Oleksandr Ihorovych Matsievskyi was captured by Russian soldiers in December 2022. When told to surrender, he responded with “Slava Ukraini”, and then Russians killed him. They filmed their own war crime and posted it online, inadvertently creating another powerful symbol of Ukrainian identity that will be still alive in another 1000 years.

In a way, this is true - every country is a social construct. If you know a bit of history, it’s fairly easy to write an essay about how any given country is artificial. The easiest examples for me would be (in no particular order): Belgium, Norway, USA, France, Italy, and of course Russia. Your typical European country either never existed as a fully sovereign state before 1900 (Finland! Ireland! Estonia!) or it kind of did, but the continuity with the ancient forerunners is questionable and actually invented during the 19th century nation building (we are the Vikings! we are the Sarmatians! and we are the Hibernians!).

No matter how much effort you put into proving that “Croatia is artificial”, it appeared on a map because some people died for it. Ask another question instead: what is so special about Ukrainian (or Irish, or Norwegian, or Latvian, or Belgian, etc.) identity that some people at some moments of history were willing to sacrifice their lives for it?

With this question, you might reach valuable insights. Of course, many did before me - and I don’t aspire to serve you scientific discoveries. What I write here can be found in books by Tim Snyder (and in a number of books that were never translated to English).

When describing Ukrainian identity, one has to begin with stating that it is Ruthenian (Eastern Slavic). I hope everybody here already understands the difference between “Ruthenian” and “Russian”. It is the same as between “Swedes” and “Scandinavians” (as peaceful as they might seem, don’t make this mistake in a club on a Friday evening - neither in Stockholm, nor in Oslo or Copenhagen).

All Ruthenian nations consider themselves heirs of medieval Kyivan Rus. By accepting Eastern Christianity in the late 10th century, it became a part of the Byzantine sphere of influence. HOWEVER, it bordered Poland and Hungary, the eastern flank of Western Christianity. After a series of wars, so called Red Ruthenia appeared on a map: ethnically and religiously Eastern, but politically a part of the West.

Kyivan Rus collapsed in the 13th century, largely due to Mongolian invasion. Three main splinter states emerged: Vladimir-Suzdal, Novgorod, and Kingdom of Galicia-Volhinia (a sort-of continuation of the Red Ruthenia). Suzdal was also short living, eventually leading to the appearance of Principality of Moscow, a splinter of a splinter of a splinter, which - with the aid of the Mongols - managed to conquer the other splinter states and finally slaughter Novgorod.

The massacre of Novgorod was the foundation of contemporary Russia. They self declared themselves the sole successors of the Kyivan Rus (and the Byzantine Empire for good measure), but they captured the city of Kyiv only in 1657. Being a successor of Kyiv without Kyiv is kind of embarrassing, this is why they are so hellbent on taking in back. It was never just about the Donbas or the “Russian speaking population”.

As the Cyryllic inscription is saying, this is king Danylo Romanovich on a mosaic in Kyiv metro station. You can almost hear him comforting the civilians hiding from Russian air raids “don’t panic, carry on, there were even worse moments in centuries”

Kingdom of Galicia went its own way, but it also did not survive long. It was absorbed by Poland and Lithuania, first separately, and when Poland and Lithuania united, it became a part of the Commonwealth. Unlike Red Ruthenia, which was never a sovereign entity, it was a proper kingdom, so it never completely disappeared (not even until today). Crucially: its king Danylo was crowned by the Western pope in 1253, making him the first pro-Western Ruthenian ruler.

There’s a quote attributed to him, probably apocryphal, but very important for the nation building. Allegedly, when given the crown, he said he would rather prefer an army. All the educated persons in Ukraine know this quote, so it is likely Zelensky was paying homage to king Danylo with his “I don’t need a ride, I need ammunition”.

The failure of Commonwealth to transform itself into triple kingdom (Poland-Lithuania-Ukraine) is commonly considered to be the main cause of its collapse in the late 17th century. Before it happened, it led to the creation of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic church in 1595 (loyal to the pope, but maintaining Eastern rites) and the emergence of the concept of Ukraine. The famous “Radziwiłł map” from 1613 for the first time mentions Ukraine in the contemporary sense.

Zoomed part of the Radziwiłł Map - near Kyiv you can find Latin remark “[this area] we also call Ukraina”, via Wikipedia

This map is also the first one to mention Cossacks, semi-nomadic people inhabiting the wastelands created by the Mongolian invasion. The collapse of post-Mongolian empire created a vacuum of wastelands (“Campi deserti” on the Radziwiłł map) populated by outlaws of various origins, united mostly by their will of having no masters. The failure of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth to integrate them was another reason for its downfall - however, for a very interesting while, the so-called “Kozacy rejestrowi” (literally, “licensed outlaws”), were the bulwark of the Eastern Flank of Western Civilization. Until we told them to bugger off, precipitating a cataclysm.

These two elements merged in the 17th century, creating the Ukrainian identity. Ruthenian, but Western. With Orthodox liturgy, but loyal to the pope in Rome. And with Cossack mentality. Remember “Russian warship, go fuck yourself”? That’s as Cossack as it gets.

Ukrainian identity is not Polish, not Russian, not Hungarian, not Lithuanian, not Turkish and of course not Mongolian (although in the last millennium, Ukraine was ruled entirely or partially by these countries, with a sprinkle of Italian merchant republics for spicing). It emerged as a result of complex mixture of events: rise and fall of Kyivan Rus, then of the Golden Horde, then of the Commonwealth of Poland and Lithuania, then of the Ottoman Empire. It’s not that unusual in Europe: if you ask “why Belgium is a thing?”, the answer will be a similar chain of events.

“Reply of the Zaporozhian Cossacks”, a famous painting by Ilya Repin from 1890. It depits Cossacks enjoying their de facto independence writing super-insulting reply to their de iure sovereign. It probably never happened, but this is yet another example of the Cossack mythos in Eastern European culture. BTW: like many leading Russian scholars and artists, Repin was of Ukrainian origins.

It’s true that they never had their own independent state before 1917, but Ireland emerged on a map roughly in the same period, and nobody calls it “artificial”. Also, the Cossacks were never independent de iure, but for more than a century they were independent de facto.

For 4 centuries Ukraine has fought many wars for independence. They were mostly lost. The current one is the among the most successful (if not THE most successful!) in their history. It goes definitely way better than their first republic (1917-1922).

I noticed that I used the expression “short lived” more than once in this note, which sums up the tragedy of Ukraine. And if you consider all this, you can understand why they are reluctant to give up their independence. This is their informal national motto: “Ukraine - proudly refusing to surrender for centuries”.

I have written about it here a number of times, I will probably repeat myself a bit, but I thought you might ask yourself the question “Well, what does this guy know”? OK! I will now list the authors who contributed most to my understanding of contemporary Russia, by writing at least one book about it or its invasion on Ukraine. In no particular order, they are:

Karolina Baca-Pogorzelska & Michał Potocki, Krystyna Kurczab-Redlich, Igor Miecik, Mariusz Wilk, Maja Wolny, Witold Jurasz, Myrosław Łajuk (his reportage from the battle of Bakhmut is mostly about Ukraine, but there are also interesting insights on the interviewed Russian POW’s and their mentality).

All these books are nonfiction (don’t get me started on fiction!), but they represent various genres. “Gonzo travels across Russia”, “literary reportage / essay”, “memoirs of a mid-ranking diplomat in Moscow”, “economics and politics of the divided Donbas in 2014-2021”, and more. My attitude towards these authors also varies, but in general I find their books insightful and informative.

If you speak Polish, you probably know these authors and their books. If you don’t, many of them will never be accessible to you (some of them are available only on paper). This creates informational asymmetry - whatever is available in English, I have probably read it too (my personal recommendations always are Timothy Snyder and Anne Applebaum). But people who don’t speak Slavic languages will never know as much as your average Slav. Sorry!

Yeah, I know nobody likes Mr Smartypants. We are living in the era of global triumph of stupidity, when politicians can’t even admit they’re reading books, that would make them ineligible. I’m not running, so I can be shameless about my filthy habit.

So without further ado, here’s what I know about Russia - based on the works of the authors mentioned above (and many others). As usual, I’m open for discussion.

The first one of many “pre-murder videos” from Twitter thread by ChrisO

1. Russian society is based on extreme selfishness

While we all like to complain about Western egotism, Russian is beyond our comprehension. In Russia, when you see someone being hurt, you don’t stop; you don’look; you don’t try to help. It’s pointless, and it will only make things worse. Russians learn it the very hard way in their childhood (Boris Yeltsin wrote memoirs where he described his early years… and it makes you understand his heavy drinking). In Western psychology it’s called “learned helplessness”, but I think in Russia “imprinted helplessness” would be better fitting.

This is needed to understand the peculiar phenomenon of Russian “pre-murder videos”, where soldiers bid their farewell to their friends and relatives with the general message “I will be murdered (‘zeroed’) tonight”. They really are killed afterwards.

What’s amazing for Western viewers is that nobody does anything about it. These videos are posted online (that’s why we know them). You can see bystanders in the background. The victim never tries to beg for help, everybody knows the rules - the bystanders are happy it’s not them, at least not today. The victim knows there will be no help.

From the moment I sign it, a countdown of my last 12 days of life begins - a very frank answer from Russian blogger Romanov on “why I don’t sign the contract with the army”. Everybody knows it’s suicide but nobody does anything about it. It would be hard to even imagine in a Western country, but not in Russia

That’s the answer to all questions like “why does the Russian society not mind heavy casualties”? They’re glad it’s not them. Why do they do nothing when someone is thrown out from the window? They’re glad it’s not them. Why don’t they mind the torture of soldiers refusing to go on suicide “meat assaults”? They’re glad it’s not them.

In Russia, expressing kindness or empathy is perceived as stupidity. This is a staple of Russian culture, from Dostoyevsky’s “The Idiot” (1867) to Yuri Bykov’s “The Fool” (2014). When you are kind to Russians, they will think you’re stupid. I’m afraid that’s what Donald Trump achieved with his red carpet in Anchorage.

“They [suicide volounteers] are being promised to have their criminal records reased in exchange for some security job somewhere [away from combat]. The members of this [Wagner] force say Prigozhin “earns trust” and guarantees everything will be according to ponyatya” - a quote from “Bakhmut” by Myrosław Łajuk (Polish translation by Maciej Piotrowski)

2. Russian society is based on gang/prison culture

I already wrote here about it, but I also encountered the word “ponyatya” in Łajuk’s book about the battle of Bakhmut (sorry, I have a screen only from the Polish edition). So you can’t understand this war without understanding “the understanding”.

In this book, “ponyatya” is used to explain how Prigozhin was recruiting volunteers for suicide assaults. For a Westerner, it seems nearly impossible. But in Russia you first recruit naïve or vulnerable individuals - basically the way you recruit entry-level, disposable gang members - and second, force them to do whatever you want them to do. That’s how gangs operate around the world.

In your typical Western country, you can live your middle-class life with no interaction with the criminal world. Your average teacher in Albuquerque never meets drug cartels, unless of course he breaks bad. In the West, you need to proactively seek this world to find it, but in Russia - like in the old joke - this world finds you.

It is important to remember it when you negotiate with the Russians as a diplomat - or as a businessman. Westerners tend to think in “long term”, like “I will pay my mortgage by 2050 and I will retire in 2060”. Russians tend to focus on today, because who knows if tomorrow ever comes - Dostoyevsky already noticed it in “The Gambler”. So they tend to prefer short-term gains over long-term plans (and that’s why it was so stupid of the West to think “if they build Nord Stream, they will turn into a peaceful merchant nation”).

Solovyev telling it like it is - via Russian Media Monitor

3. The Russian hierarchy is built on fear

In the West, when you are jealous of your neighbour’s Mercedes, you dream of being rich enough so you can buy yourself the same model (but with the AMG package). In Russia, you dream of being fearsome enough, so you can go to your neighbour and say “Give me the keys to the Benz, the house and your wife’s bedroom”.

They value money only as long as it helps them to be fearsome. So they respect Pablo Escobar, but not Warren Buffett (rich, but not fearsome).

Russian society is extremely hierarchical (no sense of brotherly egalitarianism there) and your position in this hierarchy is determined by how many people fear you (and conversely, how few people you are afraid of). At the very top are the people afraid only of Putin himself - the selected elite of politicians, oligarchs and gang leaders.

Then go their lieutenants, afraid not only of their direct bosses but also of the possibility of falling prey to inter-elite quarrels. The people “falling from the window” usually come from this echelon (high enough to die from the fall, not high enough to be untouchable). And then we go all the way down the hierarchy ladder, down to that babushka in Malaya Smrodovka.

That’s another reason why all the “Schroeder - Merkel - Trump” diplomacy, “offer them business opportunities in exchange for peace”, was bound to fail. Peaceful Putin would be less frightening and it might cost him his power (and therefore - life). No Russian leader (I mean literally not a single one!) for centuries held his imperial/secretarial/presidential power by making his serfs happy. It’s always fear, from Ivan The Terrible to Vladimir The Even Worse.

A sudden influx of business opportunities would destabilise Russia. Putin can’t give it all to just one guy, so he would have to distribute it among the inner circle, so nobody feels excluded (excluded oligarchs tend to do some Prigozhin sheet). This task is so gargantuan that, from Putin’s point of view, it’s better not to have these opportunities at all. This is also a humanitarian point of view - just imagine how many more people would have to be suicided to re-balance the increased wealth!

“Russian crying in their cars because of the war without understaning it is because of the war” is my favorite subgenre of war-related videos - via WarTranslated on BSky

4. They don’t think like we do

While conspiracy theories are popular in the West, most of us at least assume basic causality around us. If you do this, that will happen. Press this button in a Mercedes, passenger seat is heated. Press this button in an Aston Martin, passenger seat is ejected. Press this button in a Lada, nothing happens, press again, it falls off.

Russians are conditioned by everything and everyone around them into some kind of permanent zen. Things just happen to them; they don’t even try to understand why; they don’t try to prevent them or cause them; they just adapt as they happen.

I had some Russian acquaintances, and I had to cut off all relationships after 2022, because they were literally unable to understand why Russia was suddenly sanctioned and despised in the West. Their typical reply was “What did we do?” (and if you mentioned things like “war crimes” or “invasion”, they said something like “western lies! and even if true, so what”).

Case in study. Dmitry of WarTraslated fame recently posted two videos from the Russian social media. On the left, a gentleman is extremely angry at the effing gas station owners in Moscow, who raised effing fuel prices, who the eff do they think they are, so effing tough guys so they can effing do it? On the right, a lady cries with actual tears (!), because due to GPS jamming in central Moscow, she had to effing circle around Kremlin for an effing hour, because she effing had no clue where to take the effing turn.

The guy on the left seems to be unable to understand that there are such things as supply and demand. And Ukrainian drones destroying Russian refineries. Supply is low, demand is usual, so what will happen with the prices? In the West, even a child will understand it. It’s obvious.

Not for a Russian! First, what Ukrainian drones? Majority of Russians still don’t understand there’s a war going on. They heard someone is being killed in Ukraine, but they don’t think about it. This guy would rather believe in a cabal of petrol station owners (it’s actually a very popular conspiracy theory in Russia), than that the fuel shortages just MIGHT be somehow connected with the war.

Ditto the lady. She knows the GPS is being jammed in Moscow… but she does not understand why. Her country has been at war for almost 4 years but it was never her problem. She never tried to think about it. All she knows is that she missed her meeting, because she’s too stupid to drive around her town without GPS.

Did I say “stupid”? Me bad. Not inclusive. Should have said something politically correct, like “a person in crisis of being Russian”. Of course it’s not simple stupidity. The authors I mentioned above quote their conversations with highly educated and otherwise talented Russians - scientists, writers, journalists, with the same peculiar inability to connect the dots.

Again it makes all negotiations difficult, because Western diplomacy is based on some kind of causality: you do this, we do that, otherwise something happens. Russian minds just don’t work like this.

To conclude - I’m not saying diplomacy with Russia is impossible. But I’m saying it is bound to fail when done by people who do not understand Russia, like Trump or Witkoff. That said, I know Kaja Kallas knows everything she should know, so there is still hope.

How do I define these terms? As always, I try to make it simple. There are countries where the idea of “let’s invade someone” is considered outlandish and just wouldn’t fly in the elections. They are not imperialist.

However, there are countries where most of the public would actually say “great idea, let’s do it!”. Sometimes, their leaders invade someone just to IMPROVE their ratings! These countries are imperialist.

Is Russia the only imperialist country in the world? Of course not! But let’s agree first, this distinction is real and palpable. For instance, Canada and USA look very similar from the Eastern European perspective, and yet one is very much un-imperialist (the prime minister saying “let’s invade someone” would precipitate a snap no confidence vote), the other the exact opposite. It’s similar in Eastern Europe: while in Russia, invading someone always seems a good idea, it is not so in Czechia (and Russians, Czechs and the other Slavs use the same words to order “two beers” at the bar).

Back in a day, Portugal used to be an imperialist country - and their propagada was inciting national pride by the fact that they are colonies, hence “PORTUGAL IS NOT A SMALL COUNTRY”!

