Paul Goble
Helsinki, April 1 – Newly-enthroned Patriarch Kirill has ousted or weakened his opponents in the Russian Orthodox Church, divided up his old fiefdom to prevent anyone from using it as he did as a counterweight to the head of the church, and created a series of new institutions designed to expand the Church’s role abroad and at home.
This week, a meeting of the Holy Synod with Kirill in the chair and clearly in control put his stamp on the church hierarchy with a series of personal and organizational steps, many of which had been expected ever since his election as patriarch, that not only increase his own power but indicate some of the new policy directions he intends to pursue.
The most important of these changes include: the appointment of longtime Kirill loyalist Vladimir Legoyda, an MGIMO professor and editor of the church’s journal “Foma,” as head of the synod’s newly created information department, a body that apparently will promote Kirill’s interest in having the church speak out on key issues (www.foma.ru/news/2602/).
In addition, the synod shifted Metropolitan Kliment of Kaluga and Belovsk from his slot as administrator of church affairs to the much less important post of head of the publishing council of the church. Kliment had been Kirill’s most serious opponent in the patriarchal elections. His old position will now be filled by Bishop Varsonofy of Saransk and Mordovia.
Archpriest Vsevolod Chaplin, who had been Kirill’s deputy as the head of the now reorganized and much reduced Department for External Affairs, will now head a new department for the affairs of the Church and society, a position that likely will allow him to be even more outspoken about public issues than in the past.
Another important change is the appointment of Bishop Merkury of Zaraisk, who has been the administrator of patriarchal congregations in the US, as head of the Russian Spiritual Mission in Jerusalem, a key post given the Patriarchate’s extensive landholdings there and its involvement in inter-confessional activities.
.Also indicative of Kirill’s strategy and goals is the splitting up of his old fiefdom, the Eparchate of Smolensk and Kaliningrad. That will now be subdivided into two bishoprics, with Bishop Serafim of the Baltic taking over the Smolensk post and Bishop Feofilakt, currently vicar of the Moscow eparchate, assuming the Kaliningrad chair.
As a result of these changes, Kirill does not have any serious competitors inside the Patriarchate, has eliminated the posts and assignments that others, including himself, had used in the past to develop independent centers of power, and has taken steps to expand Church’s public role in society at home and in diplomacy, religious and civil, abroad.
The dividing up into several components of Kirill’s old department of external affairs has attracted the most comment. Today’s “Kommersant” reported that some Church experts think that Kirill did this because no “suitable candidate” could be found. But a more likely explanation is that Kirill does not want competition (www.kommersant.ru/doc.aspx?DocsID=1147712).
By subdividing that department into its component parts, Kirill can exercise personal control over the far more junior people who will be in charge of them than he might be able to do if there were a single “senior” churchman in charge. And consequently, what he has done in this case seems consistent with his efforts to build “a power vertical” inside the Church.
That Kirill intends to use his position to promote a more public and more active approach at home and abroad is something on which all Russian commentators agree. But in his remarks posted online today, Portal-Credo.ru’s Aleksandr Soldatov calls attention to a move at this meeting of the Synod that may prove even more important for the future of the Church.
At the direction of Kirill, the Holy Synod created a “still mysterious” commission for the preparation of materials in anticipation of an as yet undefined and unscheduled church council or “sobor’ and named Archmonk Saava, who is particularly close to the new patriarch as its secretary (www.portal-credo.ru/site/?act=comment&id=1561).
Thhis group, which Kirill apparently will chair could prove to be only a place holder for housekeeping functions or it could – and Soldatov suggests that Kirill’s own personality makes this more likely – a staging area for the convention of a Church Council like the one that met at the time of the Russian revolutions of 1917-1918.
Such a session would likely not only seek to redefine the relationship between the Moscow Patriarchate and the Russian Orthodox Church could also serve to “guarantee” Kirill’s place “in the annals of the Church,” an outcome that the in no-way-retiring patriarch almost certainly would like.
Wednesday, April 1, 2009
Window on Eurasia: Iran’s Khomeini Was a Russophile, Former KGB Resident in Tehran Says
Paul Goble
Helsinki, April 1 – Ayatollah Khomeini, the leader of the Iranian revolution whose regime was formally inauguarated30 years ago today, was a committed Russophile, according to the retired KGB officer who served as that organization’s resident in Tehran before and during that time.
In an interview published in this week’s “Voenno-promyshlenniy kur’yer,” Leonid Shebarshin, who retired from the Soviet intelligence service as a much-decorated lieutenant general and who now heads his own company, talks about his years of service in Iran, 1979-1983 (www.vpk-news.ru/article.asp?pr_sign=archive.2009.278.articles.conception_01).
Shebarshin, 74, says that the KGB’s first chief directorate in which he served had regularly predicted the fall of the shah, unlike the Americans and the Chinese who, the retired KGB officer recalls, were impressed until nearly the end by the outward trappings of the shah’s regime. “We did not make this mistake.”
In May 1979, just before he departed for Tehran, Shebarshin says that he was told by KGB chief and future CPSU leader Yury Andropov that “left progressive forces [in Iran] had no chance of coming to power and that many years would be required for Iranians to become disappointed in the theocracy.”
