A Russian Diary (48 page)

Davydova turns up the pathos and paints a touching picture of decent, law-abiding gangsters. Melnikov gave himself up to the militia voluntarily, they heard what he had to say, were sympathetic and let him go on his way. Accordingly, Melnikov had de facto invalidated the federal search
warrant, and his detention on July 22 was illegal; Deputy Procurator Yudin had merely restored the rule of law that had been violated. This, of course, is complete poppycock. There is no suggestion in the Melnikov file that he voluntarily surrendered himself to anybody.

Judge Potapova retired to consider her verdict, and soon returned to declare that the procurator is always right, and had been right in this case too when he decided not to sanction Melnikov's arrest, even though a nationwide manhunt had been conducted to find him. She rejected the complaint, and found that the deputy procurator's actions did not infringe the constitutional rights of Melnikov's victims. Other, of course, than the very important right to life.

“Russia's social and political arrangements are profoundly unjust,” Vladimir Ryzhkov tells everyone. He is one of the hopes for a democratic revival, young and from the provinces, which goes down well with the public.

It is, however, precisely these “unjust arrangements” that reinforce social apathy and keep people extremely reluctant to stick their necks out. The habit of considering yourself a “small person” is like the red button in the president's nuclear suitcase—he has only to press it and the country is in his hands. I am quite sure that Putin and his entourage fight corruption solely for PR purposes. In reality, corruption is very much to their advantage; it plays an important role in conditioning people to keep quiet. While the courts are pulled this way and that by the criminals and the politicians, he has nothing to fear.

Today is the third time Poles have been beaten up in Moscow, and this cannot be coincidental. Polish embassy staff and a Polish journalist have been attacked in the course of just a few days.

This is the response of Nashi to the fact that on July 31 the children of Russian diplomats in Warsaw were beaten up after a disco: an outbreak of brotherly Slavonic xenophobia with a political subtext, which is very much in the style of Putin's Russia. The Poles have been getting above themselves recently, people are beginning to say, including some who are perfectly decent and educated. What Lenin called “vulgar great-power chauvinism,” which Putin suffers from, is back in fashion. So, if you beat up three of ours, we beat up three of yours. The fact that the official government
response has been very sluggish and formal only shows that they approve.

Yabloko demanded that Putin intervene personally and afford the Polish embassy special protection. The problem is that all the liberals and democrats can do nowadays is appeal to Putin, and appealing to Putin while simultaneously demanding his resignation is just not sensible.

Nikita Belykh, the leader of the Union of Right Forces, has declared that “In the heart of most Russians is an urge to be better people. Our task is to make this clear to them.”

Unfortunately, in the heart of most Russians is an urge to not stand out, and it is particularly in evidence today. We do not want to attract the evil eye of repressive institutions. We want to stay in the shadows. What you get up to in the shadows depends on your personality. Many would not want to emerge under any circumstances; there is a striving for self-improvement, of course, but keeping to the shadows lies much deeper in the heart of every Russian. After all that has happened here in the twentieth century alone, it is perhaps hardly surprising.

An official survey has put Russia seventieth in the world in terms of the use it makes of its human potential.

August 13

The latest grassroots initiative to give Putin a third term has come from Adam Imadaev, a deputy of the legislative assembly of the Primorsky Region and well-known political bootlicker. He announces that he has found a loophole in the legislation that would allow Putin to be elected for a third time. The legal committee of the Primorsky Parliament instantly resolved to examine the matter in September.

August 16

The Supreme Court has caused a sensation by rescinding the Moscow provincial court's ban on the National Bolshevik Party. Old man Limonov was so touched that he said outside the court building that he had almost
had his faith in Russia restored. The procurator general is very upset and has vowed to appeal against the decision to the Presidium of the Supreme Court.