Having defined imperialism, let’s move to revanchism. Some countries USED TO be imperialist in their past. They used to own a lot of territories now owned by someone else - and yet they are cool with losing it all. Think of Sweden and Denmark, both used to own almost everything around the Baltic sea and a kitchen sink in Warsaw, and yet in either of them, the idea of “let’s reconquer Norway, it rightly belongs to us, because it used to be ours centuries ago!” wouldn’t fly in a stand-up comedy club, let alone the Rikstag.

But there is a country where the parliament would applaud the speech like “let’s invade Estonia, it is ours ever since the treaty of 1710!”. Can you guess which one? This is tricky. Estonia used to be owned by Sweden, Denmark and (partially) Poland!

But of course it’s not tricky. You know it already. In any non-revanchist country, this idea would have been rejected. In my country, it’s would be not even rejected by the parliament. Politicians saying “we need to reconquer what used to be ours!” are not in the parliament, and it’s not because they lost the election. They could not gather enough signatures to run in the election. In my country, revanchism is reserved for some social media troll accounts.

But obviously - there is acountry where the idea of “let’s reconquer Crimea, it has been ours ever since 1783!” will cause standing ovation in the parliament. Revanchism is not in the mainstream of Russian politics, it is THE mainstream. The late Alexei Navalny, murdered by Putin, used to be the opposition leader, and yet he supported Russian revanchism. His defenders claim he had to do it, otherwise he wouldn’t count in Russian politics - but that’s my point.

If you want to exist in Russian politics, you need to keep saying “we need to reconquer what used to be ours, from Finland to Armenia”. If you say in Russia “let bygones be bygones” - just like we, in the non-revanchist countries, talk about the realms our ancestors lost decades or centuries ago - you are bygone yourself.

“Nem! Nem! Soha!” maps are very popular in Hungary, asserting generations of Hungarians that their country will “NO! NO! NEVER!” accept the border changes of 1918

Russia is not the only revanchist country in the world. Hungary comes into mind, with their ubiquitous “Nem! Nem! Soha!” maps. However, they are not imperialist - not even Orban would do something as crazy as actually invading Croatia to “reclaim Zagrab”. That would finally tank him.

This combination of revanchism and imperialism is extremely dangerous - and just to make a long story short, I would call it “evil”. When you live next door to Russia, you never know when they will invade you. It’s not as simple as “don’t anger the bear and everything will be all right”. They might invade you anyway. The Baltic states in 1940 did all they could “not to anger the bear”. They signed treaties of friendship and cooperation, to no avail. It only makes the situation worse, because if you sign this kind of treaty, Russian troops can just roam freely in the country and you can’t even plan a coherent defense in case of invasion.

And it’s not like the invasion will be victimless. Estonia did not resist the Soviets and yet they committed a lot of senseless atrocities, such as shooting down the last civilian airliner leaving Tallinn Airport, Aero Flight 1631. Simply out of spite.

What I described above should be fairly obvious - it’s just facts and common sense. However, I’m old enough to know that the Jeffrey Sachs fans will just deny everything. Well, I’m glad to explore it further, if someone has any questions.

There is also a third aspect that could be a bit more controversial. While one can say about me that I am politically Russophobic (guilty as charged!), I am also a bit Russophilic meaning that I fell in love with Russian literature back when I was in high school (that was a long time ago). I will now make a sweeping generalization you might find controversial - and I would really love to argue about it with someone who reads more than I do.

“Durak” - “The Fool” is a 2014 Russian film, repeating the classic motiv of the triumpf of evil. The main protagonist (center) is the only decent person in town, trying to prevent a disaster: there’s a residential building that is bound to collapse! He tries to alert the authorities (who embezzled the money for the reconstruction, so they are interested mostly in the cover-up). Spoiler: he achieves nothing but more deaths, he destroys his own marriage, he ends up with nothing. If you know it’s Russia, it’s not a spoiler.

A frequent motif of Russian culture is the triumph of evil and nihilistic denial that virtues such as Truth or Justice even exist. Some Russian authors were true nihilists, like Eduard Limonov, the co-founder of the National Bolshevik Party (whose name was a cute wordplay on National Socialism; so apart from actual nazis, Russia also has nazbols). Some Russian authors were anti-nihilists (most notably Fyodor Dostoevsky), but they wrote about evil with such passion it created a kind of misaimed fandom. Some Russian authors were “good nihilists”, aiming to destroy the obsolete values in hope a new, better society will emerge from their ruins (Turgenev, Chernyshevsky).

You can actually draw a Russian nihilism scheme similar to the Dungeons & Dragons alignment table. There are characters being just pure evil, like Dostoyevsky’s Stavrogin. He is evil to the point where the good old Western villains would run away in tears on meeting him. Gogol excelled in creating characters of “likable evil” - they one that will kill you just like any other evil, but he will crack a joke or two, so you will laugh along as he prepares his torture devices. And probably the most dangerous are the “idealistic evil” characters, like Raskolnikov - who kill because they think they do it for the better good.

The hilarious comedy “The Government Inspector” by Nikolai Gogol is a proof that evil can be funny and quite likable. It tells a story of a town where everybody and everything is corrupt, essentially the same story as “Durak” above. This is 1836, and that is 2014, not much changed (Gogol’s own designs for his play, via Wikipedia).

Does it matter? Suppose for a while it actually does, just for argument’s sake.

Then if you are raised on Russian literature as a young person (and I can empathize with that for the reasons described above), the only choice for your adult life is what kind of evil do you want to become. Alternatively, you might choose a non-evil path, but in Russian culture this kind of character is bound to lose & die, for Evil must triumph in the end.

The mastermind of the first Russian invasion of 2014 Igor Girkin/Strelkov, is very well versed in Russian literature. Not only in the classic-classics, like Dostoyevsky - but also on the modern classics, like Strugatsky brothers. I frequently quoted him here.

I think Girkin very consciously shaped himself as the “idealistic nihilist”, doing the most horrible things, causing thousands of deaths, ordering to shoot down a civilian airliner, etc. - in belief he was bringing some kind of shining future for Mother Russia. The same is true about Lenin, who was inspired by the classic novel on “idealistic nihilism”, “What Is To Be Done” by Chernyshevsky.

The late Prigozhin was an epitome of the “likable evil”, straight from Gogol and Dostoyevsky. Of course, not because he read them, but because they based their characters on actual Russian types (Dostoyevsky’s inspiration was a guy he met in prison, who murdered his father for inheritance, and apart from that tiny detail, he was the nicest fella he ever met). And Putin - as I said many times, is a classic “pakhan”, pure evil feared by lesser evils.

Evil and nihilism in Russian literature are what Wild West and cowboys are for American literature. It’s their specialite de la maison. For Ukrainian literature, it’s freedom - beginning with Taras Shevchenko, a liberated serf, up to Serhij Zhadan.

But again, I don’t have a degree in literature studies, so while I’m fairly certain about the first two point that I made (“Russia is evil because it is imperialist and revanchist”), I’m open to discussion on the third one. In fact, I’d love to talk to a fellow Dostoyevsky afficionados.

When I started it, my basic premise was that until 2022 many people in the West had little interest, and thus little knowledge of Ukraine. This is understandable, for similar reasons I have little knowledge of Africa or Latin America.

If Brasil invaded Uruguay, and some guy from Paraguay started a blog explaining Latin American politics from a local perspective, I would surely read it. And since I know zilch about it, I would rather not express my expert opinion on Latin America, based on what I heard on Joe Rogan podcast.

We live in the age of unreason, with the Internet as a huge disinformation machine. In theory I knew that, but I was genuinely surprised on how bad it is.

This is a screen of a Bluesky user who claims to be from Brasil. Their identity is hidden, because I don’t want to blame anyone, this is just yet another example of someone who clearly lacks basic knowledge - you really need not to watch Russian media to deny Russia bombs Ukrainian cities - and yet he is very opinionated and even given a chance to talk with someone who has more information, he will reject it, because he prefers to believe what he believes.

I guess I overestimated curiosity as a motivation factor. Most people are not curious. They have some pre-existing opinions and avoid anything that could challenge them.

This seems to be somewhat amplified by two fairly recent trends. One is podcastification of discourse. It seems that if you want to reach a larger group of people, you need to talk, not write.

I prefer written expression - both as a content creator and a content consumer - because when you write, you usually have the time to check your notes before hitting “PUBLISH”. A podcast is usually a stream of consciousness without any notes. But our memory is playing tricks on us, so even if you are a bona fide expert on something, you might still make a honest mistake.

A lot of misinformation regarding Ukraine (“the coup d’etat”, “Boris Johnson forced them to reject peace deal”, “Angela Merkel admitted she signed Minsk agreements in bad faith”), etc., is spread by podcasters. Some of them are lying on purpose (it’s a quick way to make good rouble, just ask Tim Pool!), some simply never cared to google the basic facts and dates.

The worst thing about it that people frequently develop a cult-like trust in their favorite podcasters. This is a screen from a guy apparently unable to consider the possibility that Jeffrey Sachs might be wrong about something. Apparently, he doesn’t trust Wikipedia (good! critical thinking!), but he trusts Sachs to the point he’d gladly drink any Kool Aid if his tells him to do so on his favorite podcast. You can’t argue with that.

On the top of that, people are more and more reliant on Large Language Models. Even the “smart ones”, who should know better, are “quoting AI” in discussion, which is of course even worse. LLM don’t tell you “the truth”, they try to predict what kind response you will find true. They hallucinate a lot of stuff, especially when there was not enough English language material to train them.

When experimenting with them, I discovered that while they can quite well tell one Shakespeare’s play from another, they write complete nonsense when asked about Dostoyevsky or Mayakovsky. They produce something that looks like stereotypical imagination of Russian literature drawn by a Westerner who does not speak Russian and actually never read any of it.

For a similar reason, LLM/AI might give you fairly correct answers on American political party system (they aren’t that many parties in Congress!), but don’t trust it on Ukrainian politics. You shouldn’t! It’s extremely multi-party and complex. The foreigners see only Zelensky, but then again, how many politicians from Paraguay or Uruguay I could name (without checking notes)?

Anyway, if you use LLM/AI as a “source” to answer such questions like “is Russian speaking population oppressed in Ukraine”, or “did Zelensky ban all opposition parties?” or “are Christians persecuted”, the answer will be misleading at best, but depending on the model you use - it will be more or less tailored to your belief. These models don’t want to show you “the truth”, but “what you will most likely accept as the truth”, meaning that if they have you marked as a fan of Real Madrid, they will tell you that Cristiano Ronaldo is the best that ever was.

Combine it with the fact that LLM’s are easy to fool (“groom”) - and Russia is already putting a lot of effort to poison them with pro-Russian content - and the conclusion is clear. If you use them as a “source”, you’re delusional. And of course, I’m seeing more and more people in social media, using LLM as the ultimate argument: “LOOK, AI PROVES THAT I’M RIGHT, RUSSIAN LANGUAGE IS OUTLAWED IN UKRAINE!”.

I feel powerless. Stupidity is taking over the world. I give up writing longer forms. I will try to write something within the 300 characters limit on Bluesky as eastsplaining.bsky.social - but not sure for how long. As long as I’m there, I’m happy as always to answer all your Eastern European questions, and perhaps you could finally explain me Uruguay and Paraguay (I think Rome should invade to protect the Latin speaking population…).

via Bluesky account of Jason Jay Smart

I’m writing this note being impressed by riots in Georgia. They are similar to the Ukrainian Maidan in many ways - a de facto pro Russian political party won the election by claiming that they are not at all pro Russian. Then they prove that they were indeed pro Russian by suspending the talks with the European Union, which alienated even some of their own voters.

Of course, the outcome might be different. However, there is one thing we can safely bet on: someone will (or maybe already does) present these riots as an American aggression. Encroachment. Broken promise not to expand beyond the German Democratic Republic. Victoria Nuland did it, probably it’s her in this photo.

I really wish someone who believes this version of history could explain to me, how they imagine it in practice. Are all the protesters paid actors? Maybe even “crisis actors”, like in Alex Jones conspiracy theories? Or maybe they are unwilling puppets, manipulated by the Americans hidden in the shadows?

A very typical example of the “Nuland conspiracy” theory

I love good conspiracy theories - I’m an old school fan of “X-Files”! - but a good theory should have all the answers about the mundane technicalities. Who are the people facing police brutality? Maybe they don’t exist? Even assuming they do it for the money from Victoria Nuland: how much they would have to pay you to make you agree to be beaten and kicked by the police, sprayed with tear gas and hosed from water cannons?

Why is that nobody (either in Ukraine in 2014 or today in Georgia) say “OK, I didn’t sign for this, I won’t risk my life for this fistful of dollars” (substitute the “fistful” for the amount you imagine in your conspiracy theory). I will reveal the truth and make more money on Joe Rogan or Tucker Carlson!

Even if just for argument’s sake, consider the alternative explication. Eastsplication, if I could say so.

Much like in Ukraine, in Georgia most of the population possess firsthand knowledge on the quality of living in Russia and in the West (including the countries that managed to escape from the Russian sphere of influence, that is, they were “encroached on” by the “broken promises not to expand”). In a typical scenario, they have friends and relatives in Russia, but they also have friends and relatives in Poland or Germany, who drive Uber or manage a khinkali restaurant there.

Please notice the lack of symmetry. People migrate from Georgia (or Ukraine) to the West to earn some money, and either settle there for good or return some day with a not-too-old mercedes and enough savings to build a house. They don’t go to Russia (there are exceptions, but they are extremely rare and reserved for rather specific professions, such as espionage or organized crime). In a typical scenario, you send money to help your relatives in Russia and get help from your relatives in Poland.

Most people desire a better life for their children. So just imagine yourself in Georgia (or Ukraine). You do know that people in Poland have a better life than those in Russia. You know that we all used to have the same starting point in 1990. So you want your country (Georgia or Ukraine) to become more like Poland and less like Russia, and you also know that this transformation is feasible.

It does not necessarily translate into your voting behavior. Maybe you don’t vote at all (“if it changed anything, they’d abolish it”, right?). Maybe you did vote for the populist party because you wanted to “be heard”, like the Brexiters. Maybe just like in the “leopard eating faces” party” joke, you voted for the pro-Russian party because you thought they weren’t actually that much pro-Russian.

In all these three scenarios mentioned above, you used to hope that the central tenet of the politics in your country is to “go West” (life is peaceful there). So when your president or prime minister announces a sharp turn to the East - you go to your main square to protest. The future of your children is what motivates you - not Victoria Nuland, not “neocon conspiracy”, not CIA money.

The conspiracy theorists - like Robert Perry in the article quoted in the screenshot above - frequently mention some “smoking gun” arguments. “Nuland passed out cookies to anti-Yanukovych demonstrators at the Maidan square”. Apparently, Perry believed people in Eastern Europe will do anything just for cookies.

It must be a really good bakery. Can I get the address?

My non-conspiracy theory is not based on denying that Western politicians do support the protesters. Why not? I don’t deny they sometimes might indeed engage in photo-ops with some cookies and coffee. But it does not prove the protests were “engineered” by the West.

When I see protesters in Georgia (or Ukraine), I root for them. I would like to see my government helping the girl in the photo with more than just cookies. Maybe she has different political views than mine, but it’s only natural to support a peaceful demonstrator rather than the excessively brutal police. I also remember that I can now enjoy Western standards of living thanks to similar demonstrators in Poland during communist times.

In my opinion, Western politicians such as Victoria Nuland go to places like Maidan, not to “engineer” protests, but simply to boost their popularity on the domestic front. If you prefer the conspiracy version, that’s fine, but please tell me you actually believe people in Eastern Europe are desperate enough to die for cookies?

“Goodwin” farewell video, he will be dead within hours - via YT channel of Daily Telegraph

In mid-September, the #1 story on Russian TG channels was the death of drone operators, sent on a suicide mission by their commander as a cruel punishment for disobedience. So far, the English language sources picked the story up, but without the depth you can find in Russian language sources.

It’s a pity, because the whole story tells a lot about Russia. Once again, most of the truth about it will be lost in (the lack of) translation. So here I go with my humble attempt to bridge this gap.

I will try to reconstruct the sad story of the late drone operators based on what I’ve read on Russian Telegram channels. According to “Soldatska pravda”, , the drone team was formed in September 2022 under the auspices of Igor Strelkov-Girkin (now in prison). It was originally 32 volunteers from mainland Russia (the blogger using an euphemism: “from the bigger country”).

The quote on Strelkov and “the bigger country”, via TG channel of Soldatska Pravda (reposted by Ghost of Novorossia)

This is important, because people who don’t speak Russian believed the main lie, that the so called “Donbas separatism” was, in fact, Donbas separatism. Nobody in Russia believes in that, they don’t even pretend so when they talk to each other in Russian.

So if you read Russian sources, you don’t believe that “in 2014 the Russian speaking population revolted against the coup in Kyiv”, because you know the truth. The truth is that it was an invasion from the “bigger country”, led by paramilitary troops assembled by Igor Strelkov-Girkin - born and living in Moscow, Russia.

The 2014 failed to achieve its goal. They never managed to capture the entire Donbas. They were forced to retreat from their original HQ, established in Slaviansk. It is still doubtful if Russia will be able to recapture this city (even after the fall of Chasiv Yar, it is still a long way to reach there).

Unlike Putin, Girkin seems to be motivated by ideology. While he wholeheartedly supports the invasion as an idea - he became increasingly critical of the implementation. He ended up in prison for criticising Putin - but at least he is still alive.

