Paul Goble
Staunton, October 7 – The dismissal of Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov highlights the fact that “there is no Russia,” a Moscow analyst argues. Instead, “there is only a Sovietoid copy which has been converted into the RF Corporation,” something everyone involved needs to recognize in order not to continue to pay a high price for making a mistake on this point.
In an essay posted on the Folksland.net portal, Aleksey Shornikov says that “the Russian Federation is not a state, although it dresses itself up in the clothes of a power. The RF is instead a commercial company or as it can be expressed in terms familiar to us, ‘RF Inc.’” (folksland.net/m/articles/view/Aktsionernoe-obschestvo-Rossiyskaya-Federatsiya).
According to Shornikov, “the various European East Indian companies” prefigured the form that RF Inc. has taken since 1991. The most famous of these was the British one in India, a public-private partnership chartered by the king that performed many of the functions of a state but was organized and acted like a corporation pursuing profit.
Moreover, the British East India Company colonized that territory in two ways. On the one hand, its top managers directly ruled much of the population, while on the other, the corporation concluded agreements, “the so-called subsidiary treaties,” with Indian rulers usually called maharajahs.
In all this, Shornikov continues, what is interesting for present purposes is that “the colonization of India [under the East India Company] took place on the money of the Hindus themselves, was paid for by Hindu labor, and washed with Hindu blood!” But in the end, London disbanded the company for its shortcomings and introduced direct royal rule.
All this has been recapitulated during the Soviet period and since in what is now RF Inc., he says. Because of the enormous losses the USSR absorbed in fighting World War II, the Soviet system as an historical project was really finished in 1941, but the wealth of the territory allowed it to limp along for another half-century.
Throughout this period, there were various attempts to reorder life in the USSR, from Khrushchev with his planting of corn to Mikhail Gorbachev with his preference for the Swedish form of socialism. But others in the nomenklatura didn’t want that, seeing it as a threat to their power and wealth. And so they chose the variant of “wild capitalism.”
Indeed, these nomenklaturshchiki were so intent on gaining profit that they were prepared to sacrifice the Russian people and even the entire Soviet project on the basis of the principle: “The Moor has done his work; the Moor can go.” And they organized into what were formally countries but in reality were corporations, from Russia to the other former Soviet republics.
At first, some people dreamed of a “USSR-2, Inc.” but that idea died with the October 1993 clash between the RF Supreme Soviet and RF President Boris Yeltsin. And consequently by the end of that year, he says, “the present political system of a Sovietoid type” took shape, one directed at “the total theft of the former Soviet property.”
RF Inc., he continues, “has all the signs of a commercial enterprise:” its founding agreement, its rules of operation, its managers, its workers, its internal accounting system (the ruble), its “corporate ideology,” and its top managers who have a certain independent standing because of the large number of shareholders.”
The corporation’s basic profits, Shornikov says, come from the sale abroad of natural resources like oil, gas, timber and the like. Some of those profits have to be used to build roads and other infrastructure needed to export more and earn more profits for the corporation. Thos projects “are not for You, Indians or Hindus.” They are for the top managers.
Like most corporations, RF Inc. deals with other corporations – in this case Ukraine Inc. and the like – and sets up “daughter” corporations to take care of certain tasks that RF Inc. needs performed but would like to have handled by a nominally independent agent such as FSB Inc. or the RF Army Inc.
Moreover, again like all corporations, RF Inc. is internally divided with such subordinate “daughter companies” as Moscow Inc., Daghestan Inc., and so on. RF Inc. retains ownership of these “daughter” companies and deals with them as any corporation would with the daughter corporations it has established.
Corporations, even RF Inc., are not immortal. They come into existence and pass out of existence, and RF Inc. may pass away either because of a conflict with China, because of the independent actions of those the corporation controls, or because of outside assistance to those individuals and groups allowing them to displace the corporation.
Which path RF Inc. will follow is difficult to say, Shornikov continues, but he insists that the current RF Inc. elite is hardly committed to its survival if the corporation ceases to be profitable. Its members send their money and children abroad, behave like occupiers, and their Russian means nothing: Administrators of the British East India Company spoke Hindi.