The National Bolsheviks celebrated by infiltrating the inaugural day of Putin's pride and joy the prestigious Moscow Aerospace Show 2005. All sorts of Arab sheikhs had flown in, as had representatives of the Indian military-industrial complex, and King Abdullah II of Jordan, a descendant of the Prophet. Despite incredible security measures, as soon as Putin began his speech opening the show, the National Bolsheviks (God only knows how they had got in) started yelling only 30 meters away from him, “Down with Putin!” and something about his being responsible for Beslan. They were immediately pinioned and bundled off to the militia station in the nearby town of Zhukovskoye.

Three hours later they were released without so much as a fine. They were totally amazed, having expected to end up in jail. It is possible that the militiamen at Zhukovskoye have no time for Putin. Strange things do happen.

Putin got into a bomber at an airfield near the Aerospace Show and flew off with great aplomb to Murmansk Province. The defense people were quietly grinding their teeth; it might be good PR for Putin, but it was a security headache for them. Our generals are well trained, however, and know when not to answer back. They gave orders for Putin to be put in the cockpit, even though it is categorically against regulations. He briefly piloted the aircraft while it was cruising. The state-run mass media wept with delight: Putin was personally inspecting our military aviation! But why? Perhaps to boost his popularity rating?

That evening the Nashists again beat up the National Bolsheviks. There is no point in even trying to talk to the Nashi, none of whom can explain coherently why they have joined the organization. The National Bolsheviks and other left-wing young people are a complete contrast, and highly motivated. Poor people on the left are potentially the most dynamic revolutionary force in Russia. The middle class is very plodding and aspires to no more than a bourgeois way of life, regretting only that, so far, they haven't quite got the means to support that level of consumption.

Active left-wing organizations include the youth wing of Yabloko,
which has become the backbone of Defense, the Russian equivalent of the Pora movement, which was so important to the success of the Ukrainian Orange Revolution. Defense also includes the youth wings of the Union of Right Forces, Marching without Putin, Collective Action, and Our Choice. The coordinator is Ilia Yashin, leader of the youth wing of Yabloko, which has about 2,000 members. Defense is drifting increasingly toward the left, and their protests resemble those of the National Bolsheviks more and more. For their part, the National Bolsheviks are moving toward mainstream democratic policies.

The most high-profile groups are the National Bolsheviks, although their core has been depleted by the arrests; the Avant-Garde of Red Youth; and the Union of Communist Youth. They handcuffed themselves to the railings of the procurator general's office, demanding a meeting. They did not get it.

The ideology of Nashi was worked out by official spin doctors like Sergey Markov. He declared, “Youth organizations with the ideology of Russian sovereignty, like Nashi, are a panacea against the Orange Plague.” It is interesting that no anti-Orange movement appeared spontaneously. Many are afraid of Nashi, but I think they will just fall apart after a while.

August 18

It is still a moot point what will bring about the demise of this regime. How will it collapse? The present opposition is too weak and lacking in purpose to bring it down. Spontaneous protest from the Russian people appears even less likely.

One possibility is that, if Putin does construct a neo-Soviet system, it may collapse, as before, through economic inefficiency. The trademark of Putin's administration is building state capitalism, creating a loyal bureaucratic oligarchy by taking control of all the main national revenues (which are mostly delegated to deputy heads or others in the presidential administration). For this, they need to renationalize successfully functioning enterprises, turning them into financial industrial conglomerates or holding companies.

That is proceeding apace. Conglomerates such as Vneshekonom-bank, Vneshtorgbank, and Mezhprombank (so-called Russian major financial holdings to counterbalance the more Western-looking Alfa Group and others) swallow ever greater chunks of collateral, successful enterprises raised from their knees after the Soviet collapse.

This is facilitated by the administration, naturally. Swallow it they may, but they can't really digest it, as they don't have sufficient highly qualified managers. The conglomerates can't cope effectively with what they already have their hands on and the enterprises begin to fail after being taken over. As a result, economic growth in the last half-year has slowed to 5.3 percent, the export of capital was more than 900 billion rubles [$31.4 billion], and the rate of growth of incomes halved. These statistics were provided by the People's Government, formed as an alternative to the one we've got, by an independent Duma deputy, Gennadii Semigin.

