards the Palestine-Israel conflict. “We had such a poll in 2010,” Denis Leven, a Levada sociologist, said in 2021.
“I can’t say exactly if we are going to make another one in the near future. Now we focus on the events in Russia and neighbouring countries.”
This was untrue. Levada has regularly polled Russians on their attitudes towards Turkey, the US, the European Union, China, as well as the states which Russians regard as enemies — Great Britain, Poland, the Baltic states, Germany, France, Japan, and Canada. The most recent Levada poll of this kind was reported a month ago.
In 2021, speaking for the rival national pollster, the All-Russian Centre for the Study of Public Opinion (VTsIOM), Diana Osyanina said: “we aren’t planning to make a poll about this [Palestine-Israel] conflict because now we focus mostly on the domestic issues.” VTsIOM’s last published poll on the conflict appeared in January 2018; it focused on Russian views of whether Tel Aviv or Jerusalem should be the capital of Israel. The majority couldn’t say.
Five years ago, VTsIOM reported there was a deep divide in Russian opinion with support for Israel concentrated in Moscow and St Petersburg, and hostility in the rest of the country. A majority of Russians preferred to avoid taking sides in the conflict.
Read more: https://johnhelmer.net/white-noise-whit ... palestine/
This week the mass circulation Moscow daily Komsomolskaya Pravda (KP) reported a poll of reader subscribers in which the newspaper claimed there was public resistance (in Moscow) to direct Russian involvement in the conflict. 37% of the volunteering responses expressed the view the conflict “should not affect Russia in any way…Both sides are to blame there, so the intention to support someone may harm Russia.” It is unclear how many of KP’s readers participated in the survey; it is clear KP has editorialised the responses to promote the Kremlin’s opposition to engagement on the Arab side.
Another press source claims that in a multinational survey of sentiment, Russians supporting the Palestinians outnumber supporters of the Israelis by five to one; 34% said they were on the Palestinian side, 7% for Israel, while 46% were neutral, saying “this isn’t our war”. The survey, with no identified provenance, suggested that support for the Palestinians was proportionately higher in Russia than in other European countries.
The Kremlin line remains one of equivalence between the Palestinians and Israel, as Putin told an Arab interviewer he does not favour Russian engagement against the US show of force for Israel, or against the Israel Defense Forces plan for invading and destroying Gaza. Instead, Putin said he is ready to negotiate with the US and the European Union, Russia’s adversaries in the Ukraine war.
Source: http://kremlin.ru/events/president/news/72482
“At the moment, of course, it is necessary to refrain from harsh statements and, no matter what, it is not necessary to offend the feelings of people who are involved in this conflict. First. Second. It is necessary to avoid civilian casualties at all costs. All actions, if not without them, should be selective, and it is necessary to minimise threats and losses among innocent women, children, and the elderly. This is a well-known position, I think, that no one doubts. And of course, it is necessary at all costs to avoid the expansion of the conflict. Because if this happens, it will have an impact on the international situation as a whole, and not just on the region.”
Putin criticised the US for provoking the Palestinians with its pro-Israel bias, but he did not challenge the deployment of the US Navy carrier group in the eastern Mediterranean.
“I don’t see any sense from a military point of view…What for? What are they going to do? Strike with the help of carrier-based aircraft? Where, by whom? I just don’t see the point from a military point of view. First. Second. This may be an element of such military-political support. Well yes. But in my opinion, now we need to deal not with the military side of the matter, but with diplomacy, we need to look for a way to stop hostilities, and the sooner the better – the first. And the second is to return to the negotiation process, which, the process itself, should be acceptable to all parties, including the Palestinians.”
By diplomacy, Putin was asked, is he proposing to revive the Quarter formula of Russia, the US, the European Union, and the United Nations, which has been discredited in Moscow since the start of the Ukraine war. “Is it possible to resume the work of this format?” “Vladimir Putin: Why not? We have very stable, business relations with Israel, we have friendly relations with Palestine for decades, our friends know about it. And Russia, in my opinion, could also make its contribution, its contribution to the settlement process. But the severity [of the conflict] is such that, in my opinion, we don’t see anything like this anywhere.”
The only pro-Arab position Putin indicated was a diffident one. Asked to respond to Israeli demands for the Palestinians to leave Gaza for Egypt, Putin replied: “It’s hard for me to give any estimates. The land on which the Palestinians live is their land, historically their land. Moreover, it was supposed to create an independent Palestinian State here. In my opinion, this is not something that can lead to peace.”
NOTE: the lead image is of the public demonstration in support of the Palestinians in Paris this week before the Macron government issued orders to the police to drive the pro-Palestinian groups from the streets and ban anti-Israel demonstrations countrywide.
https://johnhelmer.net/russias-pollster ... more-88671
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."
Re: Russia today
WHITE FLAG IN A BLACK HOLE — IS RUSSIAN NEUTRALITY A FORCE OR A TRADE?
By John Helmer, Moscow @bears_with
The first Moscow newspaper analysis has appeared of Russia’s current position towards Israel and Palestine. It supports President Vladimir Putin’s public endorsement of the two-state solution between the Israelis and Palestinians.
Entitled “Why Russia remains neutral in the conflict in the Middle East”, Vzglyad, the Moscow security strategy publication, posted the piece late on Friday evening, October 13. It added an opinion poll for its readers with a single question, “should Russia recognise Hamas as a terrorist organisation?”
The new analysis and conclusion are in contrast to Vzglyad’s call six months ago for Russia to reorient its position towards the Arab side. This is also a marked change of editorial line in the prevailing silence in Moscow: there has been no Security Council meeting since October 3; no State Duma debate; no national opinion polling of public attitudes.
The Arab-Israeli conflict is the one in which Israel is destroying the remnants of the Palestine state territories of Gaza, the West Bank, and East Jerusalem, and replaces that two-state solution with a single state; that is the Israeli one in which about 7 million Jews restrict about 2 million Arabs in bantustans administered according to an apartheid regime.
The rules of this Jewish-based order have been fixed in Israel’s constitutional amendment enacted in 2018 as the “Basic Law: Israel – the Nation State of the Jewish People”, and ratified by the Israeli Supreme Court in 2021. This adopts the single- state solution expanding territorially by resettlement of the Palestinian territories “as a national value”; and in parallel, combating international opposition to the process by Israeli state operations to “preserve the cultural, historical and religious heritage of the Jewish People among Jews in the Diaspora.”
By equating Jewish ethnicity and religious faith with nationality of the Israeli state, this constitution eliminates Palestinian, Arab, and Muslim rights with the formula, “the exercise of the right to national self-determination in the State of Israel is unique to the Jewish People.” The corollary is that any Palestinian exercise of the right to self-determination on the expanding Jewish national territory is illegal, anti-Semitic, and terrorist. Internationally, it is the policy of Israel and its allies to make support for or discussion of Palestinian right to self-determination a thought and speech crime.
In Russian politics, this is the one international conflict on which President Vladimir Putin has said so much since the start of his term, and done so little – this has been to advocate the two-state solution in public while in private to impose a do-nothing, say-catchword line on diplomats and military officials, and the state media.
The gap between the Kremlin and the General Staff and Defense Ministry became visible in September 2018 after the Israel Air Force caused the shoot-down in Syria of a Russian Ilyushin-20M electronic reconnaissance aircraft, and the killing of all fifteen crewmen on board. At that time the Russian military expressed a loss of confidence which had not been seen in public since President Boris Yeltsin countermanded orders for Russian military support of Serbia under NATO bombing between March and June 1999, and dismissed Prime Minister Yevgeny Primakov on the US demand.
In the present fighting between Palestinian, Arab and Israeli forces, the options for Russian action are numerous; the public debate over what the options should be has been nugatory. There have been no national opinion polls; no State Duma debate; no meeting of the Security Council since October 3.
An initial statement by Patriarch Kirill of the Russian Orthodox Church was carefully balanced between Palestine and Israel, referring to the “military conflict” between the two sides, not a unilateral act of terrorism. “Peaceful coexistence” between the religious communities, Kirill said, has a “religious dimension” and requires a “just peace”. In context, this was a tilt against Israel. The Church’s Department for External Church Relations issued the statement on October 7; there has been nothing since.
As a bellwether of Russian security analysts, Vzglyad’s decision to publish a report of expert assessments on “the advantages of Russia’s neutrality in the conflict in the Middle East” is unusual. Vzglyad’s publishing record shows what the new report is not. Strategically, Russia is being obliged by the US and NATO alliance to fight an all-forces war in Europe, and commit small forces in separate conflicts in Syria; Transdnistria and Moldova; Azerbaijan and Armenia; with the possibility of engagement in the Kosovo fight against Serbia. There is no discussion in the Vzglyad outline of Russian capacities to conduct military operations on all battlefields simultaneously.
No military or intelligence source, to which Vzglyad has frequent and unique access, has been quoted. Privately, some of these sources suspect bargaining with the US in the Quartet format of the American “monopoly” of Israel for Russia’s “monopoly” of the Ukraine.
Vzglyad’s writers and editors decline to answer questions.
The Russian text has been translated verbatim without cuts or editing. Illustrations and captions have been added for clarification.
October 13, 2023
WHY RUSSIA REMAINS NEUTRAL IN THE CONFLICT IN THE MIDDLE EAST
Experts have assessed the advantages of Russia’s neutrality in the conflict in the Middle East
By Yevgeny Poznyakov and Ilya Abramov
Source: https://vz.ru/politics/2023/10/13/1234833.html
Vladimir Putin has declared the need to create an independent state of Palestine – this will become the basis for the settlement of the conflict in the Middle East. On the other hand, the Russian president has recognised Israel’s right to self-defence. Thus, Moscow has once again indicated its neutrality in this matter. Why has equidistance become Russia’s main position in the current events and what benefits does this approach promise Moscow?
This week, President Vladimir Putin said that Russia assumes that there is no alternative to resolving the Palestinian-Israeli conflict through negotiations. He announced this at the CIS [Commonwealth of Independent States] summit in Bishkek. According to him, Tel Aviv was subjected to a brutal attack and has the right to defend itself, but a real settlement of the situation is possible only if an independent Palestine is created with East Jerusalem as its capital.
In his opinion, the goal of the negotiations should be the implementation of the UN formula of ‘two states’, and there is no alternative to this. He added that ‘we need to take care of resolving this issue by peaceful means.’ Putin called the war in the Middle East a large-scale tragedy for the Israelis and Palestinians. This conflict was ‘a direct result of the failed policy of the United States in the Middle East.’ In addition, the Russian leader warned Tel Aviv against launching a ground operation in the Gaza Strip.
The entire international community is concerned about the solution of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. Back in 1967, after the end of the Six-Day War, the UN Security Council issued Resolution 242 calling on Tel Aviv to withdraw troops from the territory of East Jerusalem annexed during the fighting.
https://peacemaker.un.org/
In July 1980, the Conference of Leaders of Non-Aligned Countries declared the holy city ‘an integral part of occupied Palestine’ and it ‘must be completely abandoned and unconditionally transferred to Arab sovereignty.’ In response, Tel Aviv adopted a law on Jerusalem, according to which the settlement was proclaimed ‘one and indivisible’ and was given the status of the capital of the Jewish state.
Following that, United States tried to resolve the situation in the region. In 1993, as part of secret negotiations in Norway, the Oslo-1 agreement was signed, according to which the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) recognised Israel’s rights to exist ‘in peace and security’, and Tel Aviv agreed to interim agreements on self-government for the Arab autonomy.
Later, in 1995 the Oslo-2 agreement was signed on expanding the power of the Palestinians by creating an elected body for a limited period – for a period of no more than five years from the date of signing the agreements. However, the authority of the document was undermined by the change of government in Israel in 1996, as a result of which the country postponed the redeployment of troops in Hebron.
https://peacemaker.un.org/
Against the background of the unceasing attempts of the world community to reconcile the conflicting parties, Russia has built strong relations with both Palestine and Israel. Tel Aviv and other cities have become the centre of attraction for immigrants from the USSR and Russia. The poet and bard Vladimir Vysotsky aptly spoke about the strong social ties of the two peoples at the time: ‘… and there is a quarter of our former people.’
A similar state of affairs affects the current interaction of the states. The Israeli authorities avoided, as far as possible, involvement in the conflict in Ukraine, and the personal relations of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Vladimir Putin have always been considered warm, as the newspaper Vzglyad previously reported in detail.
At the same time, Russia is a long-standing and reliable partner of many Muslim and Arab states. During the Soviet period, Moscow was the defender of the Palestinians, and therefore the friendship of the parties was not lost even after the collapse of the USSR. At the same time, the building of relations with Iran is successfully progressing, which also has its own view on the current conflict.
In addition, the efforts of domestic diplomacy have created a path and difficult but constructive and mutually beneficial relations with Turkey, another important player in the region. And there are many Muslims living in Russia itself, which plays into Moscow’s hands when building partnership and trusting relations with states where Islam is the main religion.
In this regard, the expert community is confident that the position taken by Russia is the only correct one under the circumstances. Moscow is aware of the importance of creating two independent states in the region and insists on a peaceful settlement of the conflict, not wanting to see its expansion into the entire Middle East.
‘Moscow continues to defend the classic thesis for international relations that an armed conflict is an unacceptable way to resolve existing contradictions. This explains our neutrality within the framework of the ongoing events,’ said Stanislav Tkachenko, Professor of the Department of European Studies at the Faculty of International Relations of St. Petersburg State University, an expert of the Valdai Club.
‘The position taken by Russia is optimal. We are clearly aware that this war does not affect Moscow’s key interests, respectively, and it is not worth wasting invaluable diplomatic and military resources on it. However, Western countries adhere to a completely different approach in their policies,’ the source believes.
‘The US and the EU have almost completely aligned themselves with Tel Aviv, which reduces their manoeuverability. Moreover, the need to provide enormous support to Israel distracts the attention of Washington and Brussels from what is happening in Ukraine. This, of course, plays into Russia’s hands,’ the expert notes.
‘Nevertheless, Moscow does not want to see an increase in the conflict zone to the scale of the entire Middle East region. This scenario will not be beneficial to any state. However, theoretically, if Western countries begin to increase the volume of aid to Israel, then such an outcome will become quite likely,’ the source emphasises. ‘In this case, Russia can use its strong ties with both Palestine and Israel to act as a mediator in resolving the conflict,’ Tkachenko notes. ‘However, at the moment we are not actively seeking to fulfil this role, the time has not yet come.’
Timofei Bordachev, program director of the Valdai International Discussion Club, also calls the position chosen by Moscow correct. ‘In the current conflict, Russia stands on the side of international law. The need to create two full-fledged states, Israel and Palestine, has long been spelled out in many international documents. Nevertheless, we see that there is practically no progress in this direction,’ he said.
‘However, the implementation of the announced provisions is necessary. This method is the only way out of the crisis that can help stabilise the situation in the region. Actually, Vladimir Putin correctly points out the same thing. At the same time, the sympathies of Western countries are obviously leaning in favour of Israel,’ the expert notes.
‘Such a policy is not acceptable for Russia. We have taken a clear and verified position of neutrality. In my opinion, in the current situation this approach is most in line with Moscow’s interests. Our country does not have the habit of poking its nose into other people’s affairs, so we will continue to keep our distance from what is happening,’ Bordachev emphasizes.
At the same time, the current conflict is fraught with many potential benefits for Russia, it is believed in Europe. According to German political scientist Alexander Rahr, Russia is quite capable of providing direct assistance to resolve the confrontation between Hamas and Israel. ‘In a situation where the entire Western world has unconditionally sided with Tel Aviv, Moscow could theoretically act as a great mediator in the conflict. Washington and Brussels risk losing the trust of the Muslim states if the fighting in the Gaza Strip becomes protracted’, the source admits. ‘In addition, Russia benefits from the current events in terms of diverting the attention of the United States and the EU from Ukraine towards the Middle East. The current situation in the geopolitical arena gives Moscow a large number of opportunities. However, in order to implement them, it is necessary to offer constructive approaches to getting out of the situation and implement diplomatic efforts at a qualitative level,’ the political scientist emphasizes.
‘Over time Russia could use its influence in the Middle East to prevent the threat of an Iranian-Israeli war. It is quite possible that Tel Aviv will try to take revenge on Teheran for supporting Hamas,’ Rahr believes.
However, not everyone is ready to accept Moscow’s neutrality in its current form. Thus, Yakov Kedmi, the former head of the Israeli intelligence service Nativ, does not consider Russia’s position ‘correct and beneficial to it.’ ‘I understand that the Kremlin wants to maintain warm relations with Turkey and Iran. In addition, many Muslims live on the territory of the Russian Federation. Therefore, Moscow is trying not to choose a side,’ he notes.
Left to right: Stanislav Tkachenko, Timofei Bordachev, Yakov Kedmi (Yakov Kazakov). The Valdai Club in which the first two Russians participate regularly, is an academic organisation financed by the Kremlin. Russian-born Kedmi is an Israeli who used to run Nativ, an Israel government organisation for the objectives of encouraging Jews to migrate from Russia and gathering intelligence on Russia from those who do not.