In sum, the commentator says, “we live in RF Inc. We do not have a motherland in the form of a state. Russia was killed by the Bolsheviks in1917. And Russia did not arise in 1991. Instead, RF Inc. appeared.” Russians must take off their “rose colored glasses” and face this harsh reality.
There has not been a Russia “for more than 90 years. RF Inc. “is not Russia, but a commercial enterprise.” In fact, the Moscow commentator says, “RF is a large Soviet collective farm – and no more than that,” however much many of the people who live within it would like to believe otherwise.”
Thursday, October 7, 2010
Window on Eurasia: Circassians Increase Efforts to Secure Recognition of 1864 Genocide
Paul Goble
Staunton, October 7 – The Circassian community is intensifying its efforts to gain international recognition for the Russian killing of their ancestors in 1864 in Sochi where Moscow wants to hold the Olympic Games in 2014, the 150th anniversary of those horrific events.
Last week, Circassians continued to lobby the Georgian parliament, many of whose members appear prepared to hold the Russian Empire responsible for the events of 1864 and to give Moscow a black eye in advance of the planned Olympiad. But in addition and, perhaps to greater effect, the Circassians asked the Estonians to push their cause in European institutions.
The International Circassian Council turned over to members of the Estonian parliament in Tallinn an appeal for assistance and then in Brussels met with Indrek Tarand, an Estonian representative to the European Paarliament as well as with the members of that body’s sub-committee on human rights (kavkasia.net/Russia/2010/1286478926.php).
The Circassian appeal began with the assertion that “the Circassian people is a victim of genocide,” something it insisted the international community must take note of, especially given Moscow’s preparations for the 2014 Olympic Games and Russia’s failure to protect human rights or the environment there.
“In recent years,” it continued, the situation in the North Caucasus with regard to human rights has become sharply worse, and incidents of the persecution of journalists have achieved a critical level. In addition, the Russian government [in its preparations for Sochi] has ignored all ecological norms,” something that has already had a negative impact on people living there.
“Circassians living through the entire world together with their compatriots do not intend to accept the existing situation and thus want to gain the attention of the international community to these facts,” the appeal said, in the hope and expectation that “civilized countries” will take a clear and forceful position against what Moscow is doing.
“The reputation of Estonia as a reformist country, member of the European Union and NATO,” it continued, “permits the hope that this appeal will receive the necessary attention of the Estonian government and society, promote timely intervention in this situation, and guarantee an active part in the resolution of these questions by its partner countries.”
Meanwhile in Georgia, support for the Circassian position appears to be growing. Alexander Rondeli, a prominent commentator, said that justice required reaching a conclusion about the events of 1864 on the basis of facts, even though Moscow would use any Georgian declaration on this point against Tbilisi (kavkasia.net/interview/article/1286427893.php).
Most Georgians who have looked into the matter have concluded that “the physical destruction of the Circassians by Russia on an ethnic basis in the 19th century” took place, although debates about the interpretation of specific facts continue, all the more so because of the complexities of the relationship between the Russian Federation and Georgia now.
Moscow, however, invariably tries to blame Georgia for anything bad that happens in the region especially when it can be tied to the Sochi Olympics, Rondeli pointed out, and many people dismiss Georgian responses as nothing more than tit-for-tat, without being willing to examine the evidence offered by the various sides.
Consequently, even though most Georgian experts accept that Russian Imperial officials killed Chechens on an ethnic basis, the key characteristic of a genocide, Rondeli continued, Georgian officials cannot ignore that “the fact of recognition by Georgia of the genocide of the Circassians will also be used against Georgia.”
Indeed, he pointed out, “a decision of the Georgian parliament [on this point] will be used for anti-Georgian propaganda,” and that reality means that even those who have seen the evidence and reached a conclusion about historical truth have “various opinions” about what they should do next.
As for himself, Rondeli said, it is his view that simple justice requires taking a position. “If they force us to recognize historical facts which in reality do not exist, then why cannot we join with the voices of those who assert that [the killing that took place in Sochi 150 years ago] was a genocide?”
Staunton, October 7 – The Circassian community is intensifying its efforts to gain international recognition for the Russian killing of their ancestors in 1864 in Sochi where Moscow wants to hold the Olympic Games in 2014, the 150th anniversary of those horrific events.