In September 2022 it was already obvious that the second invasion also failed to achieve the original goals of reaching Kyiv and installing a puppet regime. The fall of 2022 was a season of bad news for the Russians - the offensive in Donbas slowed to a standstill, they were routed near Kharkiv following the retreat from Kyiv, and they were pushed out of Kherson, leaving behind billboards with a quote from Putin “Russia is here forever”, posted just a couple months before.

Farewell message from Goodwin: “I’m on the front line, our unit was disbanded, we are sent to Lisovoye, our unit consists from everybody who’s inconvenient for the commander: Ernest, me, Greek, Nick, no maps, no equipment, no information on minefields, nothing. It’s 12 of us. Tomorrow we attack Ukrainsk - via TG channel of Ghost of Novorossia

Apparently, Girkin correctly identified one of the main problem: Ukrainian supremacy in drone warfare. He decided to emulate the phenomenon of Aerorozvidka, a volunteer drone unit created by IT specialists, who wanted to defend their country in 2014 simply for the love of freedom.

They created this unit like a typical IT startup, by crowdfunding on Kickstarter. They maintained a high level of autonomy and internal liberty, even when working with the regular Ukrainian military.

The Girkin imitation was a success - to a certain extent. He assembled a group of techno-military specialists, some had engineering degrees, some had officer positions in the army. Their equipment was crowdfunded by the military bloggers (actually, this is one of the reasons they are allowed to exist).

But there was this little thingy - autonomy and liberty. Tyranny by definition won’t let you have them even if its existence depends on it.

This is especially true regarding the so called “separatist republics”. Girkin did not have much choice picking his “local leaders” there, so he had to use to the local organized crime as the backbone of the separatist “police” and “army”. That’s why the military bloggers are often robbed at gunpoint by the “police” when they deliver their goods to the “army”.

It seems that the drone operators were hoping their “elite” status will protect them and they were openly complaining about the activities of their commander (“kompolk”), colonel Puzik, callsign “Zloy” (“The Evil One”). He disbanded the drone unit, demoted them to foot infantry and sent to certain death.

In their last messages they say there were given no maps at all, let alone plans of the minefield. They were just ordered to go towards the enemy positions and almost all of them died, except for one, callsign “Sokrates”. It seems that he managed to desert, and milblogger Romanov says there is currently a manhunt for him.

Ernest, Goodvin, Riff, Shock and Sokrat - there was 12 of them, all from Russia. Sokrat is alive but there is manhunt after him - claims Romanov (on September 15th) - via TG channel of Romanov

According to the farewell videos, the “evil” kompolk was repeatedly reporting false successes to his superiors. Being drone operators, the victims knew the truth and they were also reporting it. The last case was of settlement called Lesovka - Puzik reported it as taken, while in fact his suicide stormtroopers only managed to reach it - and got killed by the Ukrainians, still present in ruins. Apparently, the demoted drone operators were sent to death in the same location.

Some bloggers seem to hint that there were other dirty secrets. Drug trafficking was rampant and the evil kompolk not only tolerated it, but he profiteered from it. There was also embezzlement of the crowdfunded goods. What can you expect from someone who literally calls himself “The Evil One”?

Now, if you think Russia and Ukraine are equally evil, try to find a similar story on the Ukrainian side. The closest one you can get is the scandal in certain unit when trained artillerymen were used as regular infantry, because there were no artillery shells for them. But this ended with the demotion of the commander who gave this order.

This is not the case with the death of Goodwin and his friends. “The Evil One” is not demoted, and while the case is being investigated, so far the investigation is focused on intimidating the witnesses. Once again, it’s not my imagination, I quote it from Russian milbloggers. Probably this will end up like the other notorious cases from Donbas - if anyone gets punished, it’s the witness, not the perpetrator.

“Puzik The Evil one” is not being demoted from commandeering the unit, on the contrary, he is now forcing his subordinates to write identical statements in his support - laments Saponkov (via Saponkov TG channel)

I would like this story (with all the juicy details!) to be known to the people who “support Russia” without a faintest clue of what Russia really is. It is fairly safe to “support Russia” from far away - as far as can be - but if someone is crazy enough to actually come to Russia and volunteer, like one Russell Bentley (callsign Texas), sooner or later they will collide with the Donbas organized crime, posing as “police” and “army”.

Russel “Texas” Bentley, a person stupid enough to actually go to Russia to help Russia - ended up killed by Russia. What a pretty Darwin prize! Via Youtube channel of Russian propaganda servive, The Grayzone

You can be an anarchist, trotskyist or radical ecologist, and hate capitalism, bourgeois democracy, NATO and European Union. But you actually need these institutions to protect your right to be an anarchist, trotskyist or radical ecologist. You don’t expect Putin or Lukashenko providing you that liberty, do you?

If Russia comes to your place, it’s not like they gonna let you keep on living like you’d want to. You will make an easy prey to the people like “The Evil One”. If he doesn’t care about the lives of his own people - how much hesitation do you expect from him before robbing and killing you?

If your mom was Ukraine capital, then yes, maybe? Via Youtube channel of Times of India

Since I started this Substack, I keep repeating basically the same mantra: Russia’s omnipotence is overrated. The recent successful incursion of Ukrainian troops proved once again this point.

In the original draft for this note, I wrote of 200 square kilometers of Russian territory captured. That alone would be a great success, but then the governor of Kursk reported to Putin, that the incursion is 40 km wide and 12 km deep, and the next day it was already over a 1000…

On August 6h, Apti Alaudanov, the miserable excuse for a general largely responsible on Russian failure around Sudzha, advised: “take popcorn” (“Berem popkorn” ) “and watch how Ukrainian troops are being destroyed”. Then he retreated, retreated, retreated and as of writing this, he keeps on retreating. I don’t know how far in the future you are reading this, but something tells me he still failed to destroy anyone (apart from his momma). Via an excellent compilation of Apti Alaudanov daily reports on Telegram channel of Noelreports.

How much and for how long Ukraine will be able to keep at it, that’s another question. But even falling back to the original 200 sq km it would still mean a lot.

I have a feeling that while obviously our hopes for Crimean Summer Beach Party did not come true (and with the recent cholera outbreaks due to poor sanitary conditions I’m not sure if I’m interested anymore), at least there will be a modest New Year celebration in Sudzha. According to the Kyiv timezone.

In the meantime, I keep reading Western and Indian (for some reason, the latter seem even more clueless) media outlets predicting that Putin will now destroy all the Ukrainian units, in fact - he already did, Zelensky went into a trap, he poked the bear, in fact - NATO poked the bear, there will be a harsh response, now it’s gloves off, Russia has finally lost patience, etc. The usual stuff.

And as usual, nothing happened. There was no “harsh response”.

The common source of all these mistakes is the assumption, shared by many Western and Indian analysts, that Russia has infinite resources of manpower, equipment and supplies. So while Ukraine is making a costly mistake of diluting its own limited resources, for Russia it costs nothing.

It’s just as if there was a magic terracotta army with thousands of artifact creatures Putin can summon by tapping some colourless mana, like in fantasy games. For some reason, he still does not use it, but if you cross THE red line (the real one, unlike the previous 2149 “red lines”), he will unleash all his anger on you. But this time for real.

Excerpt from “Growth” by Daniel Susskind

Reading a book on something else, I was stunned to discover that the standard economy textbook on American universities by Samuelson and Nordhaus, predicted the ultimate victory of Soviet economy. The prediction was based on the comparison of the triumphant growth of Soviet GDP and the much slower rate in USA. The predicted curves were overlapping in the future indicating that at some moment Russians will produce more than Americans, thus essentially winning the arms race.

If he unleashed his furry on your momma, she should still be perfectly fine (via Youtube channel of Hindustan Times)

In 1961 the authors predicted this to happen in 1980s. In the subsequent editions of their textbook the dates changed. When the 1980s finally came, it was supposed to be in the early 21 century. Then the prediction was quietly withdrawn from next editions, just before the collapse of Soviet Union.

While not directly related to the war, this factoid illustrates the general inability of Western experts to understand Russia. They don’t speak the language, they don’t know the culture, they never been there - so they just can’t believe the whole country can be based on lies.

Sure, statistics get “dressed up” everywhere, but in Russia they can be made up entirely. For instance, recently I wrote about a city of Tver that disbanded their tram network because decades of neglect damaged it beyond repair. I’m sure if you check the Russian official statistics on total length of the tram lines - the decommissioned network in Tver will still be included. Along with the lines that were never built, but the are planned since 1920s.

Oh yeah, sure. He will launch a biiiig operrrration on your momma in Kursk. That’s confirmed! But is it next week? Next month? Next year? Next century? That’s still classified (the screen is from August 2024). Via Youtube channel of Hindustan Times.

So if you read that some Russian unit has, say, 1000 tanks - first of all assume, that 300 of them never existed in the first place. But they are listed in the registers, because those non-existent tanks still are supplied with petrol and lubricants that can be sold in the black market, so the people higher-up are motivated to inflate their registers.

Of the remaining 700, 300 actually exist, but they cannot be used because of some damage. So they are used only as a reserve of spare parts for the remaining 400. Where maybe a half is in good operational shape, the rest are used as “turtle tanks” or immobile gun post.

Of course when Putin calls his imaginary friends, your momma is in panic - via Youtube channel of Hindustan Times

You should apply this principle to anything you read about Russia. Especially about Russian army.

I do - and that’s why I don’t believe in Russian “red lines”. They can’t risk an all out war with NATO, if it was so easy for Ukrainian units to capture Sudzha, how hard it would be for NATO army to reach Petersburg and Koenigsberg, essentially eliminating the Russian Baltic Fleet?

Vance and Trump standing together during the first night of the 2024 Republican National Convention, Public Domain (via Wikipedia)

The declaration of J.D. Vance, Donald Trump’s running mate, that he „does not really care what happens to Ukraine” and that America needs to focus on “the real enemy”, China - sent many shivers in Eastern Europe. Personally I think it was dangerous and irresponsible, but since J.D. Vance could be the next vice president, we will need to find some modus vivendi with him, like it or not.

So if I am blessed with the presence of any Trump voter, let me try to present my polite refutation. I will try to explain why I think he should care, and so do you.

The argument “we have enough problems locally, let’s fix them instead of being engaged in conflicts overseas” is close to my heart. I’m a bit of a pacifist myself - before 2022 I considered myself a fan of Roger Waters!

So many US citizens died on Lusitania that by sheer statistics it is nearly certain at least one of them voted for the policy of neutrality (we have enough problems in USA, let’s steer clear of this pointless European brawl…)

The problem with being a great power is that you can’t avoid engagement. In 20. century the USA tried twice to steer clear of the world wars - and failed twice.

You can say “I don’t care what is happening in Europe”. But you end up with German U-Boots killing American citizens (1915), or Japanese planes destroying Pearl Harbor (1941).

America had the choice of joining the war on its own terms or on the terms set by the enemy. The latter choice was obviously worse. Do you want to repeat the same mistake for the third time?

A country like Switzerland might have the luxury of being neutral, but not a superpower like the USA. The only way for America to get this luxury is by ceasing to be great. The logical opposite of “MAGA”!

(via “Hearts of Iron 4”)

This is because a superpower needs friends, allies, vassals, client states or “foederati”, like in Ancient Rome. Some superpowers in history indeed tried to isolate themselves from the world by building a great wall and focusing on internal problems - that’s ancient China.

The wall did not protect them from the Manchurian invasion, the internal problems spun out of control during Qing dynasty, they ended up attacked from literally all sides and suffered greatly. This is an unambiguous lesson from history, that “isolated superpower” is a bad idea. Nobody would want to repeat it today, especially not China, building its own chain of friends, clients and “foederati” right now, as we speak.

I spent my youth under communism, so it would not be hard for J.D. Vance to convince me that China is “the real enemy”. For argument’s sake, let’s assume it is true. So what are the logical conclusions?

First, we all agree that the best way to fight a war is to establish your war goals without actually fighting a war. To paraphrase the great Bruce Lee: the best combat style is “fighting without fighting”.

“My style? You can call it the art of fighting without fighting” (from “Enter The Dragon”, 1973)

The only plausible scenario of a full scale Sino-American war would be a China attempt to reconquer Taiwan by force. American war goal here is to protect Taiwan and I think J.D. Vance would agree with me that the best way to achieve this war goal is “the Bruce Lee way”: deterrence.

China perceives Taiwan as its province, but the world is full of countries seeing “lost provinces” in their neighbours. For instance, a number of Latin American states are former provinces of the Bolivarian Gran Colombia.

The World War II was a painful lesson that nothing good comes from “reclaiming lost provinces”, so the whole post-1945 international order was based on the principle of discouraging everyone from doing so. It is explicitly outlawed by the UN Charter, among other documents.

In a way, it worked. Wars of annexation - a common thing in 19. century and before that - became a rare thing after 1945.

To certain extent it was creative accounting - Soviet invasions were presented as “brotherly help”, American invasions were about “protecting human rights”, etc. - but as Rochefoucauld famously said, hypocrisy is a tribute that vice pays to virtue. Everybody accepted that “annexation” is not a valid war goal, even those who had to invent elaborate justifications to bypass this principle.

Russian annexation of Crimea and other parts of Ukraine is the first open violation of the UN Charter in decades. If it goes unpunished, we open a Pandora’s box of similar annexation wars worldwide. In particular, China might feel encouraged to solve its own border conflicts with their neighbours (it’s not only about Taiwan).

So if you consider China “the real enemy”, you should care about what happens to Ukraine. Quod erat demonstrandum. I think I already proved my point, but there are more reasons.

Like I said, ever since Bronze Age, you need good alliances to dominate. Therefore, if you perceive China as “the real enemy”, you don’t want them to have strong allies.

Since Sino-Russian alliance is already a thing, if you think of war with China, you don’t want strong Russia. Therefore, you should care what happens to Ukraine. QED - again.

The same reasoning goes the other way, of course. America cannot handle China on its own, it needs to persuade its European allies to die for Taipei.

“Karbala” (2015) - and actually pretty decent Polish movie about Polish troops in Iraq

This is not impossible - after all, not so long ago we were convinced to die for Baghdad and die for Kabul, and we sent our troops to help George W. Bush invade Iraq and Afghanistan. Neither, may I add, seemed like a particularly good idea at the time and certainly not in retrospective, but we helped our American friends because that’s what friends do.

If Russia wins, we will need our troops and resources domestically, because we will have a hostile superpower directly at our borders. So this time it could be different: America might call us for help again, but we might say “look guys, we send your our thoughts and prayers, but that’s all we can do in this situation, maybe you should have cared what happens to Ukraine after all…”

QED for the third and final time.

A random headline from YT channel “We Love Africa”. Do they really believe the West worries about these warnings?

What do you feel when reading about Russian “chilling warning?”. In the third year of the war, does anybody take these warnings seriously?

I live in the country that should be the first to go. And yet I don’t worry at all. If I find anything chilling watching youtube videos like this one, it’s more like “Netflix and chill”.

It’s not because I’m particularly brave, far from it. It’s just whenever Nebenzya, Lavrov or Medvedev start threatening us, I perceive them like a drunkard in a bar, yelling that “he will beat the crap of everyone who’s laughing at him”, but he can’t even stand up straight.

In reality, the super-duper-invincible S-500 system survived only two weeks in Crimea - the most modern Russian AA system was no match for a 30-years old ATACMS, via YT channel of Alex Mercouris

Russian army is too weak to conquer Ukraine, let alone Europe. Even if they still have some reserves, they need them for internal purposes. They have one terrorist act after another and there will be more of them - Russia no longer has enough troops to control Russia.

I don’t believe in nuclear blackmail either. Here’s my reasoning:

First, Russian elites became too dependent on the Western luxuries to think seriously of destroying the West. This is starkly different to the Cold War or World War II.

Goering did not own a condo in Kensington, so he was OK with the Blitz. Goebbels did not send his children to study at Harvard, Hitler did not buy Eva Braun a villa in Florida - etc.

Russian elites, including Putin, do all the above. They invested heavily in Western real estate. They sent their children, spouses, lovers, nieces etc. to the West, where most of them reside even today. They won’t nuke their own kin and their own property.

Soloviev is still unable to cope with the fact that he lost his villa in Italy and he keeps complaining even if it has nothing to do with the main topic of his show (here, he managed somehow to connect Assange with it). Would he fancy his villa being nuked? Via YT channel “Russian Media Monitor”

But for conversation sake, let’s assume that they would. Still, I’m not afraid.

In the case of an all-out “Russia vs NATO war”, I believe in NATO establishing full air superiority within the first hours. The reason being: Russian aircraft is crap.

It’s been 50 years when Soviet-produced fighters scored any victory over Western air forces. The West drew conclusions from the Vietnam war and changed everything, while the Soviets did not and got stuck in a dead end.

The results were seen in the next decades. If MiGs or Sukhoys scored any success, it was when fighting a a civilian airliner. Any actual air battle “MiGs versus Phantoms” (Iran/Iraq, Israel/Syria etc.) resulted in a turkey-shoot massacre of Soviet crap.

So I believe that in case of such open conflict, everything Russia will try to launch towards the West will be destroyed immediately. Usually already on the launching pad. Due to the Western domination in satellite reconnaissance, I don’t believe in Russian capability to execute a surprise attack.

