New Putin? People are waiting for the Munich speech on our home themes.
The collection of articles written over the past 10 years and published, including in “LH”, does not pretend to be sensational when publicists are competing who have gathered more fried facts or details from the personal life of the characters. The book is intended for those who reflect on the meaning and dynamics of change in the main triangle of the Russian political scene "Putin - the people - the elite". The author seeks to understand the identity of Putin himself, the changes that have occurred during the years he was in the highest posts of the state.
The book comes out on the eve of the V.N. 60 anniversary. Putin and puts before him, as the president of Russia, a number of critical questions, the answers to which must be given by all of us.
TOT, YES, not TOT
This book does not belong to the category of solemn, festive publications, does not contain biographical details about the life of the head of state. It seems to me that it largely clarifies the answer to the famous question asked at the very beginning of his presidential journey: “Who are you, Mr. Putin?”
I have never communicated with Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin, I have not even seen him, as they say, “live”, and therefore my conclusions and assessments are unbiased. But I very carefully watched the actions, statements, style and, I would say, the habits of supreme power from the side, without being included in the turbulent whirlpools of specific political events.
In general, it seems to me that the book recreates the complex and controversial image of Russia in the first twelve years of the XXI century, when the main role in the development of the state belonged to Vladimir Putin. At the same time, from the very beginning of my writer's interest in his personality, I was most attracted by precisely the sphere of his activity, which the president himself recently called "soft power." And, looking ahead, I cannot help expressing great surprise that this very important component of government efforts was “addressed” by the head of state primarily to international relations issues, although in solving internal political problems today, it’s “soft power” that has I would say it is of exceptional importance, which prompted me to put this topic in the subtitle of the book.
Today, President Putin is noticeably different from the one we knew before. In my, perhaps, subjective opinion, undoubtedly, for the better. And by the vague notion of “better,” I mean the new, heightened interest of the head of state in matters directly or indirectly related to the final formulation of the state ideology of the new Russia, which I wrote many times ago many years ago. In other words, all to the same "soft power."
Zero years of the XXI century, coupled with the upcoming period of the presidency of V.V. Putin, taking into account the path that Russia has already followed after the disaster of the 1990s, and the extent of the distance it has yet to go, will inevitably raise the question of historical the role of Putin, who led and continues to lead the country at a very crucial, crucial stage in its historical development.
TWO LINES
Soviet periodization began with a ten-year reign of the left-radical Leninist guard, which launched a great country on brushwood for the fire of the world revolution. The next seven years were transitional: picking up “household” stones scattered in the political pogrom was combined with the continued denial of Russian identity and leftist leaning into international culture. But the country's growing economic power inevitably had to come into conflict with spiritual nihilism, which hindered the rise. This was announced by the shot of Mayakovsky, a truly talented poet, stuck in the dead ends of leftist art. As in economics, the authorities suggested a vector for the spiritual development of society: in 1934, they introduced a new course of history at school, created the Academy of Architecture, the Writers' Union.
Third Russia begins
It existed until the mid-fifties, when the passionate energy of the red hundreds, whose numbers were undermined by the war, dried up. And the faithful Leninist, Khrushchev, began squandering national wealth (Crimea), demolishing churches and blaspheme Russian antiquity. The vicious idea of a worldwide triumph of socialism re-emerged on the agenda, and the USSR got involved in a cold world war, squandering resources to support the so-called progressive regimes, in essence, reviving the fanatical idea of Bolshevik messianism.
The place of the red hundreds was taken by the philistinism, about which Gorky wrote: "This class consists of people deprived of stable form, amorphous, easily taking any form ... Yesterday - a socialist, today - a fascist, just to eat hearty and irresponsible to command." It is not difficult to understand that these were precisely those educators about whom Solzhenitsyn lamented.
