Will a civil war start? Was there even a Civil War? The Southern States, separating from the United States, rebelled
The Russian Civil War is an armed confrontation in 1917-1922. organized military-political structures and state entities, conventionally defined as “white” and “red,” as well as national-state entities on the territory of the former Russian Empire (bourgeois republics, regional state entities). Spontaneously emerging military and socio-political groups, often referred to as “third force” (rebel groups, partisan republics, etc.), also took part in the armed confrontation. Also, foreign states (referred to as “interventionists”) participated in the civil confrontation in Russia.
Periodization of the Civil War
There are 4 stages in the history of the Civil War:
First stage: summer 1917 - November 1918 - formation of the main centers of the anti-Bolshevik movement
Second stage: November 1918 - April 1919 - the beginning of the Entente intervention.
Reasons for intervention:
Deal with Soviet power;
Protect your interests;
Fear of socialist influence.
Third stage: May 1919 - April 1920 - simultaneous struggle of Soviet Russia against the White armies and Entente troops
Fourth stage: May 1920 - November 1922 (summer 1923) - defeat of the white armies, end of the civil war
Background and reasons
The origin of the Civil War cannot be reduced to any one cause. It was the result of deep political, socio-economic, national and spiritual contradictions. The potential for public discontent during the First World War and the devaluation of the values of human life played an important role. The agrarian-peasant policy of the Bolsheviks also played a negative role (the introduction of the Committee of Poor People's Commissars and the surplus appropriation system). The Bolshevik political doctrine, according to which civil war is a natural outcome of the socialist revolution, caused by the resistance of the overthrown ruling classes, also contributed to the civil war. On the initiative of the Bolsheviks, the All-Russian Constituent Assembly was dissolved, and the multi-party system was gradually eliminated.
The actual defeat in the war with Germany, the Brest-Litovsk Treaty led to the fact that the Bolsheviks began to be accused of “the destruction of Russia.”
The right of peoples to self-determination, proclaimed by the new government, and the emergence of many independent state entities in different parts of the country were perceived by supporters of “One, Indivisible” Russia as a betrayal of its interests.
Dissatisfaction with the Soviet regime was also expressed by those who opposed its demonstrative break with the historical past and with ancient traditions. The anti-church policy of the Bolsheviks was especially painful for millions of people.
The civil war took various forms, including uprisings, isolated armed clashes, large-scale operations involving regular armies, guerrilla warfare, and terror. The peculiarity of the Civil War in our country was that it turned out to be extremely long, bloody, and unfolded over a vast territory.
Chronological framework
Individual episodes of the Civil War took place already in 1917 (February events of 1917, the July “semi-uprising” in Petrograd, Kornilov’s speech, October battles in Moscow and other cities), and in the spring and summer of 1918 it acquired a large-scale, front-line character .
It is not easy to determine the final boundary of the Civil War. Front-line military operations on the territory of the European part of the country ended in 1920. But then there were also massive peasant uprisings against the Bolsheviks, and performances by Kronstadt sailors in the spring of 1921. Only in 1922-1923. The armed struggle in the Far East ended. This milestone can generally be considered the end of a large-scale Civil War.
Features of armed confrontation during the Civil War
Military operations during the Civil War differed significantly from previous periods. It was a time of unique military creativity that broke the stereotypes of troop command and control, the army recruitment system, and military discipline. The greatest successes were achieved by the military leader who commanded in a new way, using all means to achieve the task. The Civil War was a war of maneuver. Unlike the period of “positional war” of 1915-1917, there were no continuous front lines. Cities, villages, and villages could change hands several times. Therefore, active, offensive actions, caused by the desire to seize the initiative from the enemy, were of decisive importance.
The fighting during the Civil War was characterized by a variety of strategies and tactics. During the establishment of Soviet power in Petrograd and Moscow, street fighting tactics were used. In mid-October 1917, the Military Revolutionary Committee created in Petrograd under the leadership of V.I. Lenin and N.I. Podvoisky developed a plan to capture the main city facilities (telephone exchange, telegraph, stations, bridges). Fighting in Moscow (October 27 - November 3, 1917, old style), between the forces of the Moscow Military Revolutionary Committee (leaders - G.A. Usievich, N.I. Muralov) and the Public Security Committee (commander of the Moscow Military District, Colonel K.I. Ryabtsev and the head of the garrison, Colonel L.N. Treskin) were distinguished by the offensive of the Red Guard detachments and soldiers of the reserve regiments from the outskirts to the city center, occupied by the cadets and the White Guard. Artillery was used to suppress white strongholds. Similar tactics of street fighting were used during the establishment of Soviet power in Kyiv, Kaluga, Irkutsk, and Chita.
Formation of the main centers of the anti-Bolshevik movement
Since the beginning of the formation of units of the White and Red armies, the scale of military operations has expanded. In 1918, they were carried out mainly along railway lines and amounted to the capture of large junction stations and cities. This period was called “echelon war.”
In January-February 1918, Red Guard units under the command of V.A. advanced along the railways. Antonov-Ovseenko and R.F. Sivers to Rostov-on-Don and Novocherkassk, where the forces of the Volunteer Army were concentrated under the command of generals M.V. Alekseeva and L.G. Kornilov.
In the spring of 1918, units of the Czechoslovak Corps formed from prisoners of war of the Austro-Hungarian army took action. Located in echelons along the Trans-Siberian Railway from Penza to Vladivostok, the corps led by R. Gaida, Y. Syrov, S. Chechek was subordinate to the French military command and was sent to the Western Front. In response to demands for disarmament, the corps overthrew Soviet power in Omsk, Tomsk, Novonikolaevsk, Krasnoyarsk, Vladivostok and throughout the entire territory of Siberia adjacent to the Trans-Siberian Railway during May-June 1918.
In the summer-autumn of 1918, during the 2nd Kuban campaign, the Volunteer Army captured the junction stations of Tikhoretskaya, Torgovaya, and Armavir and Stavropol actually decided the outcome of the operation in the North Caucasus.
The initial period of the Civil War was associated with the activities of the underground centers of the White movement. In all major cities of Russia there were cells associated with the former structures of military districts and military units located in these cities, as well as with underground organizations of monarchists, cadets and Socialist Revolutionaries. In the spring of 1918, on the eve of the performance of the Czechoslovak Corps, an officer underground operated in Petropavlovsk and Omsk under the leadership of Colonel P.P. Ivanov-Rinova, in Tomsk - Lieutenant Colonel A.N. Pepelyaev, in Novonikolaevsk - Colonel A.N. Grishina-Almazova.
In the summer of 1918, General Alekseev approved a secret regulation on the recruitment centers of the Volunteer Army created in Kyiv, Kharkov, Odessa, and Taganrog. They transmitted intelligence information, sent officers across the front line, and were also supposed to oppose the Soviet government as White Army units approached the city.
