What should Russia fear in the near future? Poll
The first such criterion - state territory, in the gathering and development of which the colossal works of all previous generations were invested. We will not rub salt on the wounds, recalling the territorial changes that occurred at the end of the twentieth century, but note that the threats to the integrity of the Russian Federation have not disappeared. First of all, they concern our Far Eastern borders, and specifically - the South Kuril ridge of islands. The mistake of N. Khrushchev, expressed in the refusal of the USSR to take part in the San Francisco Conference and in signing a peace treaty with Japan, led to the current situation when Tokyo stubbornly refuses to recognize Russian sovereignty over the islands. In its claims to Kunashir, Iturup, Habomai and Shikotan, Japan gained the support of the United States and a number of its other Western partners. Propaganda is doing its job, new generations of the rising sun in the conviction that these “northern territories” will sooner or later be alienated from Russia.
Western political analysts do not exclude also the option in which the Kaliningrad region can be proclaimed an independent, fourth Baltic state, which has already invented the name: “Amber region”.
All political and economic steps of the West towards this enclave territory are aimed at weakening its ties with Russia. As long as there is a system for appointing Moscow the governor of this region, while the Russian army is stationed there and the remains of the naval forces are in Baltiysk fleet, we maintain relative calm. But, God forbid, domestic political troubles begin in Russia: no one will give guarantees to preserve the Kaliningrad region as a subject of the federation. New generations of residents of the Kaliningrad region for the most part did not live in Russia, they do not know it. Europe is prettier and closer to many of them.
It is amazing how tenacious anti-Russian sentiments are in Estonia. From 1 on January 2011, this country became the 17 member of the European Union, entered the euro zone and received the right to mint a coin with its national symbols. The first thing she started her teenage life in the EU with was the euro, which depicts the borders of Estonia with some of the current territories of Russia included in its structure. In accepting Estonia as part of NATO, Tallinn was forced to abandon any territorial claims against Moscow, he complied, and now he again took up the old.
In the 1926-th decision of the Central Executive Committee was determined by the boundary of our possessions in the Arctic. Decisions were then made simply and categorically. From the extreme western and extreme eastern points of the USSR territory, a line was drawn along the meridians to the very North Pole. Everything that got into this huge sector was declared the territory of the USSR: islands, shelf, water surface. But no one in the West recognized this border. While the USSR was strong, he demanded that foreigners even request permission to navigate in the waters of our sector. Then, gradually, the permitting mode was replaced with the notification one, and after 1991, this order also died by itself. Now there is a cover-up struggle for the shelf of the Arctic Ocean. At one time, the congress of the US state of Alaska even made territorial claims on Wrangel Island - with reference to the discoverer’s right.
For now, the struggle for the Arctic is muffled, like a barely audible artillery cannonade on a distant front, but we must be prepared for the fact that this front will inevitably soon approach us.
The North Caucasus is still a big theater of operations. The enormous infusions of financial resources into this region from the federal treasury, which in the last 10 years amounted to 800 billion rubles, did not seem to give any positive results. The army and security forces are still the main braces that hold the fragile stability in the republics of the North Caucasus and their relationship with Russia. Extremist, separatist forces are not weakening, and, like a deep peat fire, they threaten to spill out at the first favorable opportunity.
I am not even talking about the most dangerous threats that arise for Russia as a result of the continuing mass colonization of its empty margins - the Far East and Siberia - by immigrants from the states of Southeast Asia. The lack of a clear, well-thought-out migration policy, the corruption of the entire bureaucratic ratification serving the state borders of Russia, the completely different growth rates of the population of the indigenous population of the country and foreign aliens cannot add optimism. The events in Kosovo and South Africa are too fresh in the memory, where demographic processes have changed the fate of the country.