Last week, Circassians continued to lobby the Georgian parliament, many of whose members appear prepared to hold the Russian Empire responsible for the events of 1864 and to give Moscow a black eye in advance of the planned Olympiad. But in addition and, perhaps to greater effect, the Circassians asked the Estonians to push their cause in European institutions.
The International Circassian Council turned over to members of the Estonian parliament in Tallinn an appeal for assistance and then in Brussels met with Indrek Tarand, an Estonian representative to the European Paarliament as well as with the members of that body’s sub-committee on human rights (kavkasia.net/Russia/2010/1286478926.php).
The Circassian appeal began with the assertion that “the Circassian people is a victim of genocide,” something it insisted the international community must take note of, especially given Moscow’s preparations for the 2014 Olympic Games and Russia’s failure to protect human rights or the environment there.
“In recent years,” it continued, the situation in the North Caucasus with regard to human rights has become sharply worse, and incidents of the persecution of journalists have achieved a critical level. In addition, the Russian government [in its preparations for Sochi] has ignored all ecological norms,” something that has already had a negative impact on people living there.
“Circassians living through the entire world together with their compatriots do not intend to accept the existing situation and thus want to gain the attention of the international community to these facts,” the appeal said, in the hope and expectation that “civilized countries” will take a clear and forceful position against what Moscow is doing.
“The reputation of Estonia as a reformist country, member of the European Union and NATO,” it continued, “permits the hope that this appeal will receive the necessary attention of the Estonian government and society, promote timely intervention in this situation, and guarantee an active part in the resolution of these questions by its partner countries.”
Meanwhile in Georgia, support for the Circassian position appears to be growing. Alexander Rondeli, a prominent commentator, said that justice required reaching a conclusion about the events of 1864 on the basis of facts, even though Moscow would use any Georgian declaration on this point against Tbilisi (kavkasia.net/interview/article/1286427893.php).
Most Georgians who have looked into the matter have concluded that “the physical destruction of the Circassians by Russia on an ethnic basis in the 19th century” took place, although debates about the interpretation of specific facts continue, all the more so because of the complexities of the relationship between the Russian Federation and Georgia now.
Moscow, however, invariably tries to blame Georgia for anything bad that happens in the region especially when it can be tied to the Sochi Olympics, Rondeli pointed out, and many people dismiss Georgian responses as nothing more than tit-for-tat, without being willing to examine the evidence offered by the various sides.
Consequently, even though most Georgian experts accept that Russian Imperial officials killed Chechens on an ethnic basis, the key characteristic of a genocide, Rondeli continued, Georgian officials cannot ignore that “the fact of recognition by Georgia of the genocide of the Circassians will also be used against Georgia.”
Indeed, he pointed out, “a decision of the Georgian parliament [on this point] will be used for anti-Georgian propaganda,” and that reality means that even those who have seen the evidence and reached a conclusion about historical truth have “various opinions” about what they should do next.
As for himself, Rondeli said, it is his view that simple justice requires taking a position. “If they force us to recognize historical facts which in reality do not exist, then why cannot we join with the voices of those who assert that [the killing that took place in Sochi 150 years ago] was a genocide?”
Window on Eurasia: To Pacify North Caucasus, Moscow Plans to Replace Non-Russian Officials with Ethnic Russian One
Paul Goble
Staunton, October 7 – Most commentators on the newly approved “Strategy for the Social-Economic Development of the North Caucasus Federal District out to 2025” have focused on its plan to dispatch ethnic Russians to the region and non-Russians from that region to other parts of the Russian Federation.
While many of them support the idea of reversing ethnic Russian flight from that region, few appear to believe that Moscow or the governments in the region will be able to do that. And overwhelmingly, these Russian analysts have expressed concern about the impact of the arrival of even more “persons of Caucasus nationality” into the center of Russia.
Moreover, the reluctance of most Russians to move to a region they see as still extremely unsettled and their opposition to additional gastarbeiters in Russian cities and towns means that in the short term at least the Russian powers that be are unlikely to be able to achieve much in either of these areas.