A similar role was played by the Soviet underground, which was active in the White Crimea, the North Caucasus, Eastern Siberia and the Far East in 1919-1920, creating strong partisan detachments that later became part of the regular units of the Red Army.
The beginning of 1919 marks the end of the formation of the White and Red armies.
The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army included 15 armies, covering the entire front in the center of European Russia. The highest military leadership was concentrated under the Chairman of the Revolutionary Military Council of the Republic (RVSR) L.D. Trotsky and the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of the Republic, former Colonel S.S. Kameneva. All issues of logistical support for the front, issues of regulating the economy on the territory of Soviet Russia were coordinated by the Labor and Defense Council (SLO), the chairman of which was V.I. Lenin. He also headed the Soviet government - the Council of People's Commissars (Sovnarkom).
They were opposed by those united under the Supreme Command of Admiral A.V. Kolchak armies of the Eastern Front (Siberian (Lieutenant General R. Gaida), Western (artillery general M.V. Khanzhin), Southern (Major General P.A. Belov) and Orenburg (Lieutenant General A.I. Dutov) , as well as the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of the South of Russia (AFSR), Lieutenant General A.I. Denikin, who recognized the power of Kolchak (Dobrovolskaya (Lieutenant General V.Z. May-Mayevsky), Donskaya (Lieutenant General V.I. Sidorin) were subordinate to him) and the Caucasian (Lieutenant General P. N. Wrangel) army.) In the general direction of Petrograd, the troops of the Commander-in-Chief of the North-Western Front, Infantry General N. N. Yudenich, and the Commander-in-Chief of the Northern Region, Lieutenant General E. K. Miller, acted.
The period of greatest development of the Civil War
In the spring of 1919, attempts at combined attacks by the white fronts began. From that time on, military operations took the form of full-scale operations on a wide front, using all types of troops (infantry, cavalry, artillery), with the active assistance of aviation, tanks and armored trains. In March-May 1919, the offensive of the Eastern Front of Admiral Kolchak began, striking in divergent directions - to Vyatka-Kotlas, to connect with the Northern Front and to the Volga - to connect with the armies of General Denikin.
The troops of the Soviet Eastern Front, under the leadership of S.S. Kamenev and, mainly, the 5th Soviet Army, under the command of M.N. Tukhachevsky by the beginning of June 1919 stopped the advance of the white armies by launching counterattacks in the Southern Urals (near Buguruslan and Belebey) and in the Kama region.
In the summer of 1919, the offensive of the Armed Forces of the South of Russia (AFSR) began on Kharkov, Yekaterinoslav and Tsaritsyn. After the latter was occupied by the army of General Wrangel, on July 3, Denikin signed a directive on the “march against Moscow.” During July-October, the AFSR troops occupied most of Ukraine and the provinces of the Black Earth Center of Russia, stopping on the line Kyiv - Bryansk - Orel - Voronezh - Tsaritsyn. Almost simultaneously with the offensive of the AFSR on Moscow, the attack of the North-Western Army of General Yudenich on Petrograd began.
For Soviet Russia, the time of autumn 1919 became the most critical. Total mobilizations of communists and Komsomol members were carried out, the slogans “Everything for the defense of Petrograd” and “Everything for the defense of Moscow” were put forward. Thanks to control over the main railway lines converging towards the center of Russia, the Revolutionary Military Council of the Republic (RVSR) could transfer troops from one front to another. So, at the height of the fighting in the Moscow direction, several divisions were transferred from Siberia, as well as from the Western Front to the Southern Front and near Petrograd. At the same time, the white armies failed to establish a common anti-Bolshevik front (with the exception of contacts at the level of individual detachments between the Northern and Eastern Fronts in May 1919, as well as between the AFSR front and the Ural Cossack Army in August 1919). Thanks to the concentration of forces from different fronts by mid-October 1919 near Orel and Voronezh, the commander of the Southern Front, former Lieutenant General V.N. Egorov managed to create a strike group, the basis of which was parts of the Latvian and Estonian rifle divisions, as well as the 1st Cavalry Army under the command of S.M. Budyonny and K.E. Voroshilov. Counterattacks were launched on the flanks of the 1st Corps of the Volunteer Army, which was advancing on Moscow, under the command of Lieutenant General A.P. Kutepova. After stubborn fighting during October-November 1919, the front of the AFSR was broken, and a general retreat of the Whites from Moscow began. In mid-November, before reaching 25 km from Petrograd, units of the North-Western Army were stopped and defeated.
The military operations of 1919 were distinguished by the widespread use of maneuver. Large cavalry formations were used to break through the front and conduct raids behind enemy lines. In the white armies, Cossack cavalry was used in this capacity. The 4th Don Corps, specially formed for this purpose, under the command of Lieutenant General K.K. Mamantova in August-September made a deep raid from Tambov to the borders with the Ryazan province and Voronezh. Siberian Cossack Corps under the command of Major General P.P. Ivanova-Rinova broke through the Red Front near Petropavlovsk in early September. The “Chervonnaya Division” from the Southern Front of the Red Army raided the rear of the Volunteer Corps in October-November. By the end of 1919, the 1st Cavalry Army began its operations, advancing in the Rostov and Novocherkassk directions.
In January-March 1920, fierce battles unfolded in the Kuban. During operations on the river. Manych and under Art. Egorlykskaya took place the last major equestrian battles in world history. Up to 50 thousand horsemen from both sides took part in them. Their result was the defeat of the AFSR and evacuation to the Crimea on ships of the Black Sea Fleet. In Crimea, in April 1920, the white troops were renamed the “Russian Army”, the command of which was taken by Lieutenant General P.N. Wrangel.
The defeat of the white armies. End of the Civil War
At the turn of 1919-1920. was finally defeated by A.V. Kolchak. His army was scattering, and partisan detachments were operating in the rear. The Supreme Ruler was captured and in February 1920 in Irkutsk he was shot by the Bolsheviks.
In January 1920 N.N. Yudenich, who had undertaken two unsuccessful campaigns against Petrograd, announced the dissolution of his North-Western Army.
After the defeat of Poland, the army of P.N., locked in Crimea. Wrangel was doomed. Having carried out a short offensive north of Crimea, it went on the defensive. The forces of the Southern Front of the Red Army (commander M.V. Frunze) defeated the Whites in October - November 1920. The 1st and 2nd Cavalry armies made a significant contribution to the victory over them. Almost 150 thousand people, military and civilians, left Crimea.
Fighting in 1920-1922. were distinguished by small territories (Tavria, Transbaikalia, Primorye), smaller troops and already included elements of trench warfare. During the defense, fortifications were used (white lines on Perekop and Chongar in Crimea in 1920, Kakhovsky fortified area of the 13th Soviet Army on the Dnieper in 1920, built by the Japanese and transferred to the white Volochaevsky and Spassky fortified areas in Primorye in 1921-1922. ). To break through, long-term artillery preparation was used, as well as flamethrowers and tanks.