‘”However, it would be fair to recognize Hamas as terrorists. The fact is that they are not the legitimate authority of the Gaza Strip. The group has taken control of it by force and is now killing civilians on our territory. Moreover, Israel even cooperates with the Palestinian authorities to prevent the crimes of the Islamic organization,’ the source emphasizes.
‘I believe that Russia can support the legitimate authority of Palestine and contribute to the return of the Gaza Strip under its control. However, it is also necessary to recognise Hamas as a terrorist organization. Moscow will act based on its interests, but at the same time it will condemn radicals and extremists,’ Kedmi emphasises.
Kirill Semenov, an expert of the Russian Council on International Affairs, expresses a different position. In his opinion, Moscow ‘made it clear that it considers the creation of an independent state of Palestine incredibly important, but Tel Aviv does not want the future of the region to be built in this direction.’
‘Israel has been deliberately oppressing the Gaza Strip and the West Bank for a long time. Local residents were forced out of their native lands by illegal development of the territory. This cannot work to achieve stability in the Middle East, so Russia quite correctly points out the need to change the current situation,’ the source says. .
‘Nevertheless, Moscow is still interested in developing at least neutral relations with Israel. The current geopolitical situation allows both countries to stop concerns about each other. Russia’s neutrality serves as a kind of assurance to Tel Aviv that weapons will not be sent en masse to Iran,’ the expert emphasises.
‘I note that any equipment delivered to Teheran may end up in the hands of Hamas or Hezbollah. Of course, Israel is trying to avoid this outcome. In this regard, the country is also restrained from supporting Ukraine, since this would be the starting point for a tougher position of Russia,’ Semenov sums up.
Meanwhile, the Kremlin previously answered the question of why Moscow does not recognize Hamas as a terrorist organization. As the press secretary of the President of the Russian Federation Dmitry Peskov recalled, Russia maintains contacts with both sides of the conflict, and the ‘number one priority’ in this matter is the interests of the country’s citizens who live both in Palestine and in Israel. ‘In addition, Russia continues to carefully analyse the situation and maintains its position as a party that has the potential to participate in the settlement processes,’ Peskov was quoted as saying.
At the same time Putin later noted once again that ‘Israel was faced, of course, with such an unprecedented attack, which has not been in history – not only in scale, but also in the nature of execution – what can I say, we need to call things by their proper names.’ At the same time, ‘Israel responds on a large scale and also with rather cruel methods.’
First of all, the President stressed, it is necessary to think about the civilian population in the situation around the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. ‘Of course, we understand the logic of events. But despite all the toughening on both sides, I still think that, of course, we need to think about the civilian population,’ Putin concluded.
Question: Should Russia recognize Hamas as a terrorist organization?
Results: Yes, 29.2%; No, 59.4%; difficult to say, 17.5%. Sample 1,804.
NOTE: The lead image, right, is Prime Minister Netanyahu’s display of a map at his UN speech on September 22, 2023. Here is the Jerusalem Post report of Netanyahu’s speech explaining his map. The territory of Israel in Netanyahu’s display incorporated all the Palestinian territories and the Syrian Golan Heights. Here is the Palestinian interpretation of the map in retrospect, broadcast on October 14 -- from Min 10:57: https://www.rt.com/shows/going-undergro ... ine-media/
https://johnhelmer.net/wp-content/webpc ... &nocache=1
https://johnhelmer.net/white-flag-in-a- ... more-88682
By John Helmer, Moscow @bears_with
The first Moscow newspaper analysis has appeared of Russia’s current position towards Israel and Palestine. It supports President Vladimir Putin’s public endorsement of the two-state solution between the Israelis and Palestinians.
Entitled “Why Russia remains neutral in the conflict in the Middle East”, Vzglyad, the Moscow security strategy publication, posted the piece late on Friday evening, October 13. It added an opinion poll for its readers with a single question, “should Russia recognise Hamas as a terrorist organisation?”
The new analysis and conclusion are in contrast to Vzglyad’s call six months ago for Russia to reorient its position towards the Arab side. This is also a marked change of editorial line in the prevailing silence in Moscow: there has been no Security Council meeting since October 3; no State Duma debate; no national opinion polling of public attitudes.
The Arab-Israeli conflict is the one in which Israel is destroying the remnants of the Palestine state territories of Gaza, the West Bank, and East Jerusalem, and replaces that two-state solution with a single state; that is the Israeli one in which about 7 million Jews restrict about 2 million Arabs in bantustans administered according to an apartheid regime.
The rules of this Jewish-based order have been fixed in Israel’s constitutional amendment enacted in 2018 as the “Basic Law: Israel – the Nation State of the Jewish People”, and ratified by the Israeli Supreme Court in 2021. This adopts the single- state solution expanding territorially by resettlement of the Palestinian territories “as a national value”; and in parallel, combating international opposition to the process by Israeli state operations to “preserve the cultural, historical and religious heritage of the Jewish People among Jews in the Diaspora.”
By equating Jewish ethnicity and religious faith with nationality of the Israeli state, this constitution eliminates Palestinian, Arab, and Muslim rights with the formula, “the exercise of the right to national self-determination in the State of Israel is unique to the Jewish People.” The corollary is that any Palestinian exercise of the right to self-determination on the expanding Jewish national territory is illegal, anti-Semitic, and terrorist. Internationally, it is the policy of Israel and its allies to make support for or discussion of Palestinian right to self-determination a thought and speech crime.
In Russian politics, this is the one international conflict on which President Vladimir Putin has said so much since the start of his term, and done so little – this has been to advocate the two-state solution in public while in private to impose a do-nothing, say-catchword line on diplomats and military officials, and the state media.
The gap between the Kremlin and the General Staff and Defense Ministry became visible in September 2018 after the Israel Air Force caused the shoot-down in Syria of a Russian Ilyushin-20M electronic reconnaissance aircraft, and the killing of all fifteen crewmen on board. At that time the Russian military expressed a loss of confidence which had not been seen in public since President Boris Yeltsin countermanded orders for Russian military support of Serbia under NATO bombing between March and June 1999, and dismissed Prime Minister Yevgeny Primakov on the US demand.
In the present fighting between Palestinian, Arab and Israeli forces, the options for Russian action are numerous; the public debate over what the options should be has been nugatory. There have been no national opinion polls; no State Duma debate; no meeting of the Security Council since October 3.
An initial statement by Patriarch Kirill of the Russian Orthodox Church was carefully balanced between Palestine and Israel, referring to the “military conflict” between the two sides, not a unilateral act of terrorism. “Peaceful coexistence” between the religious communities, Kirill said, has a “religious dimension” and requires a “just peace”. In context, this was a tilt against Israel. The Church’s Department for External Church Relations issued the statement on October 7; there has been nothing since.
As a bellwether of Russian security analysts, Vzglyad’s decision to publish a report of expert assessments on “the advantages of Russia’s neutrality in the conflict in the Middle East” is unusual. Vzglyad’s publishing record shows what the new report is not. Strategically, Russia is being obliged by the US and NATO alliance to fight an all-forces war in Europe, and commit small forces in separate conflicts in Syria; Transdnistria and Moldova; Azerbaijan and Armenia; with the possibility of engagement in the Kosovo fight against Serbia. There is no discussion in the Vzglyad outline of Russian capacities to conduct military operations on all battlefields simultaneously.
No military or intelligence source, to which Vzglyad has frequent and unique access, has been quoted. Privately, some of these sources suspect bargaining with the US in the Quartet format of the American “monopoly” of Israel for Russia’s “monopoly” of the Ukraine.
Vzglyad’s writers and editors decline to answer questions.
The Russian text has been translated verbatim without cuts or editing. Illustrations and captions have been added for clarification.
October 13, 2023
WHY RUSSIA REMAINS NEUTRAL IN THE CONFLICT IN THE MIDDLE EAST
Experts have assessed the advantages of Russia’s neutrality in the conflict in the Middle East
By Yevgeny Poznyakov and Ilya Abramov
Source: https://vz.ru/politics/2023/10/13/1234833.html
Vladimir Putin has declared the need to create an independent state of Palestine – this will become the basis for the settlement of the conflict in the Middle East. On the other hand, the Russian president has recognised Israel’s right to self-defence. Thus, Moscow has once again indicated its neutrality in this matter. Why has equidistance become Russia’s main position in the current events and what benefits does this approach promise Moscow?
This week, President Vladimir Putin said that Russia assumes that there is no alternative to resolving the Palestinian-Israeli conflict through negotiations. He announced this at the CIS [Commonwealth of Independent States] summit in Bishkek. According to him, Tel Aviv was subjected to a brutal attack and has the right to defend itself, but a real settlement of the situation is possible only if an independent Palestine is created with East Jerusalem as its capital.
In his opinion, the goal of the negotiations should be the implementation of the UN formula of ‘two states’, and there is no alternative to this. He added that ‘we need to take care of resolving this issue by peaceful means.’ Putin called the war in the Middle East a large-scale tragedy for the Israelis and Palestinians. This conflict was ‘a direct result of the failed policy of the United States in the Middle East.’ In addition, the Russian leader warned Tel Aviv against launching a ground operation in the Gaza Strip.
The entire international community is concerned about the solution of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. Back in 1967, after the end of the Six-Day War, the UN Security Council issued Resolution 242 calling on Tel Aviv to withdraw troops from the territory of East Jerusalem annexed during the fighting.
https://peacemaker.un.org/
In July 1980, the Conference of Leaders of Non-Aligned Countries declared the holy city ‘an integral part of occupied Palestine’ and it ‘must be completely abandoned and unconditionally transferred to Arab sovereignty.’ In response, Tel Aviv adopted a law on Jerusalem, according to which the settlement was proclaimed ‘one and indivisible’ and was given the status of the capital of the Jewish state.
Following that, United States tried to resolve the situation in the region. In 1993, as part of secret negotiations in Norway, the Oslo-1 agreement was signed, according to which the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) recognised Israel’s rights to exist ‘in peace and security’, and Tel Aviv agreed to interim agreements on self-government for the Arab autonomy.
Later, in 1995 the Oslo-2 agreement was signed on expanding the power of the Palestinians by creating an elected body for a limited period – for a period of no more than five years from the date of signing the agreements. However, the authority of the document was undermined by the change of government in Israel in 1996, as a result of which the country postponed the redeployment of troops in Hebron.
https://peacemaker.un.org/
Against the background of the unceasing attempts of the world community to reconcile the conflicting parties, Russia has built strong relations with both Palestine and Israel. Tel Aviv and other cities have become the centre of attraction for immigrants from the USSR and Russia. The poet and bard Vladimir Vysotsky aptly spoke about the strong social ties of the two peoples at the time: ‘… and there is a quarter of our former people.’
A similar state of affairs affects the current interaction of the states. The Israeli authorities avoided, as far as possible, involvement in the conflict in Ukraine, and the personal relations of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Vladimir Putin have always been considered warm, as the newspaper Vzglyad previously reported in detail.
At the same time, Russia is a long-standing and reliable partner of many Muslim and Arab states. During the Soviet period, Moscow was the defender of the Palestinians, and therefore the friendship of the parties was not lost even after the collapse of the USSR. At the same time, the building of relations with Iran is successfully progressing, which also has its own view on the current conflict.
In addition, the efforts of domestic diplomacy have created a path and difficult but constructive and mutually beneficial relations with Turkey, another important player in the region. And there are many Muslims living in Russia itself, which plays into Moscow’s hands when building partnership and trusting relations with states where Islam is the main religion.
In this regard, the expert community is confident that the position taken by Russia is the only correct one under the circumstances. Moscow is aware of the importance of creating two independent states in the region and insists on a peaceful settlement of the conflict, not wanting to see its expansion into the entire Middle East.
‘Moscow continues to defend the classic thesis for international relations that an armed conflict is an unacceptable way to resolve existing contradictions. This explains our neutrality within the framework of the ongoing events,’ said Stanislav Tkachenko, Professor of the Department of European Studies at the Faculty of International Relations of St. Petersburg State University, an expert of the Valdai Club.
‘The position taken by Russia is optimal. We are clearly aware that this war does not affect Moscow’s key interests, respectively, and it is not worth wasting invaluable diplomatic and military resources on it. However, Western countries adhere to a completely different approach in their policies,’ the source believes.
‘The US and the EU have almost completely aligned themselves with Tel Aviv, which reduces their manoeuverability. Moreover, the need to provide enormous support to Israel distracts the attention of Washington and Brussels from what is happening in Ukraine. This, of course, plays into Russia’s hands,’ the expert notes.
‘Nevertheless, Moscow does not want to see an increase in the conflict zone to the scale of the entire Middle East region. This scenario will not be beneficial to any state. However, theoretically, if Western countries begin to increase the volume of aid to Israel, then such an outcome will become quite likely,’ the source emphasises. ‘In this case, Russia can use its strong ties with both Palestine and Israel to act as a mediator in resolving the conflict,’ Tkachenko notes. ‘However, at the moment we are not actively seeking to fulfil this role, the time has not yet come.’
Timofei Bordachev, program director of the Valdai International Discussion Club, also calls the position chosen by Moscow correct. ‘In the current conflict, Russia stands on the side of international law. The need to create two full-fledged states, Israel and Palestine, has long been spelled out in many international documents. Nevertheless, we see that there is practically no progress in this direction,’ he said.
‘However, the implementation of the announced provisions is necessary. This method is the only way out of the crisis that can help stabilise the situation in the region. Actually, Vladimir Putin correctly points out the same thing. At the same time, the sympathies of Western countries are obviously leaning in favour of Israel,’ the expert notes.
‘Such a policy is not acceptable for Russia. We have taken a clear and verified position of neutrality. In my opinion, in the current situation this approach is most in line with Moscow’s interests. Our country does not have the habit of poking its nose into other people’s affairs, so we will continue to keep our distance from what is happening,’ Bordachev emphasizes.
At the same time, the current conflict is fraught with many potential benefits for Russia, it is believed in Europe. According to German political scientist Alexander Rahr, Russia is quite capable of providing direct assistance to resolve the confrontation between Hamas and Israel. ‘In a situation where the entire Western world has unconditionally sided with Tel Aviv, Moscow could theoretically act as a great mediator in the conflict. Washington and Brussels risk losing the trust of the Muslim states if the fighting in the Gaza Strip becomes protracted’, the source admits. ‘In addition, Russia benefits from the current events in terms of diverting the attention of the United States and the EU from Ukraine towards the Middle East. The current situation in the geopolitical arena gives Moscow a large number of opportunities. However, in order to implement them, it is necessary to offer constructive approaches to getting out of the situation and implement diplomatic efforts at a qualitative level,’ the political scientist emphasizes.
‘Over time Russia could use its influence in the Middle East to prevent the threat of an Iranian-Israeli war. It is quite possible that Tel Aviv will try to take revenge on Teheran for supporting Hamas,’ Rahr believes.
However, not everyone is ready to accept Moscow’s neutrality in its current form. Thus, Yakov Kedmi, the former head of the Israeli intelligence service Nativ, does not consider Russia’s position ‘correct and beneficial to it.’ ‘I understand that the Kremlin wants to maintain warm relations with Turkey and Iran. In addition, many Muslims live on the territory of the Russian Federation. Therefore, Moscow is trying not to choose a side,’ he notes.
Left to right: Stanislav Tkachenko, Timofei Bordachev, Yakov Kedmi (Yakov Kazakov). The Valdai Club in which the first two Russians participate regularly, is an academic organisation financed by the Kremlin. Russian-born Kedmi is an Israeli who used to run Nativ, an Israel government organisation for the objectives of encouraging Jews to migrate from Russia and gathering intelligence on Russia from those who do not.
‘”However, it would be fair to recognize Hamas as terrorists. The fact is that they are not the legitimate authority of the Gaza Strip. The group has taken control of it by force and is now killing civilians on our territory. Moreover, Israel even cooperates with the Palestinian authorities to prevent the crimes of the Islamic organization,’ the source emphasizes.
‘I believe that Russia can support the legitimate authority of Palestine and contribute to the return of the Gaza Strip under its control. However, it is also necessary to recognise Hamas as a terrorist organization. Moscow will act based on its interests, but at the same time it will condemn radicals and extremists,’ Kedmi emphasises.
Kirill Semenov, an expert of the Russian Council on International Affairs, expresses a different position. In his opinion, Moscow ‘made it clear that it considers the creation of an independent state of Palestine incredibly important, but Tel Aviv does not want the future of the region to be built in this direction.’
‘Israel has been deliberately oppressing the Gaza Strip and the West Bank for a long time. Local residents were forced out of their native lands by illegal development of the territory. This cannot work to achieve stability in the Middle East, so Russia quite correctly points out the need to change the current situation,’ the source says. .
‘Nevertheless, Moscow is still interested in developing at least neutral relations with Israel. The current geopolitical situation allows both countries to stop concerns about each other. Russia’s neutrality serves as a kind of assurance to Tel Aviv that weapons will not be sent en masse to Iran,’ the expert emphasises.
‘I note that any equipment delivered to Teheran may end up in the hands of Hamas or Hezbollah. Of course, Israel is trying to avoid this outcome. In this regard, the country is also restrained from supporting Ukraine, since this would be the starting point for a tougher position of Russia,’ Semenov sums up.