But then again, I don’t think this bluff is serious. Russia cannot continue war without Chinese aid, which effectively turned them into a junior partner.

While China does have its own conflicting interests with the West, they are of trade nature. You don’t win a trade war by nuking your best customers. So at the end of the day, Xi Jinping will not allow his little Vladimir to do any nuclear shenanigans.

What I wrote here is considered more or less obvious in my country. But to my amazement, there are people in the West (and elsewhere) who still take Russian “chilling threats” seriously.

You’re right, it’s worse. At least in 1960’s we didn’t have to suffer the idiot influencers - via YT channel of Jimmy Dore

Case in study: couple of weeks ago, in a pathetic attempt to show some muscle, Russia sent its warships to Cuba. For me, it was laughable. This war has clearly demonstrated that if there is anything more crappy than Russian Air Force, it is Russian Navy.

In the beginning of the invasion, Russia announced a full naval blockade of Ukrainian ports. Under UN auspices, a special humanitarian exception was created, commonly called “the grain deal” - to allow ships carrying grain to pass.

In summer 2023, Russia announced its unilateral withdrawal from the deal. It was simply ignored by everyone else.

Oh, the fear! - via YT channel of twice convicted sexual offender Scott Ritter

Why? Because in the meantime, Russia has lost the ability of enforcing the blockade. Russian Black Sea Fleet lost so many ships - including the flagship, the (in)famous cruiser Moskva - that the last operational vessels escaped to the naval bases (and even there, they keep getting pounded by Ukrainian missiles and drones).

Today even the Russians no longer talk of “naval blockade”. Major shipping companies, such as Hapag-Lloyd, recently resumed their regular service to Ukraine. Shipping cargo volumes reach the pre-war levels.

The West is shaking with laugher so hard this guy can’t even put his lines straight - via YT channel of Larry Johnson

Let me reiterate: Russia has lost its Black Sea Navy to a country that has no navy. How do you expect their performance versus US Navy?

They can launch cruise missiles towards American cities? But such missiles would be destroyed within minutes after launch, along with the ships.

It seems so obvious and yet - Twitter and Youtube were full of alarmist headlines. “The West is in panic!” “US in real trouble!” “NATO unprecedented fear!”. This will end up with Armageddon, Judgement Day, Mad Max, Terminator and Roger Waters Global Tour!

The stupidest commentary was probably produced by Russell Brand, who recorded a long incoherent monologue (“SOMETHING HUGE IS ABOUT TO HAPPEN!”), where he kept repeating that “this was so easy to prevent!”. But he never explained why even bother with the Russian navy trip to Cuba. WHO CARES? WHY PREVENT IT? They came, they went, that’s it.

As it turned out, that “something huge” was actually Russell Brand’s mom

I noticed that “predicting” something “huge” is a typical strategy for shitfluencers on Youtube. Like a broken clock that shows the correct time twice a day, something huge will happen eventually, sooner or later. And since it’s impossible to be disgraced there (Scott Ritter is a twice sentenced sex offender, ffs!), nothing happens when their “predictions” turn out to be rubbish.

It’s happening, oh my God, it’s happening! - via YT channel of Russell Brand

But is it really only this - or maybe there is something in the bigger picture that I miss? Am I blessed with the presence of someone watching Brand, Ritter, Mercouris or MacGregor - and having a different opinion than me? Maybe there is someone who still takes Putin’s nuclear blackmail seriously?

I would really love to see a different point of view. My own opinion is based on the fact that I speak Russian, I follow Russian media and I spent a significant part of my life in the Russian sphere of influence. So I’m not surprised that “no navy” can be actually stronger than “Russian navy” - when Russian-made “Elektrobritva” razor is all you have, better start growing a beard.

This note will NOT be about this, but following everything I can on the war in Ukraine, I couldn’t help but notice Sachs activity in this field. Since Putin’s invasion, he suddenly became a self-proclaimed expert on Russia.

He appears in many outlets, repeating the same message (incidentally, quite similar to the Kremlin propaganda). I use here as an example his appearance at Piers Morgan show - with auto-generated captions, so you can see I’m not putting my words in his mouth.

I just can’t help but think that the best caption for this screenshot is “Dumb and Dumber” (via Youtube channel of Piers Morgan Uncensored)

He says that “Russia throughout its history has always believed in keeping some safety from the West which has repeatedly invaded Russia”. Therefore, Russia has the right to enslave its neighbouring nations in order to create a buffer zone to be protected from the next invasion.

Why does the West keep invading Russia? Actually Sachs fails to provide an answer. For some reason, the West plainly “hates Russia” and even if the Youtube caption suggests that Sachs can explain why it is so - actually, he does not.

His reasoning boils down to tautology. The West hates Russia because it is evil. It is evil, because it hates Russia.

It is only due to this hatred that the West “repeatedly invades Russia”. Russia does nothing to provoke these invasions, it is just minding its own kolkhoz.

Why? Because it is being ruled by a satano-masonic conspiracy willing to force everybody to change their gender and - no! - recycle their trash (oh the humanity!). What did I won? Via the Youtube Channels of Judge Napolitano.

As an example of such unprovoked invasion, Sachs mentions the Crimean war and Lord Palmerston. Unfortunately, while Morgan pretends to disagree with his guest on some minor issues - in reality just providing him softball questions to keep the conversation going - he never calls this obvious bullshit out. Probably he is even more clueless about Russian history than Jeffrey Sachs.

How on earth can you present the Crimean War as an unprovoked invasion of Russia by the evil West? What does one have to have in their mind instead of a brain to imagine this?

Was it like Lord Palmerson woke up on some sunshine day and said to himself - “goddamn, it’s been so long since we last invaded Russia!” So he called his friend, Louis Napoleon Bonaparte and he agreed, “sacrebleu, ou la la, j’ai la proposition: allors invadons le Crimea!” “Good idea, old chap, see you in Dardanelles!”.

The Crimean war was a war between Russia and the Ottoman Empire. The latter was crumbling at the time and it was justly perceived by the European powers as an easy prey.

A non-lesson on non-history, with one student non-learning (via Youtube channel of Piers Morgan Uncensored)

The war started with Russia invading the Ottomans in the area of what is now Romania and Moldova. The reason was bogus - Russia said it has to protect the Orthodox Christians, although the Ottomans, trying to avoid the war, already declared that they respect the religious rights of all Christian denominations.

As it happens with many wars, the initial invasion went well (Bucharest in 3 days), but England and France did not want Russia to grow too strong. At that time European politics was all about balance of power, so Paris and London reluctantly (nobody there wanted to die for Turkey!) ended up allied with the Ottomans. Their intervention turned the initial Russian victory into a decisive Russian defeat.

But the point is, Russians started this war. If not for their initial invasion, there would be no French and British intervention, no “charge of the light brigade”, no Florence Nightingale (or rather: a different Florence Nightingale), no battle of Balaclava (meaning we would probably have to invent another word for, you know, a balaclava), etc.

Everyone was reluctant to take part in this war. England and France were not happy to send their troops to the other part of the continent. And the Turks would certainly prefer not to have been invaded in the first place.

After all, maybe some sort of censorship of pure idiocy would not be such a bad idea? (via Youtube channel of Piers Morgan Uncensored)

Yes, this is true that Russia was sometimes invaded by some Western countries. But it was never uncalled for, not even in World War II.

In 1938, the Soviet Union actually did have a chain of smaller European states, separating them from the Nazi Germany. Some of them had a non-aggression pact with Soviet Russia (e.g. Poland) and most of them would be very happy to remain neutral in the upcoming bloodshed. But Soviet Russia invaded them one after another in 1939-1940, either destroying them or turning into enemies.

And of course, Germany would not have had the army to invade Poland if not for the Soviet-German military cooperation that started already in the Weimar republic (1922). For almost two decades the Germans bypassed the limitations set by the Versailles treaty, secretly making tanks and planes in Soviet factories and training their soldiers and pilots in Soviet facilities.

Most of the Western invasions on Russian soil were of the “play stupid games, win stupid prizes” category. It frequently started with Russia noticing that a neighbour seems weak, so the tzar or general secretary decided to invade, only to cry later “boo-hoo, why is everybody picking on me!”.

Alternative histories are always a tricky business but this is fairly certain that if it wasn’t for the secret military part of the Rapallo treaty of 1922, when Hitler came to power, the German army would be considerably weaker than it was in our continuum. So even if they attacked Czechoslovakia or Poland, they would get bogged down in some WW1 trenches quagmire.

In this scenario, nobody even thinks of “invading Russia”. They brought it on themselves, as always.

If you really know a first thing about Russia, you will know that “throughout its history” (if you count the entire history, since Middle Ages) its main enemies were to the East (Mongolia, China, Japan, Siberian Nations), to the South (Turkey, Persia, Circassia, Caucasian Nations) and to the North (Sweden). The West wouldn’t get the “#1 Russian Occupier” badge simply because…

...and this is the stupidest part of Jeffrey Sachs blabbering: because until 1945 “The West” did not exist as a political or military entity. Ever since the collapse of the Western Roman Empire, most European wars were fought between VARIOUS Western countries.

For the majority of its history, the West did not know that the principality of Moscow (the predecessor of contemporary Russia) even existed. Once the contacts were established in late 15. century, Russia started to participate in the Western European wars as an ally of this or that coalition. So usually when Russia was “invaded by the West”, it was also helped by someone else in the West.

Jeffrey Sachs would have known all that if he ever read any book on Russian history. But they have a saying in Russian, “ya ne tschitatyel, ja pisatyel” - “I’m not a reader, I’m a writer”. It is used to denote authors who are too stupid, too stubborn and too proud to check their sources.

It fits Sachs like a hand fits a glove. But of course he’s not the only one repeating this whole “evil West hating Russia” nonsense. It seems that his “source” (much like that of Elon Musk or Roger Waters) is that nice lady from the Russian embassy, or that Russian businessman who owns a football team, or that cool Russian journalist who somehow can invite you to a lavish party despite all the sanctions.

Why check the facts if that means no further invitations to caviar testing sessions on the yacht “Le Oligarch”?

I just found the whole endeavor repetitive an futile. We live in the disinformation age and the truth lost.

What’s the point of reporting the facts, when Elon Musk or Russell Brand post some obvious BS and reach millions? If you try to correct them, you inevitably have to repeat the same facts again - being repetitive, and therefore boring.

This note will also be repetitive. It is essentially a follow-up to “Living in Russia is Hell”, which I wrote over a year ago.

That one was inspired by a series of recruitment ads targeted at Russian audiences. Their message boiled down to “your civilian life is hell anyway, so why not volunteer for the army, what do you have to lose?”.

Back in a day, this caused some uproar among the Russian bloggers that I follow. They considered these ads “anti Russian”. Maybe so, but they did the trick: so far Putin indeed is able to find volunteers to die for him, apparently they REALLY have nothing to lose.

The mock image of a new high speed train that is supposed to connect Moscow and St Petersburg in some unspecified future (as we say, it will be probably just to celebrate the holiday of St Never) - via TG Channel Tolkovatel

Recently at the Petersburg Economy Forum it was announced that a new, modern high speed rail will connect Moscow and Petersburg, via Tver and Novgorod. The discussion went off topic, as usual in the social media, but the new direction was a surprise even for me.

Russian bloggers began to wonder why Tver and Novgorod are such shitholes, if they are located between two prosperous cities. “Very good question!”, admits Roman Saponkov (I actually quote him also in “Living in Russia is Hell”) and he adds his three kopeykas to the discussion.

“Good question!” by Roman Saponkov (via his TG channel)

“When I travel to Europe I’m always surprised how well they live in glubinka” - he writes. I leave this word without translation, because I don’t think there is a good equivalent in Western languages.

“Glubinka” means literally “deep territory”, but the literal meaning can be misleading. In this discussion Tver and Novgorod are classified as “glubinka”, although they are literally in the middle of the Moscow-Petersburg urban corridor.

In other languages and cultures you do have some expression for “flyover states” or “one horse town”, but in Russia, “glubinka” could also mean a city with population over a million. Basically, everything that isn’t Moscow or Petersburg counts as “glubinka”.

Living in “glubinka” is so unpleasant it was used as a punishment in the Soviet and tzarist years. Andrei Sakharov, the famous dissident, was internally exiled to Nizny Novgorod (of population 1.6 million), until Gorbachev “pardoned him” and allowed him to return to Moscow.

Saponkov seems genuinely surprised that this is not the case with the Western equivalents of “glubinka”. In Finland he noticed that a small town can be beautiful “like on a postcard”. And he specifies what he means by “postcard quality”: beautiful houses, pedestrian-only streets, summer garden cafes, a lake in the city center with a paved sidewalk, where people are strolling...

And the climate is exactly the same like in Russian Karelia - he notices. So why can't cities in Russian Karelia look as nice as those in Finland? A very good question, indeed.

He asks further: “Why an hour of ride outside Moscow or Petersburg takes you to a city that looks like set decorations for <<Cargo 200>> [a post-Soviet thriller that made the expression world famous - ES]? Even if there is a lake in the center, it’s overgrown with reed, and instead of a sidewalk there is a dead Soviet factory?”.

The actual “Cargo 200” (directed by Aleksei Balabanov)

Since this discussion originated at the economic forum, some economically-minded bloggers already provided their economic answers. Moscow and Petersburg are important hubs for business and administration and they siphon off resources from Tver and Novgorod. People from Tver and Novgorod find better jobs in one of the two Russian capitals, relocate there and pay taxes there. So nothing can be done about it.

Saponkov agrees but he asks another question. How do they manage to avoid this problem in Europe, then?

He provides his answer: perhaps the state should forcibly relocate some companies from Moscow and Petersburg to glubinka. And perhaps companies in the capital cities should be more heavily taxed?

How do they do in in Europe - Saponkov wonders (via his TG channel)

Well, comrades - how do we do it in Europe? Small towns in Poland often have the same “postcard quality” as described by Saponkov - even down to the lakeshore promenade.

I like reading Russians, because it kind of forces me to rethink my own values. In Poland, it’s not usual to say out loud “I like democracy”, one is socially expected to complain about it.

But in reality the main answer to the “postcard questions” is that there is a mayor, there is city council, they want to get reelected and one of their dirty tricks is making the residents happy (even if they refuse to admit it).

In Poland the local authorities usually keep getting reelected. We have an expression about our “unsinkable” mayors and presidents. Some of them are literally holding the office since the first free election in 1990!

The “unsinkables” phenomenon is frequently cited as a flaw in Polish democracy, but I would argue otherwise. People vote for them because they are more or less satisfied.

Of course, any self respecting Polish citizen will present you with a laundry list of issues with their mayor/president. In fact, it could be a good detector for foreign spies: if someone is in awe at the postcard-quality landscape, it’s probably a Russian spy.

But the fact remains that many Polish cities evolved from what Romanov describes as the typical landscape of Russian glubinka (“decaying factory ruins by an overgrown lake”), to the European Union “postcard quality” standard. Pedestrian-only streets? Check. Cafes with summer gardens? Check. River/lakeside promenade? Check.

It’s largely because of the effort of local authorities. There are European funds designated specifically to improve “glubinka”, but they don’t work on their own, the local authority must present a project and win the approval to get the funding. The failure can sink the “unsinkables”.

That’s what I mean when I say that Ukraine fights for democracy. I can see your cynical smiles from here!

Yes, I know Chomsky, I know Breitbart and I know that there is no real democracy in the West. When a political candidate can’t even pay hush money for a porn star from his campaign funds, that’s basically Gestapo! I read that one too.

But I don’t use here “Democracy” as some unattainable perfect Platonic ideal. I mean it in the very basic, technical way: that your local president/mayor needs your vote to keep their post.

Saponkov solution to the “glubinka” problem is very typically putinist. If the problem with Tver comes from the fact that people from Tver moved to Moscow for better jobs, let’s just forcibly exile them back to Tver, make them pay taxes there, and problem solved!

Somehow I don’t think this solution would result in “people happily strolling on a lakeshore promenade” and “summer garden cafes full of local residents”. And what about pedestrian-only streets?

Well, on November 14th, 2018 the city of Tver disbanded its tram network citing that decades of neglect damaged it beyond repair. So if you don’t have a car, comrade… vam pizdets, pardon my Russian.

Russian glubinka - Pereslavl-Zalesskiy, phot. by Igor Zhirnov, via FB fanpage “Estetika Yebenya”

If Gods hate you and they made you live in Russian glubinka, there’s little you can do. You can’t vote out the people who mismanage your city. You can’t even complain - people who complain about the authorities in Russia are prone to lethal accidents. You might as well join the army and die in another meat assault.

People in the West who don’t speak Russian often fall for the propaganda aimed specifically at the clueless Westerners. Social media are full of fake images of the beauty of Russian towns, propagated by people pretending to be Russian, such as the infamous Donbas Devushka. Thus some people in the West may think that maybe Putin is harsh, but at least he keeps the streets clean and the trams running on time.

But it also works the other way round. Those Russians who never travel to the West actually imagine our “glubinka” as something more or less similar to theirs. If you show them photos of the quality of life or average people in some average European town, they will think it’s all staged. And even if someone like Saponkov happens to visit such town, he still does not get how it actually works, his understanding of Finnish society is on the cargo cult level.

This misunderstanding leads to people on both sides asking the same silly question: what’s the point of resisting, why die for the flag on the city hall? Because this never merely about the flag.