The system that emerged under Khrushchev was initially unstable. Politically, it was considered the basis of the CPSU, performing state functions. But in order to understand the causes of the third civil war, its consequences and the Russian historical path in general, it is useful to divert from politicized assessments. In fact, the CPSU was only a shell for the amorphous bourgeois mass that dominated the USSR in the post-Stalin era. This shell, the bourgeois flesh of flesh, holding within itself what was called Soviet society, took different forms - depending on the moods of the educated, increasingly tilting towards the well-fed West, in competition with which Khrushchev got involved. When the list became critical, the shell broke, existing only formally in the years of perestroika. Diverse elements of society that have fought for domination have fallen out of it. The property question, allegedly the main one, was simply used as an incident belli - a pretext for war. If the political left won, the country would also go to the market. But - in the Chinese way.
Subsequent events with striking literalness, prompting them to raise their eyes to heaven, reproduced what happened after the revolution of 17. The decade 1990-x was a period of unchallenged power of right-wing neo-Bolsheviks and leftists from art, who sought to strangle the Orthodox Church with unbridled sectarian freedom. (Everyone remembers the desperate struggle around the law that limited sectarianism.) The next seven years, up to the global financial crisis, also turned out to be transitional, and in a familiar pattern: picking up “economic” stones scattered by non-Bolsheviks, who dissolved Russia in “universal human values”, combined with neglect of the values of national culture, the increase in propaganda of immorality, bad tastes.
Meanwhile, in 2008 Russia came to a turning point - the presidential election, the inevitable change of the “king”. And the question: “What's next?” - rose to its full height.
Responding to it today after the fact, it is necessary to take into account that in the national, depoliticized system of coordinates, the historical movement of Russia proceeds along two autonomous lines. One of them was designated clearly: Lenin - Khrushchev - Yeltsin. All three periods have similar features and are characterized by the impairment of national Russian traditions, the impoverishment of the spiritual life, neglect to the basic interests of Russia, attempts to “internationalize” it and, as a result, rapid or deferred (Khrushchev) economic decline. The heroes of the day were internationalists or general human beings, which is the same thing culturally detached from the people (Khrushchev’s attacks on abstractionists and the dispersal of the “bulldozer exhibition” made the representatives of left art the heroes of the day).
The other line includes periods when Russian interests were put at the forefront, relied on a system of national moral and cultural values, respected Russian antiquity, without giving up the best European trends. At such times, the sovereign power sharply increased, and the “Russian Europeans” became the role model - Moscow people (by the way, of many nationalities and geographically unattached to Moscow) of the pre-Peter warehouse, who remained faithful to the roots, but ready to perceive and creatively enrich modern world achievements. This line leads from Alexander III to Stalin.
What is the trajectory of the historical movement that Russia went after the presidential election of 2008 of the year?
Recalling that election cycle, it should be noted that initially the overwhelming majority of the people preferred the simplest and clearest option: it is necessary to change the Constitution and leave Putin for a third term. It is a mistake to assume that this point of view was rooted in any “pleasures to the authorities,” a flattery of officialdom and other purely tactical circumstances. If not with the mind, then, as they say, everyone knew in their heads: the country once again approached the historical fork, and did not want change. Putin’s refusal to run for a third term led to the fact that society, the authorities and the people were in a psychological dead end.
Most of the "augurs" agreed that Putin would propose a weak or ill successor to return to the Kremlin in a couple of years at the request of the people ...
In order to get out of the difficult fortune-telling of that period and realize what is actually happening, it is necessary again to move from politics to understanding the ethno-cultural shifts going on in the country. Even Stalin could not arbitrarily determine the historical movement of Russia, he only guessed the mentality of the red hundreds and headed them. Apparently, in the zero years of the 21st century, the authorities also felt the increasing pressure of multinational common people, dissatisfied with the devastation of 1990's and the overwhelming dominance of foreign trends.
The collapse of the CPSU and the collapse of the USSR, the third civil war, which took the form of perestroika and a change in the social system, when, according to Blok, “the law broke about the law”, the former Soviet society shook up much. The abolition of all sorts of restrictions, including the institution of registration, career dependence on membership in the CPSU, led to the fact that analogous blacks (with innate religious consciousness) and red hundreds, who dream of climbing to different levels of regional and federal authorities. In addition, opinion polls have long shown the growing discontent with oblivion of moral values, in connection with which large claims are made to television.