But one Russian analyst, Konstantin Novikov, has focused on an aspect of this program that Moscow does appear likely to implement -- even though it is certain to lead to a further deterioration of ethnic relations in the North Caucasus and possibly to intensify violence there
(ruskline.ru/analitika/2010/10/07/strategiya_zamireniya_kavkaza_generalgubernatora_hloponina/).
Novikov argues that as part of what he calls “Governor General Khloponin’s pacification strategy” – the complete text of that 25,000-word document is available online at government.ru/media/2010/10/4/35578/file/1485.doc -- Moscow will replace local non-Russian officials with ethnic Russian ones brought in from other parts of the country.
In his analysis of the strategy document, Novikov says that its authors believe that the North Caucasus will remain “primarily agrarian,” something that if true will make the transfer of significant populations that the strategy anticipates even more difficult than might otherwise be the case.
What the strategy calls for to make it attractive for ethnic Russians is the development of tourism and transportation and selected industries, sectors the center through Aleksandr Khloponin, the presidential plenipotentiary, is prepared to provide massive financing at least in the short term.
And despite earlier denials, Novikov continues, the strategy calls for boosting outmigration of non-Russians from the region from 17,500 a year to as many as 40,000, a number that will create problems elsewhere because the North Caucasians will not, as the authors of the strategy believe, replace Central Asian gastarbeiters but compete with them.
That in turn, the Moscow analyst argues, will lead to more crime and more xenophobia among ethnic Russians, developments that will simultaneously limit these flows and require Moscow’s intervention to maintain order in places where the situation at present is more or less stable.
But the most interesting aspect of the strategy, Novikov continues, is that it identifies “the outflow of the ethnic Russian population from the North Caucasus” as “one of the main causes of the destabilized situation,” reversing what most analysts say is the cause and the effect, and commits Moscow to returning ethnic Russians to the region.
“For the first time in the history of post-Soviet Russia,” he writes, the powers that be have set as their task “the social-economic development of places of compact settlement of the ethnic Russian population, including the implementation of investment projects and the creation of the infrastructure of Russian culture in the North Caucasus.”
To that end, Novikov notes, the strategy calls for providing those who move there with housing and compensation for resettling. Moreover, it “includes the creation of social preferences for the ethnic Russian population (as sometimes were given to representatives of Soviet national minorities) including in the sphere of education and science.”
The strategy calls for “quotas” for ethnic Russians in republic higher educational institutions and offers ethnic Russians “the opportunities for government and municipal service especially in places of their compact settlement” in the non-Russian republics of the North Caucasus.
But perhaps most significantly, the strategy, which is based on a recognition of “the danger of mono-national formation of the quasi-state formations in the North Caucasus,” calls for “attracting the ethnic Russian element into the administrative and economic structures of the republics,” through the use of “the old Soviet method of national quotas – but now for Russians.”
(In an aside, Novikov suggests that this goal helps to explain why Stavropol kray was included in the North Caucasus Federal District. That was done, he said, “consciously” in order to create a “’neutral’” territory within the district “so that the organs [of the district] could remain primarily ethnic Russian.”)
It remains to be seen, Novikov concludes, “how far the powers that be are prepared to go for the realization of their goals in the North Caucasus.” It is, however, clear that they will face enormous resistance from non-Russians there, who view their ability in post-Soviet times to put members of their own nationality into office as a major step forward.
But Khloponin’s proposals point to a development with consequences far beyond the North Caucasus: His suggestions, which have now been approved by Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, suggest that the Russian Federation is moving toward a system in which the majority nationality – the ethnic Russians – will be given preferences at the expense of non-Russians.
That may win Moscow points from some ethnic Russian nationalists, but this taking back of something the non-Russians won after the fall of the Soviet Union will likely trigger new non-Russian challenges to the center just as Mikhail Gorbachev’s turn to the right at the end of 1990, after he had promoted liberalization, had the effect of accelerating the demise of the USSR.
Staunton, October 7 – Most commentators on the newly approved “Strategy for the Social-Economic Development of the North Caucasus Federal District out to 2025” have focused on its plan to dispatch ethnic Russians to the region and non-Russians from that region to other parts of the Russian Federation.
While many of them support the idea of reversing ethnic Russian flight from that region, few appear to believe that Moscow or the governments in the region will be able to do that. And overwhelmingly, these Russian analysts have expressed concern about the impact of the arrival of even more “persons of Caucasus nationality” into the center of Russia.