Victory over P.N. Wrangel did not yet mean the end of the Civil War. Now the main opponents of the Reds were not the Whites, but the Greens, as the representatives of the peasant insurgent movement called themselves. The most powerful peasant movement developed in the Tambov and Voronezh provinces. It began in August 1920 after the peasants were given an impossible task of food appropriation. The rebel army, commanded by the Socialist Revolutionary A.S. Antonov, managed to overthrow the Bolshevik power in several counties. At the end of 1920, units of the regular Red Army led by M.N. were sent to fight the rebels. Tukhachevsky. However, fighting the partisan peasant army turned out to be even more difficult than fighting the White Guards in open battle. Only in June 1921 was the Tambov uprising suppressed, and A.S. Antonov was killed in a shootout. During the same period, the Reds managed to achieve a final victory over Makhno.
The high point of the Civil War in 1921 was the uprising of Kronstadt sailors, who joined the protests of St. Petersburg workers demanding political freedoms. The uprising was brutally suppressed in March 1921.
During 1920-1921 units of the Red Army made several campaigns in Transcaucasia. As a result, independent states were liquidated on the territory of Azerbaijan, Armenia and Georgia and Soviet power was established.
To fight the White Guards and interventionists in the Far East, the Bolsheviks created a new state in April 1920 - the Far Eastern Republic (FER). For two years, the army of the republic drove Japanese troops out of Primorye and defeated several White Guard chieftains. After this, at the end of 1922, the Far Eastern Republic became part of the RSFSR.
During the same period, overcoming the resistance of the Basmachi, who fought to preserve medieval traditions, the Bolsheviks won a victory in Central Asia. Although a few rebel groups were active until the 1930s.
Results of the Civil War
The main result of the Civil War in Russia was the establishment of Bolshevik power. Among the reasons for the Reds' victory are:
1. The use by the Bolsheviks of the political sentiments of the masses, powerful propaganda (clear goals, prompt resolution of issues in the world and on earth, exit from the world war, justification of terror by the fight against the enemies of the country);
2. Control by the Council of People's Commissars of the central provinces of Russia, where the main military enterprises were located;
3. Disunity of anti-Bolshevik forces (lack of common ideological positions; struggle “against something”, but not “for something”; territorial fragmentation).
The total population losses during the Civil War amounted to 12-13 million people. Almost half of them are victims of famine and mass epidemics. Emigration from Russia became widespread. About 2 million people left their homeland.
The country's economy was in a catastrophic state. The cities were depopulated. Industrial production fell by 5-7 times compared to 1913, agricultural production by one third.
The territory of the former Russian Empire disintegrated. The largest new state was the RSFSR.
Military equipment during the Civil War
New types of military equipment were successfully used on the battlefields of the Civil War, some of which appeared in Russia for the first time. For example, in units of the AFSR, as well as the Northern and Northwestern armies, English and French tanks were actively used. The Red Guards, who did not have the skills to fight them, often retreated from their positions. However, during the assault on the Kakhovsky fortified area in October 1920, most of the white tanks were hit by artillery, and after the necessary repairs they were included in the Red Army, where they were used until the early 1930s. The presence of armored vehicles was considered a prerequisite for infantry support, both in street battles and during front-line operations.
The need for strong fire support during horse attacks gave rise to the emergence of such an original means of combat as horse-drawn carts - light two-wheeled carts with a machine gun mounted on them. Carts were first used in the rebel army of N.I. Makhno, but later began to be used in all large cavalry formations of the White and Red armies.
Air squads interacted with the ground forces. An example of a joint operation is the defeat of the cavalry corps of D.P. Rednecks by aviation and infantry of the Russian Army in June 1920. Aviation was also used for bombing fortified positions and reconnaissance. During the period of “echelon warfare” and later, armored trains, the number of which reached several dozen per army, operated together with infantry and cavalry on both sides. Special detachments were created from them.
Recruiting armies during the Civil War
In the conditions of the Civil War and the destruction of the state mobilization apparatus, the principles of recruiting armies changed. Only the Siberian Army of the Eastern Front was recruited in 1918 upon mobilization. Most units of the AFSR, as well as the Northern and Northwestern armies, were replenished from volunteers and prisoners of war. Volunteers were the most reliable in combat.
The Red Army was also characterized by the predominance of volunteers (initially, only volunteers were accepted into the Red Army, and admission required “proletarian origin” and a “recommendation” from the local party cell). The predominance of mobilized and prisoners of war became widespread at the final stage of the Civil War (in the ranks of the Russian Army of General Wrangel, as part of the 1st Cavalry in the Red Army).
The White and Red armies were distinguished by their small numbers and, as a rule, the discrepancy between the actual composition of military units and their staff (for example, divisions of 1000-1500 bayonets, regiments of 300 bayonets, a shortage of up to 35-40% was even approved).
In the command of the White armies, the role of young officers increased, and in the Red Army - party nominees. The institution of political commissars, which was completely new for the armed forces (first appeared under the Provisional Government in 1917), was established. The average age of the command level in the positions of division chiefs and corps commanders was 25-35 years.
The absence of an order system in the AFSR and the awarding of successive ranks led to the fact that in 1.5-2 years officers progressed from lieutenants to generals.
In the Red Army, with a relatively young command staff, a significant role was played by former officers of the General Staff who planned strategic operations (former lieutenant generals M.D. Bonch-Bruevich, V.N. Egorov, former colonels I.I. Vatsetis, S.S. Kamenev, F.M. Afanasyev, A.N. Stankevich, etc.).
Military-political factor in the Civil War
The specificity of the civil war, as a military-political confrontation between whites and reds, was also that military operations were often planned under the influence of certain political factors. In particular, the offensive of the Eastern Front of Admiral Kolchak in the spring of 1919 was undertaken in anticipation of quick diplomatic recognition of him as the Supreme Ruler of Russia by the Entente countries. And the offensive of General Yudenich’s North-Western Army on Petrograd was caused not only by the hope of quickly occupying the “cradle of the revolution”, but also by fears of concluding a peace treaty between Soviet Russia and Estonia. In this case, Yudenich’s army lost its base. The offensive of the Russian army of General Wrangel in Tavria in the summer of 1920 was supposed to draw back part of the forces from the Soviet-Polish front.
Many operations of the Red Army, regardless of strategic reasons and military potential, were also of a purely political nature (for the sake of the so-called “triumph of the world revolution”). So, for example, in the summer of 1919, the 12th and 14th armies of the Southern Front were supposed to be sent to support the revolutionary uprising in Hungary, and the 7th and 15th armies were supposed to establish Soviet power in the Baltic republics. In 1920, during the war with Poland, troops of the Western Front, under the command of M.N. Tukhachevsky, after operations to defeat the Polish armies in Western Ukraine and Belarus, transferred their operations to the territory of Poland, counting on the creation of a pro-Soviet government here. The actions of the 11th and 12th Soviet armies in Azerbaijan, Armenia and Georgia in 1921 were of a similar nature. At the same time, under the pretext of the defeat of units of the Asian Cavalry Division of Lieutenant General R.F. Ungern-Sternberg, troops of the Far Eastern Republic and the 5th Soviet Army were introduced into the territory of Mongolia and a socialist regime was established (the first in the world after Soviet Russia).
