HOW DO YOU SLAY A DRAGON?

Everything that helps us achieve this goal is in keeping with Russia’s national interests. Everything that hinders the achievement of this goal, or puts off the overdue transformation needed, goes against those interests. The pursuit of imaginary greatness is insulting to Russia’s genuine greatness; there is something to be proud of, not just the atom bomb.

The Kremlin and its henchmen want to isolate Russia from the West, while at the same time adopting a Western lifestyle for themselves. So for this they want the country to have the status of a military superpower. But Russia’s national interests are diametrically opposed to this. We need to remove the country’s isolation, whilst on the other hand isolating all those who use the threat of war to maintain their feudal privileges, including the right to steal money from the country with impunity, and spend it in the West. They want Russia to be closed off, so that they can steal and cheat forever. We want Russia to be open, so that this can never happen again.

Chapter 14. The Historical Choice:

Muscovy or Gardarika (which has nothing to do with Gaidar) 1 ?

Will Russia will be an empire or a nation state? Will the focus be on building a practical way of life, or will people try to create yet another utopia of universal proportions? Whatever the situation is, a crucial question for future generations will be about the centralisation of power in Russia. Should the Russian political system remain strictly centralised, with most (if not all) authority based on the single point of the federal government in Moscow? Or should the system be de-centralised (even artificially)? And, even if it takes huge efforts, should a number of places across the country be empowered to make various political decisions, depending on their level of competence?

Either variant is possible within the liberal and democratic model. Simply turning away from the authoritarian system doesn’t remove the question. In both theory and practice a democratic state can be strongly centralised – Britain and France are examples of this – or it can be largely de-centralised, such as in the USA and Germany. We shall have to choose which would suit Russia best, taking into consideration our cultural heritage, and the particulars of the new, unique historic tasks that will lie before us. This is neither a simple nor an obvious choice, not least because it goes against a deeply-rooted political tradition.

Matters are made more complicated because centralism is the sacred cow of the Russian political mentality. Attacking this would be fraught with risks. In each of the three previous incarnations of its civilisation – Muscovy, the Empire and the USSR – Russia was a hyper-centralised state. The tradition was laid down by Muscovy; strengthened by Peter the Great’s Empire; and taken to the extreme by the Communist empire. And neither in the 1990s, nor in the first decade of the twenty-first century did anything change significantly. So for the past 500 years of history, the movement has been only towards greater centralisation, and never the other way. You could say that, despite the many changes of era, Russia is still Muscovy.

Paradoxically, centralism as a political principle is so deep-rooted in the mass consciousness that the idea unites both the supporters and the opponents of the current Russian regime. Among the latter group, there are fanatics who believe in concentrating power in the hands of a national government in Moscow just as much as do the apologists for the regime. Even though the motives for each of these political forces are completely different, they each relate to the idea of de-centralisation with the same scepticism and suspicion.

For the clan that rules Russia, this is a question of the type of control that they can exert over the situation, a matter of maintaining the political and economic status quo. For them, hyper-centralisation is a tool for suppressing any challenges that threaten the established political order, or for dealing with local grievances. Naturally, for them, centralism is the main means of maintaining the stability of the regime. They are totally dependent on the centralised apparatus for repression and propaganda carrying out its work effectively. It’s also the way in which they maintain control over the resources that are essential for keeping this apparatus going.