Oleg Shulyakovsky is resigning. He has managed the Baltic Factory, the most important surface shipyard in the northwest of Russia, since 1991. Shulyakovsky was such a major figure that he was retained by all its various owners after it was privatized in the early 1990s. He is finally leaving now because of the de-privatization model imposed on the factory in 2005, after it was bought by United Industrial Corporation, which belongs to Mezhprombank. It is being merged with three design bureaus and some other enterprises, with an obvious loss of efficiency. What the presidential administration does now without Shulyakovsky at the helm (and Mezhprombank was able to swallow the 150-year-old company only because of its contacts with the administration) remains to be seen.

Shulyakovsky was a pillar of the shipbuilding establishment, but even he has given up because Mezhprombank is creating a state capitalist holding of naval shipbuilding. The defense companies Almaz-Antei and Milya Helicopters were both de-privatized in a similar way recently. Mezhprombank is controlled by Sergey Pugachev who, although a senator and hence disqualified from running a bank, continues de facto to do so. He is one of the so-called Orthodox oligarchs, a comrade-in-arms of Putin in creating a state oligarchy.

The only problem with Putin's system is that it will take decades to
collapse through creeping stagnation. Nobody doubts that this fate awaits the Baltic Factory, even if Putin manages to prevent foreigners and those of other tribes from advancing another inch onto Russian territory. In order to preserve their system, they will start passing down the presidency from one useless successor to the next. Their principal characteristic will be their facelessness, and they will get in after elections rigged in the Soviet fashion.

The main problem is that while collapse is inevitable, we will not see it in our lifetime. That's a pity, because we would like to.

August 19

Today's court hearing of the National Bolsheviks’ trial descends into farce.

“On December 14 I look and see a commotion. I was standing beside Room 14. I saw everything that happened. I was there the whole time. So then I see the frame of the metal detector lying in a horizontal, prone position …” With the single-mindedness of a provincial sleuth, Yevgeny Posadnev delivers this damning evidence from the witness stand. He used to be the director of some Soviet corrective labor institution, and now works for the presidential administration as a “Reception Adviser,” which means that he mediates between Putin and his suffering people. Posadnev's countenance is extremely grave. He is denouncing enemies.

“What condition was the metal detector in after these young people knocked it over?” the state prosecutor asks.

“It was lying down like a letter L,” Posadnev explains, “but it should have been standing up like a letter Haitch.”

Even Judge Shikhanov is laughing.

“The lads from our security unit,” the witness continues, as if telling teacher that Vasya has been stealing apples again, “blocked their route with this metal detector, so that this group of persons should be prevented from dispersing throughout the entire administration building. The lads from the unit blocked the corridor with this L and thereby diverted the mob into Room 14!”

The prosecution roll their eyes in horror. What on earth is their witness saying?

“That is, the crowd were directed into Room 14?” the defense immediately interjects. “They didn't burst in there themselves?”

The indictment, in support of which Posadnev is supposed to be testifying, says in black and white that the gravity of the offense committed by the thirty-nine defendants was that they had seized Room 14. This impertinence is the official reason they have been held in jail for almost nine months.

“No, they didn't go in there by themselves,” the witness insists, trying to show how bravely the Federal Security Service had acted and supposing that he is bringing out the full gravity of the invaders’ offense. “They wanted to run all through the administration, but were forced into the room with the L-shaped metal detector.”

“And were the doors of the room locked?” the defense asks.

“No, they were open.”

“But then they locked the doors?”

“No, the first of the doors, the outer one, stayed open.”

“Then why was it broken?” Total destruction of that door is the second most serious item of material damage of which they stand accused.

“I saw it, I saw everything, I saw them barricading the second door with a safe. Barricading themselves in.”