Russian actual neo-Nazi Ivan Okhlobystin, proclaiming “goida” - Russian equivalent for jihad - against the whole West during a rally with Putin in Moscow, September 2022. Can you reason with this guy?

I apologize for neglecting this blog. My only explanation is simple, so many other things have been going on. However, in a classic self contradictory manner, I will try to explain once again why I think war in Ukraine matters more to us in Europe than anything else.

It is bigger than elections in Poland, elections in Holland, war against Hamas, everything that keeps us distracted. Of course, I’m guilty of that distraction too.

It’s a common cognitive error: issues that are more recent seem to be more important, even if they obviously are not. Covid is still killing people, but we pretend it is gone.

If you live in Europe (not necessarily Eastern Europe), there is still no issue bigger than war in Ukraine. All your current worries - should I take this job, is this the right moment to take a mortgage, or even the eternal “are you the one I’ve been waiting for” - might become irrelevant if Russia wins, just as the corresponding dilemmas of our ancestors in 1938-1941.

Before I go into detail, let me define what I mean by “if Russia wins”. There are two scenarios I would call by this name.

One is the decisive Russian victory - Russian flag flying over Presidential Palace in Kyiv, Zelensky fleeing in panic, Russian troops reaching the Polish border. That would be the end of the world as we know it, but I don’t think this is even remotely possible. Russia simply lacks the potential.

I am mostly concerned with the scenario of a minor Russian victory. This would happen if the Western allies force Ukraine into some kind of de facto surrender, such as a peace treaty allowing Russians to keep whatever they managed to occupy - or even worse, the “annexations”, which would mean giving up the cities Russians never even reached, such as Zaporhizhia.

I hope this will not happen - but the voices in the West promoting this idea are getting louder and pro-Ukrainian voices are getting quieter. “Give peace a chance so people will stop dying”, we hear that from Musk, we hear that from Orban, we hear that from the usual Russian assets in the West.

One cannot stress it often enough: peace on Russian terms WILL NOT STOP KILLING AND DYING. That was the miserable outcome of the Minsk agreements - in 2015 the line of contact was frozen for 7 years, but people were still dying from shelling on both sides. Russia always finds a way to violate cease-fire by saying “it’s not us, it’s the little green men”.

It is very unlikely that this kind of peace or ceasefire is to be accepted by any democratic government of Ukraine, so this would mean Zelensky overthrown in a coup - this time for real - and replaced by some Russian puppet, Lukashenko/Kadyrov style. This, in turn, means extremely brutal suppression of resistance - in other words, people dying from tortures and executions, like in Chechnya or Belarus.

Actually, it would be much worse. Ukrainians are used to defending their liberty by public unrest. They would react with another Maidan. It would have to be slaughtered for this puppet government to survive.

Even if you react with cynical “so be it” - it will be your problem, too. The very obvious result will be another wave of refugees, much bigger than the one from the first days of the invasion.

They will be impossible to stop by the EU, because at least the Polish border will remain open. But due to significant Ukrainian diaspora in North America, this wave will certainly cross the Atlantic. So even if you are pro-Russian in the West (the only place to be pro-Russian!), you will still suffer the inevitable disruption of your economy.

If you live in the collective West, Russia perceives you as the enemy. Even if you are “liking” on social media the pro-Russian statements of Western fringe politicians or maybe even have a pro-Putin bumper sticker. It is in your best personal interest to keep Russian troops far from Kyiv and Kharkiv, even if you are a die-hard follower of tankie left or MAGA right.

It is rather easy to imagine what would happen if Putin got his chunk of Ukraine. We’ve been there already.

Russian invasion of Georgia in 2008, © Andrei nacu, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikipedia

In 2008 Russia invaded Georgia, creating puppet states of “South Ossetia” and “Abkhazia”, comprising roughly 20% of Georgian territory. The world did not react with sanctions.

On the contrary, Russia was rewarded for this land grab by the Western policy of “reset”. Back then, everybody (me included, I must admit) was so panicked about “escalation” that we reproduced the classic Munich appeasement fallacy. We had hoped if Putin gets what he wants, he will quit invading his neigbours.

How silly of us! This appeasement ended like all appeasements. In 2014 Putin invaded Ukraine for the first time, expecting the same reaction - but to his dismay, this time there was some half-assed reaction from the West. But the sanctions were mild enough for him to repeat this in 2022.

You can see that Russian pundits and diplomats are genuinely surprised by the West. “Why are you sanctioning us now, while you didn’t do so back in 2008? What’s the difference? Why we can’t just ignore the suffering of Ukrainians and keep trading? Are they so much different than Georgians?”

It’s very easy to predict what will happen if Russia gets another “reset” and the West accepts another land grab. They will lick their wounds, rebuild their military potential - and make another invasion in 10 years.

These invasions get only worse each time. When they invaded Chechnya, you could say it wasn’t even an invasion, formally it was Russian territory. When they invaded South Ossetia, you could say Southern Ossetians wanted to be reunited with Northern Ossetians (which, ironically, never happened, they are still separate entities, divided by hard border). When they invaded Ukraine in 2014, you could say “well, the Russian speaking population want to be raped and looted by Russian speaking occupiers”.

These causes were only getting more and more far fetched and the invasion goals more and more unclear. The next country to be invaded could be Finland, could be Turkey, could be Poland - Russian politicians and Russian media are already full of such ideas. And again, it will hurt you too, even if you “support Russia”.

There are other wars, other humanitarian disasters, other pressing issues. But war in Ukraine remains the only one capable of directly hurting Mr Joe The Average from Small Town, The West. Or - for that matter - you, dear reader.

For people in the West, this topic is almost always a huge surprise. Since Hitler is rightly perceived as the ultimate evil incarnate, how could a person collaborate with him? They must also be evil, right?

Sometimes in popular culture this topic is used as a surprising plot twist for unsuspecting Western viewer. One of the best James Bond villains turns out to be a “Lienz Cossack”, a Russian Nazi collaborator, who always secretly despised the West (mostly, England!) for being deported to Soviet Union after World War II.

Since it is actually a good plot twist, I refrain from revealing you who is this person in “Goldeneye”, a 1995 James Bond movie, filmed partially in the former Soviet Union - for the first time in history. So instead just enjoy 007 in a T-55 tank.

Pierce Brosnan driving one of the most unusual vehicles in the history of the whole franchise (publicity still from MGM/UA)

“Lienz Cossacks” were Nazi collaborators who surrendered to the British in Austria. When disarmed, they were “repatriated” to Stalin - in order to be slaughtered, including women, children and old people.

Many of them weren’t even Soviet citizens, because they escaped the Bolshevik regime in the 1920’s. There was no pity for them, no respect for their human rights, because - after all - they collaborated with the ultimate evil.

This is the main difference between the East and the West. For the people in the West, Stalin is seen either as lesser evil or even actually just a nice old chap looking so convivial with his trademark pipe. He does not look like a genocidal maniac, does he?

And yet he killed more innocent people than Hitler. His rule was also much longer, so in terms of megadeath per annum, Hitler still wins the first prize. Let us avoid the absurd calculations of their genocide scores in “transferable Tamerlanes” and simply put them on par with the third most horrible mass murderer of twentieth century - Mao Zedong.

The historical evidence is overwhelming. That’s why we in Eastern Europe watch with bewilderment Western double standards regarding our genocidal maniacs.

While Holocaust denialism is generally seen as a big “no-no”, sometimes even forbidden by law - Gulag denialism, Holodomor denialism, Ribbentrop-Molotov denialism, etc., are still somewhat legitimate in the West. It’s almost as if it was still unclear and debatable whether Stalin actually murdered millions of his own people.

For us in Eastern Europe, it is not. Even those of us who don’t read history books and they don’t know the hard evidence - usually heard some stories from their grandparents. Hidden family stories that were prohibited by censorship during communism, but they were passed from generation to generation. For me, it was actually a kind of surprise that the family legends turned out to be true - when I could finally confront them with actual history after 1989.

Eight decades ago our great-ancestors were either conquered and enslaved by Hitler or Stalin, or forced to make a choice, when those two former allies started to fight in 1941. This choice was hardly truly voluntary - most of us would prefer to stick with the Versailles order of Europe and be friends with the Western allies, but the Versailles order collapsed in 1938. Largely due to the actions of the then-leaders of France and England, Daladier and Chamberlain.

Poland was the only country in the region that said hard “no” to both Stalin and Hitler. The price for this stubbornness was so horrible that nobody did that ever again on political level - every country ended up collaborating with one or other. While some individuals maintained the “two enemies” approach (and again, usually also paid a horrible price for it), majority opted to either work with the German occupation administration, or the Soviet occupation administration, or both. Some of the worst war criminals in Baltic states were actually the former members of the Soviet collaboration administration.

Still from “Katyń” Andrzej Wajda (2007). Polish refugees run in panic from German army in 1939. On a bridge they encounter a similar group running in panic from Russian army. At the time, it was impossible to predict the survival rate - both occupiers exterminated Polish population, but with slightly different methods and priorities. If you were a wealthy lawyer of Jewish origins, the former will kill you for being Jewish, the latter for being a bourgeois, and you have hours to decide…

Again, this is true for all nations of Eastern Europe, including ethnic Russians. They formed various formations collaborating with Hitler, notably the infamous Russian Liberation Army and the even worse Russian National Liberation Army.

All these formations committed horrible crimes against the largely defenceless Polish population - just like their Ukrainian counterparts, such as the Ukrainian Insurgent Army. That was the price Poland paid for refusing to collaborate with Stalin and Hitler: neither was willing to supply weapons for self-defence to the local population and they were OK with letting someone else do the ethnic cleansing.

What I find unfair though is picking just only one country - as if there was something special or unique about Ukrainian collaboration. This is Russian propaganda in action - first they pretend there was no Russian collaboration (which is blatantly not true), and then build a thesis like “Finns, Estonians, Latvians, Lithuanians, Ukrainians, Belorussians, Romanians, Bulgarians, Hungarians, Czechs, Slovaks and of course Poles are genetically Nazi”. As absurd as it sounds, it’s a daily staple of Soloviev, Skabayeva and Simonyan propaganda on Russian TV.

Of course, nobody is “genetically Nazi”. But both genocidal maniacs have had extensive lists of people they wanted to exterminate. People from these lists welcomed the approaching army (be it Red Army or Wehrmacht) as deliverance from imminent death, if not exactly liberation.

The case of Ukraine is perhaps the most painful. In early 1930s., Stalin reduced its population by artificial famine - a particularly cruel method of killing.

If you are interested in the mundane details: how do you starve to death people living on fertile farmlands, I recommend a great book by Anne Applebaum to you. Some people might dislike her for her association with right wing politics and neoconservatism, but I never saw criticism of her work, research or sources, only criticism of her person. I see this as corroboration (if they could attack what she actually wrote, they would).

So how do you starve a farmland population? You simply confiscate at gunpoint all the food they produced and then send small search groups walking from house to house, seeking everything that might be hidden - and then destroying it for the sake of it.

One of the most common murder weapons during Holodomor was a long stick with a sharp end - the Komsomol activists used it to poke through walls and roofs, just in case there might be a sack of flour behind. They usually had no means to take this flour with them, but they had clever ways to contaminate or destroy it - burning the house if they had to (the family living there would be deported to Gulag anyway, for the crime of hiding a sack of flour).

Those Ukrainians who managed to survive until 1941 did not necessarily saw Hitler as someone worse than Stalin. You can’t blame them for that (but, again, of course you can and you should blame the particular persons and organisations for the crimes they committed).

So while I agree that the whole invitation for Yaroslav Hunka was a mistake, I disagree that it changes or proves anything. If anything, it is the lack of understanding of Eastern European history in Canada and elsewhere.

A year ago, Elon Musk proposed insanely stupid “peace plan”. Now we know that his “source of information” was Russian embassy - that explains a lot (via Twitter)

If you are reading this, you must be following the war pretty closely, so I assume you already have a basic knowledge of Crimean history. You know that it was captured by Russia from the Ottoman Empire in 1783 and then transferred to Ukraine in 1954 by Khrustschev.

Current Russian propaganda is portraying this transfer as something sinister, erroneous, controversial, or even illegal (as if the decision of the party leaders could ever be illegal in a communist country!). This is a new phenomenon caused by looking for justification of the war - there was no controversy about it as far back as 10 years ago.

This decision was simply pragmatic. Crimea is mostly barren rock, almost everything (food, gas, electricity, water, consumer goods) has to be delivered from the mainland.

The shortest route leads to Kherson. So it is only natural for Crimea to be in the same administrative unit as Kherson - otherwise there would always be issues such as “Kherson power grid authority refuses to allocate more gigawatts to Crimea”.

For centuries, the economy of Crimea was based on being the southern terminus of the Dnipro trail, “from Varangians to the Greeks”, that is: from Scandinavia to Byzantium. Kyvian Rus was described in the earliest chronicles as the country stretched along this route. The economy of Crimea makes no sense if it’s separated from Dnipro.

That’s why the Elon Musk peace plan is so insanely stupid. It’s not only about the water, Crimea depends on external supplies. Since no matter how this all ends, Russia and Ukraine are unlikely to become friends in the foreseeable future, the issue of “supplies from the mainland” would be inevitably divisive.

Sooner or later Russia would demand an extraterritorial corridor. As we know from history, such demands usually lead to new war. There will be no lasting peace with Crimea and Kherson separated by state border.

So in the perfect world, who should get Crimea? Here in Eastern Europe we hate the history-based argument like “Russian since 1783”, because you can invalidate each and every country of this region.

Remember: all our countries had a long period of “being absent from the map”. Russia snatched Finland in 1809, Georgia in 1801, Azerbaijan in 1828, Moldova in 1812, Latvia in 1772, Estonia in 1710 and large part of Poland in 1795. By Elon Musk’s logic, all these countries should not exist as well.

It’s not surprising given that his source of “knowledge” is Russian embassy. And Putin made it clear in his speech opening the invasion, that his long-term intention is restoration of the tzars empire (“undoing the Bolshevik mistake of letting them go”).

This is actually telling that from the Arctic to the Caucasus, all these nations took the first opportunity to shake off Russian rule in 1917-1922. This is rare, the only similar example in the West I can think of is Ireland.

If I’m to design the perfect world of my dreams, I would give Crimea to the Crimean Tatars, who ruled the peninsula for much longer than Russia. The Crimean Khanate was the most successful splinter state of the Golden Horde and it existed from 1441 to 1783.

Before the Tatars, Crimea was inhabited by various lost civilisations (Goths, Scythians, Khazars), then colonized by the Greeks and the Romans. If you feel that Crimean toponomics often sound like they are derived from Greek or Latin (Theodosia, Eupatoria, Taurida) it’s because they are.

Map of pre-Tatar Crimea, by Amitchell. CC BY SA 3.0, via Wikipedia.

Crimea was a location of the last Gothic state - Principality of Theodoro (existing until 1475), and an early corporate state, a colony owned by aGenoese bank and controlled by Jewish family Ghisolfi (existing until 1483). In 15. century Antiquity, Middle Ages and Renaissance co-existed (with a splash of cyberpunk: come on, a corporation with its own navy, army and territory!), resulting in mind-blowing ethnical & religious diversity.

The Tatar rule largely preserved it. I don’t want to sound like I’m idealising them. Khanate was no democracy, of course. But these various communities could exist fairly well protected by the millet system - if they paid taxes and were generally loyal to the Khan, they enjoyed considerable autonomy.

Instead of listing all these communities, I will focus on one of them in particular. For some reason, I was always mostly interested in the Crimean Karaites.

Unlike mainstream (Rabbinic) Jews, Karaites reject Talmud and Midrash, they believe only in the sanctity of the Torah. This approach never caught much traction in the Jewish world, so Karaites for most of their history were a minority within a minority.

They found a safe haven in Crimea for centuries. Since the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was usually on good terms with Crimean Khanate, some of them moved to Poland, where they contributed greatly to Polish science and culture.

The most famous Polish Karaite is probably Eugeniusz Robaczewski, a voice actor. He developed a scenic voice that sounded vaguely unpleasant, so you assume his character must be evil even when he appears to be nice. For a whole generation in Poland, he is the voice of various Scooby-Doo villains and Scrooge McQuack from the “Duck Tales”.

He rarely played in live action cinema, however he did have an important role in one of the most important comedies of the communist era: “Miś”. He plays a mysterious unnamed character who appears to write songs for a living, but he is surprisingly well informed and well connected. It seems that his second source of income is the communist secret police. Of course, it could not have been openly shown in the movie: it is mostly implied by his sinister voice (and the odd fashion choices, such as leather jacket and a necktie).

Eugeniusz Robaczewski (right), the most famous Karaite in Poland. Still from “Miś” (1981) by Stanisław Bareja.

This comedy is so important in Poland it could be used as a test for genuine Polishness. “Don’t shoot, I’m Polish!” “Oh yeah? Sing the song the Songwriter is writing in <<Miś>>!” (that’s a tricky one: he’s writing two of them, so the correct answer is “which one?”; who knows, maybe it will save your live some day).

I’m focusing on Karaites because a typical depiction of Crimean diversity just lists the various groups living there as “Jews, Muslims, Christians”, etc. It was even more complex than this.

It’s not enough to say that Jews were living there. What kind of Jews? Ashkenazim? Sephardim? Mizrahim? They all did!