Meanwhile, the Kremlin previously answered the question of why Moscow does not recognize Hamas as a terrorist organization. As the press secretary of the President of the Russian Federation Dmitry Peskov recalled, Russia maintains contacts with both sides of the conflict, and the ‘number one priority’ in this matter is the interests of the country’s citizens who live both in Palestine and in Israel. ‘In addition, Russia continues to carefully analyse the situation and maintains its position as a party that has the potential to participate in the settlement processes,’ Peskov was quoted as saying.
At the same time Putin later noted once again that ‘Israel was faced, of course, with such an unprecedented attack, which has not been in history – not only in scale, but also in the nature of execution – what can I say, we need to call things by their proper names.’ At the same time, ‘Israel responds on a large scale and also with rather cruel methods.’
First of all, the President stressed, it is necessary to think about the civilian population in the situation around the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. ‘Of course, we understand the logic of events. But despite all the toughening on both sides, I still think that, of course, we need to think about the civilian population,’ Putin concluded.
Question: Should Russia recognize Hamas as a terrorist organization?
Results: Yes, 29.2%; No, 59.4%; difficult to say, 17.5%. Sample 1,804.
NOTE: The lead image, right, is Prime Minister Netanyahu’s display of a map at his UN speech on September 22, 2023. Here is the Jerusalem Post report of Netanyahu’s speech explaining his map. The territory of Israel in Netanyahu’s display incorporated all the Palestinian territories and the Syrian Golan Heights. Here is the Palestinian interpretation of the map in retrospect, broadcast on October 14 -- from Min 10:57: https://www.rt.com/shows/going-undergro ... ine-media/
https://johnhelmer.net/wp-content/webpc ... &nocache=1
https://johnhelmer.net/white-flag-in-a- ... more-88682
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."
Re: Russia today
Putin in Beijing
October 17, 2023
The principal news items on Russian state television this evening were the reception Vladimir Putin was given by Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing and the succession of meetings that he had with other heads of state who are participating in the 10th anniversary celebrations of China’s Belt and Road Initiative.
You won’t find a word about the Russian President’s visit to Beijing in this evening’s online New York Times, but the paper’s editorial board is slow to post news about Putin, probably waiting for the State Department to suggest the proper ‘spin.’ However, The Financial Times online gives Putin ‘front page’ coverage in two articles: one is an overview of his scheduled meetings and the other focuses on his talks with one leader in particular, prime minister Viktor Orban of Hungary.
Let us stop for a moment to consider what the FT wants us to know about Putin in Beijing. And after that we can come back to the Russian coverage, which not only casts a different light on what you read in FT but provides a good deal more factual information to take in.
*****
In keeping with its regular propagandistic journalism, the FT cannot print an article about Putin without reminding its readers what a pariah he is, a man pursued by international courts, a man who is isolated and weak. The title itself already sets the tone: “Vladimir Putin visits Beijing for first time since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.”
Yes, they concede in the first paragraph that he arrived in China “for a high-level meeting with Chinese leader Xi Jinping,” but then take the air out of that by saying it was the Kremlin which described Putin as the ‘main guest’ at the event, not their own reporter on the ground in Beijing.
Two lines down we read: “The Russian leader cut back his foreign travel after the war in Ukraine began and until last week had not left the country since a war crimes indictment from the International Criminal Court in March.” We are reminded that Putin skipped the G20 meetings in Indonesia and in India in September.
Thus, almost half the article is spent telling us about where Putin has not traveled to and nothing about this visit to Beijing.
Moving on, the authors speak about how “Russia had become increasingly dependent on China as an economic lifeline” ever since the launch of its Special Military Operation and imposition of sanctions by the West. This is a quote from a former political adviser at the European parliament who is now with a university in Taiwan. The same expert completes the downgrading of Russia by explaining that it is the ‘junior partner’ in the relationship with China.
After kicking the tires of the Belt and Road Initiative in general for having to renegotiate or write off $79 billion in bad loans, the authors give us four lines at the end that actually contain some news, of which I quote two below:
“Putin met Hungary’s prime minister Viktor Orban and Vietnamese president Vo Van Thuong on Tuesday, ahead of further meetings with Thai, Mongolian and Laotian leaders.”
The space allotted to the close-up photo of Putin and Xi smiling complacently to one another at the head of the article is six times bigger than the actual news in the text of the article.
The separate article “Orban meets Putin in bid to ‘save everything possible’ in bilateral relations” might be said to be marginally better journalism though the same Max Seddon in Riga is a co-author of both. The editors have done their best to spoil everything by giving it the subtitle “European head is first western leader to meet Russian president since issue of war crimes warrant for his arrest.” Once again the big photo of Orban and Putin, clasping hands at their meeting, tells more than the text.
There are some of the same general reminders here of Putin’s alleged isolation and pariah status, but they are given more force by a quotation from the U.S. ambassador to Hungary condemning the meeting: “…Orban chooses to stand with a man whose forces are responsible for crimes against humanity in Ukraine…”
The only neutral remarks in the article catalog the common business interests of Russia and Hungary, including natural gas supply and a nuclear power plant under construction by Rosatom.
*****
Russian television news support the view that Putin is the main guest at the BRI gathering in Beijing by videos showing the entry of the participants to the state banquet this evening: the procession is led by Putin and Xi side by side. Just behind them is Xi’s wife and Kazakhstan president Tokaev. The several dozen others follow behind. Similarly in the video of all the leaders lined up for their group photo, Putin and Xi are together in the very center chatting to one another. Questions anyone about who is who, and what is what?
Perhaps the Russians go overboard in stressing the great demand of other participants for one-on-one time with Putin at the large residence which the Chinese made available for holding these tête-à-têtes in discrete luxury. Pavel Zarubin, the host of the Sunday evening program Moskva, Kremlin, Putin is a master at showing off details like the line of limousines of leaders waiting outside for their time in the sun with Putin.
Aside from footage from the meeting with Orban, Russian television presented to viewers the public part of Putin’s meeting with the president of Laos, who opened the conversation speaking passable if heavily accented Russian. As we learned, he was studying at Leningrad University during the same years as Putin, though in a different department. The Vietnamese president also made reference to studies in the Soviet Union in their opening remarks for the cameras. His talks with Putin were likely about energy first of all since Gazprom is fairly active in the country. Gazprom chairman Alexei Miller is in the Russian delegation. As for the meeting that Putin had with the interim president of Pakistan, who is an English speaker, we know that they discussed energy projects and deliveries of more than a million tons of Russian grain to Pakistan, presumably paid for in yuan. With the Mongolian president, Vesti tells us they discussed a new gas pipeline which apparently is intended to supply Mongolia itself and not only serve as a transit route to China.
However, from the Russian perspective these side meetings with other BRI Forum participants are small beer. What they are awaiting with great anticipation is the several hours tomorrow that Putin and Xi will spend one-on-one and then are joined by their respective delegations. We know that the situation in the Middle East is at the top of their agenda, with a secondary focus on the Ukraine war and remaining time devoted to further development of economic ties.
The one tantalizing tidbit that Russian news (Sixty Minutes) threw out to viewers is that whereas Putin returns to Moscow tomorrow evening, Foreign Minister Lavrov flies to North Korea for a meeting with Kim.
©Gilbert Doctorow, 2023
https://gilbertdoctorow.com/2023/10/17/ ... n-beijing/
October 17, 2023
The principal news items on Russian state television this evening were the reception Vladimir Putin was given by Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing and the succession of meetings that he had with other heads of state who are participating in the 10th anniversary celebrations of China’s Belt and Road Initiative.
You won’t find a word about the Russian President’s visit to Beijing in this evening’s online New York Times, but the paper’s editorial board is slow to post news about Putin, probably waiting for the State Department to suggest the proper ‘spin.’ However, The Financial Times online gives Putin ‘front page’ coverage in two articles: one is an overview of his scheduled meetings and the other focuses on his talks with one leader in particular, prime minister Viktor Orban of Hungary.
Let us stop for a moment to consider what the FT wants us to know about Putin in Beijing. And after that we can come back to the Russian coverage, which not only casts a different light on what you read in FT but provides a good deal more factual information to take in.
*****
In keeping with its regular propagandistic journalism, the FT cannot print an article about Putin without reminding its readers what a pariah he is, a man pursued by international courts, a man who is isolated and weak. The title itself already sets the tone: “Vladimir Putin visits Beijing for first time since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.”
Yes, they concede in the first paragraph that he arrived in China “for a high-level meeting with Chinese leader Xi Jinping,” but then take the air out of that by saying it was the Kremlin which described Putin as the ‘main guest’ at the event, not their own reporter on the ground in Beijing.
Two lines down we read: “The Russian leader cut back his foreign travel after the war in Ukraine began and until last week had not left the country since a war crimes indictment from the International Criminal Court in March.” We are reminded that Putin skipped the G20 meetings in Indonesia and in India in September.
Thus, almost half the article is spent telling us about where Putin has not traveled to and nothing about this visit to Beijing.
Moving on, the authors speak about how “Russia had become increasingly dependent on China as an economic lifeline” ever since the launch of its Special Military Operation and imposition of sanctions by the West. This is a quote from a former political adviser at the European parliament who is now with a university in Taiwan. The same expert completes the downgrading of Russia by explaining that it is the ‘junior partner’ in the relationship with China.
After kicking the tires of the Belt and Road Initiative in general for having to renegotiate or write off $79 billion in bad loans, the authors give us four lines at the end that actually contain some news, of which I quote two below:
“Putin met Hungary’s prime minister Viktor Orban and Vietnamese president Vo Van Thuong on Tuesday, ahead of further meetings with Thai, Mongolian and Laotian leaders.”
The space allotted to the close-up photo of Putin and Xi smiling complacently to one another at the head of the article is six times bigger than the actual news in the text of the article.
The separate article “Orban meets Putin in bid to ‘save everything possible’ in bilateral relations” might be said to be marginally better journalism though the same Max Seddon in Riga is a co-author of both. The editors have done their best to spoil everything by giving it the subtitle “European head is first western leader to meet Russian president since issue of war crimes warrant for his arrest.” Once again the big photo of Orban and Putin, clasping hands at their meeting, tells more than the text.
There are some of the same general reminders here of Putin’s alleged isolation and pariah status, but they are given more force by a quotation from the U.S. ambassador to Hungary condemning the meeting: “…Orban chooses to stand with a man whose forces are responsible for crimes against humanity in Ukraine…”
The only neutral remarks in the article catalog the common business interests of Russia and Hungary, including natural gas supply and a nuclear power plant under construction by Rosatom.
*****
Russian television news support the view that Putin is the main guest at the BRI gathering in Beijing by videos showing the entry of the participants to the state banquet this evening: the procession is led by Putin and Xi side by side. Just behind them is Xi’s wife and Kazakhstan president Tokaev. The several dozen others follow behind. Similarly in the video of all the leaders lined up for their group photo, Putin and Xi are together in the very center chatting to one another. Questions anyone about who is who, and what is what?
Perhaps the Russians go overboard in stressing the great demand of other participants for one-on-one time with Putin at the large residence which the Chinese made available for holding these tête-à-têtes in discrete luxury. Pavel Zarubin, the host of the Sunday evening program Moskva, Kremlin, Putin is a master at showing off details like the line of limousines of leaders waiting outside for their time in the sun with Putin.
Aside from footage from the meeting with Orban, Russian television presented to viewers the public part of Putin’s meeting with the president of Laos, who opened the conversation speaking passable if heavily accented Russian. As we learned, he was studying at Leningrad University during the same years as Putin, though in a different department. The Vietnamese president also made reference to studies in the Soviet Union in their opening remarks for the cameras. His talks with Putin were likely about energy first of all since Gazprom is fairly active in the country. Gazprom chairman Alexei Miller is in the Russian delegation. As for the meeting that Putin had with the interim president of Pakistan, who is an English speaker, we know that they discussed energy projects and deliveries of more than a million tons of Russian grain to Pakistan, presumably paid for in yuan. With the Mongolian president, Vesti tells us they discussed a new gas pipeline which apparently is intended to supply Mongolia itself and not only serve as a transit route to China.
However, from the Russian perspective these side meetings with other BRI Forum participants are small beer. What they are awaiting with great anticipation is the several hours tomorrow that Putin and Xi will spend one-on-one and then are joined by their respective delegations. We know that the situation in the Middle East is at the top of their agenda, with a secondary focus on the Ukraine war and remaining time devoted to further development of economic ties.
The one tantalizing tidbit that Russian news (Sixty Minutes) threw out to viewers is that whereas Putin returns to Moscow tomorrow evening, Foreign Minister Lavrov flies to North Korea for a meeting with Kim.
©Gilbert Doctorow, 2023
https://gilbertdoctorow.com/2023/10/17/ ... n-beijing/
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."
Re: Russia today
IN THE CORRIDORS OF POWER — THE US AND ISRAEL ARE DARING RUSSIA, CHINA AND THE WORLD TO GO TO WAR TO SAVE ARAB PALESTINE
By John Helmer, Moscow @bears_with
It comes to this now, again.
Call it a repeat of the SS ultimatum to the Warsaw Ghetto of April 1943 — evacuate and we’ll give you a small chance of surviving, or stay and we’ll kill you for certain.
Following the embrace of President Joseph Biden and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the US has endorsed the Israeli plan to force the evacuation of the Palestinians from Gaza City to designated camps in the south. There Israeli forces will allow convoys of humanitarian aid to enter from Egypt and unload after Israeli forces have inspected the cargoes. The new southern zone will be cordoned off by an Israeli ring of fire, and everything north of the line, including Gaza City will be destroyed, hospitals included.
This formula has been pressed on Egypt, the other Arab states, China, and Russia to accept by the UN Secretary-General, Antonio Guterres, a Portuguese government retiree, and his deputy for humanitarian affairs, Martin Griffiths, a British government retiree. They have emphasized there is no alternative to the destruction of Gaza, and its full absorption into the state of Israel. Reinforcing them, the US has cast its veto of all resolutions proposed in the UN Security Council (UNSC) by Russia, China and the Arab states to create humanitarian corridors under a ceasefire.
China is preparing a new UNSC resolution to face the US veto shortly, according to a statement by Zhang Jun during Wednesday’s UNSC debate in New York.
In Beijing, President Vladimir Putin and President Xi Jinping discussed between themselves what they plan to do jointly and publicly. “Over a cup of tea”, Putin told Russian reporters on Wednesday evening, “we talked for another hour and a half, maybe two hours, and discussed some very confidential issues face to face. It was a very productive and informative part of our meeting.” “Informative” in Russian means they were unable to agree to make a public declaration of a Sino-Russian action plan.
Instead, Putin announced he is deploying supersonic Kinzhal missiles within range of the US naval and air forces positioned in the eastern Mediterranean and in Jordan. “They have upped and dragged two carrier task forces to the Mediterranean. I want to say – what I am going to say and inform you about is not a threat – that I have instructed the Russian Aerospace Forces to start patrolling the neutral zone over the Black Sea on the permanent basis. Our MiG-31 aircraft carry the Kinzhal systems that, as is common knowledge, have a range of over 1,000 kilometres and can reach speeds of up to Mach 9.”
Putin repeated: “This is not a threat. But we will perform visual control, and weapons-based control over what is happening in the Mediterranean Sea.” In Russian, “this is not a threat” means this is exactly what it is.
Said twice, Putin was telling the US, Israel, Guterres, and Griffiths to consult the map of Russian missile strike ranges; and also to remember that the last US Navy aircraft carrier to be sunk by hostile fire was the USS Bismarck Sea which in February 1945 could not defend against waves of Japanese kamikaze aircraft.
This is the map of Russia’s missile strike ranges in the eastern Mediterranean:
The Tartous based fleet was reduced last week with the exit of the submarine, Krasnodar; Source: https://t.me/infantmilitario/110440
Listen to Chris Cook broadcasting on Gorilla Radio in the 32-minute summary of the main pointers of the world war now looming over Palestine, beginning at Minute 27:55. https://gorilla-radio.com/2023/10/19/go ... r-18-2023/
For the full story of what Russian officials are saying, and not saying; what they are doing, and not doing, read the backfile since the Hamas operation commenced on October 7.
The attempt of UN officials like Guterres and Griffiths, the US, and Israel to make their media case against Hamas is a misrepresentation of the history of Israeli operations against Gaza and its elected government over many years before October 7; for the record, read Jonathan Cook’s reporting from Nazareth, and his latest pieces here.
UN Secretary-General Guterres speaking in Bejing on October 18: “Immediately before departing for Beijing, I made two urgent humanitarian appeals: To Hamas, for the immediate and unconditional release of the hostages. To Israel, to immediately allow unrestricted access of humanitarian aid to respond to the most basic needs of the people of Gaza - the overwhelming majority of whom are women and children. I am fully aware of the deep grievances of the Palestinian people after 56 years of occupation. But, as serious as these grievances are, they cannot justify the acts of terror against civilians committed by Hamas on October 7 that I immediately condemned. But those attacks cannot justify the collective punishment of the Palestinian people.”