The second criterion of state security - The state of the population of the state. International political science is almost united in the statement that the quantity and quality of a country's population determine the place of a state in the world community. The quality of a population is understood as its ability to perceive and quickly master the achievements of world scientific and technological progress. But above all, the ability to create new intellectual values, find breakthrough solutions to engineering problems, move world science forward is appreciated. Such nations receive flattering names of “locomotives of human civilization”.
Even in the distant "stagnant" 70-s of the twentieth century, the CIA began a broad program of systematic study of the state of demographic processes in the USSR. The main intermediate result of these studies was the conclusion of a gradual deterioration in the quality of the population. It was based on the fact that the birth rates in various regions of the USSR were incomparable: the population growth in the Muslim republics of Central Asia, in Azerbaijan and the autonomies of the North Caucasus significantly exceeded similar figures in the RSFSR, in Ukraine and Belarus. The structure of the national composition of the USSR gradually changed.
The CIA then noted that the general educational level of the population in the Muslim republics and autonomies was significantly inferior to that in the Slavic state formations. In the end, it was stated: over time, the Soviet leadership will receive the worst quality reinforcement in its Armed Forces, which, due to increasing saturation with the latest technologies, will require an increasingly qualified contingent of draftees every year. This process should have a negative impact on the general course of the scientific and technological development of the USSR.
The events of 1991 led to the withdrawal from the USSR of all the former Soviet republics. Russia suddenly got rid of the "national suburbs" and got a historic chance to become a predominantly mono-national state, while maintaining in its composition a large number of small ethnic groups. Russians made up 85 percent of the total population.
But “the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the twentieth century,” according to Vladimir Putin, hit the Russians the hardest.
This nation was responsible for all the mistakes and crimes of the Soviet government, it was dismembered by many state tumors, it was demoralized, remained among the latter during the privatization process. She lost the status of "older brother" and ceased to be the backbone of the state. As you know, demoralization is stronger than poverty, or even poverty, beats the vitality of a nation. The Russians began to die out, and this tendency is the most terrible danger for the Russian state, in which the word “Russians” itself disappeared from all official documents. Everything became “Russian” except, perhaps, one institution — the Russian Orthodox Church.
The progressive loss of the indigenous population is partially compensated by the growing influx of migrants from marginal autonomies and from the near abroad, but this only aggravates the general demographic situation, complicating it with the growth of interethnic tension, a jump in crime and other negative phenomena. The measures to stimulate fertility, which were adopted very late, — maternity capital; the provision of land for country construction — is completely insufficient to reverse the fatal tendency towards extinction of the population. The Russian Orthodox Church, whose clergy and parishioners are distinguished by the most numerous families, should play a more significant role in supporting the efforts of the state in this direction.
The quality of the living generations of Russian citizens inspires many fears for the future of the country. We still, unfortunately, occupy leading positions in such “nominations” as the number of suicides, the number of mentally ill people affected by venereal diseases, drug addiction, and alcoholism. With the current state of health care, we are unlikely to cure a sick society, so the main efforts should be directed to preserving the health of the young generation of Russian citizens, using for this the rich global and domestic experience.
Demographic processes are not as fleeting and mobile as social changes, but they are more formidable and destructive for states.
They are similar to the slow accumulation of volcanic energy in subterranean formations that once burst out in the form of devastating eruptions and deadly pyroplastic flows, destroying all living things in their path.
And let's not say that these threats arise by themselves and come from nowhere ...
The material and material wealth of the state and its people - the key to its prosperity and development. This wealth consists of two main components. Natural gifts are considered the first; they can be in the form of underground storerooms, climatic advantages or a geographical location on the globe. The second component of national wealth is everything that has been created on the territory of the state by the hands of numerous generations of people who lived and live here. Industry, agriculture, transport, communications - the components of the wealth of the nation. In the history of mankind, all reforms, as a rule, were aimed at increasing this wealth more quickly and on a large scale.