During the Civil War, it became a practice to carry out operations dedicated to anniversaries (the beginning of the assault on Perekop by troops of the Southern Front under the command of M.V. Frunze on November 7, 1920, on the anniversary of the 1917 revolution).
The military art of the Civil War became a striking example of the combination of traditional and innovative forms of strategy and tactics in the difficult conditions of the Russian “Troubles” of 1917-1922. It determined the development of Soviet military art (in particular, the use of large cavalry formations) in the following decades, until the beginning of World War II.
From the analysis of geopolitical processes and potential armed conflicts, it follows that one of the probable and extremely important scenarios for the fate of humanity is a possible civil war in Russia. The civil war will be fought over one of the options for the future of Russia: a strong sovereign state with a mixed economy, an oligarchic empire, or a colony with a possible division of the country. Military expert Konstantin Sivkov speaks about this on the pages of the Military-Industrial Courier: We must admit: it is our country today that is the main obstacle on the path of the West, especially the United States, to world domination. Its elimination as a factor of power or its strict subjugation is their most important geopolitical task. Without this, Western and transnational elites will find it very difficult, if not impossible, to survive in the new reality. The country also has all the internal prerequisites for the emergence of mass unrest that could develop into a “color revolution”, the direct consequence of which is likely to be a civil war. Such scenarios have been repeatedly considered by experts (“Controlled chaos is approaching Russia”), along with the measures that need to be taken to eliminate the objective and subjective preconditions of the “color revolution.” Unfortunately, today we can state that no truly effective measures have been taken to prevent it. It doesn't look like this will happen in the near future. Therefore, an analysis of the likely nature of a new civil war in Russia becomes relevant. Moreover, no one from the scientific expert community addressed this topic, at least in the open press. The study of the nature of any war begins with the contradictions that cause it, which are insoluble in the existing order of things, which, as a rule, leads to armed violence. There are such in Russia. “The security forces will go over to the side of the “reds,” representatives of the highest echelons will defect to the camp of the colonialists, and some will simply flee abroad.” In the spiritual sphere, the most important of them is the contradiction between the patriotic orientation of information policy, the formation among the population of the image of a hero, a patriotic sacrificer, the idea of confronting an external enemy (the West), defencist psychology on the one hand, and cosmopolitanism, the openly anti-state activities of the “masters of life.” At the same time, the authorities’ desire to demonstrate the fight against these groups has the opposite effect. The scale of the detected theft does not correspond at all to the insignificance of the punishment for it. The struggle turns into profanation. In this same area, there is another serious contradiction, consisting in the constitutional enshrinement of the equality of all before the law and the virtually unpunished numerous obvious facts of its violation by representatives of high-ranking officials and influential businesses, their relatives and friends. The dominance in power (especially at the federal and regional levels) and in the economy by a relatively small number of closely related clans (in comparison with the country’s population) has destroyed the hope for most young citizens of occupying a high position in the Russian establishment, which gives rise to a feeling in society of the injustice of the state structure as a whole. , the desire to change it. It is especially obscene to appoint various “young geniuses” who have done nothing in life to leadership positions in the state and in industry, with much more qualified and talented specialists subordinate to them. The guarantee of a high position, combined with impunity, deprives the “golden youth” of incentives for self-improvement. At the same time, the main advantage of a person in a position becomes not a thorough knowledge of the object and its effective management, but the ability to build relationships with management. This leads to the degradation of the elites and exacerbates the contradiction between the intellectual potential of the developed part of the population and its social status. A serious contradiction lies between the authorities’ recognition that the reforms of the 90s were disastrous for the country, the extremely unfair and frankly gangster privatization of that time, and not only the reluctance to bring to justice the organizers of the country’s pogrom, but also the preparation of new programs for the seizure of public property, contrary to even all the laws of a market economy. That is, in spiritual terms, the social system is perceived as extremely unfair, where the power elites brazenly neglect the interests of the absolute majority. This is an extremely dangerous situation, since, as the experience of the Arab Spring shows, it is injustice that pushes the intellectual proletariat to mass protests. In the economic sphere, the main contradiction lies between the poor and the rich. The decile coefficient in Russia has long exceeded the dangerous threshold and reaches 16. The gap in wages between ordinary employees and top managers ranges from several hundred to a thousand or more times. More than 22 million Russians are below the subsistence level. The contradiction between the poverty of a significant part of the country's population and the ostentatious luxury of the elite is a powerful detonator of civil confrontation. The listed imbalances and contradictions are largely antagonistic in nature, since their resolution involves either a radical reduction in the consumption of the elite with a restructuring of the roles of layers in society, or the consolidation and further significant strengthening of the injustice that has developed in society, making life intolerable for a significant part of the population. The development of the situation in any direction will require significant changes to the model of government. The aggravation of contradictions to a critical level, combined with the initiation of a “color revolution” from outside, could become the direct cause of a civil war in Russia. Red on white In any civil war, the warring parties defend a certain model of the future government system. An analysis of possible options for resolving internal Russian imbalances and contradictions, the ideological concepts of various political parties and movements, the most active part of the political spectrum and socially active layers of society shows that the country, in the event of a “color revolution” occurring in it, has three possible options for overcoming the crisis, around which the struggle will be waged. The first option involves resolving the noted contradictions in the interests of the absolute majority of the population with the construction of a strong, fully sovereign state with a mixed economy, ensuring real social justice and equality of citizens. The government structure is federal or unitary. Strategic sectors of the economy are owned by the state and are directly managed by it. Private business - only medium and small - is concentrated in the field of venture activities and services. A sharply differentiated tax scale excludes the possibility of the emergence of large private capital. Power in the country belongs to councils of people's deputies. Executive institutions are subordinate to them. They are also controlled by special bodies under the councils. The power structures of the state - special services, law enforcement agencies and the army - are the basis of military-political stability, within the limits of their competence supervising the authorities and each other. This version of the government system can be called neo-socialism. It ensures breakthrough development of the country with access to leading positions in a relatively short time. The second option is focused on preserving and strengthening the dominance of part of the existing oligarchic (those associated with the current vertical of power) and bureaucratic clans. It assumes the construction in Russia of a strong, but limited sovereign state with a purely oligarchic economy, where the overwhelming majority of national resources will be owned or controlled by ruling clans that have undivided power. Its dominant branch is the executive branch with the unconditional subordination of all others to it. The country is headed by a president or monarch with enormous powers. The army, intelligence services and law enforcement agencies are the main power tool to ensure the inviolability of the power of the ruling clans. This system can be called neo-imperialism. The third option involves resolving contradictions in the interests of foreign powers, Russian oligarchic clans associated with them and dependent on them, and regional, separatist-oriented elites. The result is either the destruction of Russia with the creation on its territory of several puppet states with totalitarian semi-criminal regimes relying on foreign military support (including occupation forces), or, while maintaining the formal integrity of the country, the elimination of its real sovereignty with the destruction of the main elements that ensure it: army, intelligence services and parts of law enforcement agencies, remnants of the high-tech industry. In fact, this means foreign power, so the option should be called colonial. It should be noted that the second and third options, despite all their differences, have one thing in common: both assume the establishment of undivided oligarchic power in Russia. This is how they fundamentally differ from the first one. Therefore, the main and most acute confrontation will unfold between supporters of neo-socialism on the one hand, totalitarian monarchy and colonialists on the other. The latter will most likely unite at the stage of struggle against neo-socialists. The opposing sides in a likely civil war are determined accordingly. 