Make Russia Small Again

Russian opposition politician Yulia Navalnaya, wife of the tortured opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who was imprisoned in Russian camps, gave a speech at the Strategic Forum in Slovenia. In her address, she proposed that Europe develop a new concept of a "democratic Russia" without Putin and start looking for ways to create such a country.

The answer to Navalnaya's proposition is simple: in no way.

However, this would make for a very short article, so let's consider the main points from the speech by one of Russia's leading so-called opposition figures.

"I would like to talk not about tactics but about strategy. And, of course, as a politician and as someone from Russia, I want to talk about Russia. Alexei, my husband, who was killed by Putin six months ago, often liked to repeat: we must not lose sight of the bigger picture. He could see it better than anyone else and shape a vision for the future, one that looked far ahead. That's how his concept of a 'beautiful Russia of the future' was born. A democratic, peaceful, European country that will inevitably replace Putin's regime."

From the very beginning of her speech, even before getting to the main issue, Yulia, following the well-worn traditions of Russian politicians, commits two subtle semantic shifts. The first shift is: "Alexei, my husband, who was killed by Putin six months ago." This phrase is intended to immediately establish in the audience's mind the perspective that Navalny was killed by Putin. Personally. Not by the FSB officers who had poisoned Navalny in previous years (who are Russian citizens), not by the cannibalistic Russian penal system, made up of the FSSP workers, prison doctors, camp guards, and other prison staff (all of whom are also Russian citizens). In this way, the blame is transferred from the executors (who make up the building blocks of the 'beautiful Russia of the future') to the presumed mastermind, Putin, who is presented as a spider single-handedly pulling all the hundreds of thousands of threads in his dictatorial web.

This is a lie. Navalny was killed by ordinary Russians, eager to serve the regime in every possible way.

Therefore, the notion that a "democratic, peaceful, European country will inevitably replace Putin's regime" is highly questionable. Why would such a country replace the dictatorship when every cog in the system diligently serves Putin's tyranny, raised and corrupted by it, knowing and accepting no other way of life?

In a historical context, the feverish delusions of Russian liberals about a "beautiful democratic Russia of the future" have no foundation. Over the last 300 years (in fact, throughout its entire history since the founding of the Principality of Moscow), Russia in any of its forms has never been a democratic country. Tsarist monarchy, Bolshevik dictatorship, the rule of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, or the 30-year period of Yeltsin-Putin rule – this vast, wild empire has always been governed by tyrants, through violence, bloodshed, and fear. This is precisely due to its excessive ambitions and the immense scale of its territory, where, instead of self-determination for local peoples, harsh centralised control from the Kremlin was imposed.

Nevertheless, such reflections are of no interest to Yulia Navalnaya, as she represents the interests of the "good ordinary Russians", and thus she continues:

"What about the discussion around Russia? We can easily find those who claim that all Russians sincerely support Putin. Yet they cannot explain how the number of political prisoners in Russia is growing daily, and the number of Russian emigrants abroad is increasing. Nor can they explain how to help those who are against the war and persuade those who have doubts."

Yes, Russia indeed continues to imprison people for "discrediting the Russian army" or "calls for undermining the territorial integrity of the Russian Federation". But these few dozens or, if we count from the beginning of the full-scale invasion, hundreds of political prisoners, in the context of a population of 140 million, are a statistical error that cannot serve as the foundation for building a democratic society. Most of Russia's population consists of apathetic, politically disinterested, atomised, and disenfranchised subjects (who don't even deserve the title of citizens of their own country). These people do not care about the events happening in their own territory, let alone the war crimes their country is committing in neighbouring Ukraine. They are incapable of reflection, repentance, or realisation of the criminality of their silence and non-resistance to the actions of the authorities. The only society that can be built from such a foundation will inevitably be totalitarian again – whether with Putin at the helm, or Yulia Navalnaya, or even the Pope.

Dictatorship always rests on the shoulders of the people, who allow the dictator to commit evil. Russians, whether from the provinces who care nothing for the capital, or the Muscovites and Petersburgers who care nothing for the provinces, are content with the current state of affairs, otherwise, they would have long since swept away Putin's regime.

Navalnaya continues:

"Finally, there are those who talk about the need to urgently 'decolonise' Russia. They argue that our country, which is too large, should be divided into a couple of dozen small, safe states. However, these 'decolonisers' fail to explain why people with a shared background and cultural context should be artificially separated. Nor do they explain how this is supposed to happen."

Again, lies and manipulations that, remarkably, surface just as the efforts of the Ukrainian Armed Forces have already "decolonised and denazified" parts of the Kursk and Belgorod regions. By talking about people "with a shared background and cultural context" who, in her view, should not be artificially divided, Navalnaya demonstrates the typical imperialist, superficial perspective of a "titular nation" representative (as the residents of the capital see themselves) on dozens of peoples who have no connection to Russia or Russians and never wished to be part of the Russian Empire voluntarily.

This thesis from Navalnaya sparked a strong reaction on social media from both Ukrainians and representatives of the national groups subjugated by Russia.

"A shared cultural context was created through five centuries of genocide."

"I believe Russia should fall apart, and I can even 'explain how it should happen': the subjugated peoples should have the right to self-determination and, if they wish, sign new treaties and/or federations. Meanwhile, the dangerous imperial monster under the false guise of a 'federation' has long since exhausted the world's tolerance."

As Ukrainian journalist and political analyst Vitaly Portnikov noted, 

"Yulia Navalnaya, speaking at the strategic forum in Slovenia, mocks the decolonisers of Russia. But decolonisation is the main condition for transforming this disgusting beast into at least a relatively normal state."

One of the final points in Yulia Navalnaya's speech sounds threatening, not for Ukrainians, who have already seen the true face of the "brotherly Russian people", but for Europeans:

"Whatever the future of Europe may be, Russia will be part of it. And whatever the future of Russia may be, it will be linked to Europe's future."

Whether Europeans, not those sitting on grant programmes from "Russian cultural centres", but the ordinary people of Europe, want such a future is for them to decide. But it is worth remembering that a shared future with Russia always begins with ballet, opera, "Pushkin evenings" and "Russian culture weeks", and always ends with Prague Spring, the Berlin Wall, and the genocide of local populations under the guise of "protecting Russian-speaking citizens of European states". This is well known by Poles, Czechs, East Germans, the Baltic peoples, and others once bound by the Warsaw Pact.

At the end of her speech, Navalnaya suggests "drawing a distinction between Putin and Russia", not supporting those who want to "divide Russia into many parts", and graciously, from a patronising stance, allows Europe to "help Ukraine in exercising its right to self-defence". Note – she speaks of the right to self-defence, not the right to victory and the just peace that Ukraine rightfully deserves. But not a word of this is mentioned in Yulia Navalnaya's strategy, because a victorious Ukraine, for any Russian liberal, means a defeated, disintegrated, and collapsing Russia.

And that is something they will never accept.