Unfortunately, the attempt to reform the old Soviet economic machine, undertaken in the 80-90-ies during the so-called "restructuring" and the subsequent "reforms" turned out in many respects simple destruction. In its place, a modern socio-economic model has not yet been created, and even its main features are very poorly visible. The lack of clear guidelines for national development and ways to move towards them reduces the speed of movement forward. The state ship is groping, in a fog.
The destructive stage of “perestroika” and “reforms” dealt a severe blow to the material and technical wealth of the state. According to experts, the total damage amounted to 1,75 trillion dollars, which is more than four times the damage caused by World War II to the economy of the USSR. During the post-Soviet period, more than 70 thousands of plants and factories stopped in Russia, 5 thousands of which were large, with more than a thousand employees. Whole industries turned out to be almost completely lost, and among them machine building (with the exception of automobiles), machine tools, controls and communications, consumer electronics and others. Agriculture suffered huge losses, about half of the livestock of all types of livestock was destroyed. Russia has lost its food independence.
Crying and wailing over losses in the material and technical wealth of the state have become commonplace in Russian journalism, but the country has so far great resources for its development as a modern power.
The fuel and energy complex, which keeps our economy afloat, has been preserved; the metallurgical (including non-ferrous) industry and the chemical industry are operating in terms of fertilizer production. Last year, the production of all types of cars sharply, almost doubled. The society widely commented on the initiative of Mikhail Prokhorov to create a unique Russian hybrid car, which should surpass the well-known world analogues in all key performance indicators.
Work has begun on creating an innovation center at Skolkovo. It is said that the first swallow does not make spring yet, but still gives hope for its coming. At the same time, ordinary people who are tired of many years of fruitless conversations on the topics of modernization and acceleration are willing to invent ironic terms. Instead of “Silicon Valley” they will say “Silicone raspberry”, “nanotechnologies” will be renamed “mannotechnologies” ...
In the field of agriculture, at the very end of 2010, an important law was passed providing for the forcible seizure of the former owners of agricultural land that had not been used for this purpose during the last three years. This initiative, on the one hand, is fully justified, because hundreds of thousands of hectares of agricultural land were bought up by speculators for resale to large agricultural holdings. But, on the other hand, it will hit, and it is very painful, on hundreds of thousands of peasants - yesterday's collective farmers, who, during the liquidation of their farms, received the so-called “shares”, conditionally making them land owners. But the peasants did not have the means to purchase agricultural equipment, seeds, fertilizers, they could not even pay the inflated prices for land surveying. Some people, in desperation, sold their shares to speculators, but many still hold on to their rights, which can now be eliminated. History knows examples of very effective solutions to agrarian problems and agricultural production. Russia also requires comprehensive agrarian legislation, focused mainly on increasing agricultural productivity and securing the population on the land.
The state, as historical practice shows, plays the main role in overcoming the difficulties that have arisen as a result of serious distortions in the socio-economic situation of the country. So it was in Russia after the defeat in the Crimean War, in the USA after the severe civil war of 1861-1864 and after the “great depression” of 1929, in the PRC after the “big jump” and bet on the creation of “agricultural communes”.
Hopes that the laws of the market themselves will lead to the elimination of crisis phenomena, especially if they are associated with the anomalous structure of the economy, are groundless and can only lead to a loss of time, which Russia no longer has.
For our country, perhaps the most urgent task is to find ways to stop capital flight abroad. The Ministry of Economic Development recognizes: private capital in Russia is not invested in its own state, but it is an excuse to flee offshore. This circumstance, on the one hand, undermines all hopes of updating the material and technical basis of the country, and on the other, it demoralizes the whole society, which sees that the leadership class does not believe in the future of its state and is preparing for emigration abroad in advance. In this, perhaps, the greatest threat to our country in this direction.
Back in 1996, Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia Alexy II and the Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church issued a statement saying: “Not wanting to enter the field of political sympathies and antipathies, without interfering in the political struggle, the Church, however, cannot but express the deepest anxiety for the fate of Russia, for the spiritual state of the people, their culture, science, social status. The freedoms gained by the cost of many labors and losses can be devalued by the destruction of the material basis of their realization. ” Pay attention to the last words: they are relevant today.