1. Neo-socialist group. Its political core will be parties and social movements of a communist, socialist and nationalist orientation, mainly non-systemic patriotic opposition, as well as part of the systemic one - mainly from lower structural units, pursuing the goals of preserving the unity of the country and reviving its power on the basis of building a just society. The social base will consist of the majority of the intellectual and industrial proletariat, representatives of small and partly medium-sized businesses. The military power base of the group will be the overwhelming majority of officers, a significant part of the special services and law enforcement officers. It is logical to call this group, referring to the terminology of the civil war of the last century, “the new reds”. 2. Neo-imperialist group. Its political core will be the party in power, part of the systemic opposition, as well as parties and movements pursuing the goals of maintaining the dominance of big capital, largely associated with high-tech production, with the unity of the country as the main guarantee of its security and the promotion of private interests abroad. Support for this group can be provided by movements of a monarchical orientation, non-political organizations that consider the vertical of power as a bond, albeit a formal one. The social basis will be large capital, predominantly working in the fields of high technology and related to it, some (significantly smaller than that of the neo-socialists) part of the intellectual and industrial proletariat, and individual representatives of small and medium-sized businesses. The military power base of the group will be some of the army ranks, a certain part of the intelligence services and law enforcement officers, mostly close to the highest echelons of government and big capital. 3. Colonial group. Its political core will be parties and movements of the liberal-Western orientation of the non-systemic opposition (essentially the Fronde), pursuing the goal of integrating Russia into the “European home” in fact, in the position of a colony. This group has strong support from foreign intelligence services and large Western capital. Its social basis is part of those associated with foreign employers and well-paid employees, people with a pronounced cosmopolitan and liberal-Western position or who do not have clear ideological guidelines, as a rule, dissatisfied with their financial situation and status. This group also includes liberal nationalists - in fact, Russian separatists who advocate the separation of some territories and even the secession of large regions such as Siberia and Primorye from Russia. Another such community is representatives of radical Islam, who set themselves the goal of separating individual republics from Russia. The military power base of the group will be predominantly armed gangs created on regional, ideological, ethnic or religious grounds from both local citizens and foreign mercenaries, the formation of Western PMCs, special operations forces and intelligence services operating in Russia. If events develop favorably for the colonialists, the occupying forces will help them. And throughout the civil war, this group will enjoy powerful information, diplomatic and material support from Western powers. With the manifestation of the course of the “new reds” towards the nationalization of all strategically important sectors of the country’s economy, stopping the export of capital outside its borders and limiting large incomes (in particular due to a sharply differentiated tax scale), with bringing to real responsibility the plunderers of state property given the weak positions of the neo-imperialists in the event the outbreak of a full-scale civil war (neither the country nor the West needs them), the latter will unite with the colonialists to protect their property and income, easily sacrificing the interests of the state. It is fair to call such a group “white.” Their military-strategic goal will be the defeat of neo-socialism at any cost, including at the expense of Russia’s state sovereignty, which is being lost partially or even completely. The main military-strategic goal of the “Reds” is the elimination of the other two groups and the reflection of possible external aggression. From information to nuclear Taking into account the decisiveness of the goals of the parties in the civil war, it should be expected that during its course all the most advanced types of weapons and military equipment, including mass destruction, will be used: Information weapons - at all stages of preparation and development of a civil war, mainly in the interests of ensuring the use of armed force groups; Conventional weapons - with the beginning of hostilities. The trigger will be the minimum moral, psychological and legal framework for the start of military action. Before this, we should expect limited use of conventional weapons by special operations forces to ensure effective information impact. The main types of non-nuclear weapons of mass destruction are chemical and biological. It is most likely to be used by foreign military formations or a group of “whites” against civilians in order to create a moral, psychological and regulatory framework for foreign intervention when defeat is obvious. The possibility of covert use of biological weapons, especially the latest models, will make it possible to use them not only during hostilities, but also in the previous period to increase socio-political instability in certain regions of Russia. The ease of production of this type of weapons of mass destruction makes it accessible to non-state and limited-capacity organizations. Nuclear weapon. It can be used to a limited extent, mainly to intimidate the enemy in order to force him to abandon the escalation of the war or from further fighting. In particular, a neo-socialist group may resort to the demonstrative use of tactical nuclear weapons to prevent foreign intervention. “Whites” - to defeat individual military formations of the “Reds”. Large-scale use of nuclear weapons is unlikely. But if the West, hoping to destroy Russian nuclear potential in a country disorganized by a civil war with the obvious impossibility of taking it under control, strikes with strategic means, Russia will most likely respond fully by maintaining the combat effectiveness and controllability of its strategic nuclear forces. Between blitzkrieg and occupation A civil war in Russia is likely to break out at the peak of the “color revolution,” when mass unrest reaches such a level that the authorities largely lose the ability to suppress them, and the confrontation turns into an armed phase. Here, the neo-imperialist group will have the greatest organization and combat capability, the basis of which will be power institutions that retain their powers. In its favor is operational control over a significant part of the Armed Forces and other law enforcement agencies, material and information resources. The most important weaknesses are the absence of any clear ideology, the readiness of most representatives, especially from the highest echelons, to fight to the end (the primacy of personal interest and foreign assets of some, combined with the lack of sense in dying for billions of leaders among others, do not contribute to the emergence of heroes) and significant foreign support. As the war progresses, the strengths will quickly be neutralized by the weak, and the ability to resist will gradually be reduced to zero. This group can only count on quick success - a blitzkrieg. In case of failure, it will crumble: the main part of the power component will go over to the side of the “reds”, representatives of the highest echelons, focusing on certain foreign centers of power, will go over to the colonialist camp, forming a full-fledged “white” movement, and some will simply flee abroad . By the beginning of the civil war, the colonialist group will also have good organization (albeit significantly weaker than the neo-imperialist one), based largely on the support of foreign intelligence services. Another strong side of it is its rather serious military component: illegal armed groups, including foreign mercenaries and employees of Western PMCs, local security companies, as well as the NATO special operations forces group deployed on Russian territory by this time. Weaknesses are the rejection of liberal ideology by the absolute majority of the population, a negative political background and a weak social base in the absence of mass support in the security forces. Without foreign military support, the colonialists will not hold out for long and will strive to bring the situation to intervention as quickly as possible. By the beginning of the civil war, the neo-socialist group most likely will not have fully formed, which will not allow it to conduct coordinated actions at first. The lack of information potential comparable to the other two, the presence of secondary contradictions between the united political organizations, and limited influence in the security forces are also not in favor of the “reds”. Plus their rejection by the main foreign players, of course. Strengths - the presence of a simple and understandable to the majority of the population (even if not strictly scientifically based) ideological concept, the core of which will be the desire to build a society of social justice, mass support, including in the power structures of the state, high morale, willingness to fight to the end (victory or death), based on the understanding that defeat means the loss of the country and the death of everything, including the family. This group has every chance of winning a protracted civil war, if only a full-scale military intervention by major powers can be prevented.