Same goes for Muslims. But what ethnicity? Turkish? Arabic? Caucasian? Catholics? But do you mean Roman Catholic or Greek Catholic? Orthodox? But which autocephaly, Greek Orthodox, Eastern Orthodox or Oriental Orthodox? All these communities coexisted with Tatar rule for centuries.

Hitler and Stalin were united in destroying diversity. Their ideas of Gleichschaltung were slightly different, but in both cases it boiled down to the same thing: geno- and ethnocide. Murder and deportations.

Crimea emerged severely depopulated from their monstrous crimes. That’s another reason for Khruschev's decision: connecting the peninsula to the much bigger neighbour just made it easier for the people to move there.

I would dream of Crimea being diverse again. In practice, this is possible only in a democratic country protected by EU-level human rights.

Russian society is based on racism. While racism in the West is at least mitigated by law and what Elon Musk would call “political correctness” and “woke mind virus”, Russians are pretty open about their racism (as I wrote before). They just don’t know any other “diversity” than “Tuvan, Tajik, Kalmuks etc. enslaved by their Moscow- and Petersburg based overlords”.

You should also bear in mind that the Russian naval base in Sevastopol was de facto extraterritorial in independent Ukraine (it was guaranteed by bilateral treaties). People working for the Russian Navy usually had no Ukrainian passports. That’s why it was so easy for Girkin’s thugs to seize power in 2014 - they arrived from Moscow without border controls and changed to combat gear in the extraterritorial base.

Sevastopol will no longer have its special status after the war. If Russia wins: it will not need it. If Ukraine wins: they will not allow it.

In August 2022, first Ukrainian airstrikes on Crimea commenced, resulting in exodus of Russian holidaymakers. One video of a crying Russian woman went viral. From her monologue it seems she has no idea what is going on (still from video posted on Twitter)

The decision obviously belongs to Ukraine and Ukraine alone. But if they say “Russian occupiers and collaborators should leave Crimea”, I would say: that’s only fair. It was the same in the democratic West after 1945 - in France alone, 46000 people were punished by law for collaboration with the Germans.

Personally, if I was a Russian citizen in Crimea, I would leave before it’s too late. Be realistic: how many months do you give to the Kerch bridge?

“Yo momma” - Afghanistan, Poland, Japan, France, England…

I am all for peace, but I am also realistic. For instance, during World War II numerous Jewish uprisings erupted in ghettos and camps. Would it make sense for the Jewish fighters to negotiate a truce with the Germans? Not really, because they intended to kill them anyway.

In more recent example, negotiating truce and surrender with the Islamic State was impossible for similar reasons. Those who tried were later executed in some cruel and spectacular way: beheaded with a knife, drowned in a cage, burned alive.

Sometimes, with some enemies, peace is not an option. Not because “war is good”, but because they simply are not interested in a rational deal, “you take this, I take that and we can stop fighting”.

Is Russia one of them? The only way to determine is to check the history of previous Russian truce&peace treaties.

The last time Russia signed anything like this was in 1997, when Russia and Chechnya agreed to “forever” reject the use of force. This was a follow up to the Khasavyurt agreement of 1996, ending the First Chechen War with a “5-year ceasefire”.

A Chechen guerilla next to the ruins of the Presidential Palace in Grozny, January 1996. Mikhail Evstafiev, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikipedia

The truce was an unpleasant surprise to Russian public opinion. In spite of an overwhelming advantage in manpower and equipment, the mighty Russian army was unable to conquer a tiny breakaway republic with a population of around a million and no regular army). They managed to raze the capital to the ground, they burned entire villages (with their inhabitants) with flamethrowers, and yet they could not control the territory, sustained heavy losses, and eventually were forced to ask for truce.

Russians love to think they are invincible. Of course, they aren’t - no empire is - but it’s very important for their self-perception. Therefore, they hate the memory of Khasavyurt and put it in the general container of “bad things from the horrible 90’s”.

The “eternal peace” and “5-year truce” lasted about 3 years. In August 1999 Russia restarted hostilities, citing an incursion of rogue Chechen warlord Shamil Basayev into neighbouring Dagestan and mysterious bombings of apartment buildings, where over 300 people died - that was supposed to be a violation of peace treaties by the Chechen side.

Both claims were doubtful. First, as a rogue warlord Basayev was not affiliated with the Chechen state. Second, no evidence that Checheyna had anything to do with the bombings was ever presented.

Russia captured and killed some suspects, but none of them was from Chechenya - and they were tried in secrecy. People running independent investigations of the bombings were all killed in the following years (e.g. Anna Politkovskaya).

Many questions regarding these bombing remain unanswered. Russians avoid asking them not only because they are afraid to do so, but also because they were generally happy to get rid of the Khasavyurt humiliation.

Solovyev and Girkin hate each other, but they will both agree that Russia does not need “another Khasavyurt”. I think both have said something like this regarding the current war.

The rest of us (non-Russians who happen to live in the neighbourhood) would agree for different reasons. If you sign a “5 year truce” with Russia, they will attack you in 3 years, tops.

They will invent some pretext to put the blame on you. It will be illogical and far fetched, just like the justification to invade Chechenya, but Elon Musk will find it convincing. And with him, his army of betas on Twitter.

Let me remind you that Ukraine in theory was protected by a Russo-Ukrainian treaty of 1990, the Minsk Treaty od 1990 (not to be confused by the Minsk Treaties of 2014-2015, also violated by Russia), Budapest Memorandum (1994), Treaty of Friendship (1997), and the Russo-Ukrainian Border Treaty (2003). I’m not even talking about the broader treaties, such as the UN Charter.

Bottom line: Russia will not negotiate peace or truce treaty until forced by major defeat. And this treaty will be valid only as long as they remain too weak to attack again.

Still from “Cargo 200” by Aleksei Balabanov, 2007

They had such a defeat in Afghanistan. The war lasted over 9 years (1979-1989), and it was similar to the current one in some aspects.

Americans saw the opportunity to inflict heavy losses to their enemy at a fairly low cost - a Stinger missile cost a fraction of the plane it shots down. And since the Soviets never declared the war to anyone, they had no one to negotiate peace with.

Formally, the Soviet army was in Afghanistan to help protect a friendly government from Western invasion. Back in the Soviet day, it was called “brotherly help” and it even entered common parlance (eg. “back off dude, or I’ll brotherly help the crap out of you”).

Eventually, a strange diplomatic solution (repeated later by the Minsk agreements) was brokered by Pakistan. The Geneva Accord was formally a peace treaty between Pakistan and Afghanistan. Soviet Union was not a party, but merely a co-guarantor (together with USA).

Thus, Russians can claim they never lost the war in Afghanistan, because they never fought it in the first place. And what about the dozens of thousands of Soviet Army casualties?

First of all, they didn’t exist (it was top secret; I recommend the excellent Russian thriller “Cargo 200”). And second, they didn’t die in a war. What war?

The Geneva Accord did not bring peace to Afghanistan. The only part that was ever implemented was the withdrawal of the Red Army.

I think the history lesson is: the treaty ending the war against Ukraine must be signed by Russia as the belligerent. A diplomatic charade like the Minsk agreements will not bring peace anyway.

I believe in 20. century Russia only twice lost a war in such decisive manner it was forced to sign a genuine peace treaty that brought an actually lasting peace. It was defeated by Poland in 1921 and by Japan in 1905.

The Polish-Soviet war ended with treaty of Riga. The best thing one can say about it is that it brought 18 years of peace.

A scheme explaining the Polish-Soviet war, from: “A Sketch-map History of the Great War and After, 1914-1939”, by Irene Richards, J.B. Goodson and J.A. Morris, via warwick.co.uk

The Polish delegation was dominated by nationalist right, dreaming of Poland as a nation-state. The centre-left (whose traditions are dear to me) was pursuing a slogan “the free with the free, the equals with the equals” to denote the future relationships between Poland, Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania.

The Soviets were beaten so badly they were ready to give up as much territory as Poland would have requested. They even offered Minsk themselves. However, that would mean too many Belarussians and Ukrainians would live in the future Poland, reducing the electoral chances of the nationalist right.

In a very controversial move, Polish delegation accepted more modest eastern border. It was supposed to be compensated by 30 million golden pre-revolutionary rubles. Of course, not even a single kopeika was paid (that’s in general a problem with reparations: it’s easy to write them down in a peace treaty, collecting them after the war is a whole different thing).

For me, the worst part of the treaty of Riga is that Poland threw is allies under the bus. We fought the Soviets together in 1920, and now we signed a separatist treaty that was essentially partitioning our former allies. Not cool, nationalist right, not cool.

On a side note: I hope to live to see the incarnation of the ideals of Polish progressives from 100 years ago. Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, Belarus and Ukraine, the free with the free, the equals with the equals, in European Union and NATO.

The list of the nations that managed to beat Russia in the last century finishes with Japan. The Russo-Japanese war of 1904-1905 was a crushing defeat of the decaying tzarist empire.

Japanese propaganda map from 1904. Public domain via Wikipedia.

It was the first defeat of an European great power in a colonial war. Other great powers were not happy about it and the resulting treaty of Portsmouth was limiting Japanese gains (mostly due to American pressure).

The peace between Russia and Japan lasted for decades, but the treaty did not bring actual peace to the territories of Manchuria and Korea, where this war was being fought. In a way it never ended (the Korean war formally is still going on).

So another lesson about peace treaties is that a treaty might be signed, both parties might actually adhere to it - and yet millions of people will be slaughtered for decades in the same war zone. That’s what happens when you refuse to hear the most interested party, the people who live there. Peace negotiations between Russia and USA cannot bring peace to Ukraine, just as peace between Russia and Japan did not bring peace to Manchuria and Korea.

But the most important lesson from history is that Russia is not invincible. “Russia cannot be defeated” is propaganda nonsense aimed at the people who don’t even know their own history. Even France and England are on the list of “countries who defeated Russia” (Crimean war, 1853-1856), but I wanted to limit myself to the present and last century for the sake of brevity.

This post is already too long, anyway.

The answer I provided hitherto, “it’s because Girkin is with FSB” is not helpful. How do I know that? “Citation needed”, as they say on Wikipedia. After all, it’s not something one would advertise in their LinkedIn profile.

The downfall of Prigozhin and Girkin had an interesting side-effect: an abundance of source material. I have more citations than I ever needed.

A very warm farewell to “Wagner” from his brother in arms. The caption says: “Future Hero of Russia, four times awarded Order of Bravery, at the time of the photograph commanding the reconaissance group of the 876 separate company of GRU spetznaz, Dmitry Valerevich Utkin. Norhtern Osetia, end of 1990’s. Via Telegram Channel “Grey Zone”.

Dmitri Utkin, callsign “Wagner”, the military commander of the namesake mercenary organisation, was bid farewell by his brothers in arms. They wrote interesting eulogies praising his courage on the battlefield - apparently once in Luhansk Utkin was heavily wounded by shrapnels and he did not lose his fighting spirit even as he was holding his own intestines in his hands.

The story of Utkin’s intestines, as told by his another brother in arms. Via Telegram channel Reverse Side of The Medal.

From the point of view of the discussions that we have here, there are two interesting points in these eulogies. First: his own friends do not deny his involvement in the so-called “separatism”. On the contrary, they portray him as a person who saved the “separatist republic”. Remember: nobody takes this “separatism” seriously in Russia; this is purely for clueless Westerners who don’t speak Russian.

Second: nobody denies he was a GRU operative. GRU stands for “Main Intelligence Directorate” and they are not to be confused with civilian FSB (Federal Security Service), a direct successor of KGB. GRU is a successor to GRU, they saw no need to rebrand after 1991.

At the time of writing, Girkin callsign “Strelkov” seems to be still alive, although in Russian jail you can never be 100% sure. He has to write his own eulogies, but that’s fine for him. You can accuse him of many things, but not of being too modest.

Prior to his arrest he wrote a lengthy post in praise of himself, stylised as a “CV of a Russian patriot”. Again, we see two interesting things.

A snippet from extensive “CV of a Russian Patriot”, in praise of Igor Girkin by Igor Girkin. Translated and discussed below. Via Girkin’s Telegram channel.

First: he actually discloses his engagement with the military activities of FSB. Between 1996 and 2014 he participated in 7 assignments (you can brush up your Cyrillic skills and spot the word “komandirovka/i”), mostly in Chechenya and Dagestan.

Second, the interesting part. “By the end of February 2014 - an informal advisor to the chairman of Crimean Republic Supreme Council, S.V. Aksyonov (…) Initiates the volunteer special purpose battalion, participating in many activities in order to establish and protect people’s authority in the Republic of Crimea. Later on, this [unit] was used in order to create a Separate Company <<Crimea>>, consisting of 52 warriors, accomplishing a raid on Sloviansk in the night of 11 to 12 April of 2014”.

A snippet from extensive “CV of a Russian Patriot”, in praise of Igor Girkin by Igor Girkin. Translated and discussed above. Via Girkin’s Telegram channel.

That’s your “Donbas separatism” in a nutshell. The whole “Donbas people republics” started on 12 April, when “Donbas militias” (as the Western media still tend to describe them) occupied government buildings in Sloviansk, proclaiming this city the capital of separatist Donbas.

Crimea, their base of operation, was also not a “separatist state”, but an artificial Girkin' creation. Sergey V. Aksyonov was “elected” on 27 February in a very peculiar “session” of the council. Let me quote Wikipedia:

“on 27 February an emergency session was held in the Crimean legislature while it was occupied by Russian forces without insignias.[3] After sealing the doors and confiscating all mobile phones, the MPs who had been invited by Aksyonov to enter the building, passed the motion in the presence of the gunmen armed with Kalashnikov assault rifles and rocket launchers (…) Various media accounts have disputed whether he was able to gather a quorum of 50 of his peers before the session convened that day, and some Crimean legislators who were registered as present have said they did not come near the building.[3] Others denied being in the city, and claimed that duplicate voting cards stolen from the Parliament's safe were used in their name (…) Crimean Prime Minister Anatolii Mohyliov was barred from attending the session”

Our dear friend and contributor Formosa might be willing to point out that after all, Aksyonov was a local politician, so you can’t say that there was no local separatism. But Vidkun Quisling was even more local in Norway - at least he held no German passport, while Aksyonov has dual citizenship.

Can I say that Norway was under German occupation during World War II? Can I call Quisling “a quisling”? If so, then I can say that Crimea was under Russian occupation once Girkin’s thugs arrived there “at the end of February”. And Aksyonov is simply another quisling.

Reading pro-Russian Western propagandists makes you frequently raise the question: just how stupid one can get? Via Twitter channel of Jackson Hinkle.

These eulogies can answer another question, frequently raised by the pro-Russian Westerners on Twitter. About half a year ago, when things were still looking pretty rosy for them, they expressed their admiration for both Prigozhin and Girkin (two great Russian patriots!), but they were worried that these two men hated each other.

They could not understand, why. Shouldn’t we all be united in our anti-NATO-anti-woke-anti-LGBT-anti-vaccine-pro-MAGA camp?

The explanation is very simple. Girkin is/was FSB. Utkin was GRU. Both agencies for decades were engaged in the traditional rivalry, just like in the West.

A random example of a clueless comment on Twitter

While Girkin can be praised in some circles that he occupied Crimea “without firing a shot” (that’s not exactly correct, shots were fired), his operation was seen by many as a failure. They were forced out of Sloviansk in July - and there is no realistic scenario for Russia to recapture this city ever again.

The concept of “Little Green Men” was effective during the first half of 2014, but soon it displayed its limitations. Most of Girkin's thugs had no military training. They were effective in terrorising deputies and aldermen, maybe even policemen, but when confronted with real soldiers from Ukraine, they retreated.

Enter Utkin. In mid-2014, another three letter agency started to handle things in “the separatist republics”. They were better trained, better equipped, even more ruthless. The Russian troops were no longer retreating, on the contrary, the launched the 2014/2015 offensive. The battle of Debaltseve in February 2015 was the first notable success of “Wagner group”.

By the way, literally NONE of these eulogies ever mentioned any particular interest Dmitri Utkin might have had in music. None of his friends shared memories like “I remember when we saw Lohengrin at the Bolshoi Theatre together”. It really seems that the only interest Utkin might have had in Wagner is that this was the favourite composer of his favourite German politician. Because, you know, there are no Nazis in Russia.

But I digress. “Wagner group” provided Putin with the same plausible deniability he got from Girkin’s “Little Green Men”. He could always say “we’re not there”, because until September 2022 “Wagner group” officially did not even exist.

After all, mercenary activity is forbidden until Russian law. You don’t think anything illegal could be happening in Russia, do you?

It seems that until late March 2022, “Wagner group” played no significant role in the invasion. What for, since Kyiv was supposed to be captured in 3 days? Only in late March they were engaged in battle of Popasna, ending their combat trail in Bakhmut.

Having your own mercenary company, looting Syrian and African cities at your whim, can be a gold mine. Sometimes even literally. Therefore other oligarchs and politicians, including Shoigu himself, wanted to have their own private armies and it seems that Wagner efforts were indeed suppressed by the “unfair competition”, as Prigozhin complained in his famous videos.

One thing remains certain: the other private mercenary armies were a massive failure. PMC “Redut” and PMC “Patriot” were supposed to capture Vuhledar in February 2023. The whole pro-Western world enjoyed the results. In general, Russia had no successes ever since July 2022, other than those achieved by Wagner group.

