Russian language skills, that I lack, appear necessary to gain full benefit. There may be a way to copy and paste cited passages into Google Translate; however, I am not finding it.
It looked to me as if you summarized what was in the screenshots, without giving a translation of everything in the screenshots. Perhaps I did not read with sufficient care.
Trust is something that can grow over time.
By the by, I have to say, I have been quite unaware of people writing in English language in favor of the Not-So-Special Operation.
You, however, have ears to the ground.
Thanks for what you do.
Oh: Many Poles who emigrated found new homes in the area where I live. Unfortunately, I was unappreciative of this while growing up, but, in my old age am learning better.
Almost all translations herein are literal (not "summaries"), with one big exception. I just can't get myself to translate the whole answer given by Peskov to the "morning/evening Putin" question. I summarize it as "vague and avoidant", and this is just boring "in order to avoid bloodshed, difficult decisions, yadda yadda".
I have always understood it as a period of time when the state collapses and there is no strong ruler. Mutinity is not needed here. That is why the whole 90s is often called smuta - there was President Yeltsin and there was no mutinity, but the government was weak. Wages and pensions went unpaid for months. People were uncertain about their future. And worst of all, there was no one to ask for help against the local boyars.
Then Putin came along and ended it. He bombed rebellious Chechnya, he started paying pensions on time (thanks to rising oil prices, but who cares...) and he removed old boyars from power and punished some of them. And he ended with "dermocracy" (shitocracy), which led to Yeltsin-era smuta. So the election results did not decide who will rule, it is the ruler who decides about the election results. Also, many elected officials were changed to presidential appointees.
Of course there were new boyars, but people knew that the tsar loved them and that they could ask him for help. And at least once a year he had a big TV event where he solved the problems of a few commoners and jawed at stupid officials. The smuta was over.
Now that one of the boyars has almost managed to take over Moscow, it seems that a new smuta is about to begin...
I am! Actually, someone on Russian TV said almost the same thing, and he even used the same word (chek the Twitter account TheKremlinYap for a clip with subtitles). Smuta is an umbrella term, it covers both "The Great Smuta" (state collapse) and your garden variety, not so great smuta, such as this one.
To me this putsch is a final argument that the concept of "Putin's war" (implying the lack of support for the war among the Russian population) is dead. Russians in Rostov cheered Wagner, defying Putin. And what did Prigozhin say about the war? In a nutshell, that he'd fight it better than Putin. So the only rebel against Putin whom the ordinary Russians dare to support against Putin is the one who's pro-war. Hence, to me, it means that at least now, the war is more popular in Russia than Putin. Anyone who will replace him will be pro-war too.
If you listened to the video that Prigozhin released just before the putsch, you would know that he said that there was no reason to invade Ukraine and that the conflict should have been resolved through negotiations with Zelensky.
Of course it matters. If he used this rhetoric just before the putsch, negating what both Putin and the Z-radicals were saying, it means that he thought it was the most likely thing to get him support – from Russians who don't know what the war is for and are tired of it.
I don't think he spoke to the general Russian audience. I'm working on a separate post on that, but I think people in the West fail to understand Russia, because they don't know Russian prison culture - and they don't understand how important it is in Russian every day. Prigozhin is an urka, that's obvious (he doesn't even deny it). So I read his last speech before the coup as: I tried to salvage as much as possible for our gang but Soledar and Bakhmut was all I could grab for the getaway car, and it is not my fault, but Shoigu and Gerasimov failed the execution, and Beseda failed the preparation, he tould our gang leader there will be no alarm!
A very interesting post.
Russian language skills, that I lack, appear necessary to gain full benefit. There may be a way to copy and paste cited passages into Google Translate; however, I am not finding it.
I put them as screenshots, but this is always followed by my translation - don't you trust me?
It looked to me as if you summarized what was in the screenshots, without giving a translation of everything in the screenshots. Perhaps I did not read with sufficient care.
Trust is something that can grow over time.
By the by, I have to say, I have been quite unaware of people writing in English language in favor of the Not-So-Special Operation.
You, however, have ears to the ground.
Thanks for what you do.
Oh: Many Poles who emigrated found new homes in the area where I live. Unfortunately, I was unappreciative of this while growing up, but, in my old age am learning better.
Almost all translations herein are literal (not "summaries"), with one big exception. I just can't get myself to translate the whole answer given by Peskov to the "morning/evening Putin" question. I summarize it as "vague and avoidant", and this is just boring "in order to avoid bloodshed, difficult decisions, yadda yadda".
PS Thanks for all the kind words, appreciated!
How about utilizing Google Translate app? Just point your smartphone camera at the screen and receive instant translation.
Try Google Lens
Are you sure about the use of the word "smuta"?
I have always understood it as a period of time when the state collapses and there is no strong ruler. Mutinity is not needed here. That is why the whole 90s is often called smuta - there was President Yeltsin and there was no mutinity, but the government was weak. Wages and pensions went unpaid for months. People were uncertain about their future. And worst of all, there was no one to ask for help against the local boyars.
Then Putin came along and ended it. He bombed rebellious Chechnya, he started paying pensions on time (thanks to rising oil prices, but who cares...) and he removed old boyars from power and punished some of them. And he ended with "dermocracy" (shitocracy), which led to Yeltsin-era smuta. So the election results did not decide who will rule, it is the ruler who decides about the election results. Also, many elected officials were changed to presidential appointees.
Of course there were new boyars, but people knew that the tsar loved them and that they could ask him for help. And at least once a year he had a big TV event where he solved the problems of a few commoners and jawed at stupid officials. The smuta was over.
Now that one of the boyars has almost managed to take over Moscow, it seems that a new smuta is about to begin...
I am! Actually, someone on Russian TV said almost the same thing, and he even used the same word (chek the Twitter account TheKremlinYap for a clip with subtitles). Smuta is an umbrella term, it covers both "The Great Smuta" (state collapse) and your garden variety, not so great smuta, such as this one.
To me this putsch is a final argument that the concept of "Putin's war" (implying the lack of support for the war among the Russian population) is dead. Russians in Rostov cheered Wagner, defying Putin. And what did Prigozhin say about the war? In a nutshell, that he'd fight it better than Putin. So the only rebel against Putin whom the ordinary Russians dare to support against Putin is the one who's pro-war. Hence, to me, it means that at least now, the war is more popular in Russia than Putin. Anyone who will replace him will be pro-war too.
If you listened to the video that Prigozhin released just before the putsch, you would know that he said that there was no reason to invade Ukraine and that the conflict should have been resolved through negotiations with Zelensky.
I know he said that. It doesn't matter.
Of course it matters. If he used this rhetoric just before the putsch, negating what both Putin and the Z-radicals were saying, it means that he thought it was the most likely thing to get him support – from Russians who don't know what the war is for and are tired of it.
It doesn't matter, because he used the past tense.
I don't think he spoke to the general Russian audience. I'm working on a separate post on that, but I think people in the West fail to understand Russia, because they don't know Russian prison culture - and they don't understand how important it is in Russian every day. Prigozhin is an urka, that's obvious (he doesn't even deny it). So I read his last speech before the coup as: I tried to salvage as much as possible for our gang but Soledar and Bakhmut was all I could grab for the getaway car, and it is not my fault, but Shoigu and Gerasimov failed the execution, and Beseda failed the preparation, he tould our gang leader there will be no alarm!