One of the frequently discussed topics in recent months in our country is the following topic: will Russia become the next target for the West after Syria and Iran, will Washington, London and other world capitals bless the flights of bombers carrying “freedom of speech” and “democracy” to towards Russian cities? And, as usual, society is divided into two parts, representatives of one of which are sure that talk about foreign aggression against Russia is nothing more than the dreams of the radical opposition, while representatives of the other, in contrast, talk about a real threat looming over Russia.
But if such a threat really exists, then it must have objective reasons. And, in addition, aggression against our country must be expressed in some way, because with all the reverence of certain citizens for the forces of NATO aviation, it is obvious that the leaders of the North Atlantic Alliance clearly do not have the courage to give the order for an open attack on Russian territory, as happened, say, , with Libya.
If we talk about the reasons, the main one is as follows: a banal change of power with the opportunity to influence Russia’s internal policy from the outside, as happened in the late eighties and early nineties. At the same time, supporters of the idea of an indispensable change of power in the country work according to the classic principle of “black pr” - an idea that was once developed in the West and has been successfully working for decades. The idea in relation to modern Russia (as a special case) is that it is necessary by all means to bring to the surface all the negativity concerning the activities of the Russian authorities. At the same time, everything positive that has been achieved recently is stubbornly not commented on, and if it is commented on, it is with a clear touch of provocative rhetoric.
In order not to be unfounded, it is worth giving several examples of how a system aimed at the desire to solve Russia’s problems exclusively with the help of “Western support” works in our country. To do this, let’s turn to quotes from a certain segment of modern media, which are “raised” on the idea of waiting for saving missionaries from somewhere on other worlds...
Example one: The radio station “Echo of Moscow” conducted a remarkable survey on August 11, 2012. Radio listeners were asked which country they consider to have started the war in South Ossetia?
An amazing thing is happening. Dozens of international commissions worked on this issue. Even Western journalists and politicians, who can hardly be blamed for their great love for Russia, managed to provide materials on who started the war on 08/08/08 and in which offices its plans were developed. During a number of meetings of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, the result related to the aggression ordered by Saakashvili was announced after a long independent investigation. However, “Echo of Moscow” decided 4 years later to let listeners dream up (otherwise it’s difficult to say) on a given topic. And the listeners, we must give them their due, accepted the idea of the Echo management with a bang. As a result, it turned out that about two-thirds of the listeners of this radio station believe that it was the Russian Federation that started the war in South Ossetia...
In this regard, we can expect a continuation of the “victorious” march of such surveys on radio stations. Isn’t it an option for “Echo” to ask listeners the question: “Who really started the Second World War?” In this case, the phrase “in fact” will be highlighted in a special way. You don’t have to go to a fortune teller to find out the “correct” answer: naturally, the majority of Echo listeners will name the Soviet Union as the country that started the big war, and for the sake of historical decency, 20-25% will vote “for” Nazi Germany.
After getting acquainted with the results of such publications, it becomes more than obvious that the disease called “the search for historical truth on the path to all-conquering democracy in Russia” has seriously affected our society. After all, it has now become possible to present the historical “truth” the way the reader, viewer, or listener wishes. To do this, you can invite a dozen “independent” experts, “autonomous” scientists and other people to a conversation, whose words will be presented as the ultimate truth.
And if the majority, after “meetings” with such experts, acquires the confidence that it is Russia that is to blame for all mortal sins, if only the Russian authorities are “destroying” the people and the Fatherland, then after this the desire grows to “reach out” to the West with a request to organize something similar to the Libyan scenario.
Example two: Novaya Gazeta categorically declares that the Russians are not satisfied with the medal standings of the Russian team at the London Olympics. Who exactly is not happy? For some reason, the newspaper does not provide such data, but this, apparently, is not necessary... They are not happy, you understand, and that’s all - it would seem that there is nothing more to talk about... But Novaya “gives the opportunity” to readers to speculate on the topic of “hard conclusions” after the Russian “failure”. The result of this entire discussion is approximately the following thought: Russia loses miserably everywhere, the United States and other representatives of the “progressive” West always win (well, and China benefits, supposedly, from the fact that there is a rigid and enslaving training system, where there is rigid political power “ rules” in each of the areas of activity). They say that only the democratic West in this world is ready to offer us the only possible option for success.
These two examples are just a small part of the stream of what “exposes” Russian inconsistency and aggressiveness. And how much more about “kickbacks”, “cuttings”, “PZhiV” and everything else that strengthens the confidence of the average oppositionist in the need to start a patriotic war with the support of foreign “friends of Russia”.
For obvious reasons, the idea of the overwhelming superiority of Western civilization over us - the poor, unwashed and illiterate - is gradually penetrating the heads of those who are ready to perceive information exclusively in the form in which it is presented. And from this perception it is not far from the formation of those very “opposition fronts” that declare slogans about liberal values, crystal-clear patriotism and opposition to “despotism.”
But how can these values get into our country if we have millions of “mediocrities” who do not want to realize that an exclusively radical change of power in Russia in the direction of a purely “democratic” vector of Western ideals is the main Russian way out of the crisis...
Most of all, Russia’s “failures” as a reason for foreign activity in the Russian Federation are ready to be discussed by those who not so long ago, sorry, themselves “fleeed” to the West. And this is natural - you need to at least somehow justify yourself to the Russians who remained in Russia, no matter what. From a distance the problems are more visible...
It turns out that we need a “small victorious war” in which “abroad will help us”...
Well, since a real war with Russia is a very doubtful matter for the West, to say the least (even based on historical factors), we will have to promote the idea of an internal war. This war is usually called civil.