International humanitarian law, comprising international conventions and treaties, as well as judgements and case argument from the International Court of Justice, has formulated the legal rights of self-defence to include armed measures provoked by and proportional to the violence of the armed attack; read more. This history and the law cast the operation of October 7, decided by the Gaza government’s military wing, in a totally different legal light.
In the public formulations of Russian policy, Hamas is treated as the lawfully elected government of the Gaza part of Palestine, and a “party to the hostilities”, not as a terrorist organisation. There has been no public discussion of the official Russian interpretation of the international law applying to the October 7 operation or to the subsequent fighting. The Russian military establishment, the military bloggers reporting on the fighting in Palestine, as well Vasily Nebenzya, the Russian Ambassador to the UN, have called the bombardment of the Al-Alhi Hospital in Gaza an “air strike” from Israel, not an errant Hamas rocket. Nebenzya explained to the UNSC that in drafting the wording of the Russian resolution to implement a ceasefire and a stop to indiscriminate attacks on civilians and civilian targets, Moscow intended not to name either Hamas or Israel in order to avoid the political polarisation the terms are triggering.
The US, like Guterres, Griffiths and other UN officials have insisted on naming Hamas as a terrorist organisation which initiated the violence on October 7. The UN officials have also disclaimed knowing who was responsible for the hospital attack during Wednesday’s session of the UNSC. According to Tor Wennesland, the Norwegian government retiree appointed by Guterres as his special Middle East mediator, “responsibilities [for the hospital attack] still need to be clarified…” Griffiths repeated the know-nothing line, and called for a “fact-based inquiry into what happened.”
Griffiths was reporting to the UNSC from Cairo. Guterres is scheduled to fly from Beijing to join Griffiths in Cairo on Thursday. On Monday, October 16, Griffiths had announced his terms for humanitarian relief of Gaza to have come from US Secretary of State Antony Blinken who, Griffiths said, had been “hugely helpful”. Blinken’s terms came from Netanyahu: no aid without release of Hamas hostages; depopulation of Gaza City; creation of “places of deconfliction” (Griffiths’s term) under Israeli military cordon with US military backup.
There were two Russian papers for the UNSC vote on Wednesday. The first proposed “an unambiguous call for a stop on indiscriminate attacks on civilians and civilian objects in the Gaza Strip [including the hospital attacked by “an airstrike”]” and an “immediate, durable and fully respected humanitarian ceasefire”. — Min2-4:30.
The first proposal drew 6 votes; the second 7; the US vetoed them both. The abstainers included the UK. Nebenzya then responded by telling the Council session: “Those delegations who either abstained or who voted against were essentially against a cessation of the bloodshed in the Middle East. There can be no other explanations of it. Of course, the colleagues here… you’ve made your choice, however. And you are going to have to bear responsibility for it” (Min 10).
Vasily Nebenzya speaking at Wednesday’s session. “Given the extremely tense situation," the Foreign Ministry had reported in Moscow the day before, “it was necessary to act without delay. That is why the draft we presented did not contain political elements and assessments, mentions of one or another side of the conflict, which could complicate the process of its approval. Almost 30 countries, including 17 states of the Arab world, have become co-sponsors of the Russian initiative.” In its statement the Foreign Ministry blamed the US by name but omitted to identify Israel: “All this is happening with the inaction of the UN Security Council, paralysed…and in the narrow-minded interests of individual countries, whose unilateral actions not only ended in complete failure, but also led to a massive escalation of violence in the Middle East region.”
In his briefing of Russian reporters after meeting Xi on Wednesday night, Putin also avoided naming or blaming Israel.
Source: http://en.kremlin.ru/
“With regard to the strike on the hospital – the tragedy that happened there, this is a horrible event, which killed hundreds and left hundreds more wounded. Of course, this is a disaster for such a thing to happen in this place, especially considering its humanitarian mission. I do hope that this will serve as a signal that this conflict must end as quickly as possible. In any case, there must be a push paving the way towards the launch of contacts and talks. This is my first point.”
“Second, regarding the impressions I got during conversations with the five [actually seven – Iraq, Turkey, Egypt, Syria, Palestine, Iran, Israel] regional leaders, these were important talks, and timely too. Let me tell you what matters the most here without going into details: I have an impression that no one wants this conflict to continue or expand, or the situation to escalate. In my opinion, regarding the main actors – there is virtually no one there who wants the conflict to expand while others are wary of something and are not ready to turn it into a full-scale war. This is the impression I got. This is very important.”
Putin’s engagement in the negotiations with Egypt, other Arab states, Turkey, and Iran to secure a ceasefire and the establishment of corridors for the delivery of humanitarian aid to Gaza was first signalled at the Kremlin meeting on Monday, October 16. The Kremlin communiqué refers to this as a “meeting on current issues… to discuss the course of the special military operation and the situation in the zone of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.”
The only uniformed participant was the director of the Federal Service of National Guard Troops, Viktor Zolotov. His presence at this session is unprecedented, Kremlin, military and other Moscow sources acknowledge while claiming not to know the reason.
Left to right: Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov, Zolotov, and Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu; source.
A working-class steelworker, martial arts devotee, and former member of the KGB border guards, Zolotov has risen from the role of personal bodyguard for Boris Yeltsin, St. Petersburg Mayor Anatoly Sobchak, and Putin. In 2014 Putin appointed him head of Interior Ministry troops, and then upgraded this to the National Guard (Rosgvardiya) in 2016; with that post came a permanent seat in the Kremlin Security Council. In seven years, according to the Kremlin record, Zolotov has attended only one session of the Council.
The only Security Council meeting Zolotov attended until this week was on February 21, 2022, on the eve of the Special Military Operation; it was a session which Putin called to demonstrate publicly the support of all his officials for the operation. Zolotov made the shortest speech in the record of the meeting: “… we do not border on Ukraine, we have no border with Ukraine. This is the Americans’ border, because they are the masters in that country, while the Ukrainians are their vassals. And the fact that they are rushing weapons to Ukraine and are trying to create nuclear arsenals will backfire on us in the future. Recognising these republics is certainly a must. I would like to say that we should go ever further to defend our country. That is all I have to say. Thank you.”
Kremlin session of the Security Council on February 21, 2022 – Zolotov with Shoigu; Presidential Plenipotentiary Envoy to the Central Federal District Igor Shchegolev: and Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov. Source: http://en.kremlin.ru/
In September 2020, Zolotov met Putin one on one, and discussed the Guard’s performance “in joint tasks with the Combined Forces in the North Caucasus and the limited contingent in the Syrian Arab Republic.”
On August 30, 2022, there was a telltale meeting with Putin, again one on one, in which Zolotov reported the National Guard operations in the Donbass, noting that in addition to military operations, he directed convoy protection. “In addition, Russian National Guard patrols critical state property, infrastructure facilities and communications infrastructure. We facilitate humanitarian security, and we escort shipments and convoys. We also provide medical services to local population, and we treat civilians. This is the range of our tasks.” Zolotov also confirmed he was running specialised home, civilian, and infrastructure guard operations: “Furthermore, we also provide extradepartmental security services and protect people’s homes and property. We have over a million such facilities under our protection. We also continue to guard important state facilities – we have 72 such contracts, including facilities that are located in the Arctic and in the ports along the Northern Sea Route. In 2019, we were contracted to guard a floating nuclear power plant in Pevek.”
In short, Zolotov was the only official at Monday’s meeting with Putin with expertise and command responsibility for convoy operations in a combat zone, and for site security in Syria.
That operations of this kind have also been in discussion with Egypt is indicated, sources believe, by a flurry of telephone communication and meetings between the Egyptian Ambassador to Moscow, Nazih Nagari (right), and Foreign Ministry officials during Wednesday, October 18. The Russian communiqués confirm that “special attention is paid to the tasks of establishing the process of evacuation of civilians, including foreigners, from the enclave through the Rafah checkpoint and sending humanitarian aid to the residents of Gaza”; and “the issues of interaction in the BRICS were considered, including in the light of Russia’s upcoming chairmanship in this association. Some other issues of mutual interest were also discussed.”
In parallel with Nagari’s negotiations, the Foreign Ministry published a statement urging international coordination “towards an immediate ceasefire and to open humanitarian corridors in order to give badly needed support to people in Gaza, including deliveries of food, medicines and fuel, to evacuate everyone who wants to leave, and to prevent the looming humanitarian disaster.”
Listen to the hour-long discussion with Chris Cook: https://gorilla-radio.com/2023/10/19/go ... r-18-2023/
NOTE: Several hours after the broadcast, the first news was published that the Ministry of Emergencies has begun the first flights to El Arish of Russian humanitarian aid to the Palestinians. This first flight delivered 27 tonnes.
https://johnhelmer.net/in-the-corridors ... more-88694
A few other images at link.
By John Helmer, Moscow @bears_with
It comes to this now, again.
Call it a repeat of the SS ultimatum to the Warsaw Ghetto of April 1943 — evacuate and we’ll give you a small chance of surviving, or stay and we’ll kill you for certain.
Following the embrace of President Joseph Biden and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the US has endorsed the Israeli plan to force the evacuation of the Palestinians from Gaza City to designated camps in the south. There Israeli forces will allow convoys of humanitarian aid to enter from Egypt and unload after Israeli forces have inspected the cargoes. The new southern zone will be cordoned off by an Israeli ring of fire, and everything north of the line, including Gaza City will be destroyed, hospitals included.
This formula has been pressed on Egypt, the other Arab states, China, and Russia to accept by the UN Secretary-General, Antonio Guterres, a Portuguese government retiree, and his deputy for humanitarian affairs, Martin Griffiths, a British government retiree. They have emphasized there is no alternative to the destruction of Gaza, and its full absorption into the state of Israel. Reinforcing them, the US has cast its veto of all resolutions proposed in the UN Security Council (UNSC) by Russia, China and the Arab states to create humanitarian corridors under a ceasefire.
China is preparing a new UNSC resolution to face the US veto shortly, according to a statement by Zhang Jun during Wednesday’s UNSC debate in New York.
In Beijing, President Vladimir Putin and President Xi Jinping discussed between themselves what they plan to do jointly and publicly. “Over a cup of tea”, Putin told Russian reporters on Wednesday evening, “we talked for another hour and a half, maybe two hours, and discussed some very confidential issues face to face. It was a very productive and informative part of our meeting.” “Informative” in Russian means they were unable to agree to make a public declaration of a Sino-Russian action plan.
Instead, Putin announced he is deploying supersonic Kinzhal missiles within range of the US naval and air forces positioned in the eastern Mediterranean and in Jordan. “They have upped and dragged two carrier task forces to the Mediterranean. I want to say – what I am going to say and inform you about is not a threat – that I have instructed the Russian Aerospace Forces to start patrolling the neutral zone over the Black Sea on the permanent basis. Our MiG-31 aircraft carry the Kinzhal systems that, as is common knowledge, have a range of over 1,000 kilometres and can reach speeds of up to Mach 9.”
Putin repeated: “This is not a threat. But we will perform visual control, and weapons-based control over what is happening in the Mediterranean Sea.” In Russian, “this is not a threat” means this is exactly what it is.
Said twice, Putin was telling the US, Israel, Guterres, and Griffiths to consult the map of Russian missile strike ranges; and also to remember that the last US Navy aircraft carrier to be sunk by hostile fire was the USS Bismarck Sea which in February 1945 could not defend against waves of Japanese kamikaze aircraft.
This is the map of Russia’s missile strike ranges in the eastern Mediterranean:
The Tartous based fleet was reduced last week with the exit of the submarine, Krasnodar; Source: https://t.me/infantmilitario/110440
Listen to Chris Cook broadcasting on Gorilla Radio in the 32-minute summary of the main pointers of the world war now looming over Palestine, beginning at Minute 27:55. https://gorilla-radio.com/2023/10/19/go ... r-18-2023/
For the full story of what Russian officials are saying, and not saying; what they are doing, and not doing, read the backfile since the Hamas operation commenced on October 7.
The attempt of UN officials like Guterres and Griffiths, the US, and Israel to make their media case against Hamas is a misrepresentation of the history of Israeli operations against Gaza and its elected government over many years before October 7; for the record, read Jonathan Cook’s reporting from Nazareth, and his latest pieces here.
UN Secretary-General Guterres speaking in Bejing on October 18: “Immediately before departing for Beijing, I made two urgent humanitarian appeals: To Hamas, for the immediate and unconditional release of the hostages. To Israel, to immediately allow unrestricted access of humanitarian aid to respond to the most basic needs of the people of Gaza - the overwhelming majority of whom are women and children. I am fully aware of the deep grievances of the Palestinian people after 56 years of occupation. But, as serious as these grievances are, they cannot justify the acts of terror against civilians committed by Hamas on October 7 that I immediately condemned. But those attacks cannot justify the collective punishment of the Palestinian people.”
International humanitarian law, comprising international conventions and treaties, as well as judgements and case argument from the International Court of Justice, has formulated the legal rights of self-defence to include armed measures provoked by and proportional to the violence of the armed attack; read more. This history and the law cast the operation of October 7, decided by the Gaza government’s military wing, in a totally different legal light.
In the public formulations of Russian policy, Hamas is treated as the lawfully elected government of the Gaza part of Palestine, and a “party to the hostilities”, not as a terrorist organisation. There has been no public discussion of the official Russian interpretation of the international law applying to the October 7 operation or to the subsequent fighting. The Russian military establishment, the military bloggers reporting on the fighting in Palestine, as well Vasily Nebenzya, the Russian Ambassador to the UN, have called the bombardment of the Al-Alhi Hospital in Gaza an “air strike” from Israel, not an errant Hamas rocket. Nebenzya explained to the UNSC that in drafting the wording of the Russian resolution to implement a ceasefire and a stop to indiscriminate attacks on civilians and civilian targets, Moscow intended not to name either Hamas or Israel in order to avoid the political polarisation the terms are triggering.
The US, like Guterres, Griffiths and other UN officials have insisted on naming Hamas as a terrorist organisation which initiated the violence on October 7. The UN officials have also disclaimed knowing who was responsible for the hospital attack during Wednesday’s session of the UNSC. According to Tor Wennesland, the Norwegian government retiree appointed by Guterres as his special Middle East mediator, “responsibilities [for the hospital attack] still need to be clarified…” Griffiths repeated the know-nothing line, and called for a “fact-based inquiry into what happened.”
Griffiths was reporting to the UNSC from Cairo. Guterres is scheduled to fly from Beijing to join Griffiths in Cairo on Thursday. On Monday, October 16, Griffiths had announced his terms for humanitarian relief of Gaza to have come from US Secretary of State Antony Blinken who, Griffiths said, had been “hugely helpful”. Blinken’s terms came from Netanyahu: no aid without release of Hamas hostages; depopulation of Gaza City; creation of “places of deconfliction” (Griffiths’s term) under Israeli military cordon with US military backup.
There were two Russian papers for the UNSC vote on Wednesday. The first proposed “an unambiguous call for a stop on indiscriminate attacks on civilians and civilian objects in the Gaza Strip [including the hospital attacked by “an airstrike”]” and an “immediate, durable and fully respected humanitarian ceasefire”. — Min2-4:30.
The first proposal drew 6 votes; the second 7; the US vetoed them both. The abstainers included the UK. Nebenzya then responded by telling the Council session: “Those delegations who either abstained or who voted against were essentially against a cessation of the bloodshed in the Middle East. There can be no other explanations of it. Of course, the colleagues here… you’ve made your choice, however. And you are going to have to bear responsibility for it” (Min 10).
Vasily Nebenzya speaking at Wednesday’s session. “Given the extremely tense situation," the Foreign Ministry had reported in Moscow the day before, “it was necessary to act without delay. That is why the draft we presented did not contain political elements and assessments, mentions of one or another side of the conflict, which could complicate the process of its approval. Almost 30 countries, including 17 states of the Arab world, have become co-sponsors of the Russian initiative.” In its statement the Foreign Ministry blamed the US by name but omitted to identify Israel: “All this is happening with the inaction of the UN Security Council, paralysed…and in the narrow-minded interests of individual countries, whose unilateral actions not only ended in complete failure, but also led to a massive escalation of violence in the Middle East region.”
In his briefing of Russian reporters after meeting Xi on Wednesday night, Putin also avoided naming or blaming Israel.
Source: http://en.kremlin.ru/
“With regard to the strike on the hospital – the tragedy that happened there, this is a horrible event, which killed hundreds and left hundreds more wounded. Of course, this is a disaster for such a thing to happen in this place, especially considering its humanitarian mission. I do hope that this will serve as a signal that this conflict must end as quickly as possible. In any case, there must be a push paving the way towards the launch of contacts and talks. This is my first point.”
“Second, regarding the impressions I got during conversations with the five [actually seven – Iraq, Turkey, Egypt, Syria, Palestine, Iran, Israel] regional leaders, these were important talks, and timely too. Let me tell you what matters the most here without going into details: I have an impression that no one wants this conflict to continue or expand, or the situation to escalate. In my opinion, regarding the main actors – there is virtually no one there who wants the conflict to expand while others are wary of something and are not ready to turn it into a full-scale war. This is the impression I got. This is very important.”