The former resident also describes the very different ways in which the Iranians treated the US and Soviet embassies, invading both in the course of November 1979 but not seizing any of the Soviet diplomats, and about the way in which specialists on the USSR who were working in the shah’s intelligence service survived while those working on other questions did not.
Moreover, he discusses the extremely negative impact of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in December 1979 on Iranian attitudes and also the adverse consequences for Moscow of Iraqi use of Soviet airplanes and weapon systems during Baghdad’s attack on Iran at the behest of the Americans.
And Shebarshin describes what he says were the “intelligent and pragmatic” qualities of the Iranian leaders who maintained their economic relations with the Soviet Union and did not force out most Soviet workers in the country, although Tehran did force all Americans and most Europeans to do so.
But perhaps the most important comments in the current context are Shebarshin’s description of the pro-Russian attitudes of Ayatalloh Khomeini. Although the former KGB officer acknowledges that he “unfortunately” did not have direct personal ties with the leader of the revolution, he provides a remarkable vignette into the thinking of the Islamic leader.
At the end of December 1979, after Moscow had sent its forces into Afghanistan, the Soviet ambassador in Tehran travelled to Khomeini’s residence in Qum to explain why Moscow had taken the decision to intervene and to discuss the possible consequences of that action for Soviet-Iranian relations.
“The imam attentively listened to [the Soviet diplomat] and then said: ‘You are making a big error!’ And in general, [the Iranian leader] turned out to be right,” Shebarshin acknowledges. But then the former KGB officer makes the following declaration: “Imam Khomeini was a Russophile, however strange this may seem” to those who do not know the history of Iran.
Of course, the ayatollah was “an opponent of godless socialism, but [he was also] a man who had great respect for northern neighbor and belonged to an [Iranian] Russophile family. “At the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century,” Shebarshin explains, “Iranian society was approximately equally divided between Anglophiles and Russophiles.”
And it turned out that “already his upbringing in childhood and youth led Ruholla al-Musavi al-Khomini to relate to Russia with respect,” a background Moscow and its KGB clearly recognized, valued, and exploited but one that many people elsewhere not only did not know but considered absolutely impossible.
Helsinki, April 1 – Ayatollah Khomeini, the leader of the Iranian revolution whose regime was formally inauguarated30 years ago today, was a committed Russophile, according to the retired KGB officer who served as that organization’s resident in Tehran before and during that time.
In an interview published in this week’s “Voenno-promyshlenniy kur’yer,” Leonid Shebarshin, who retired from the Soviet intelligence service as a much-decorated lieutenant general and who now heads his own company, talks about his years of service in Iran, 1979-1983 (www.vpk-news.ru/article.asp?pr_sign=archive.2009.278.articles.conception_01).
Shebarshin, 74, says that the KGB’s first chief directorate in which he served had regularly predicted the fall of the shah, unlike the Americans and the Chinese who, the retired KGB officer recalls, were impressed until nearly the end by the outward trappings of the shah’s regime. “We did not make this mistake.”
In May 1979, just before he departed for Tehran, Shebarshin says that he was told by KGB chief and future CPSU leader Yury Andropov that “left progressive forces [in Iran] had no chance of coming to power and that many years would be required for Iranians to become disappointed in the theocracy.”
The former resident also describes the very different ways in which the Iranians treated the US and Soviet embassies, invading both in the course of November 1979 but not seizing any of the Soviet diplomats, and about the way in which specialists on the USSR who were working in the shah’s intelligence service survived while those working on other questions did not.
Moreover, he discusses the extremely negative impact of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in December 1979 on Iranian attitudes and also the adverse consequences for Moscow of Iraqi use of Soviet airplanes and weapon systems during Baghdad’s attack on Iran at the behest of the Americans.
And Shebarshin describes what he says were the “intelligent and pragmatic” qualities of the Iranian leaders who maintained their economic relations with the Soviet Union and did not force out most Soviet workers in the country, although Tehran did force all Americans and most Europeans to do so.
But perhaps the most important comments in the current context are Shebarshin’s description of the pro-Russian attitudes of Ayatalloh Khomeini. Although the former KGB officer acknowledges that he “unfortunately” did not have direct personal ties with the leader of the revolution, he provides a remarkable vignette into the thinking of the Islamic leader.
At the end of December 1979, after Moscow had sent its forces into Afghanistan, the Soviet ambassador in Tehran travelled to Khomeini’s residence in Qum to explain why Moscow had taken the decision to intervene and to discuss the possible consequences of that action for Soviet-Iranian relations.
“The imam attentively listened to [the Soviet diplomat] and then said: ‘You are making a big error!’ And in general, [the Iranian leader] turned out to be right,” Shebarshin acknowledges. But then the former KGB officer makes the following declaration: “Imam Khomeini was a Russophile, however strange this may seem” to those who do not know the history of Iran.
Of course, the ayatollah was “an opponent of godless socialism, but [he was also] a man who had great respect for northern neighbor and belonged to an [Iranian] Russophile family. “At the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century,” Shebarshin explains, “Iranian society was approximately equally divided between Anglophiles and Russophiles.”