By the way, many publications (for example, Sibirsk.org) quite openly call for the start of a new civil war in Russia. According to the latest “experts”, in Russia everything needs to be broken again and a new society needs to be built anew, because the society that exists in its current version is supposedly incapable of participating in the development of the country. At the same time, the same people speak with extreme negativity about the revolutionary events in Russia in 1917, when the same ideas were embodied by slightly different forces, but with completely overlapping technologies.
It turns out that that revolutionary activity (100 years ago) is disgusting and counterproductive, but the “ferment” of today is an exclusively beneficial trend. An amazing position... The presence of “good” and “bad” revolutions is something new for the socio-political vocabulary.
Apparently, a “good” revolution is practically not even a violent change of power, as a result of which the country is governed by a person who reports weekly on the work done to Washington or London. An example of “good” revolutions can be called in this case the coming to power of such lumps of modern politics as Mikheil Saakashvili, Viktor Yushchenko and a number of other “accountable” gentlemen.
But for revolutionary ferment to begin in the country, society must be carefully “prepared.” And this “artillery preparation” has already begun in our country. And it didn’t start today.
To “warm up” social groups, a completely shabby method is used - to show how bad and hopeless everything is in Russia. In this regard, “revolutionary fronts” are open in different directions. Firstly, corruption... But the whole problem for the ideological inspirers of the new Russian revolution is that it is difficult to surprise Russian society with the word “corruption”, because it did not arise in the early 2000s. Russian corruption (as a historical phenomenon) will give many times a head start to any revolution, will catch up, and then give again...
Realizing that the topic of corruption needs to be raised, let’s say, from a different angle, modern oppositionists say: they say, look at the West - corruption has been suppressed and debunked there, but what about in Russia (or, as the oppositionists usually say, “in Russia”)? .. To this we can say approximately the following: corruption feels great both in the West and in the East and in general, anywhere. It’s just that in the United States it’s not called “corruption.” Why call a spade a spade if businessmen who support high-ranking officials, and therefore the officials themselves, may suffer as a result...
Freedom of speech in the West is such that even journalists are very reluctant to use the term in question. American journalist Barbara Ehrenreich speaks about this, in particular, in one of her articles. She states that in American society a stereotype is deliberately formed that corruption is somewhere abroad, but not in the United States. Meanwhile, the same Ehrenreich states that the lion's share of financial investments in US presidential campaigns is money from Wall Street, which itself literally drowned in corruption schemes and plans for money laundering through “democratized countries” (Iraq, Libya, Egypt, etc.) , and not only through these states.
Another front of the ideologists of the new Russian revolution is the infringement of the rights and freedoms of Russian citizens. They say that the new “anti-people” laws adopted by the authorities create a favorable field for supporting the “Putin regime.”
But if so, then you need to be completely honest. But aren’t these same Russian laws copied from Western versions? Isn’t there a law in the United States of America that labels organizations that receive funding from abroad as “foreign agents”? Isn’t there a fight against the spread of child pornography and extremism in the UK and other democratic countries?.. It turns out that Russia itself seems to be adopting that same progressive Western experience, but in this case, you see, there was no need to adopt it... Well, then this banality of double standards is the main achievement of the democratic West.
In conclusion, it is worth saying that we are all well aware of the problems in our country. However, this does not give anyone a reason, through savoring the exclusively negative features of socio-political life, to try to again pit different strata of Russian society against each other. These problems are completely solvable without revolutionary marches.
Well, if someone has an idea in their head that all the country’s problems need to be solved exclusively with the help of revolution, civil war, violence, blood and an endless desire to curry favor with foreign countries, then such an idea is strange and looks like a sign of a serious human illness, who expresses it (the idea) ...
I was asked very often: Will there be a civil war in Russia?
Previously answered: Possible, but not advisable.
Now I answer: She is already coming.
Show in full…
You just need to realize this. What is a civil war? Did you think thatonly "reds against whites". No.
This is a war of some citizens of the country against others. And it doesn't matter how. It doesn't matter what methods are used.
Once upon a time it was ideological. Opinion versus opinion. Word against word. Then the authorities involved riot police in this war.
Then the courts. Then again the riot police and special equipment. Now internal troops and military equipment are also being used against citizens.
The civil war in Russia is already underway. You just need to realize this. Yes. It is not yet as bloody as it could be. But it’s no longer bloodless. This war already has casualties. There are hundreds arrested, imprisoned and even killed. There are beaten and maimed, intimidated and those who fled the country...
The war is already underway. Realize this.
Our power has gone out of the right field. And everyone who advocates compliance with the law was declared outlawed. Criminals. Our valiant riot police and our valiant national guard do not protect citizens. They defend power...
Our government is involving not only security forces in this war, but also ordinary citizens. Constantly instilling in them through the media that those who are against the government are against the country. Outlaw. Traitors. Traitors to the Motherland. Setting some citizens of the country against others. Instilling in them that they want civil war.
But without explaining that she is already on her way.
And she's already coming. And there are already those killed in this war. There are not many of them, but they already exist.
The trick is that the battlefields are slightly shifted. Protesters are fighting for the observance of laws and for individual freedom. The authorities are fighting for only one thing - to maintain power.
When their fields converge, then the real meat grinder will begin. Then that classic civil war will begin, which everyone understands precisely as a civil war.
To do this, you just need to shift to the field of power and start fighting for power. Not for compliance with laws, democratic values, freedom, “for all the good against all the bad.” Namely for power.
I'm afraid it won't work any other way.
And, as I see it, the authorities don’t want it any other way.
That's the only way, guys.
Our government does not want to leave. This is primary. Everything else is secondary.
Non-compliance with laws, corruption, bribery, nepotism, cutting the dough - this is secondary. Because this is precisely why they came to power.
Primary is the power itself. The loss of the primary for them automatically entails the loss of the secondary. And many people took a very long time to get to the primary one. It was difficult to walk. Stepping over laws, breaking laws. If not by killing, then by ordering murders.
You can't scare someone like that with roses or sneakers on their shoulders.
Your war is lost. You are asking the impossible from them. What? Just obey the laws?
They don't give a damn about these laws. They now write the laws themselves. And not for myself. For you. And they don’t give a damn about new laws. And they did not come to power to obey the laws.
And you are already being imprisoned under these new laws. Some for insulting the feelings of believers, some for reposting, some for a picture, some for a poem...
The war is already underway. Realize this and move to the battlefield. And the battlefield here is power. Fight for power.
All. There is no other way out.
Mikhail Ezhov
A civil war may begin in Russia. How likely is this scenario?
To Ross and a civil war could begin. How likely is this scenario? It is difficult to put probabilities in numbers, because we do not yet know exactly at what speed and amplitude events will occur that, in their entirety, can lead to such a scenario.