Putin’s engagement in the negotiations with Egypt, other Arab states, Turkey, and Iran to secure a ceasefire and the establishment of corridors for the delivery of humanitarian aid to Gaza was first signalled at the Kremlin meeting on Monday, October 16. The Kremlin communiqué refers to this as a “meeting on current issues… to discuss the course of the special military operation and the situation in the zone of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.”
The only uniformed participant was the director of the Federal Service of National Guard Troops, Viktor Zolotov. His presence at this session is unprecedented, Kremlin, military and other Moscow sources acknowledge while claiming not to know the reason.
Left to right: Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov, Zolotov, and Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu; source.
A working-class steelworker, martial arts devotee, and former member of the KGB border guards, Zolotov has risen from the role of personal bodyguard for Boris Yeltsin, St. Petersburg Mayor Anatoly Sobchak, and Putin. In 2014 Putin appointed him head of Interior Ministry troops, and then upgraded this to the National Guard (Rosgvardiya) in 2016; with that post came a permanent seat in the Kremlin Security Council. In seven years, according to the Kremlin record, Zolotov has attended only one session of the Council.
The only Security Council meeting Zolotov attended until this week was on February 21, 2022, on the eve of the Special Military Operation; it was a session which Putin called to demonstrate publicly the support of all his officials for the operation. Zolotov made the shortest speech in the record of the meeting: “… we do not border on Ukraine, we have no border with Ukraine. This is the Americans’ border, because they are the masters in that country, while the Ukrainians are their vassals. And the fact that they are rushing weapons to Ukraine and are trying to create nuclear arsenals will backfire on us in the future. Recognising these republics is certainly a must. I would like to say that we should go ever further to defend our country. That is all I have to say. Thank you.”
Kremlin session of the Security Council on February 21, 2022 – Zolotov with Shoigu; Presidential Plenipotentiary Envoy to the Central Federal District Igor Shchegolev: and Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov. Source: http://en.kremlin.ru/
In September 2020, Zolotov met Putin one on one, and discussed the Guard’s performance “in joint tasks with the Combined Forces in the North Caucasus and the limited contingent in the Syrian Arab Republic.”
On August 30, 2022, there was a telltale meeting with Putin, again one on one, in which Zolotov reported the National Guard operations in the Donbass, noting that in addition to military operations, he directed convoy protection. “In addition, Russian National Guard patrols critical state property, infrastructure facilities and communications infrastructure. We facilitate humanitarian security, and we escort shipments and convoys. We also provide medical services to local population, and we treat civilians. This is the range of our tasks.” Zolotov also confirmed he was running specialised home, civilian, and infrastructure guard operations: “Furthermore, we also provide extradepartmental security services and protect people’s homes and property. We have over a million such facilities under our protection. We also continue to guard important state facilities – we have 72 such contracts, including facilities that are located in the Arctic and in the ports along the Northern Sea Route. In 2019, we were contracted to guard a floating nuclear power plant in Pevek.”
In short, Zolotov was the only official at Monday’s meeting with Putin with expertise and command responsibility for convoy operations in a combat zone, and for site security in Syria.
That operations of this kind have also been in discussion with Egypt is indicated, sources believe, by a flurry of telephone communication and meetings between the Egyptian Ambassador to Moscow, Nazih Nagari (right), and Foreign Ministry officials during Wednesday, October 18. The Russian communiqués confirm that “special attention is paid to the tasks of establishing the process of evacuation of civilians, including foreigners, from the enclave through the Rafah checkpoint and sending humanitarian aid to the residents of Gaza”; and “the issues of interaction in the BRICS were considered, including in the light of Russia’s upcoming chairmanship in this association. Some other issues of mutual interest were also discussed.”
In parallel with Nagari’s negotiations, the Foreign Ministry published a statement urging international coordination “towards an immediate ceasefire and to open humanitarian corridors in order to give badly needed support to people in Gaza, including deliveries of food, medicines and fuel, to evacuate everyone who wants to leave, and to prevent the looming humanitarian disaster.”
Listen to the hour-long discussion with Chris Cook: https://gorilla-radio.com/2023/10/19/go ... r-18-2023/
NOTE: Several hours after the broadcast, the first news was published that the Ministry of Emergencies has begun the first flights to El Arish of Russian humanitarian aid to the Palestinians. This first flight delivered 27 tonnes.
https://johnhelmer.net/in-the-corridors ... more-88694
A few other images at link.
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."
Re: Russia today
Russia Is Crushed...
... by EU new sanctions. But, of course, apart from banning Russian diamonds, the perfidy of Lithuania knows no bounds. They are already crafting the unconditional surrender declaration in Kremlin and Mishustin is currently in Putin's cabinet, while Shoigu and Medvedev are noticed at the military airfield near Moscow boarding the government Tu-204 trying to escape to North Korea. Lithuania finally did it!
Overlong Russian steel-import exemptions also "significantly distort the steel market in the EU in favour of Belgian and Italian companies," Lithuania said. Vilnius' recommendations for "degrading of Russian industrial capacities" stretched to dozens of pages of minutiae. The EU, in previous rounds, banned exports of toilets to Russia, prompting mockery of living standards under Putin, where many people don't have ordinary mod cons. The 12th round should also include a ban on EU exports of "radiators for central heating, non-electrically heated, and parts thereof," (worth €49m last year) Lithuania said. And it should ban even sales of "nails, tacks, drawing pins" and "sewing needles, knitting needles", Vilnius said.
Fuck. I cannot get hold of my mother because all phone lines are busy because the moment Lithuania announced that it bans drawing pins and knitting needles people took to the streets of all major Russian cities. Putin's address to nation is expected shortly where he will also announce the crushing details of a collapse of strategic Russian industries, especially tacks. This one hurts especially badly. EU, you finally did it. Here is one to celebrate Lithuania's contribution:
Ah, needles and pins... I cannot believe still--drawing pins!! How could you, Lithuania.
https://youtu.be/0S-t45AGIpc
jfc, where did he dig that up? However, 'point' taken...
*******
Russian smartphones and tablets will appear in November
October 20, 20:17
And more news about import substitution.
Smartphones and tablets from Russian manufacturers will hit the market in November
Gadgets from domestic companies Fplus, ByteErg and Aquarius on Aurora OS will soon appear in retail sales. According to Kommersant's sources, smartphones and tablets will arrive in the Vsesmart retail chain in November. We are talking about devices in the lower price segment - up to ₽20 thousand. The key obstacle to gadgets running the Russian OS being able to occupy a significant market share is their incompatibility with Android applications.
As we previously wrote, ( https://t.me/suverenka/751)despite the active work being done in this direction, the Aurora application catalog cannot yet please with special variety. There are currently only 76 listings there, compared to millions on Google Play. So for the average user the choice is absolutely obvious. If the phone is needed not only to make calls, make phone calls and use some specialized work applications, then a smartphone on the Aurora OS will not even be considered by a potential buyer.
Of course, entering the consumer segment will speed up the development of software for Aurora, but customers need applications now, and not someday later.
At the moment, the only potential users of such devices can be considered officials or employees of state-owned companies. As restrictions are introduced on the use of foreign gadgets for this category of buyers, the demand for smartphones and tablets based on the Aurora OS will increase. Although it is unlikely that domestic producers will be able to occupy any significant market share.
So far, all measures taken should be considered only as an attempt by the state to protect critical infrastructure from external influence and create at least some kind of sales market for Russian gadgets.
https://t.me/suverenka/5144 - zinc
In the meantime, all our stores are filled with Chinese and Korean goods. The main thing is that it doesn’t work out like Yotafon https://dzen.ru/a/YfopUVvXohf8SiH1
However, we need to move in this direction, hitting the bumps, so as not to find ourselves in complete technological dependence on other countries for a number of parameters.
In principle, if you take a dialer, then you can try it if it is truly a domestic assembly, and not a Chinese one with a “made in Russia” label. There were precedents.
https://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/8717439.html
Google Translator
... by EU new sanctions. But, of course, apart from banning Russian diamonds, the perfidy of Lithuania knows no bounds. They are already crafting the unconditional surrender declaration in Kremlin and Mishustin is currently in Putin's cabinet, while Shoigu and Medvedev are noticed at the military airfield near Moscow boarding the government Tu-204 trying to escape to North Korea. Lithuania finally did it!
Overlong Russian steel-import exemptions also "significantly distort the steel market in the EU in favour of Belgian and Italian companies," Lithuania said. Vilnius' recommendations for "degrading of Russian industrial capacities" stretched to dozens of pages of minutiae. The EU, in previous rounds, banned exports of toilets to Russia, prompting mockery of living standards under Putin, where many people don't have ordinary mod cons. The 12th round should also include a ban on EU exports of "radiators for central heating, non-electrically heated, and parts thereof," (worth €49m last year) Lithuania said. And it should ban even sales of "nails, tacks, drawing pins" and "sewing needles, knitting needles", Vilnius said.
Fuck. I cannot get hold of my mother because all phone lines are busy because the moment Lithuania announced that it bans drawing pins and knitting needles people took to the streets of all major Russian cities. Putin's address to nation is expected shortly where he will also announce the crushing details of a collapse of strategic Russian industries, especially tacks. This one hurts especially badly. EU, you finally did it. Here is one to celebrate Lithuania's contribution:
Ah, needles and pins... I cannot believe still--drawing pins!! How could you, Lithuania.
https://youtu.be/0S-t45AGIpc
jfc, where did he dig that up? However, 'point' taken...
*******
Russian smartphones and tablets will appear in November
October 20, 20:17
And more news about import substitution.
Smartphones and tablets from Russian manufacturers will hit the market in November
Gadgets from domestic companies Fplus, ByteErg and Aquarius on Aurora OS will soon appear in retail sales. According to Kommersant's sources, smartphones and tablets will arrive in the Vsesmart retail chain in November. We are talking about devices in the lower price segment - up to ₽20 thousand. The key obstacle to gadgets running the Russian OS being able to occupy a significant market share is their incompatibility with Android applications.
As we previously wrote, ( https://t.me/suverenka/751)despite the active work being done in this direction, the Aurora application catalog cannot yet please with special variety. There are currently only 76 listings there, compared to millions on Google Play. So for the average user the choice is absolutely obvious. If the phone is needed not only to make calls, make phone calls and use some specialized work applications, then a smartphone on the Aurora OS will not even be considered by a potential buyer.
Of course, entering the consumer segment will speed up the development of software for Aurora, but customers need applications now, and not someday later.
At the moment, the only potential users of such devices can be considered officials or employees of state-owned companies. As restrictions are introduced on the use of foreign gadgets for this category of buyers, the demand for smartphones and tablets based on the Aurora OS will increase. Although it is unlikely that domestic producers will be able to occupy any significant market share.
So far, all measures taken should be considered only as an attempt by the state to protect critical infrastructure from external influence and create at least some kind of sales market for Russian gadgets.
https://t.me/suverenka/5144 - zinc
In the meantime, all our stores are filled with Chinese and Korean goods. The main thing is that it doesn’t work out like Yotafon https://dzen.ru/a/YfopUVvXohf8SiH1
However, we need to move in this direction, hitting the bumps, so as not to find ourselves in complete technological dependence on other countries for a number of parameters.
In principle, if you take a dialer, then you can try it if it is truly a domestic assembly, and not a Chinese one with a “made in Russia” label. There were precedents.
https://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/8717439.html
Google Translator
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."
Re: Russia today
Leningrad or St. Petersburg
No. 10/86.X.2023
Although I am a naturally inquisitive person, at the same time I cannot boast of the title of an avid traveler. The circumstances of my happy, but (more importantly in this context) modest life do not allow me to indulge myself, sufficiently satisfying the above curiosity. In this regard, it is surprising that even those rare “forays” into the outside world that I, due to various circumstances, have the opportunity to undertake, unfortunately, become forgotten by me in a very short time. This happens for reasons unknown to me, but obviously in some way connected with the peculiarities of my thinking apparatus.
So vivid impressions and deep thoughts would have continued to fade into oblivion, if not for my fateful meeting with the Marxists who united around the theoretical program of the Breakthrough magazine. Their propaganda experience and the comradely advice formulated on its basis allowed me to make a decision according to which, henceforth and for the rest of my life, I undertake (first of all, to myself) to record the impressions that arise on my life’s path, and to create on their basis journalism that will promote the formation of a true Marxist writer from an inquisitive young man.
Well, so that you, dear reader, do not suspect me of idle talk or verbiage, I hasten to share some of my thoughts, which were inspired by my recent trip to St. Petersburg.
I
Selflessness is a characteristic feature of healthy family, friendly or romantic relationships, guided by which close people strive to help each other and support each other (especially in difficult times). As a somewhat fortunate person, this rule did not bypass me. So, people close to me, wanting to distract me from the difficulties that I encountered on my life’s path, gave me the opportunity to visit one of the most beautiful cities on Earth, St. Petersburg.
I can't say that I was absolutely happy. Quite the contrary. The usual environment of work and study was to be replaced by a daily stream of abruptly changing events, devoid of the peace and high concentration that I was rich in in my ordinary life. However, realizing that rest is a necessary feature of a healthy lifestyle, I still went on my first trip in a long time.
The exhausting and long road to the destination did not in any way affect the first impression of St. Petersburg. And besides, from the moment I entered the city until the moment I left it, I strived for scientific knowledge of the essence of the northern capital, so I tried to keep the emotions that manifested themselves with varying degrees of frequency and interfered with a conscious study of the city under control. However, some of the impressions and thoughts overwhelmed me immediately upon arrival, without giving me time for deep analysis.
The unusual combination of tasteless modern and highly artistic classical architecture was initially not so noticeable against the background of my general admiration for the specific atmosphere of St. Petersburg, immersion in which was facilitated by the aroma of fresh coffee and expensive perfume, successive cozy St. Petersburg streets, occasionally separated by fragrant green squares, thoughts of luxurious palaces and grandiose architectural ensembles, which, as a joke, it seemed to me, were eagerly awaiting my visit. All this from the first minutes made me forget about the terrible headache and numb limbs. However, my first impression soon, as I promised myself, was replaced by a thoughtful study of St. Petersburg. A couple of days spent in the city were enough for me to formulate the verdict below.
II
The disgusting spectacle of moral depravity and spiritual degradation reminded us of the capitalist essence of what was once, indeed, a very cultured city. Communist Leningrad gave way to capitalist St. Petersburg not only in reference books and on maps, but also in the very appearance of the city, in the way of thinking of people both living in it and visiting it. Dozens of musicians, randomly located throughout the tourist center and often reminiscent of one of the main mottos of modern St. Petersburg, “Drink in St. Petersburg,” personify the “beneficial” influence of democracy and liberalism on culture.
Think about it! Don’t read Gogol or Pushkin, don’t walk through the summer gardens, talking about lofty and important things, don’t enjoy painting, sculpture and architecture, so richly represented in St. Petersburg, but drink, carouse, smoke (not always tobacco)… in general, relax in St. Petersburg.
Let's take, for example, the main street of the city, Nevsky Prospekt. Alcohol bars and strip clubs offering curious travelers a plunge into the pool of easily accessible sins; part-time students or migrants handing out leaflets at every step containing information about the evil of drugs, the need to fight drug addiction, leaflets that are only the appearance of this fight; brazen scammers masquerading as charming marketers and looking for the next naive victim among the crowds of tourists; mercantile girls who attract rich and no less mercantile suitors with their revealing outfits; golden youth, loudly and boorishly driving around in expensive foreign cars - this is what the main street of the “cultural capital” is filled with. And this is just a short list of examples of the famous St. Petersburg “culture” that I remember.
The main and, in truth, the only realizable function of St. Petersburg is to fulfill the dream of an ordinary person who seeks to hide from capitalist exploitation in thoughtless and incessant fun. And St. Petersburg, we must give it its due, successfully copes with this function. Fortunately, I was ready for this, since I did not have hopes about the above-mentioned “beneficial” influence of capitalism on culture. But understanding alone cannot completely suppress unpleasant impressions from direct perception of the source of disgust.
It is worth noting, however, that my negative emotions did not concern the cultural heritage itself, so nothing prevented me from visiting with great pleasure, for example, the Hermitage and the Mikhailovsky Palace, where I was able to enjoy the masterpieces of Aivazovsky and Bryullov, Rembrandt and da Vinci, Repin and Kuindzhi , get closer acquainted with ancient statues, with busts of Socrates, Spinoza, Herzen, Tolstoy, come into contact with your eyes and thoughts with the greatest works of art that the Russian land has ever seen.
However, even with “beautiful” everything is not so smooth. The fact is that many of the attractions, behind the veil of external splendor, conceal the suffering and torment of the working population. Luxurious vases and diamond jewelry were purchased with material resources obtained through the cruelest exploitation of the working population. The architecture, grandiose in its splendor, hid behind it the crimes of those in power, grandiose in brutality, who did not stop at any victims on the way to ostentatious greatness. Unfortunately, most people forget about this “little thing”. But in vain.