The fourth carrier column of state (national) security is the way of life of the population, often referred to as the “way of life”. The greatest contribution to the development of this category was made by American political scientists, so we are constantly being told about the “American way of life”, for which the authorities are ready to use the most extreme means. It was enough for them to announce in their time the incompatibility of the “communist ideology” with the American way of life, so that all legislative work would henceforth be imbued with a restraining anti-communist spirit. Among some peoples in history, a major place was occupied by the struggle to preserve their distinctive “way of life” - China, Japan, others sought to impose their way of life on other nations with military force. Thus, the Mayan and Aztec South American civilizations, the original cultural centers of Africa and Asia, which were replaced by the colonial system, were destroyed. The latest universal attempts to impose their "way of life" on other nations can be considered the Hitler's "new order" or the idea of the world socialist revolution.
In recent decades, the concept of globalization has arisen, in other words, bringing the whole world to a common denominator. The idea of globalization seems to have humane principles. It seems that globalization arose by itself, as a consequence of the scientific and technological world progress in the field of communications and information technology.
But any sane person understands: globalization is the same old policy of imposing alien peoples on living standards, only camouflaged much better.
In the role of beneficiaries of globalization are the powers that have the greatest economic and promotional power.
Lifestyle - the spiritual component of national security. By this is meant the whole set of historically established relations of the individual with other people, with society and the state. This is a complex web of legal norms, moral standards, religious and ethical relations. The stronger this “way of life” is, the more stable is the ethnos or state that created it. For Russia, this concept was formulated in the nineteenth century by the then Minister of Education, Sergei Uvarov, as "autocracy, Orthodoxy, and nationality." The Russian state rested on this triad for almost half a millennium, but in the dramatic - if not tragic - twentieth century, the way of life of our people was twice subjected to a radical break. After the October Revolution, a new “way of life” began to be created, the basic values of which were the opposite of what was familiar to many previous generations of Russians. The personality was completely subordinated to the interests of the state, religion was outlawed, private property was liquidated. For seventy years, the new government tried to find a form in order to combine personal interests with public interests, but in the historical period allotted to it, it was not able to solve this problem.
Events 1991-th led to a new, no less destructive change in the way of life of the population. The customary collectivism was replaced by the cult of individualism. Alien seeds were brought into the ruined Russian soil - without a clear understanding of what kind of mutants could grow on it.
Instead of the excessive oppressive Soviet paternalism, the current state completely disclaimed responsibility for the material and spiritual life of the people.
The habitual scale of vital values of the person was distorted. Everything on which the education of the individual was built, starting with biblical times and ending with the “Code of the Builder of Communism,” was overturned overnight. Money became the only measure of success in life, all spiritual things were trampled upon and ridiculed, although in the Holy Scripture it is said that "man does not live by bread alone."
Such breaks in the way of life of the people lead to disastrous consequences for the people and the state. When we today begin to lament the death of such an institution as an ordinary human family - and it was called the "cell of the state" - then we must understand that this is a consequence of the destruction of our historical "way of life".
We are among the most corrupt countries in the world, the scale of theft in Russia has taken a destructive scale. Some in the West call our social structure "the dictatorship of kleptocracy." Alexander Solzhenitsyn in his work "Russia in a fall" comes to the following thought: "Russia is flattened under the rubble of the reinforced concrete structure of communism." And all this - a consequence of the destruction of the lifestyle of the people.
It is the formation of a new way of life - the primary task of the Russian authorities and leading religious denominations of the country, especially the Russian Orthodox Church. In their hands is the most extensive network of educational institutions, they control the bulk of the media. A personal example of secular and spiritual leaders and shepherds is extremely important for establishing a new lifestyle.
All the threats in question really exist. Whether we like it or not. If we decide that they are in the past, and in the coming year a “new life” began, this will be the biggest mistake.
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