However, the spread of new means of communication, above all the Internet, has had a special, exceptional effect on the people's speculation. According to the experience of color revolutions, especially Egyptian, it is considered that network methods of communication lead to an increase in the role of the advanced, read, protest-minded strata of society. But in Russia, the opposite is true: it is the Internet that has greatly influenced the growth of self-awareness of the deep, common people, allowing millions of ordinary poor, but ambitious young people to break out of the humiliation of everyday life with their minds and hearts to join the newness of the current “IT-friendly” life and urge them to its peaks - first municipal, and then higher ...
IPHONE AND CAPTURE
The extraordinary similarity of the phases of the Russian historical movement is a non-random chronological coincidence. In a country with a rich historical past and deep cultural roots, it is not right-wing political fights that have a decisive influence on the course of development, but the confrontation between two ethnocultural types of people formed in pre-Peter the Great and Peter the Great. This feature, unknown to Europe, gives our dialogue with the West the character of a civilizational dispute, and our spiritual values - extraordinary vitality, even in conditions of total television pressure.
Russia has always been able to find answers to the challenges of the time that are new to world practice. And it was precisely such an absolutely non-standard answer that was found in 2008: a fundamentally new mechanism of transfer and preservation of power was created, ideally fitting into the constitutional framework, absolutely legitimate and democratic. This mechanism is called "tandem".
There is no need to talk in detail about how many stinging arrows were fired against the Putin – Medvedev tandem, how they blasphemed and continue to blaspheme him in Russia and other parts of the world. But these arrows are poisoned solely by political poison, the current world-wide Internet party is not accustomed to taking into account the trajectory of the historical movement of great states, did not understand that this is not just about someone's personal agreements, but about the mechanism of transfer of power - and not in the name of power as such, but in order to preserve the country's sustainable development.
Political thought immediately began to chew on the topic of the liberal Medvedev and the traditionalist Putin, although it later turned out that Medvedev always turned out to be a conservative, and this deeply disappointed his supporters. However, as always, much more important differences between the members of the tandem were overlooked: Medvedev fits very well into Petersburg, in other words, Peter’s ethnocultural type, which, of course, has nothing to do with his Leningrad origin, and Putin clearly belongs to the ethnocultural type of black or red hundreds, that is, before Peter the Great. (Putin himself understands a more precise definition of his type, since at this historical stage the vital interests of the black and red hundreds coincide.)
And it was precisely these very significant differences between Medvedev and Putin with striking, truly frightening similarity that led to the repetition of the confrontation that arose during the second civil war between the Red Hundreds and the Leninist guards of the radical Bolsheviks. Fortunately, this time it was not and could not go about repression, but from the point of view of political mutual aversion and rage began to go off-scale.
The similarity is not external in nature. The so-called protest movement of disgruntled townspeople, whom Medvedev and Surkov rashly called the advanced part of society, largely consists of descendants of the repressed Leninist guard, who especially defeated Stalin, and if again distracting themselves from political categories, from supporters of Russia's universal path, rejecting its dominion . It is no coincidence that the Ekho Moskvy website, which became the ideological inspirer of the protest and where Putin is violently annihilated, does not say a word about the disastrous Yeltsin decade: in the ethnocultural sense, Yeltsin’s line on dissolving Russia in the world supranational space is quite consonant with Lenin’s international plans. The Leninist-Khrushchev line was also clearly manifested in the far-overlapped atheistic criticism of transcendent attacks on the Russian Orthodox Church. But the strongest evidence on this point is, perhaps, the leftist leader of Udaltsov, the grandson of the inflexible Leninist, after whom one of the Moscow streets is named. Here the similarity is truly literal. A descendant of the Bolshevik revolutionary calls Putin an impostor, refusing to recognize his presidency ...
In this connection, it is interesting to recall the history of the creation of national anthems. Stalin was attracted in the Mikhalkov version of the word "Russia", and Putin used Soviet music in combination with the old Russian coat of arms and tricolor flag, trying to emphasize the continuity of all stages of Russian history. By the way, the absence of the word "Rus" in dozens of other versions of the text submitted to Stalin reflected the secret protest of the "Kataev" intelligentsia against the sovereign course. And we all remember the hot bouts, right up to the demonstrative exit of some deputies from the State Duma meeting hall, when Putin proposed the current national anthem.