Visiting museums and other places of note from a cultural and historical point of view led me to another thought. Wandering through the beautiful halls and admiring the sights, I saw thousands and thousands of tourists mindlessly contemplating exhibits and displays. People who did not have access to the communist education system naively believed that a couple of hours spent in an “aesthetic” atmosphere could replace decades of philistine, alien-to-culture life, lifting them to the “spiritual Olympus.” And even the so-called audio guides, hung over the ears (like noodles in the famous Russian proverb), could not help in the same couple of hours to reverse decades of systematic degradation and stupidity. This observation once again reminded me of the former greatness of the once cultural city. Today, people come to St. Petersburg not out of a craving for the beautiful and great. No. They are attracted by the brand, fashion, and the vanity of the individualistic bourgeois who seeks to boast of his cultural experience over other similar individualistic bourgeois people. St. Petersburg has turned from a cultural capital into a capital of ostentatious prestige, revelry and forbidden pleasures.
In continuation of the topic, it is also worth adding that the institute of tour guides is very developed here (by and large, useless). Numerous excursions to museums or along water canals, filling the empty heads of listeners with meaningless and empty information, for example, about the number of diamonds in the empress’s bracelet, are a fiction, a deception for proud tourists, hypocritically assuring themselves and everyone around them of their interest, their literacy, with his sensitive and refined taste. Modern art historians do not explain the essence of art and culture as a special, necessary form of human labor, do not talk (truthfully and scientifically) about the horrors that accompanied the construction of St. Petersburg in general and individual palaces and castles in particular, do not explain all the stupidity and savagery of such events that doom thousands and millions of slaves to terrible spiritual and then physical death for the sake of the false happiness of a bunch of self-proclaimed rulers. All their art history scholarship is limited to listing secondary facts that obscure the light of truth, equally hidden both from the guides themselves and from their solvent, and therefore helpless, victims. Thus, visiting monuments and museums is nothing more than a tribute to some god of hypocritical decency; it is always a forced, but not always interesting, duty of a naive traveler.
How should it really be? The museum must be understood, not just viewed. The treasures of human culture stored in our museums can only be perceived by fully educated people, whose number tends to zero under capitalism. Until social relations undergo a qualitative change, there is no need to talk about any real cultural and educational events. Popular lectures and excursions are just a way of extracting money from tourists, a way that denies real culture, replacing it with a beautifully packaged surrogate.
The study of science and culture should be organized on the basis of a diamatic methodology of thinking, excluding idealism, pluralism, bourgeois objectivism and other forms of stupidity of humanity. Sporadic and random moments of acquiring knowledge (and often dubious; remember bourgeois art history and natural science, which are disseminated by the so-called “popularizers of science”
must be replaced by planned, targeted pedagogical scientific and educational practice, which is only possible with a communist organization of society.
Despite all the ugliness described above, Leningrad is one of the largest Soviet cities, so finding fragments of communist civilization here was not so difficult. On the advice of a friend, I slowly rode along the red line of the St. Petersburg metro, enjoying the famous Stalinist style, which was unfairly “forgotten” due to the fault of Khrushchev. Moreover, many of the already built Stalinist stations felt the consequences of the 20th Congress: for example, in 1961, at the Narva station, a mosaic panel with a portrait of Stalin was removed. The so-called struggle “against excesses in architecture” was in full swing, which personified the struggle between opportunism that had taken power and Lenin-Stalinist Marxism.
Unfortunately, not everything was done in a few days; for example, I was never able to visit the Kirov Apartment Museum and the Museum of the Siege of Leningrad, which, despite capitalism, which spreads slander against everything communist, could contain useful and interesting information about the Soviet period of the northern capital Cities. Therefore, I will look forward to a new opportunity for a deeper acquaintance with the communist side of this city.
III
Arriving in St. Petersburg, I could not ignore one more topic for discussion. As you know, St. Petersburg is usually called the “cultural capital” of Russia. Ironically, if you believe information from open sources, the city first received this unofficial title from Boris Yeltsin. Many years have passed since then, but this title remains firmly established in St. Petersburg. What is interesting is both the title itself and the historical circumstances under which it was received.
The collapse of the USSR entailed a degradation unprecedented in history not only of production, but also of culture. Mass closures of museums and libraries, institutes and research centers, departments and faculties influenced the entire post-Soviet public consciousness, destroying even the appearance of culture almost everywhere except large cities. Thousands of scientific and cultural workers, who instantly found themselves on the street, were directly confronted with the “generosity” and “kindness” of the democrats, about which the communists had been “lying” for so long. Therefore, obtaining the title of the capital of culture during the period of dominance of lack of culture is not at all accidental, but, on the contrary, a natural process, which is also reflected in the very wording of the title.
Post-Soviet capital accumulation gradually gave way to monopolization and concentration, which also affected culture. Moscow and St. Petersburg took into their clutches not only most of the production capacity of the former RSFSR, but also left tens of millions of workers outside the cultural context, plunging the province into material and spiritual poverty. Imperialism, destroying everything human, did not stop at the noble desire of people for the beautiful and true. The processes of monopolization, thus, were not limited to the economic sphere, extending to the cultural sphere. Those residents of St. Petersburg who curse the nineties and boast of the loud title of “cultural capital” do not understand that both phenomena do not contradict each other, they are two natural consequences of the “liberation” of Russia from the shackles of “communist totalitarianism.” As a result, we have, on the one hand, a concentration of culture (or rather, what else can be called such) in economically dominant cities, and on the other hand, poverty and degradation in the provinces. Those rare fragments of culture that remained after the Democrats came to power rest solely on the enthusiasm of individual outstanding personalities. However, such secular asceticism, devoid of understanding of the need to move towards communism, is only a new reading of the so-called “ theory of small deeds ” and is doomed to failure, as the harsh reality of the dying Russian hinterland demonstrates to us. The question of what form such processes (cultural policy and educational programs) took and should take during the construction of communism is of some interest and should be considered in a separate article.
IV
On the last day of my stay in St. Petersburg, sitting on a bench in one of the small parks of Vasilievsky Island, I was looking on the Internet for information related to the history of Leningrad, and accidentally came across a news story that talked about the initiative of certain “communist activists” to rename St. Petersburg to Leningrad. This incident is far from the first, but it is quite remarkable and important in the context of my trip.
It is obvious that the renaming of St. Petersburg can carry a positive content that will help cleanse national history of at least that radical form of liberal anti-communism that was implemented with varying degrees of success in the era preceding the Northern Military District. However, no renaming is capable of returning to the minds of millions an understanding of the significance of this city for all humanity, in other words, it is not capable of introducing the knowledge of Marxism into the consciousness of the average person. Leningrad is not just a set of letters, not just a name. Leningrad is a symbol of communism, a symbol of reason and freedom, goodness and love. This is the city that became the cradle of the first communist revolution, the city that personifies the beginning of a qualitatively new era in the history of civilization, the city that realized the dream of all advanced humanity, the city that with honor withstood the onslaught of European barbarism, the city... of Lenin, the greatest of people. Therefore, pathetic attempts at formal historical revenge undertaken by short-sighted activists are perceived only as an insult to the memory of our glorious ancestors, who sacrificed their lives not for the sake of the name, but for the sake of the meaning contained in it.
If the Russian authorities find it necessary and beneficial, then they will carry out this renaming without expecting new initiatives from various activists. Historical circumstances force the domestic bourgeoisie to resort to formal and often superstructural re-Sovietization from above, which communists should use to explain to people the meaning of such processes, their class essence and possible consequences for the country. Otherwise, the populist measures of the Russian government will continue to be perceived as a deliberate “left turn,” which obviously does not suit us.
The communists are not against the renaming itself, because, as I have already said, from the point of view of communist agitation, it does more good than harm. Communists are against the populist activities of activists who replace integral communist practice with a parody of it, an empty shake of the air through loud newspaper headlines. A true communist in our time should not run around to various administrations, carrying complaints and wishes, but engage in systematic communist propaganda and self-education, cultivating his conscience and will, training in the journalistic field. Only then will the renaming of Leningrad be the work not of individual bourgeois bureaucrats, but of the entire Russian people, led by the Communist Party.
V
So. What do we have in the end? Leningrad was a cultural city not in name, but in essence. And this culture was determined not so much by the number of masterpieces of art, but by mass literacy and culture, which was the result of the synthesis of the spiritual and material heritage of Russian and foreign masters with the unprecedented educational activities of the Bolsheviks. The scientific, cultural and industrial center that Leningrad was under the conscientious communists Stalin, Kirov and Zhdanov, under the unscrupulous anti-communist oligarchs, turned into a glamorous garbage dump, filled to overflowing with pubs and brothels, teeming with drug addicts, perverts, homeless people and other city “attractions”. As it was before the communist revolution.
The situation on the banks of the Neva is typical for any capitalist society. Culture is replaced by a brand, knowledge by intellectual snobbery. However, there is no reason for despondency. Vice versa. A comparative analysis of the same city is capable of demonstrating better than any statistical collections and slanderous “studies” the real difference between a communist dictatorship and a liberal democracy, between a society of creators and a conglomerate of consumers. Therefore, making such comparisons seems useful for communist propaganda and agitation.
The fact that modern St. Petersburg does not deserve the title that it received with the light hand of the first president of democratic Russia does not raise the slightest doubt in me. Moreover, real culture is, firstly, a communist phenomenon, unattainable on the basis of the “civilization” of private property, the “civilization” of the rule of ignorance and dishonesty, and, secondly, a phenomenon that does not limit itself to the framework of metropolitan agglomerations. Communist culture strives to be present in the lives of people both in large cities and beyond. The elimination of illiteracy in the USSR was carried out, including in villages and villages, which resulted in an unprecedented pace of education of the masses and an increase in the productive forces. Over two decades, the Bolsheviks managed to make a real breakthrough in the field of education, turning a backward peasant empire into an advanced industrial power. All this was possible only thanks to the fact that the party was led by communist leaders, the largest theoreticians and practitioners of Marxism - Lenin and Stalin.
I would prefer to stop listing the names of these two great people. In the future, many topics can still be thought about, something can be clarified, something can be added, but the journey has come to an end. Actually, it’s difficult to call my trip a vacation. But these are the features of modern big cities, which overwhelm you with their energy of constant haste. You need to try hard to really relax in the “metropolis”. Nevertheless, my trip gave me important thoughts, which I hastened to share with you, dear reader. Therefore, I have the right to recognize my journey as useful, productive and instructive.
Bronislav
25/10/2023
https://prorivists.org/86_leningrad/
Google Translator
No. 10/86.X.2023
Although I am a naturally inquisitive person, at the same time I cannot boast of the title of an avid traveler. The circumstances of my happy, but (more importantly in this context) modest life do not allow me to indulge myself, sufficiently satisfying the above curiosity. In this regard, it is surprising that even those rare “forays” into the outside world that I, due to various circumstances, have the opportunity to undertake, unfortunately, become forgotten by me in a very short time. This happens for reasons unknown to me, but obviously in some way connected with the peculiarities of my thinking apparatus.
So vivid impressions and deep thoughts would have continued to fade into oblivion, if not for my fateful meeting with the Marxists who united around the theoretical program of the Breakthrough magazine. Their propaganda experience and the comradely advice formulated on its basis allowed me to make a decision according to which, henceforth and for the rest of my life, I undertake (first of all, to myself) to record the impressions that arise on my life’s path, and to create on their basis journalism that will promote the formation of a true Marxist writer from an inquisitive young man.
Well, so that you, dear reader, do not suspect me of idle talk or verbiage, I hasten to share some of my thoughts, which were inspired by my recent trip to St. Petersburg.
I
Selflessness is a characteristic feature of healthy family, friendly or romantic relationships, guided by which close people strive to help each other and support each other (especially in difficult times). As a somewhat fortunate person, this rule did not bypass me. So, people close to me, wanting to distract me from the difficulties that I encountered on my life’s path, gave me the opportunity to visit one of the most beautiful cities on Earth, St. Petersburg.
I can't say that I was absolutely happy. Quite the contrary. The usual environment of work and study was to be replaced by a daily stream of abruptly changing events, devoid of the peace and high concentration that I was rich in in my ordinary life. However, realizing that rest is a necessary feature of a healthy lifestyle, I still went on my first trip in a long time.
The exhausting and long road to the destination did not in any way affect the first impression of St. Petersburg. And besides, from the moment I entered the city until the moment I left it, I strived for scientific knowledge of the essence of the northern capital, so I tried to keep the emotions that manifested themselves with varying degrees of frequency and interfered with a conscious study of the city under control. However, some of the impressions and thoughts overwhelmed me immediately upon arrival, without giving me time for deep analysis.
The unusual combination of tasteless modern and highly artistic classical architecture was initially not so noticeable against the background of my general admiration for the specific atmosphere of St. Petersburg, immersion in which was facilitated by the aroma of fresh coffee and expensive perfume, successive cozy St. Petersburg streets, occasionally separated by fragrant green squares, thoughts of luxurious palaces and grandiose architectural ensembles, which, as a joke, it seemed to me, were eagerly awaiting my visit. All this from the first minutes made me forget about the terrible headache and numb limbs. However, my first impression soon, as I promised myself, was replaced by a thoughtful study of St. Petersburg. A couple of days spent in the city were enough for me to formulate the verdict below.
II
The disgusting spectacle of moral depravity and spiritual degradation reminded us of the capitalist essence of what was once, indeed, a very cultured city. Communist Leningrad gave way to capitalist St. Petersburg not only in reference books and on maps, but also in the very appearance of the city, in the way of thinking of people both living in it and visiting it. Dozens of musicians, randomly located throughout the tourist center and often reminiscent of one of the main mottos of modern St. Petersburg, “Drink in St. Petersburg,” personify the “beneficial” influence of democracy and liberalism on culture.
Think about it! Don’t read Gogol or Pushkin, don’t walk through the summer gardens, talking about lofty and important things, don’t enjoy painting, sculpture and architecture, so richly represented in St. Petersburg, but drink, carouse, smoke (not always tobacco)… in general, relax in St. Petersburg.
Let's take, for example, the main street of the city, Nevsky Prospekt. Alcohol bars and strip clubs offering curious travelers a plunge into the pool of easily accessible sins; part-time students or migrants handing out leaflets at every step containing information about the evil of drugs, the need to fight drug addiction, leaflets that are only the appearance of this fight; brazen scammers masquerading as charming marketers and looking for the next naive victim among the crowds of tourists; mercantile girls who attract rich and no less mercantile suitors with their revealing outfits; golden youth, loudly and boorishly driving around in expensive foreign cars - this is what the main street of the “cultural capital” is filled with. And this is just a short list of examples of the famous St. Petersburg “culture” that I remember.
The main and, in truth, the only realizable function of St. Petersburg is to fulfill the dream of an ordinary person who seeks to hide from capitalist exploitation in thoughtless and incessant fun. And St. Petersburg, we must give it its due, successfully copes with this function. Fortunately, I was ready for this, since I did not have hopes about the above-mentioned “beneficial” influence of capitalism on culture. But understanding alone cannot completely suppress unpleasant impressions from direct perception of the source of disgust.
It is worth noting, however, that my negative emotions did not concern the cultural heritage itself, so nothing prevented me from visiting with great pleasure, for example, the Hermitage and the Mikhailovsky Palace, where I was able to enjoy the masterpieces of Aivazovsky and Bryullov, Rembrandt and da Vinci, Repin and Kuindzhi , get closer acquainted with ancient statues, with busts of Socrates, Spinoza, Herzen, Tolstoy, come into contact with your eyes and thoughts with the greatest works of art that the Russian land has ever seen.
However, even with “beautiful” everything is not so smooth. The fact is that many of the attractions, behind the veil of external splendor, conceal the suffering and torment of the working population. Luxurious vases and diamond jewelry were purchased with material resources obtained through the cruelest exploitation of the working population. The architecture, grandiose in its splendor, hid behind it the crimes of those in power, grandiose in brutality, who did not stop at any victims on the way to ostentatious greatness. Unfortunately, most people forget about this “little thing”. But in vain.
Visiting museums and other places of note from a cultural and historical point of view led me to another thought. Wandering through the beautiful halls and admiring the sights, I saw thousands and thousands of tourists mindlessly contemplating exhibits and displays. People who did not have access to the communist education system naively believed that a couple of hours spent in an “aesthetic” atmosphere could replace decades of philistine, alien-to-culture life, lifting them to the “spiritual Olympus.” And even the so-called audio guides, hung over the ears (like noodles in the famous Russian proverb), could not help in the same couple of hours to reverse decades of systematic degradation and stupidity. This observation once again reminded me of the former greatness of the once cultural city. Today, people come to St. Petersburg not out of a craving for the beautiful and great. No. They are attracted by the brand, fashion, and the vanity of the individualistic bourgeois who seeks to boast of his cultural experience over other similar individualistic bourgeois people. St. Petersburg has turned from a cultural capital into a capital of ostentatious prestige, revelry and forbidden pleasures.