And it turned out that “already his upbringing in childhood and youth led Ruholla al-Musavi al-Khomini to relate to Russia with respect,” a background Moscow and its KGB clearly recognized, valued, and exploited but one that many people elsewhere not only did not know but considered absolutely impossible.
Window on Eurasia: Russia’s April Fools’ Day Present to Itself and the World
Paul Goble
Helsinki, April 1 – Mark Twain observed a century ago that “April 1st is a day when we remember what we are like the other 364 days of the year,” but according to commentator Leonid Radzikhovsky, “in Russia these words have a special meaning” because today is the 200th birthday of Nikolay Gogol, whose “kind laughter” over the foibles of his nation helped define it.
In an article in “Rossiiskaya gazeta” yesterday, the Moscow political scientist observes that all Russians are “characters out of Gogol,” because like Russia’s greatest poet Aleksandr Pushkin but even more immediately, the 19th century humorist not only “CREATED” Russia but “DISCOVERED Russia” for itself (www.rg.ru/2009/03/31/gogol.html).
If the role of Pushkin is widely recognized and regularly celebrated, Radzikhovsky writes, that “of Gogol is less obvious but in no way less significant.” Pushkin created “a system of coordinates of his internal world which became the world of Russian culture,” but Gogol “populated this space with people” whom Russians could identify as much like themselves.
He was “the first in Russian literature to describe in detail LIVING Russian people. Because he DID NOT THINK THEM UP,” but rather took them from life itself and thus they “are somewhat more vivid and real than ‘the demons of Dostoyevsky’ or the ‘noble relatives of Tolstoy.’”
And while Gogol highlighted and even made fun of the foibles of his heroes, he “loved them. And that is “one of the main secrets” of his continuing attraction. His laughter was never intended to hurt, it was not from the outside, but rather it in a good hearted way “LEGITIMATED that very Russia” which Gogol loved.
Even “The Dead Souls,” the name of perhaps his most famous novel, were people Gogol loved, Radzikhovsky continues, even as his loved all the other characters that are not only immortal in literature but still found among Russians. And that is something worse recalling too on this bicentennial.
But even as Russians mark this round anniversary, there have been several statements about him that Gogol would have seen as confirmation of and justification for his affectionate amusement for his people. On the one hand, a Russian literary expert has argued that one can’t translate Gogol into Ukrainian without losing his meaning (www.rg.ru/2009/04/01/mann.html).
And on the other, a Russian Orthodox monk, the director of the Sretensk Monastery publishing house, says that Pushkin may be “our all,” as Russians have always insisted, but Gogol is “all ours,” as even those angry at the way his observations are employed by others have to admit (www.foma.ru/articles/2159/).
Helsinki, April 1 – Mark Twain observed a century ago that “April 1st is a day when we remember what we are like the other 364 days of the year,” but according to commentator Leonid Radzikhovsky, “in Russia these words have a special meaning” because today is the 200th birthday of Nikolay Gogol, whose “kind laughter” over the foibles of his nation helped define it.
In an article in “Rossiiskaya gazeta” yesterday, the Moscow political scientist observes that all Russians are “characters out of Gogol,” because like Russia’s greatest poet Aleksandr Pushkin but even more immediately, the 19th century humorist not only “CREATED” Russia but “DISCOVERED Russia” for itself (www.rg.ru/2009/03/31/gogol.html).
If the role of Pushkin is widely recognized and regularly celebrated, Radzikhovsky writes, that “of Gogol is less obvious but in no way less significant.” Pushkin created “a system of coordinates of his internal world which became the world of Russian culture,” but Gogol “populated this space with people” whom Russians could identify as much like themselves.
He was “the first in Russian literature to describe in detail LIVING Russian people. Because he DID NOT THINK THEM UP,” but rather took them from life itself and thus they “are somewhat more vivid and real than ‘the demons of Dostoyevsky’ or the ‘noble relatives of Tolstoy.’”
And while Gogol highlighted and even made fun of the foibles of his heroes, he “loved them. And that is “one of the main secrets” of his continuing attraction. His laughter was never intended to hurt, it was not from the outside, but rather it in a good hearted way “LEGITIMATED that very Russia” which Gogol loved.
Even “The Dead Souls,” the name of perhaps his most famous novel, were people Gogol loved, Radzikhovsky continues, even as his loved all the other characters that are not only immortal in literature but still found among Russians. And that is something worse recalling too on this bicentennial.
But even as Russians mark this round anniversary, there have been several statements about him that Gogol would have seen as confirmation of and justification for his affectionate amusement for his people. On the one hand, a Russian literary expert has argued that one can’t translate Gogol into Ukrainian without losing his meaning (www.rg.ru/2009/04/01/mann.html).
And on the other, a Russian Orthodox monk, the director of the Sretensk Monastery publishing house, says that Pushkin may be “our all,” as Russians have always insisted, but Gogol is “all ours,” as even those angry at the way his observations are employed by others have to admit (www.foma.ru/articles/2159/).
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