It seems that running a successful private military company requires some know-how and personal skills. Without a doubt, Utkin had it all, but he’s no longer a worry. I sincerely hope the remnants of the Wagner group will be now transferred to the people who brought us the Vuhledar offensive or the Kherson gesture of good will.

Because… who else? Let me reiterate: no Russian success since July 2022 (capture of Lysychansk), other than Wagner trail Popasna-Soledar-Bakhmut. If they have any competent generals, where are they hiding?

Which Girkin do you feel today? I take “chaotic good”. Posters prepared for the - rather anaemic - campaign “FREE STRELKOV!”. Via Girkin’s Telegram channel.

Girkin himself, in a statement allegedly smuggled out by his lawyer and published on his Telegram channel by his wife, expressed his doubt that Putin is responsible for the death of Prigozhin and Utkin. The probability that Ukraine or the West did it is even smaller. His thesis is that this is the sign of “return of the dreadful 90’s”.

What does it mean? The fall of Soviet Union resulted in a chaotic all-out war of criminal organizations. “Bellum omnium contra omnes”.

Even those who disagree with Putin in other issues, appreciate his achievement of ending this war. Just like a good “pakhan”, he introduced a lasting peace among the various criminal groups.

Soloviev is trying hard to convince himsel (and his viewers) that the West is responsible for killing Prigozhin. Just as if reading my Substack, he vehemently denies Russia is a mafia state. Via Youtube channel “Russian Media Monitor”.

It lasted two decades, but it started to crumble even before the second invasion. The creation of Donbas “separatist republics” made some people very rich all of a sudden, which prompted the other oligarchs to plot against them. A good example is the meteoric rise and fall of one Vladislav Surkov. The gang equilibrium was disturbed in 2014 and now it seems gone.

I don’t want to speculate on who killed Prigozhin or who will take over his enormous wealth. I’m a “citation needed” guy and there is simply too early for good citations.

But I agree with Girkin in one point. The 90’s seem to be back in Russia with a bang. Literally.

We will quite likely see more Russians killing Russians, Russians planes shot down by Russian missiles, Russian generals disappearing, Russian propagandists attacking each other...

We're gonna need popcorn. Lots of popcorn.

First: there is no need to imagine. The Minsk agreements have a nice Wikipedia entry.

Of course, one might not trust Wikipedia. After all, it is nothing but an instrument of the satano-masonic conspiracy aiming to fed us with insects while they poison us with vaccines for a lab-made disease.

But if you don’t trust it, you can check a direct link to the original. Here it is!

via Aaron Mate Twitter account

People like Aaron Mate (quoted above) are too lazy to check. And they correctly assume their audience is also too lazy to check.

Once again I emphasize the expression “pro-Russian Western”, because you won’t find it in the actual Russian propaganda. “Aaron Mate style” propaganda works only for the people who only recently learned of the existence of Ukraine.

I don’t blame them. Until very recently, I didn’t know about the existence of ECOWAS. I’m not proud of my ignorance, but at least I don’t pontificate on how African countries should redraw their borders to my liking. That alone makes me a better person than Aaron Mate.

“Little Green Men” occupying the parliament building in Crimea, 1.03.2014, photo by Sergey Ponomarev, taken from: “The little green men A look at the people behind the annexation of Crimea. A photo series by Sergey Ponomarev”, Meduza.io, 11.03.2015, link below

In order to understand the Minsk agreements, first you have to remember that in 2014 Ukraine was invaded by Russian-sponsored paramilitaries led by Moscow resident Igor Girkin. At the time, Russia vehemently denied its involvement, claiming that these paramilitaries came from some unknown location, perhaps even a different planet, hence their nickname - “Little Green Men”.

Today this is no longer denied by anyone in Russia. Girkin is now in prison, but not for his war crimes - he just went too far in criticising Putin.

His Telegram channel is now run by his wife, who is reposting some scarce voices in defence of Girkin. The one quoted below is a heartwarming story of a brave leader who changed the course of history with a group of “52 warriors”.

“He’s a proof … that a detachment of 52 warriors can create a new country, change the course of history, re-draw the world map” - a very poetic praise of Girkin by one of his followers, taken from his Telegram account

Let me reiterate. Nobody in Russia currently denies the role Girkin played in the invasions on Crimea and Donbas in 2014. His friends praise him for how much he managed to achieve given so little resources, his enemies chastise him for failing to capture the entire Donbas.

The fairy tale of “pro-Russian population of Crimea and Donbas who revolted against the CIA-installed junta” does not exist in the Russian media sphere. Only the people in the West who are as clueless about Ukraine as I am about Africa, still fall for it.

But Russia was still in full denial back in 2014, which turned the peace negotiations into a farce. Russia presented itself as a neutral, non-belligerent party, as much concerned with the “insurgency” in the neighbouring country as anybody else.

The Western leaders of the time (notably Francois Hollande and Angela Merkel) pretended they believed this. It was the peak of the “do not anger the bear” period.

The Russian-appointed “leaders” of the “separatist republics” declared they don’t care about peace negotiations, since they were not invited. However, not even Russia was willing to recognise them (they did so only on the eve of the 2022 invasion), so inviting them to the table would break a long standing taboo on “negotiating with terrorists”.

Donetsk People Republic spokesperson Eduard Basurin rejecting Minsk 1 - taken from “Ukraine suffers considerable losses”, TASS agency, 23.01.2015

This is what they were, both in legal and practical terms. They grabbed power in Donbas and Crimea by abducting and killing people. They even held the OSCE observers as hostages.

The Minsk negotiations were doomed to fail. The first round (Minsk 1) was ignored by the “separatists”.

They whole point of the negotiations was brokering a ceasefire. The separatists used it as a cover for another offensive. Hence Minsk 2 - where they were invited without diplomatic recognition.

Negotiating with terrorists is not just morally wrong, it is an exercise in futility. If they are not shy of killing innocent people, how do you expect them to be shy of lying?

It should be no surprise to anyone (except, of course, Merkel & Hollande) that the separatists ignored the ceasefire almost immediately after signing the agreements. Thus, Minsk 2 was dead on arrival much like its predecessor.

An obituary for the ceasefire - taken from “Ukraine Truce Hangs by Thread as Rebels Claim Key Rail Hub” by David Stout, Time Magazine

I wonder how Aaron Mate imagines himself “honuring of Minsk” from Ukraine. How can you honour a ceasefire unilaterally? Be shot without shooting back? I guess that’s what he wants, because for the next 8 years, shooting back in counterbattery fire was presented by these guys as the “Donbas genocide”.

Since the main point of Minsk 1 and Minsk 2 - ceasefire - was unilaterally rejected by the “separatists”, it makes little relevance what else was in the agreements. Yes, it’s true they included concessions providing larger autonomy to the Donbas provinces, but on conditions of restoring law & order in the area.

In practice this meant returning border controls to the Ukrainian border guards (for some mysterious reason, the “separatists” who came from unknown country, started with capturing Russo-Ukrainians border checkpoints), allowing OSCE inspectors to monitor the implementation of the agreement, run early elections according to Ukrainian law under international monitoring and withdrawal of the “Little Green Men” to their mysterious planet of origin.

Since the separatists did not even pretend they intended to implement any of these - it’s hard to imagine what Ukraine could have done to unilaterally implement their part of the agreements.

What was the point, then? Was it worth it?

The Girkin-led invasion was a humanitarian disaster. The frontline went through many settlements, trapping thousands of people without food, water, heating or electricity. Even an imperfect ceasefire was a chance to save some lives.

On the  international level, the biggest fear back then was that Putin will quit the “Little Green Men” charade and switch to a full scale invasion. Ukraine was not ready for this, nor was the West.

But was Putin ready? As with alternative histories, we’ll never know “what if”.

By invading Ukraine, he violated a lot of international treaties. Not just the toothless “Budapest Memorandum”, but the UN Charter, OSCE Treaty and whatnot. For 8 years the leaders of the West were turning a blind eye on this, pretending the “Little Green Men” came from outer space.

Taken from: Angela Merkel opens up on Ukraine, Putin and her legacy” by Alistair Walsh, Rina Goldenberg; “Deutsche Welle, 06.07.2022

Angela Merkel is saying today that these 8 years helped Ukraine to arm itself. Well, not thanks to her, that’s for sicher. Germany was always in fear of “angering the bear”, they refused to help Ukraine even after the full scale invasion and even today they refuse to deliver long range weapons.

I guess they must have a very peculiar case of “bear fetish”.

Dude, don’t you think Russia would be already doing this, having the possibility? (random Twitter reaction to Ukraine enforcing Black Sea blockade)

Sometimes there is no justification whatsoever. You can see that the author simply loves Russia so much, that Russia is always right in their eyes. You can’t argue with that.

Sometimes, however, there is some justification. “You can’t poke a bear! You can’t fight a nuclear superpower! Ukraine should surrender to prevent World War III! Don’t escalate the conflict!”. Some people with this attitude have even appeared here in the comments section.

But what if there is no bear after all? (random Twitter reaction to Moscow bombing)

I don’t believe in nuclear threat in Ukraine. I already have explained my reasoning in detail - but it was in the comments section again, so I will recap it here.

First of all: Putin’s has to please his kleptocratic oligarchs, otherwise they will side with the next Prigozhin. They don’t want World War III, not even with the impossible outcome of Russian victory, because for every Russian the biggest privilege is to enjoy Western indulgence. The oligarchs (and especially their lovers & children) want to drive Western cars, smoke Western cigarettes, use Western smartphones, wear Western clothes and vacation in Western resorts.

Remember: not even the biggest Russian patriot would actually prefer Lada over Toyota or Crimea over Disneyland. They are literally the last to want to see Paris burning (even counting the actual French).

Apparently, the decision making centers in Kyiv were “immediately” destroyed last July. At least if you believe Russian propaganda. (random Twitter reaction to the attack on Chonhar bridge)

Seeing failure of his Plan A (quick takeover of Kyiv), Plan B (forced vassalization via “peace treaty”), Plan C (Wagner troops taking over Donbas), etc., Putin has to stick to the Plan Z. It’s a prolonged conflict with no chance for Russian victory, but also no Russian decisive defeat.

Plan Z is not perfect, but it does offer Russian oligarchs plenty of opportunities to profiteer. Someone has to bypass the sanctions and smuggle microchips. Someone pockets the ample funds for restarting Russian military industry (probably the same person who “privatised” the Soviet-build factories to sell them for scrap). Someone knows the exact timetable of the next stages of rouble collapse - and this information is priceless on Forex. So as longs a Putin does not do anything stupid that would end the war prematurely - he and his oligarchs make one big happy kleptocratic family.

That’s why I’m not afraid of “poking the bear” or “escalating the conflict”. How can it escalate? Russia cannot invade Ukraine again or bomb Ukrainian cities more intensely as they already do (they run at full capacity). As long as the remnants of Russian army are bogged in this quagmire, they also cannot invade anyone else. So what is there to worry about?

To my surprise, some people still fall for the drunken rants of Dmitry Medvedev, who keeps promising “Armageddons”, “judgement days”, “strikes at decision making centres”, “total destruction of Ukrainian infrastructure” and what not, if Ukraine or the West “crosses” some imaginary “red lines”. I literally cannot comprehend how it is possible NOT to see that these threats are empty - simply for their sheer repetition, if nothing else.

I didn’t count how many times Medvedev threatened the West with nukes over this conflict, but I think I managed to find the first instance. It was the third day of the war - 26 February 2022 (below: a snippet from Al Jazeera).

Photo credits: [Yekaterina Shtukina/Sputnik via AP], snippet from Al Jazeera, 26.2.2022

The West was supposed to be destroyed if it supplies Ukraine with lethal weapons. Then Ukraine was supposed to be destroyed if it attacks Russian territory. Especially if they sink Russian ship. Or if they hit Moscow. Especially if they hit Kremlin.

They did all of that. And?

In July 2023 Medvedev was threaening the West with “Judgement day” if Ukraine uses Storm Shadow missiles to hit targets in Crimea. The next day Ukraine did precisely that, Russian military bloggers were circulating photos of the debris to prove that the missile that hit the Chonhar Bridge was indeed a Storm Shadow. Of course, nothing happened. And yet he keeps repeating the same worn out phrases and some people in the West still fall for this crap.

I think the most ridiculous instance was in September 2022, when Russia announced “annexation” of territories they did not even fully control. But that was enough for pro-Russian propagandists to fantasise that Ukraine was now in checkmate - they can’t regain these territories (including Kherson) as they were now a part of Russian territory and therefore “under  Moscow's nuclear umbrella”.

I still can’t believe anyone took this seriously! A snippet from: Mark Trevelyan, “Russia says seized Ukrainian lands are under its nuclear protection”, Reuters, 18.10.2022

Ukraine ignored this BS and liberated Kherson two months later. The pro-Russian propagandists quickly forgot their own “prophecies”. The annexations were announced almost a year ago but nothing happened in practice - the border checkpoints are where they used to be, passenger cars still have Ukrainian license plates. Nobody talks of a “nuclear umbrella over annexed territories” anymore.

The funny thing is that Putin never draws these “red lines” himself. I don’t think he ever used this expression or anything remotely similar. Putin’s remarks are intentionally vague, it’s up to his henchmen and propagandists to try to translate them to human language.

A rare moment of clarity on Skabayeva show (via TheKremlinYap)

If you watch Skabayeva or Soloviev shows, you know that even the Russian propagandists are sick and tired of talking about “red lines” and “judgement days”. Just how many times can you repeat the same empty threats? If Ukraine can hit not just Moscow, but the very Kremlin with a drone and nothing happens, where do you draw the next imaginary “red line”, on Putin’s dacha?

I guess the last group of people still afraid of “poking the bear” are the pro-Russian non-Russians. They seem to believe that Putin can surprise us with some Wunderwaffe he keeps hidden in the taiga.

If one of them is reading this then - please, please, please: provide us with some plausible explanation, what this Wunderwaffe consists of, where it is hidden, why it hasn't been used yet. While we wait, let me entertain you with a joke from the communist times, slightly paraphrased (the original version is more vulgar).

What is this: it is no wonder and it can’t be used as a weapon? Russian wonder weapon.

The only thing I’m afraid of is that Plan Z will work out and Putin manages to turn it into a prolonged stalemate. That should be prevented at any cost. Ukraine should get as much Western weapons as it needs to push Russia back to the 1991 border, without any strings attached such as “don’t use long range missiles to hit Russian mainland”. We can’t expect Ukraine to fight with one arm tied.

There’s a classic Russian proverb, “the circus is gone but the clowns are staying”. A tank stuck in a circus gate in Rostov during the failed Prigozhin putsch - by Reuters

If you understand The Understanding, you know two things. First: Prigozin is an urka. Second: Putin is a vor v zakonye [edit: or pakhan? check the discussion for clarification!]

English, please? Yes sir!

Ponyatya is an umbrella term for the Russian prison culture. Every country has one, but in a typical Western society, if you have a normal, boring, bourgeois life, you don't pay much attention to it.

A typical Western European does not expect ever to go to prison or have a friend or relative behind bars. For your average Lars Nielsen or Jan Novak, prison culture is something they encounter only in crime fiction.

This is not the case for Ivan Ivanovich. There's a Russian proverb translating roughly to “everyone should be prepared for prison life or beggar's life”. High levels of incarceration result(ed) in very high probability of encountering prison culture “the hard way”.

No way of life, no social status can protect you. Rocket scientist? Party apparatchik? Doctor? Lawyer? They have a special place in Gulag with your name on it, comrade.

Being a member of the royal family was no protection during the tzarist years. Actually, it only made your more vulnerable to being imprisoned for such a crime as “offending a tzar’s daughter during a ball”. The Dekabrist revolt of 1825 alone created a lot of aristocratic convicts.

The main reason for this was that due to the imperialist expansion of 18. and 19. century Russia was in control of vast territories that were either unpopulated or inhabited by an indigenous population too rebellious and hostile that it “had” to be exterminated (such as Circassians). Either way, Russian settlers were urgently needed in the wastelands.

But since nobody really wanted to live in the harsh conditions of the new Russian territories, compulsory settlement was the only solution. The cruelty of the verdict varied, from merely getting forcibly settled in a colony - up to marching on foot in shackles to the site of your forced labor - “katorga”, where you were expected to die of malnutrition (provided you survived the murderous trip).

Thus, Russian judicial system never cared much about justice or law & order. The primary goal was to create involuntary settlers for colonies in Siberia, Kuban, Caucasus etc.

The Bolsheviks vastly expanded this system. Katorga was a child’s play compared to the genocidal cruelty of Gulag. It was disbanded after 1991, but the institution of a “penal colony” has  survived until this very day.

There is one other country with comparably high levels of incarceration - and being world famous for its own prison and gangsta culture. Of course, I'm talking of the USA.

However, in order to imagine a comparable level of influence of gangsta culture, you'd have to move your fantasy well beyond Snoop Dogg bragging about his connection with the Crips. Imagine state-sponsored gangsta rap festivals. Imagine most of your writers mentioning this topic one way or another - from pulp fiction to Nobel laureates, all writers describing gangsta characters.