In continuation of the topic, it is also worth adding that the institute of tour guides is very developed here (by and large, useless). Numerous excursions to museums or along water canals, filling the empty heads of listeners with meaningless and empty information, for example, about the number of diamonds in the empress’s bracelet, are a fiction, a deception for proud tourists, hypocritically assuring themselves and everyone around them of their interest, their literacy, with his sensitive and refined taste. Modern art historians do not explain the essence of art and culture as a special, necessary form of human labor, do not talk (truthfully and scientifically) about the horrors that accompanied the construction of St. Petersburg in general and individual palaces and castles in particular, do not explain all the stupidity and savagery of such events that doom thousands and millions of slaves to terrible spiritual and then physical death for the sake of the false happiness of a bunch of self-proclaimed rulers. All their art history scholarship is limited to listing secondary facts that obscure the light of truth, equally hidden both from the guides themselves and from their solvent, and therefore helpless, victims. Thus, visiting monuments and museums is nothing more than a tribute to some god of hypocritical decency; it is always a forced, but not always interesting, duty of a naive traveler.
How should it really be? The museum must be understood, not just viewed. The treasures of human culture stored in our museums can only be perceived by fully educated people, whose number tends to zero under capitalism. Until social relations undergo a qualitative change, there is no need to talk about any real cultural and educational events. Popular lectures and excursions are just a way of extracting money from tourists, a way that denies real culture, replacing it with a beautifully packaged surrogate.
The study of science and culture should be organized on the basis of a diamatic methodology of thinking, excluding idealism, pluralism, bourgeois objectivism and other forms of stupidity of humanity. Sporadic and random moments of acquiring knowledge (and often dubious; remember bourgeois art history and natural science, which are disseminated by the so-called “popularizers of science”
must be replaced by planned, targeted pedagogical scientific and educational practice, which is only possible with a communist organization of society.Despite all the ugliness described above, Leningrad is one of the largest Soviet cities, so finding fragments of communist civilization here was not so difficult. On the advice of a friend, I slowly rode along the red line of the St. Petersburg metro, enjoying the famous Stalinist style, which was unfairly “forgotten” due to the fault of Khrushchev. Moreover, many of the already built Stalinist stations felt the consequences of the 20th Congress: for example, in 1961, at the Narva station, a mosaic panel with a portrait of Stalin was removed. The so-called struggle “against excesses in architecture” was in full swing, which personified the struggle between opportunism that had taken power and Lenin-Stalinist Marxism.
Unfortunately, not everything was done in a few days; for example, I was never able to visit the Kirov Apartment Museum and the Museum of the Siege of Leningrad, which, despite capitalism, which spreads slander against everything communist, could contain useful and interesting information about the Soviet period of the northern capital Cities. Therefore, I will look forward to a new opportunity for a deeper acquaintance with the communist side of this city.
III
Arriving in St. Petersburg, I could not ignore one more topic for discussion. As you know, St. Petersburg is usually called the “cultural capital” of Russia. Ironically, if you believe information from open sources, the city first received this unofficial title from Boris Yeltsin. Many years have passed since then, but this title remains firmly established in St. Petersburg. What is interesting is both the title itself and the historical circumstances under which it was received.
The collapse of the USSR entailed a degradation unprecedented in history not only of production, but also of culture. Mass closures of museums and libraries, institutes and research centers, departments and faculties influenced the entire post-Soviet public consciousness, destroying even the appearance of culture almost everywhere except large cities. Thousands of scientific and cultural workers, who instantly found themselves on the street, were directly confronted with the “generosity” and “kindness” of the democrats, about which the communists had been “lying” for so long. Therefore, obtaining the title of the capital of culture during the period of dominance of lack of culture is not at all accidental, but, on the contrary, a natural process, which is also reflected in the very wording of the title.
Post-Soviet capital accumulation gradually gave way to monopolization and concentration, which also affected culture. Moscow and St. Petersburg took into their clutches not only most of the production capacity of the former RSFSR, but also left tens of millions of workers outside the cultural context, plunging the province into material and spiritual poverty. Imperialism, destroying everything human, did not stop at the noble desire of people for the beautiful and true. The processes of monopolization, thus, were not limited to the economic sphere, extending to the cultural sphere. Those residents of St. Petersburg who curse the nineties and boast of the loud title of “cultural capital” do not understand that both phenomena do not contradict each other, they are two natural consequences of the “liberation” of Russia from the shackles of “communist totalitarianism.” As a result, we have, on the one hand, a concentration of culture (or rather, what else can be called such) in economically dominant cities, and on the other hand, poverty and degradation in the provinces. Those rare fragments of culture that remained after the Democrats came to power rest solely on the enthusiasm of individual outstanding personalities. However, such secular asceticism, devoid of understanding of the need to move towards communism, is only a new reading of the so-called “ theory of small deeds ” and is doomed to failure, as the harsh reality of the dying Russian hinterland demonstrates to us. The question of what form such processes (cultural policy and educational programs) took and should take during the construction of communism is of some interest and should be considered in a separate article.
IV
On the last day of my stay in St. Petersburg, sitting on a bench in one of the small parks of Vasilievsky Island, I was looking on the Internet for information related to the history of Leningrad, and accidentally came across a news story that talked about the initiative of certain “communist activists” to rename St. Petersburg to Leningrad. This incident is far from the first, but it is quite remarkable and important in the context of my trip.
It is obvious that the renaming of St. Petersburg can carry a positive content that will help cleanse national history of at least that radical form of liberal anti-communism that was implemented with varying degrees of success in the era preceding the Northern Military District. However, no renaming is capable of returning to the minds of millions an understanding of the significance of this city for all humanity, in other words, it is not capable of introducing the knowledge of Marxism into the consciousness of the average person. Leningrad is not just a set of letters, not just a name. Leningrad is a symbol of communism, a symbol of reason and freedom, goodness and love. This is the city that became the cradle of the first communist revolution, the city that personifies the beginning of a qualitatively new era in the history of civilization, the city that realized the dream of all advanced humanity, the city that with honor withstood the onslaught of European barbarism, the city... of Lenin, the greatest of people. Therefore, pathetic attempts at formal historical revenge undertaken by short-sighted activists are perceived only as an insult to the memory of our glorious ancestors, who sacrificed their lives not for the sake of the name, but for the sake of the meaning contained in it.
If the Russian authorities find it necessary and beneficial, then they will carry out this renaming without expecting new initiatives from various activists. Historical circumstances force the domestic bourgeoisie to resort to formal and often superstructural re-Sovietization from above, which communists should use to explain to people the meaning of such processes, their class essence and possible consequences for the country. Otherwise, the populist measures of the Russian government will continue to be perceived as a deliberate “left turn,” which obviously does not suit us.
The communists are not against the renaming itself, because, as I have already said, from the point of view of communist agitation, it does more good than harm. Communists are against the populist activities of activists who replace integral communist practice with a parody of it, an empty shake of the air through loud newspaper headlines. A true communist in our time should not run around to various administrations, carrying complaints and wishes, but engage in systematic communist propaganda and self-education, cultivating his conscience and will, training in the journalistic field. Only then will the renaming of Leningrad be the work not of individual bourgeois bureaucrats, but of the entire Russian people, led by the Communist Party.
V
So. What do we have in the end? Leningrad was a cultural city not in name, but in essence. And this culture was determined not so much by the number of masterpieces of art, but by mass literacy and culture, which was the result of the synthesis of the spiritual and material heritage of Russian and foreign masters with the unprecedented educational activities of the Bolsheviks. The scientific, cultural and industrial center that Leningrad was under the conscientious communists Stalin, Kirov and Zhdanov, under the unscrupulous anti-communist oligarchs, turned into a glamorous garbage dump, filled to overflowing with pubs and brothels, teeming with drug addicts, perverts, homeless people and other city “attractions”. As it was before the communist revolution.
The situation on the banks of the Neva is typical for any capitalist society. Culture is replaced by a brand, knowledge by intellectual snobbery. However, there is no reason for despondency. Vice versa. A comparative analysis of the same city is capable of demonstrating better than any statistical collections and slanderous “studies” the real difference between a communist dictatorship and a liberal democracy, between a society of creators and a conglomerate of consumers. Therefore, making such comparisons seems useful for communist propaganda and agitation.
The fact that modern St. Petersburg does not deserve the title that it received with the light hand of the first president of democratic Russia does not raise the slightest doubt in me. Moreover, real culture is, firstly, a communist phenomenon, unattainable on the basis of the “civilization” of private property, the “civilization” of the rule of ignorance and dishonesty, and, secondly, a phenomenon that does not limit itself to the framework of metropolitan agglomerations. Communist culture strives to be present in the lives of people both in large cities and beyond. The elimination of illiteracy in the USSR was carried out, including in villages and villages, which resulted in an unprecedented pace of education of the masses and an increase in the productive forces. Over two decades, the Bolsheviks managed to make a real breakthrough in the field of education, turning a backward peasant empire into an advanced industrial power. All this was possible only thanks to the fact that the party was led by communist leaders, the largest theoreticians and practitioners of Marxism - Lenin and Stalin.
I would prefer to stop listing the names of these two great people. In the future, many topics can still be thought about, something can be clarified, something can be added, but the journey has come to an end. Actually, it’s difficult to call my trip a vacation. But these are the features of modern big cities, which overwhelm you with their energy of constant haste. You need to try hard to really relax in the “metropolis”. Nevertheless, my trip gave me important thoughts, which I hastened to share with you, dear reader. Therefore, I have the right to recognize my journey as useful, productive and instructive.
Bronislav
25/10/2023
https://prorivists.org/86_leningrad/
Google Translator
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."
Re: Russia today
Breaking News: Russia tests its nuclear triad for massive response capability
A couple of days ago, Russian evening news showed a brief video of Vladimir Putin arriving at the southern military command center in Rostov on Don for a meeting with Valery Gerasimov, Head of the General Staff of Russian Armed Forces. We were shown their handshakes at the start and their handshakes at the conclusion of the meeting as Putin was on his way to his aircraft, but nothing was said about the reason for the visit.
This evening we found out about the likely topic of the talks two days ago. Breaking news on Russian television gave some sketchy details of the tests just carried out on the war readiness of the country’s nuclear triad for response to some incoming nuclear missile from an unnamed enemy. Gerasimov reported to Putin on the satisfactory results of the launch from the nuclear submarine Tula in the Barents Sea of a Sineva ballistic missile with 5,500 km range; the launch of a Yars ballistic missile with 12,000 km range from an underground shaft in Kamchatka; and the launch of a 5,500 km range cruise missile from a TU-95 “Bear” turboprop bomber-missile carrier (location unspecified). Considering the location of the missile launches and the radius of possible strikes, it does not take much imagination to conclude that the enemy being attacked was the U.S. of A. The actual tests consisted of one missile each; the capability being tested was for a massive retaliatory strike.
We may assume that the tests were Russia’s response to the announcement within the past week of American ‘pre-tests’ of nuclear weapons, which Moscow took to indicate that Washington intends to proceed with weapons testing in one way or another now that the treaty banning such tests has become dead letter. Or we may assume that the Russian missile firings were a warning to the United States against escalation in the Middle East by attacking Iran.
On the subject of Iran, Russian state television yesterday told us about the visit to Teheran of Foreign Minister Lavrov, who arrived from meetings in Pyongyang with North Korean leader Kim and had talks with the Iranians and representatives of Armenia and Azerbaijan over resolution of their conflict. Lavrov told a reporter inter alia that talks with Teheran over conclusion of a Strategic Partnership agreement are 90% complete.
Today Russian state television related news from Prime Minister Mishustin on his talks with Iranian leaders over furtherance of bilateral trade and also on the likely conclusion before year’s end of a Free Trade Zone agreement with the Eurasian Economic Union. Clearly the ‘axis of evil’ is forming with amazing speed under pressure from the wars in Ukraine and now in the Middle East.
I call attention to the difference in tone with respect to Iran by Israeli leaders these past two days and by spokesmen of the Biden administration. A member of Netanyahu’s cabinet has threatened Iran with utter destruction, whereas American officials are focusing their attention on the various proxies that Iran is helping to prepare for military action against Israel if the ground invasion of Gaza proceeds. Moreover, it is now unclear whether the large naval task forces that the United States is assembling in the Eastern Mediterranean and in the Red Sea are intended for offensive action against Iran or for defensive action, to protect American bases in the region against attack from pro-Iranian forces and to evacuate American military and civilians from the region if necessary.
©Gilbert Doctorow, 2023
Postscript, 26 October 2023:
One linguistic point worth mentioning as regards the announcement of the tests of the nuclear triad:
Vladimir Solovyov on his show last night called attention to the word наступательный to describe Russia’s strategic nuclear weapons. That word means “offensive”. So what is this all about? It means that the Russians are heading towards first strike thinking. Not a small detail!
In this connection, it is worth considering that the trouble-making political scientist Karaganov who riled Western and also Russian peers by urging on Russia use of tactical nukes in some half-assed place like Poland or Romania to sober up Western leaders and remind them of Russia’s deterrence, now has come out with the statement a “nuclear war can be won.”
https://gilbertdoctorow.com/2023/10/25/ ... apability/
*******
Moscow State University students write to Putin
colonelcassad
October 25, 20:00
Continuing the topic about the scandal at Moscow State University with the actual disruption of teaching a course on information warfare at Moscow State University. Students have already reached the stage of writing open letters to Putin and the dean.
The further it goes, the more it looks like poorly hidden sabotage with the aim of eliminating the only university course in the Russian Federation on information and hybrid wars. And then they complain that we have problems with conducting information operations. Where can specialists come from if their training is not carried out systematically, and the only course that was launched after the start of the SVO drags out such a miserable existence.
https://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/8728434.html
Google Translator
A couple of days ago, Russian evening news showed a brief video of Vladimir Putin arriving at the southern military command center in Rostov on Don for a meeting with Valery Gerasimov, Head of the General Staff of Russian Armed Forces. We were shown their handshakes at the start and their handshakes at the conclusion of the meeting as Putin was on his way to his aircraft, but nothing was said about the reason for the visit.
This evening we found out about the likely topic of the talks two days ago. Breaking news on Russian television gave some sketchy details of the tests just carried out on the war readiness of the country’s nuclear triad for response to some incoming nuclear missile from an unnamed enemy. Gerasimov reported to Putin on the satisfactory results of the launch from the nuclear submarine Tula in the Barents Sea of a Sineva ballistic missile with 5,500 km range; the launch of a Yars ballistic missile with 12,000 km range from an underground shaft in Kamchatka; and the launch of a 5,500 km range cruise missile from a TU-95 “Bear” turboprop bomber-missile carrier (location unspecified). Considering the location of the missile launches and the radius of possible strikes, it does not take much imagination to conclude that the enemy being attacked was the U.S. of A. The actual tests consisted of one missile each; the capability being tested was for a massive retaliatory strike.
We may assume that the tests were Russia’s response to the announcement within the past week of American ‘pre-tests’ of nuclear weapons, which Moscow took to indicate that Washington intends to proceed with weapons testing in one way or another now that the treaty banning such tests has become dead letter. Or we may assume that the Russian missile firings were a warning to the United States against escalation in the Middle East by attacking Iran.
On the subject of Iran, Russian state television yesterday told us about the visit to Teheran of Foreign Minister Lavrov, who arrived from meetings in Pyongyang with North Korean leader Kim and had talks with the Iranians and representatives of Armenia and Azerbaijan over resolution of their conflict. Lavrov told a reporter inter alia that talks with Teheran over conclusion of a Strategic Partnership agreement are 90% complete.
Today Russian state television related news from Prime Minister Mishustin on his talks with Iranian leaders over furtherance of bilateral trade and also on the likely conclusion before year’s end of a Free Trade Zone agreement with the Eurasian Economic Union. Clearly the ‘axis of evil’ is forming with amazing speed under pressure from the wars in Ukraine and now in the Middle East.
I call attention to the difference in tone with respect to Iran by Israeli leaders these past two days and by spokesmen of the Biden administration. A member of Netanyahu’s cabinet has threatened Iran with utter destruction, whereas American officials are focusing their attention on the various proxies that Iran is helping to prepare for military action against Israel if the ground invasion of Gaza proceeds. Moreover, it is now unclear whether the large naval task forces that the United States is assembling in the Eastern Mediterranean and in the Red Sea are intended for offensive action against Iran or for defensive action, to protect American bases in the region against attack from pro-Iranian forces and to evacuate American military and civilians from the region if necessary.
©Gilbert Doctorow, 2023
Postscript, 26 October 2023:
One linguistic point worth mentioning as regards the announcement of the tests of the nuclear triad:
Vladimir Solovyov on his show last night called attention to the word наступательный to describe Russia’s strategic nuclear weapons. That word means “offensive”. So what is this all about? It means that the Russians are heading towards first strike thinking. Not a small detail!
In this connection, it is worth considering that the trouble-making political scientist Karaganov who riled Western and also Russian peers by urging on Russia use of tactical nukes in some half-assed place like Poland or Romania to sober up Western leaders and remind them of Russia’s deterrence, now has come out with the statement a “nuclear war can be won.”
https://gilbertdoctorow.com/2023/10/25/ ... apability/
*******
Moscow State University students write to Putin
colonelcassad
October 25, 20:00
Continuing the topic about the scandal at Moscow State University with the actual disruption of teaching a course on information warfare at Moscow State University. Students have already reached the stage of writing open letters to Putin and the dean.