Moreover, the reluctance of most Russians to move to a region they see as still extremely unsettled and their opposition to additional gastarbeiters in Russian cities and towns means that in the short term at least the Russian powers that be are unlikely to be able to achieve much in either of these areas.
But one Russian analyst, Konstantin Novikov, has focused on an aspect of this program that Moscow does appear likely to implement -- even though it is certain to lead to a further deterioration of ethnic relations in the North Caucasus and possibly to intensify violence there
(ruskline.ru/analitika/2010/10/07/strategiya_zamireniya_kavkaza_generalgubernatora_hloponina/).
Novikov argues that as part of what he calls “Governor General Khloponin’s pacification strategy” – the complete text of that 25,000-word document is available online at government.ru/media/2010/10/4/35578/file/1485.doc -- Moscow will replace local non-Russian officials with ethnic Russian ones brought in from other parts of the country.
In his analysis of the strategy document, Novikov says that its authors believe that the North Caucasus will remain “primarily agrarian,” something that if true will make the transfer of significant populations that the strategy anticipates even more difficult than might otherwise be the case.
What the strategy calls for to make it attractive for ethnic Russians is the development of tourism and transportation and selected industries, sectors the center through Aleksandr Khloponin, the presidential plenipotentiary, is prepared to provide massive financing at least in the short term.
And despite earlier denials, Novikov continues, the strategy calls for boosting outmigration of non-Russians from the region from 17,500 a year to as many as 40,000, a number that will create problems elsewhere because the North Caucasians will not, as the authors of the strategy believe, replace Central Asian gastarbeiters but compete with them.
That in turn, the Moscow analyst argues, will lead to more crime and more xenophobia among ethnic Russians, developments that will simultaneously limit these flows and require Moscow’s intervention to maintain order in places where the situation at present is more or less stable.
But the most interesting aspect of the strategy, Novikov continues, is that it identifies “the outflow of the ethnic Russian population from the North Caucasus” as “one of the main causes of the destabilized situation,” reversing what most analysts say is the cause and the effect, and commits Moscow to returning ethnic Russians to the region.
“For the first time in the history of post-Soviet Russia,” he writes, the powers that be have set as their task “the social-economic development of places of compact settlement of the ethnic Russian population, including the implementation of investment projects and the creation of the infrastructure of Russian culture in the North Caucasus.”
To that end, Novikov notes, the strategy calls for providing those who move there with housing and compensation for resettling. Moreover, it “includes the creation of social preferences for the ethnic Russian population (as sometimes were given to representatives of Soviet national minorities) including in the sphere of education and science.”
The strategy calls for “quotas” for ethnic Russians in republic higher educational institutions and offers ethnic Russians “the opportunities for government and municipal service especially in places of their compact settlement” in the non-Russian republics of the North Caucasus.
But perhaps most significantly, the strategy, which is based on a recognition of “the danger of mono-national formation of the quasi-state formations in the North Caucasus,” calls for “attracting the ethnic Russian element into the administrative and economic structures of the republics,” through the use of “the old Soviet method of national quotas – but now for Russians.”
(In an aside, Novikov suggests that this goal helps to explain why Stavropol kray was included in the North Caucasus Federal District. That was done, he said, “consciously” in order to create a “’neutral’” territory within the district “so that the organs [of the district] could remain primarily ethnic Russian.”)
It remains to be seen, Novikov concludes, “how far the powers that be are prepared to go for the realization of their goals in the North Caucasus.” It is, however, clear that they will face enormous resistance from non-Russians there, who view their ability in post-Soviet times to put members of their own nationality into office as a major step forward.
But Khloponin’s proposals point to a development with consequences far beyond the North Caucasus: His suggestions, which have now been approved by Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, suggest that the Russian Federation is moving toward a system in which the majority nationality – the ethnic Russians – will be given preferences at the expense of non-Russians.
That may win Moscow points from some ethnic Russian nationalists, but this taking back of something the non-Russians won after the fall of the Soviet Union will likely trigger new non-Russian challenges to the center just as Mikhail Gorbachev’s turn to the right at the end of 1990, after he had promoted liberalization, had the effect of accelerating the demise of the USSR.
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