It is interesting from this point of view to assess the fierce struggle around the exam, at one time approved by Putin. With all the imperfections of the Unified State Exam, he widely opened the way to higher education specifically for the children of the provincial “Red hundred”. And steep assaults on the USE by the protest intelligentsia, perhaps unconsciously for her, reflect her final disengagement from the new type of Russian people (again, not in an ethnic sense), which is being formed in provincial Russia.
These and other discrepancies between Putin and Medvedev led to a very curious phenomenon. An admirer of Western pop groups, arch-promoted on the part of the Internet Medvedev, whom the network community dubbed Ayfonchik, saw in modern means of communication only a useful technical innovation that facilitates Russia's entry into the world family of civilized nations. (I forgot, Medvedev forgot wise Pushkin, who bequeathed: “Enter Europe, but stay Russia!”) And Putin, who deliberately met Obama with a Russian samovar, boot and a man in a red shirt, managed to see on the Internet a powerful means of awakening provincial Russia ...
Barely enthroned in the Kremlin, in his first presidential address, Vladimir Putin said: “The development of society is unthinkable without agreement on common goals. And these goals are not only material, spiritual and moral are just as important. The main thing is to understand: what kind of Russia we believe in and what kind of Russia we want to see. ” Alas, the socio-economic and political routine, the personnel roundabouts of the following years, put Putin’s first intuitive sentiments into the background. But today life itself demands a return to them ...
Will there be a Munich speech on internal topics?
In the first half of 1990, some assistant (or adviser?) Yeltsin, apparently in charge of humanitarian issues, convinced his patron that the new Russia, which had replaced the rough Soviet-communist skin with like market covers, badly needed a new national idea. This ridiculous propaganda idea failed very quickly. Someone else jokingly, or seriously, in the absence of other sprouts of public interest, would not mind coming to national unity through football hockey and other sporting passions.
But one way or another, it seems that the national idea in its classical understanding in the new Russian open spaces is not expected. And in this regard, the sacramental question suddenly arises: does it really need this national idea? After all, if we ignore the approaches of the former Yeltsin advisers and current communist leaders who tried to redefine the famous triad of the XIX century in a new way, we will have to admit that in all the centuries-old history of Russia, what is now called the national idea was only twice. This is “Moscow is the Third Rome!” Of the elder Philotheus and the Uvarov formula “Orthodoxy, autocracy, nationality”. In other periods of our history, very, by the way, bright - for example, under Ivan the Terrible, under Peter I, under Catherine II - was this clear, well-rounded national idea? And aren't these two formulas forever stamped on state tablets and gold script drawn in the minds of all Russian generations, only a special case, just a very successful verbal reflection of some other, more important and deep-seated state-historical processes that can successfully to develop in the absence of slogan support?
This comment is directly related to President Vladimir Putin. And even formally, given the sufficient length of the period during which Vladimir Vladimirovich is already and will still be at the helm of the Russian ship. Meanwhile, the answer to the question: “Is the leader of the nation or an employee?” Has a very deep and not at all formal meaning.
For the essential concept of “leader of the nation” imposes special obligations on the president, far beyond his personal preferences, and special responsibility. When they say that we need a king, this phrase must be correctly understood. This is a deep historical tradition, which, changing its internal content, nevertheless remains extremely important and in demand for the people and the development of the country as a whole.
The centuries-long autocracy that forms the basis of the tsarist tradition ended in March 1953 with the death of Stalin. And the further gradual decline of the country was not least connected with the uncertainty that the Supreme Ruler personified in the eyes of the people.
The president, who declared himself an “employee” in 2002, is not needed by Russia. And Putin’s then super-modest self-denial of self-denial can only be explained by one thing: Putin accidentally, by coincidence, found himself at the highest state post and internally, with his inherent decency, he still couldn’t believe it, not realizing that it was not his personal perception now what happened, but about the attitude of the people to the supreme power in general ...