The further it goes, the more it looks like poorly hidden sabotage with the aim of eliminating the only university course in the Russian Federation on information and hybrid wars. And then they complain that we have problems with conducting information operations. Where can specialists come from if their training is not carried out systematically, and the only course that was launched after the start of the SVO drags out such a miserable existence.
https://colonelcassad.livejournal.com/8728434.html
Google Translator
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."
Re: Russia today
THE PRESIDENT’S ATTENTION HAS WANDERED OVER THE DECADES, EVEN IN WARTIME, BUT HE KEEPS COMING BACK TO MARAT KHUSNULLIN
OCTOBER 28, 2023
By Andrey Pertsev & Svetlana Reiter, Meduza, 10/5/23
In the 2010s, Marat Khusnullin nearly rebuilt the city of Moscow. Today, he’s maneuvered himself into a leading role as the overseer of Russia’s “restoration” of annexed Ukrainian territories. Meduza explains how this construction bureaucrat from Tatarstan won a prized position in the federal government and especially in Vladimir Putin’s circle of trusted underlings.
Last month, in early September, Vladimir Putin christened a new section of the “Vostok” expressway connecting Moscow and Kazan. “You’re cleared… Let’s go,” the president said with a smile. Joining him at the ceremony was Deputy Prime Minister Marat Khusnullin, who oversees construction projects for the federal government. He hurriedly and obsequiously noted that the highway would have been impossible without Putin, crediting the president with “all the comprehensive solutions” needed “to build such a beauty of a road!”
A source close to the presidential administration told Meduza that Putin’s expressway jamboree was staged as a campaign event. Indeed, the ceremony took place just a few days before a gubernatorial election in the Nizhny Novgorod region (where the new highway section was built), and United Russia candidate Gleb Nikitin later won the vote handily. But the Kremlin already had a bigger campaign on its mind, says Meduza’s source, who calls Marat Khusnullin a “key figure” in Putin’s re-election next spring.
The administration will reportedly rely on Khusnullin to serve as one of the leading “event suppliers” ahead of election day. Meduza has already written about the Kremlin’s plan to transform next year’s race into a “parade of holidays” celebrating the many “achievements of Putin’s Russia.” Some of these festivities will feature the opening of new infrastructural facilities, including new chunks of expressway.
Meduza’s sources with knowledge of the Kremlin’s election plans say that Khusnullin has become “one of Putin’s favorite subordinates.” For example, when the president made a brisk nighttime visit to occupied Mariupol in March 2023, it was Khusnullin who accompanied Putin on a drive around town, boasting about Russia’s “restoration” of a city it bombed and shelled to the ground in many places.
“A helicopter arrives, there were two escort cars, and he got behind the wheel. He even chose the route himself. Nobody saw it coming… People recognized him and started exiting their apartments… So, everything turned out very friendly,” Khusnullin later said, describing Putin’s tour of the city.
A source close to the federal government cabinet told Meduza that Putin first noticed Khusnullin when the latter oversaw Tatarstan’s Construction Ministry. (Before this job, Khusnullin worked for local construction companies and also served as a deputy in Tatarstan’s State Council.) Two decades ago, Putin frequented Kazan, which celebrated its millennium in 2005 and hosted the Universiade (now known as the FISU World University Games) in 2013. When Putin came to town, Khusnullin took him on tours of construction sites around the city. “He always knew how to present himself to his superiors and point out his role in the common cause,” recalls a long-time acquaintance who worked with Khusnullin in Tatarstan.
Meduza’s sources attribute Khusnullin’s rapid career rise to these encounters in Kazan. By 2010, he oversaw construction in Moscow as one of the city’s deputy mayors and intersected with Putin even more often as one of the officials leading renovations to the Luzhniki Olympic Complex ahead of the 2018 FIFA World Cup. Additionally, he was front and center in creating Moscow’s Zaryadye landscape urban park and renovating buildings throughout the city. Khusnullin was also involved in the Moscow Subway’s expansion between 2012 and 2019 when the Metro added another 47 stations.
Dozens of businesspeople from Tatarstan followed Khusnullin to Moscow, where they found leading positions in the city’s construction sector. An investigation in September 2018 by journalists at Novaya Gazeta identified 46 of these people. For example, Khusnullin’s former deputy at Tatarstan’s Construction Ministry, Mars Gazizullin, went on to manage Moscow City’s Mosinzhproekt civil engineering company, which oversaw the subway’s expansion.
From 2011 to 2018, companies from Tatarstan and firms connected to entrepreneurs from the region won Moscow City contracts worth almost half a trillion rubles (roughly $5 billion in today’s currency). Investigative reporters found that some of these businesses and their owners had ties to Khusnullin, but he denies any corruption allegations.
Khusnullin didn’t limit himself to just participation in such projects but labored to promote himself publicly in any way he could. A source who worked at Moscow City Hall told Meduza that Khusnullin reads the news media (“even opposition outlets”) and Telegram channels and tries to ensure that he’s mentioned. For example, while working for the Mayor, Khusnullin’s press office regularly compiled “positive news” about Moscow and pushed it on Telegram.
But he always stresses shared achievements and puts his bosses first. “Meaning, it was the mayor when he worked at City Hall, not Mr. Khusnullin. The top figure came first; he was just the good executor of the leadership’s will. Irreplaceable, perhaps, but a mere operator,” says Meduza’s source.
This tactic paid off. In 2020, Khusnullin reached the federal level, becoming a deputy prime minister charged with overseeing construction projects. He promptly announced plans to build a network of roads between Russia’s regions and to renovate housing across the country. “Construction is movement; it’s energy,” he said in 2021, describing his feelings about the job. “You can see the results of your work immediately. If everything is going well, your mood improves instantly. I even love the smell of paint, cement, and dust.”
Sources who know Khusnullin say he lacks any “special political views.” “He understands the planned economy of the Soviet era, but he’s also fine with the free market,” the individuals told Meduza, adding that Khusnullin “loves hands-on management” and takes “subordination” very seriously: “He understands who is above him and who is below him. There’s a real cult of personality on his team.”
A source close to United Russia’s Moscow branch leadership told Meduza that Khusnullin is “crude but effective.” “Mr. Khusnullin is an experienced vizier from the East,” says a source close to the Kremlin. “He always knows what to tell the Shah, how to interest him, and how to thank him. For the president, this style of communication has become comfortable lately.”
As Meduza reported in the fall of 2022, Putin lost almost all interest in civilian affairs and domestic issues in the early months of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Even construction projects receded from the president’s agenda. While others in the federal government cabinet tried to keep their distance from the war, Khusnullin dove head-first, traveling regularly to the “new territories” and becoming Russia’s de facto curator of “restoration” infrastructure projects in occupied Ukraine. This, of course, caught Putin’s attention again, says a source with ties to the Kremlin.
Today, Khusnullin and the Construction Ministry he controls are key in allocating Russia’s construction contracts in the occupied territories. The total cost of this work is unknown, but the Russian authorities have estimated that the “restoration of infrastructure” will require at least 1.5 trillion rubles (more than $15 billion).
A source close to the Russian government cabinet told Meduza that Khusnullin understands how vital this restoration work is to Putin, and he even tries to outperform the president’s expectations, setting speed records and overfulfilling plans. For example, Khusnullin was the official who reported on the early completion of repairs to Russia’s coveted Crimean Bridge, which a truck bomb damaged in October 2022. Khusnullin has also declared that “the people are returning to Mariupol” thanks to the Russian authorities’ efforts. (He’s careful not to emphasize the invasion assault that caused the city’s exodus and devastation in the first place.)
On multiple occasions, Putin has praised Khusnullin. With the front lines in Ukraine frozen in many places, the president “is gradually getting tired of military topics” and regaining his interest in domestic affairs, say sources close to the Kremlin. “It’s become important to prove [to the West] that the economy is holding up and everything is going like before,” explained Meduza’s sources. “Construction, roads, and bridges — this is stuff he gets. It brings back memories of the good ole days.”
A source with ties to Russia’s government says Khusnullin “knows what he’s doing,” but that doesn’t mean he harbors specific career ambitions. “He just knows how to grow,” said Meduza’s source. “He knows that the boss doesn’t like it when someone articulates some clear goal and then achieves it. The president knows better where and who is needed. If they tell [Khusnullin] to take over as prime minister, he’ll do it. He’ll be happy to do it. But it would be wrong to say he’s working toward his premiership.”
A journalist from Tatarstan who spoke to Meduza on condition of anonymity recalled that rumors circulated not so long ago about Khusnullin’s possible return to the region, this time as its leader. But that chance seems to have gone with the “zeroing out” of incumbent Rustam Minnikhanov’s term clock. A source close to the federal government told Meduza that Khusnullin going back to Tatarstan is off the table. “He now carries more weight than the whole republic.”
https://natyliesbaldwin.com/2023/10/the ... husnullin/
OCTOBER 28, 2023
By Andrey Pertsev & Svetlana Reiter, Meduza, 10/5/23
In the 2010s, Marat Khusnullin nearly rebuilt the city of Moscow. Today, he’s maneuvered himself into a leading role as the overseer of Russia’s “restoration” of annexed Ukrainian territories. Meduza explains how this construction bureaucrat from Tatarstan won a prized position in the federal government and especially in Vladimir Putin’s circle of trusted underlings.
Last month, in early September, Vladimir Putin christened a new section of the “Vostok” expressway connecting Moscow and Kazan. “You’re cleared… Let’s go,” the president said with a smile. Joining him at the ceremony was Deputy Prime Minister Marat Khusnullin, who oversees construction projects for the federal government. He hurriedly and obsequiously noted that the highway would have been impossible without Putin, crediting the president with “all the comprehensive solutions” needed “to build such a beauty of a road!”
A source close to the presidential administration told Meduza that Putin’s expressway jamboree was staged as a campaign event. Indeed, the ceremony took place just a few days before a gubernatorial election in the Nizhny Novgorod region (where the new highway section was built), and United Russia candidate Gleb Nikitin later won the vote handily. But the Kremlin already had a bigger campaign on its mind, says Meduza’s source, who calls Marat Khusnullin a “key figure” in Putin’s re-election next spring.
The administration will reportedly rely on Khusnullin to serve as one of the leading “event suppliers” ahead of election day. Meduza has already written about the Kremlin’s plan to transform next year’s race into a “parade of holidays” celebrating the many “achievements of Putin’s Russia.” Some of these festivities will feature the opening of new infrastructural facilities, including new chunks of expressway.
Meduza’s sources with knowledge of the Kremlin’s election plans say that Khusnullin has become “one of Putin’s favorite subordinates.” For example, when the president made a brisk nighttime visit to occupied Mariupol in March 2023, it was Khusnullin who accompanied Putin on a drive around town, boasting about Russia’s “restoration” of a city it bombed and shelled to the ground in many places.
“A helicopter arrives, there were two escort cars, and he got behind the wheel. He even chose the route himself. Nobody saw it coming… People recognized him and started exiting their apartments… So, everything turned out very friendly,” Khusnullin later said, describing Putin’s tour of the city.
A source close to the federal government cabinet told Meduza that Putin first noticed Khusnullin when the latter oversaw Tatarstan’s Construction Ministry. (Before this job, Khusnullin worked for local construction companies and also served as a deputy in Tatarstan’s State Council.) Two decades ago, Putin frequented Kazan, which celebrated its millennium in 2005 and hosted the Universiade (now known as the FISU World University Games) in 2013. When Putin came to town, Khusnullin took him on tours of construction sites around the city. “He always knew how to present himself to his superiors and point out his role in the common cause,” recalls a long-time acquaintance who worked with Khusnullin in Tatarstan.
Meduza’s sources attribute Khusnullin’s rapid career rise to these encounters in Kazan. By 2010, he oversaw construction in Moscow as one of the city’s deputy mayors and intersected with Putin even more often as one of the officials leading renovations to the Luzhniki Olympic Complex ahead of the 2018 FIFA World Cup. Additionally, he was front and center in creating Moscow’s Zaryadye landscape urban park and renovating buildings throughout the city. Khusnullin was also involved in the Moscow Subway’s expansion between 2012 and 2019 when the Metro added another 47 stations.
Dozens of businesspeople from Tatarstan followed Khusnullin to Moscow, where they found leading positions in the city’s construction sector. An investigation in September 2018 by journalists at Novaya Gazeta identified 46 of these people. For example, Khusnullin’s former deputy at Tatarstan’s Construction Ministry, Mars Gazizullin, went on to manage Moscow City’s Mosinzhproekt civil engineering company, which oversaw the subway’s expansion.
From 2011 to 2018, companies from Tatarstan and firms connected to entrepreneurs from the region won Moscow City contracts worth almost half a trillion rubles (roughly $5 billion in today’s currency). Investigative reporters found that some of these businesses and their owners had ties to Khusnullin, but he denies any corruption allegations.
Khusnullin didn’t limit himself to just participation in such projects but labored to promote himself publicly in any way he could. A source who worked at Moscow City Hall told Meduza that Khusnullin reads the news media (“even opposition outlets”) and Telegram channels and tries to ensure that he’s mentioned. For example, while working for the Mayor, Khusnullin’s press office regularly compiled “positive news” about Moscow and pushed it on Telegram.
But he always stresses shared achievements and puts his bosses first. “Meaning, it was the mayor when he worked at City Hall, not Mr. Khusnullin. The top figure came first; he was just the good executor of the leadership’s will. Irreplaceable, perhaps, but a mere operator,” says Meduza’s source.
This tactic paid off. In 2020, Khusnullin reached the federal level, becoming a deputy prime minister charged with overseeing construction projects. He promptly announced plans to build a network of roads between Russia’s regions and to renovate housing across the country. “Construction is movement; it’s energy,” he said in 2021, describing his feelings about the job. “You can see the results of your work immediately. If everything is going well, your mood improves instantly. I even love the smell of paint, cement, and dust.”
Sources who know Khusnullin say he lacks any “special political views.” “He understands the planned economy of the Soviet era, but he’s also fine with the free market,” the individuals told Meduza, adding that Khusnullin “loves hands-on management” and takes “subordination” very seriously: “He understands who is above him and who is below him. There’s a real cult of personality on his team.”
A source close to United Russia’s Moscow branch leadership told Meduza that Khusnullin is “crude but effective.” “Mr. Khusnullin is an experienced vizier from the East,” says a source close to the Kremlin. “He always knows what to tell the Shah, how to interest him, and how to thank him. For the president, this style of communication has become comfortable lately.”
As Meduza reported in the fall of 2022, Putin lost almost all interest in civilian affairs and domestic issues in the early months of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Even construction projects receded from the president’s agenda. While others in the federal government cabinet tried to keep their distance from the war, Khusnullin dove head-first, traveling regularly to the “new territories” and becoming Russia’s de facto curator of “restoration” infrastructure projects in occupied Ukraine. This, of course, caught Putin’s attention again, says a source with ties to the Kremlin.
Today, Khusnullin and the Construction Ministry he controls are key in allocating Russia’s construction contracts in the occupied territories. The total cost of this work is unknown, but the Russian authorities have estimated that the “restoration of infrastructure” will require at least 1.5 trillion rubles (more than $15 billion).
A source close to the Russian government cabinet told Meduza that Khusnullin understands how vital this restoration work is to Putin, and he even tries to outperform the president’s expectations, setting speed records and overfulfilling plans. For example, Khusnullin was the official who reported on the early completion of repairs to Russia’s coveted Crimean Bridge, which a truck bomb damaged in October 2022. Khusnullin has also declared that “the people are returning to Mariupol” thanks to the Russian authorities’ efforts. (He’s careful not to emphasize the invasion assault that caused the city’s exodus and devastation in the first place.)
On multiple occasions, Putin has praised Khusnullin. With the front lines in Ukraine frozen in many places, the president “is gradually getting tired of military topics” and regaining his interest in domestic affairs, say sources close to the Kremlin. “It’s become important to prove [to the West] that the economy is holding up and everything is going like before,” explained Meduza’s sources. “Construction, roads, and bridges — this is stuff he gets. It brings back memories of the good ole days.”
A source with ties to Russia’s government says Khusnullin “knows what he’s doing,” but that doesn’t mean he harbors specific career ambitions. “He just knows how to grow,” said Meduza’s source. “He knows that the boss doesn’t like it when someone articulates some clear goal and then achieves it. The president knows better where and who is needed. If they tell [Khusnullin] to take over as prime minister, he’ll do it. He’ll be happy to do it. But it would be wrong to say he’s working toward his premiership.”
A journalist from Tatarstan who spoke to Meduza on condition of anonymity recalled that rumors circulated not so long ago about Khusnullin’s possible return to the region, this time as its leader. But that chance seems to have gone with the “zeroing out” of incumbent Rustam Minnikhanov’s term clock. A source close to the federal government told Meduza that Khusnullin going back to Tatarstan is off the table. “He now carries more weight than the whole republic.”
https://natyliesbaldwin.com/2023/10/the ... husnullin/
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."