So imagine alternative America, where people successfully run for the office on a ticket “supported by San Quentin chapter of Aryan Brotherhood”. Imagine American writers such as Cormac McGangsta, James Fennimore Gangstooper and Edgar Allan Gangstoe. Imagine gangsta culture in the most important pieces of poetry and fiction in American classics, all the way to the poem “The Sot Weed Gangsta”.

State prosecutor in the city of Obninsk, proudly displaying his prison tatoos (via Kamil Galeev Twitter)

I'm not exaggerating. If you look for depictions of Russian prison culture, you have to begin with the timeless classic - “The House of the Dead” by Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky (unrelated to the game franchise by Sega, but equally frightening). But if you are serious with your research, you have to dig into Lermontov, Tolstoy, even Pushkin. For a casual reader, I recommend the historical pastiche crime novels by Boris Akunin.

Of course, if you really want to understand The Understanding, you need to check academic writing. This post is based on a publication by Jadwiga Rogoża, „Rosja za kratami: wpływ kultury więziennej na rosyjską kulturę polityczną i społeczną” (Russia behind bars: the impact of prison culture on Russian political and social culture available in Polish in Nowa Europa Wschodnia, 3-4/2013). It’s in Polish - izvenite! - but for your quick needs, here’s a Twitter thread by Kamil Galeev.

I’ll give him that: Colin Farrell certainly did his homework and playing an urka in Peter Weir’s "The Way Back” (2010), he does his best to look like an urka, but… he still looks like Colin Farrell.

So, who is an urka? He is (no progressive pronouns here!) a ruthless criminal, ready to commit murder you even if it’s all about 50 cents. “Original Gangsta” could be a remote equivalent in English.

Urka follows only three commandments: never fear, never ask, never trust. It makes him different from an American gangster, who typically trusts his lawyer and the state regulations such as “attorney-client privilege”.

Obviously, in the entire Russian history there never was such a thing as “attorney-client privilege”. Actually, your defence lawyer is the last person you should trust - unlike you, he still has something to lose.

Of course, not every Russian is an urka - even not every Russian criminal is one! - but every Russian must ask himself this question: will I survive meeting one? A casual encounter in the street is always possible and always risky (eye contact is dangerous but actively avoiding eye contact is even worse). A non-casual encounter in prison is certain.

Therefore, every Russian must learn the rules of ponyatya. The only way to earn some kind of respect from an urka is to prove you kind-of follow his commandments in your own, mediocre way. For instance, that you respect suicidal bravery.

That’s why Russians have no compassion for those killed in exile, from Trotsky to Litvinenko. By trying to escape torture and death, they kind-of lost their human status (according to ponyatya).

Boris Yeltsin and his entourage, on top of a tank he (allegedly) disarmed with his bare hands during the Pugo-putsch of 19th August 1991. Photo by Reuters, via BBC: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-14589691

If you want to play any role in Russian politics, you need to display publicly your suicidal bravado. Yeltsin rose to power because he had shown no fear during a failed putsch and stopped advancing tanks with his bare hands. Navalny returned from the exile almost volunteering for torture.

If you watched HBO series “Chernobyl”, a number of notable characters display disregard for their own survival, doing things that no Westerner would have done (of course, no Westerner would ever approve this reactor design in the first place).

It’s not that every Russian ACCEPTS this system of values (in fact, Dostoyevsky devoted his work to its criticism), but every Russian KNOWS it. For ages, it was the only law that actually worked in Russia.

Both in culture and in folklore you will find various versions of a story of a poor widow or an orphan, who was robbed of all her belongings. In desperation she went to the gang leader, “vor v zakonye” in order to complain, that according to the “law of thieves”, one is not supposed to steal from his own neighbours. “My apologies”, responds the leader and then, first thing in the morning, the orphan/widow finds all the stolen belongings returned to her doorstep, with a bottle of moonshine for moral damages.

Putin’s popularity is based on him presenting himself as an old school “vor v zakonye”. He frequently refers to prison slang in his speeches - this is usually mistranslated in the West, because stunned Western journalists, who know textbook Russian, are puzzled by such expressions as “to kill them in the toilet” (if urkas wanted someone to disappear without a trace, they drowned him in the latrine hole - the body would decompose before anyone finds it).

But as a “vor v zakonye”, Putin must follow ponyatya. He is not bound by constitution - he can change it on the spot. But he is bound by the law of thieves - this is why he can’t touch Prigozhin.

“Shoigu! Gerasimov! Where is my ammunition?” - this weird video by Prigozhin raised many eyebrows, especially among the pro-Russian non-Russian crowd in the West. If he need ammunition, why doesn’t he ask? At this point, you already know (via Prigozhin’s Telegram channel)

The authority of  “vor v zakonye” is strictly conditional: it lasts as long as the leader’s decision are beneficial for the whole gang. If his decisions hurt the gang members, his leadership will be questioned (usually in a bloody showdown - the Prigozhin putsch was the first attempt, I think more are likely to follow).

Before he is killed/disposed by rival gang members, “vor v zakonye” enjoys the peculiar power of controlling the “obschak”. I apologize for another untranslatable word - I guess the nearest equivalent in English will be “the stash”, however the Russian words is derived from the word “obshchyi”, meaning common / universal / general.

Obschak is like communism before communism - from each gang member according to his abilities, to each gang member according to his needs. In prison, obschak is the stash of money, cigarettes, moonshine, drugs, weapons and whatever make you survive. In Russian politics, it’s the control over natural resources, state companies, banking system - whatever make you rich.

Putin’s obschak is operating in plain sight. Some parts of it are even incorporated as legal enterprises.

One of them is Kooperativa Ozero (Lake Cooperative), formally a cooperative of fellow of dacha owners. Each participant can withdraw any amount of money from the cooperative account - this is a very convenient way to launder money. You cannot bribe Putin, but you can submit any payment to the cooperative.

In Russian political parlance, “Kooperative Ozero” is a metaphor for Putin’s inner circle. In the West people imagine this inner circle the Western style - as the close advisors, cabinet members, party leaders etc.

This is just wrong. People like Lavrov, Medvedev or Peskov are like a criminal who is hired by the gang, but not actually a gang member. Think of a getaway driver, who will get a flat fee for his role in a bank heist.

Our frequent contributor Formosa made an interesting mistake saying that “Putin surprised his inner circle by the invasion”. He did not. On the contrary, there is a common opinion that the whole idea came from his TRUE inner circle from the dacha cooperative, notably Yury Kovalchuk aka “Putin’s banker”.

This post is already too long, so I will end it by a recap of how to understand this war in the light of The Understanding. Until around 2010, Putin was a successful “vor v zakone”, trusted both by “widows and orphans” (who preferred his reign over the chaotic lawlessness of Yeltsin years), but above all, by the oligarchs / gang members, who enjoyed the vast possibilities he has created for them.

The first, rather lenient sanctions started under the Obama administrations - hurting some of the gang interests. They were somewhat compensated by the 2014 invasion, but it failed to achieve the original, grandiose plans of taking the whole Donbas and ending the Ukrainian democracy.

What’s worse, there were more sanctions. In order to give his oligarchs more opportunities, Putin started to engage in military interventions in Syria and Africa (that make no sense otherwise - what interests Russia as a country might have in Mali?).

Viktor Medvedchuk - a member of Putin’s inner circle, who was supposed to be the next president of Ukraine (should they take Kyiv in 3 days) - via Zelensky’s Telegram channel

But even that was not as profitable as expected. So he was persuaded into the ultimate heist: take Kyiv in 3 days and install a gang member Medvedchuk as a “president” of Ukraine. Should that succeed, the possibilities for looting and profiteering would be enormous. Ukraine might not be a very rich country, but there’s certainly more to steal there than in South Ossetia.

So what we are witnessing now in Russia, is a classic noir thriller scenario of a failed heist. The gang members are now debating what to do, and the rest, from the hired guns such as Peskov, down to widows and orphans (there’s more and more of them!), just wait for their verdict, trying not to get caught in the crossfire.

Quote from Chris Hedges (via ScheerPost)

Since he took money from Russia Today, I find it hard to believe he is acting in good faith. But let’s assume that he does for conversation sake.

Above you will find a quote from his latest pro-Russian rant. What I find particularly interesting is his comparison to Vietnam and Iraq.

In the early days of this substack, I wrote a post about how important our history is to us in Eastern Europe. We put disproportionate attention to what happened to “our” nation in Middle Ages and I’m the first to agree this is probably going too far, but here I am, unable to resist this urge.

What I find interesting in this context is - acting in good faith or not - goes definitely not far enough. He seems to remember only the historical events that happened in his lifetime. He was 19 when the last helicopter took off the embassy rooftop in Saigon.

I would say that this is typical for Westerners, at least Americans. If they build “historical analogies”, they usually refer to something that happened 20, 30, at best 50 years ago.

This war is being fought by people with a broader scope of historical context ON BOTH SIDES. This is something you simply have to take into account regardless if you are “pro Putin” or “pro NATO”, “true neutral” or “chaotic good”.

When I read Russian blogs and media, they are full of analogies with World War II, sometimes mixed with references to the Russian civil war of 1917-1923 and the Crimean war of 1853-1856. In all these instances, the question “how to advance from Kherson to Crimea” (or vice versa) was also a key issue.

Let me just stick to the WW2 - in spite of everything that happened after 1945, we still see it as the most important event in recent history. After all, our borders were largely drawn in 1945 (with minor modifications).

You can’t get Eastern Europe if you don’t understand that in the first place. World War Two analogies are EVERYWHERE, from politics to popular culture. Even if our authors imagine fantasy neverlands or space opera galactic empires, the main scope of conflict is usually surprisingly similar to “Axis vs Allieds vs Comintern”.

Yennefer of Vengerberg, your very Eastern European sorceress (Netflix publicity shoot)

Case in point: “The Witcher” franchise. The political backdrop to this fantasy saga is a war on the imaginary Continent, where the totalitarian empire of Nilfgaard is conquering the “kingdoms of the North”.

Nilfgaard is unable to do it by military power alone, because the Northern kingdoms are stronger. On paper. But the shrewd Emperor Emhyr is playing the Northern kings for fools, sowing discontent among them, and just taking them one by one.

The Netflix adaptation has just reached the part of the book saga when the Continent mages, led by sorceress Yennefer of Vengerberg, try to arrange a Northern alliance. Technically it’s a spoiler, but it should be no surprise to you that this attempt will be a colossal failure.

This is a very Eastern European story. While the West is seeing World War Two as the triumph of allied democracies fighting the evil empire of Third Reich, our memories are different. We remember facing Hitler and Stalin in horrible solitude.

That’s how we remember it in Poland, but judging from the books I have read, there is a similar sentiment in Czech, Romanian, even Hungarian literature (e.g. Sandor Marai). This is especially surprising when you read memoirs from countries that made the deal with the devil and joined the Axis - at the time it was not perceived as something to be happy about, but as the lesser evil that would not be necessary if not for the “Western betrayal”.

While we all here perceive it slightly differently, the concept of “Western betrayal” will be easily understood in every country from Finland to Greece. I will use the meme below as an example of this misunderstanding.

Seems suicidal… but was it? (assumed public domain)

Yes, why did Poland choose to ally with France and Britain? It makes sense if you look at the broader context of the entire interwar period. Let’s begin with the Paris Peace Conference of 1919-1920, establishing the interwar European order.

As a result of the Paris treaties, multiple news states emerged on the map, from Finland to Yugoslavia. Most of them were carved from former German, Austro-Hungarian or Russian lands and as such they were in immediate threat by the great power revanchism as well as by  your neighbour next door (next mountain), because the process of drawing new borders caused a lot of new border conflicts.

Western diplomats knew about it and they established a mechanism they hoped will be strong enough to prevent the next war forever. In reality, it did not last even for 20 years, but if you look at Europe in - say - 1930, it still seems pretty solid.

Europe as emerged from the Paris Peace Conferences - George Bacon, public domain (via Wikipedia)

The new countries formed an alliance called Little Entente - under the auspices of France. France guaranteed Little Entente and its members guaranteed each other. It was almost like the alliance Yennefer of Vanderberg tried to build in the Witcher saga… but there was one catch. Or maybe two.

First: two Eastern European countries were on the wrong side of World War I, and for this they were punished by sanctions, reparations and unfavorable border changes. They were Bulgaria and Hungary.

Both countries felt that this punishment was unjustified. As for Hungary, they did not enter World War I on their own accord. As a junior partner in the Austro-Hungarian union, they had nothing to say. They felt they don’t deserve to be treated like the culprits of the WWI, they were the victims forced to participate.

So did Bulgarians. They tried to remain neutral, but both sides (Axis and Allied) made it clear they will not respect neutrality and Bulgaria will be crushed by both sides should it refuse to join one of them. In 1915 they reluctantly joined the Central Powers, because Russian conditions for joining entente were murderous.

So even at the very beginning of the interwar period, we had two Eastern countries despising this system. To make things worse, there were countries such as Poland or Lithuania, generally happy with the Versailles treaty, but unhappy about the borders they ended up with - Poland snatched Vilnius from Lithuania, while Czechoslovakia did so with Zaolzie.

Therefore Poland and Czechoslovakia perceived each other as enemies, so they could not be in the Little Entente together. But no worries! There was Romania, who had no conflict with Poland, so there was a separate bilateral treaty of mutual protection.

Technically someone who attacked Czechoslovakia should end up in war with Romania, who could in turn ask their trusted ally - Poland, for help. All these countries were guaranteed by France, who enjoyed cordial alliance with Britain.

So if you look at the map in 1936, it seems that Hitler and Stalin are paper tigers. They can do nothing without triggering a full scale war with the victors of the Great War, Britain and France and the combined Polish, Czechoslovakian, Yugoslavian and Romanian armies (looking pretty strong on paper).

As Hitler’s rhetoric became more and more belligerent, countries of Eastern Europe started to fortify their borders. Czechoslovakia built a system of bunkers in Sudetenland, Romania protected itself from Hungary with a King Michaels Line, Poland fortified the German border, and France created the world famous Maginot Line.

If it was so good, how could things go so wrong? Why did World War Two happen at all?

This rock-solid system started to collapse with the Anschluss of Austria in March 1938. It was a direct violation of the Paris Peace Treaties, but the world did nothing. After all, they spoke the same language, and they seemed to be happy about it (maybe except the Austrian Jews, but after all you can’t please everyone, can you?).

Now the borders of Czechoslovakia started to look hopeless. The most populated and developed “head” of the country was surrounded by Germany from three sides, and the less populated “tail” was squeezed between two hostile countries, Poland and Hungary. In case of war it would be impossible to maintain the land corridor to Romania.

In September 1938 Hitler demanded Sudetenland. He said he has no more territorial claims in Europe, but it is his duty to protect the German speaking population.

In his famous speech in Sportpalast on September 26th, Hitler presented himself as the biggest pacifist in Europe, trying to merely to sign just and fair treaties with his friendly neighbours, while the English and French “warmongers” provoke war in Europe. However, by taking Sudetenland he made it certain there will be no war “at least in 10 years”.

Neville Chamberlain, Edouard Daladier, Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini assuring each other that it is all about German-speaking population of Czechoslovakia and nothing else (public domain, author unknown)

Of course, when Czechoslovakia “agreed” to give up its fortified border areas, it was virtually disarmed. In March 1939 Hitler took the rest of the country and in an act of insane political myopia, Poland snatched Zaolzie back.

But now Hitler had the gold reserves of the Czechoslovakian national bank, the industrial power of Skoda and Zbrojovka Brno, and crucially, tanks and guns from the once powerful Czechoslovak army. They were soon to be used to crush Poland and France, who handed them over to their enemy on a silver plate, accelerating their own undoing.

Now Polish borders were impossible to defend. In spite of that, we were the first country to say “no” to Hitler and Stalin. We paid such a horrible price for this that the when it was the turn for Romania, they did not want to repeat this mistake, they just handed over their fortified border areas to Hungary and Soviet Union. Now they were helpless and thus have no other option but to join Axis, the easy way or the hard way.

By mid-1941, all the countries in Eastern Europe were either annexed by Hitler or Stalin, or at best vasalised. And what is most horrible is that they took us one by one, while we could have won, if acting as united in 1938.

There is a proverb saying that nobody ever learned anything from history, but I think war in Ukraine proves otherwise. Everybody in Eastern Europe remembers how stupid it was to deliver Sudetenland to Hitler.

We know that if Ukraine submits to Russian demands, it will not bring “10 years of peace”. On the contrary, it will make the next war inevitable.

We see no similarity to “Vietnam, Iraq and Libia”, but a lot of similarities with the collapse of Paris Peace Treaties in 1938-1940. Actually, if you look closer to Chris Hedges’ line of reasoning, he talks much like Hitler in Sportpalast. He is blaming some undefined “war pimps” or “warmongers” on the West, with complete disregard for the interest of Eastern European nations.

All the Eastern European nations (including Greece and Finland!) have their own version of the “Western betrayal”. But at some point between 1938 and 1941, we were indeed betrayed by the people in the West saying “why die for Austria, why die for Sudetenland, why die for Danzig”. Pretty soon they had to die for London, but in much worse conditions.

This is why Eastern Europe, with all our internal struggles and differences, is nearly unanimous in this matter. It doesn’t matter if you are left or right, progressive or conservative, Polish, Lithuanian or Romanian, you know appeasement does not work. The recent history of your own country is full of evidence.