Putin only today, after difficult elections for him, got a chance to become a true king - in the sense of a true national leader, burdened with the greatest obligations towards the entire people of Russia. However, does Putin himself fully understand what responsibility now lies on his shoulders?
Meanwhile, time is not waiting. The royal authority arises precisely in the first, major, defining days. And responsibility to the people should be higher than personal obligations. The people are tired of diarchy, from the endless struggle under the carpet. The people are waiting for the Munich speech on our home themes, and not about “tightening” the nuts or loosening them, but about abruptly, with one blow of the royal word, do away with the bureaucratic fuss, take all the responsibility on ourselves - and in the sphere of power solve everything in your own way ...
Putin will be able to become such a high moral authority - everything in Russia will go fine, like clockwork. It will continue to be tactful in dealing with personnel issues, it is too vigilant to take into account all sorts of side interests, and in fact, to share with someone the supreme power - does not recognize its people as king, and those who overwhelmingly elected him as president will refuse it.
NO, NOT A “HUNDRED WORKER”
The fact that Vladimir Putin, who returned to the Kremlin, began to change, is noticeable by many factors. I once wrote that Putin of a second term (2004 – 2008) locked himself in the bureaucratic circle, and today we see that the president invites governors for talks - with the whole team, and by no means bureaucratic, he carefully listens to people from the bottom of life. He calls miners to Moscow - not just for a holiday, but for advice. This, of course, particular, minor details, but they are combined with other important innovations.
And yet, what is happening now very much resembles the deepest epiphany of the unforgettable Mikhail Saltykov-Shchedrin Evgrafovich, who wrote the famous cycle called “In an environment of moderation and accuracy”. Carefully, step by step, Putin goes to his goal - almost the same way he did it ten years ago, when the country was balancing on the verge of non-existence and any wrong move could again throw it to the abyss. But the situation has changed dramatically since then. And not only in terms of strengthening the Russian state, but also in terms of popular speculation. Having recovered from the 1990's ills, buying annually more new cars than in Germany, but still remaining in the tenacious embraces of “domestic slavery”, policeman, Zhekhehovsky and other lawlessness, people are increasingly perplexed: well, now what prevents to hit the fist on the table? ..
It is clear and obvious for people who are closely observing state affairs that Putin is making great efforts so that our Western partners (and actually competitors!) Do not drag us into any international conflicts using external force.
And indeed, some people in the West would very much like to drag us into a hot conflict like Afghanistan. However, these "someone" more and more clearly understand: it will not work! will not work! Today, for Putin, the main task is to collect lands: the strengthening of the Customs Union, the creation of the EurAsEC. And at the same time - the arrangement of a powerful defense shield, so that it would not come to anyone’s heads to try us for strength, using missile defense and so on. And it is precisely the futility of trying to draw us into an external adventure, coupled with a radical, super-modern renewal of the defense shield, that prompts our eternal western partners to resort to the only remaining, but well tested, method of weakening Russia - the creation of internal instability in the country.
It can not be that Putin did not understand this. But if he understands, then why does he allow himself to insult himself on the Internet with almost vulgar abuse? In general, what kind of national leader, who is covered in the world, being covered with network anonymity, is thrown with words from side to side, like a matchbox?
Yes, you can be above this, do not pay attention to this nonsense, and sometimes paid calculation. But these are personal, human considerations, the philosophy of the “hired worker”, despite everything, and despite everything, persistently and conscientiously doing his work. But is it possible not to think about how bitterly the people perceive merciless insults to the national leader? And this is not the point to prohibit, censor and so on and so forth.
But answer!
To answer so calmly, firmly and with dignity, so that people deeply respecting and electing their national leader would be proud of their chosen one.
How proud in those days when Russian President Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin spoke with his famous Munich speech, announcing to the whole world about Russia's full-fledged return to the geopolitical scene, announcing our active participation in solving complex international issues of the modern world, which is at a turning point in its development, associated with the completion of the centuries-old Western dominant and the movement of the global center of gravity to other regions.
That “soft power” in international relations, about which President Putin spoke, speaking before Russian diplomats, is now coming to the fore in the internal political life of the country, acquiring a new, modern meaning and sound.
But will the president have enough hardness for “soft power”?
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