The fact is that, from my point of view, the civil war scenario requires the simultaneous materialization of several processes, such as the collapse of the banking and financial systems, the subsequent collapse of the real economy and the subsequent social explosion, which in the long or rather even medium term in Russia will inevitably happen, writes inforesist.org
Have you heard about Nassim Taleb's theory, when one or more unpredictable events intervene in the course of history, which lead to dramatic changes in the course of historical events?
In the near future, a perfect storm may occur due to such a “black swan” or a combination of several “black swans”. The scenario, it must be said, is very likely. These birds have become suspiciously fond of Russia lately.
If we are talking about the gradual development of the current negative scenario, which is now being realized before our eyes, then it will also lead to collapse, the perfect storm that you are talking about, albeit not so quickly.
The fact that the banking system is in a deplorable situation can no longer be hidden. Now imagine a domino wave of bank failures, causing the deposit insurance agency to quickly admit they have no money.
The only way for the Central Bank and the government in this situation will be to save the remnants of the banking system from ruins with the help of ruble issues. This medicine, in its side effects, will be worse than the disease that needs to be fought, and it will cause a whole series of other side effects: devaluation will follow, a surge in inflation, and importers will go bankrupt en masse.
A huge number of companies will lose money that is in bank deposits. Financial market participants and businesses will not be able to trade with each other and will not be able to use those normal banking services that exist in any normal country. Debts for many companies will become unsustainable (if we count them in aggregate, foreign currency corporate debt today amounts to half a trillion dollars), and households will begin to go bankrupt en masse. Banking collapse further leads to simultaneous chaos and collapse in the real economy. As you understand, chaos in the economy will be followed by chaos on the streets.
This is one option for the development of the situation. However, events may develop in a different sequence: first there will be a collapse of the real economy, as a result of which a record number of people become unemployed, a huge number of households will lose their livelihoods, and mass defaults on consumer loans, mortgages, and car loans begin. All this, in turn, hits the banking and financial systems and will cause a domino effect there. Consumers of banking sector services are both the population and business. Accordingly, before the banking sector fully feels the burden of a critical mass of population defaults (and they are already feeling this process today - and with ever-increasing force), by this time it will already experience defaults on loans from bankrupt companies. Thus, a critical mass of bankruptcies, which will lead to the collapse of the real economy, will inevitably entail the collapse of the banking system.
Here are two scenarios of economic collapse in Russia, which imply the collapse of both the banking and real sectors, but in different sequences, with different cause-and-effect relationships, which we cannot predict with certainty now. Moreover, the result in both cases will be political collapse, which will be especially noticeable not even in Moscow, but in the provinces.
The fact is that in Russia there is a real time bomb - these are single-industry towns that were built around the so-called city-forming enterprises during the Soviet era and exist to this day. These enterprises are in fact the only employer in the entire, sometimes quite extensive, region.
And the trouble is that there are a lot of such cities, from 200 to 300, and millions of people live in these cities.
Remember Pikalevo, where there was a fairly serious crisis in 2008: then the “fire” was extinguished manually by Putin personally.
A huge number of cities of this kind are located in areas that, to put it mildly, are not resort areas. Let's take, for example, Kovdor beyond the Arctic Circle - several hundred kilometers from Murmansk, in the middle of the taiga. The city-forming enterprise there is the Kovdorsky GOK (mining and processing plant - ed.) What will happen there when this enterprise stops working? Where will the people who work there get money to live, given the fact that labor mobility in Russia tends to zero, and real unemployment (and not the one reported by Rosstat) is already reaching alarming proportions?
These people have no money to move, they have nowhere to go, their only source of income is work at these city-forming enterprises. But this is not the whole problem, but only part of it, since in Russia, in addition to the official single-industry towns, there are cities that “officially” are not single-industry towns, but based on a number of characteristics they can easily be classified in this category. For example, Tolyatti: the city-forming enterprise there is AVTOVAZ. The vast majority of jobs in the city are created there. If AVTOVAZ stops, the city will be brought to the brink of survival.
Moreover, problems of single-industry towns can easily arise even in cities such as Tver. It also has its own city-forming enterprise, called the Tver Carriage Works. And if you don’t know, I can tell you that a few weeks before the murder of Boris Nemtsov, the largest strike in the region in recent decades was supposed to take place in Tver. The workers of Tver Carriage Works OJSC gathered to go on strike - because their plant stopped working, because no one needed their cars. During a crisis, railway loads and transportation decline (in addition, they produce poor and expensive cars).
Accordingly, a mass strike was being prepared at the enterprise, which was also extinguished manually, as once in Pikalevo in 2008. Mercedes drove there with bags of dollars, scared some, bought others. Putin ordered Yakunin to give a state order to this plant - for their useless cars. Yakuninsky Russian Railways ordered 3,000 cars, and production started again. However, in manual mode you can solve the problem in one, well, two places at the same time. But what will they do when this entire structure collapses in the regions, and when federal highways begin to be blocked again? We do not know what the reaction of the central authorities will be. Will they send riot police and the army there to suppress these unrest? Will they shed blood? If they go, what kind of blood will it be: rivers of blood, seas of blood - and how deep? How tough and uncompromising will the response be, will military units go over to the side of the people? If blood starts flowing on both sides, this is a direct road to civil war.
So, we have three main factors of inevitable destabilization: the first is the collapse of the banking system, the second is the collapse of the real economy. Which of them will be the first, which will lead to the next, we do not know now. The third is the collapse of single-industry towns in the regions and mass social protests.
Add to this the parade of sovereignties: at the first sign of the center’s inability to control the situation, the regions will simply begin to fall away.
Some Tatarstan, Bashkortostan, a number of other regions where there is a self-sufficient regional economy, the same Urals. They will say: for the last 15 years we have been going to the UAE, to Dubai, we see how they live there and what they have done over the past 15 years. And we want to achieve one twentieth of this success, but we will not be able to do this as part of Russia. And they will start to fall off, and some riot police or army sent from Moscow will start shooting at people.
Practice shows that post-Soviet dictators, without much hesitation, resort to using force against the population in the event of serious social crises.
The main question here is whether the situation will develop according to the worst of scenarios, when, desperately clinging to power, Putin provokes a civil war in the country. Or will it be possible to resolve the issue through a peaceful revolution? I travel a lot around the country, from Moscow to Vladivostok. And I can tell you that there are actually a lot of influential people in the country, business representatives who want to work hard and live well. And they don’t want civil war, lawlessness in the country, they don’t want an organized crime group at the head of Russia. They do not want to be cut off from international financial markets, they do not want their business to be squeezed out, they do not want their country to be isolated, they understand perfectly well that Putin is responsible for all this. At the same time, they want a normal investment climate and want to be part of the international business community. Therefore, among them there will definitely be people who will not only express dissatisfaction with the Kremlin’s attempts to start a civil war, but will protest against it and actively resist it.
What can trends in the modern global economy indicate, how can they affect what is happening?
S.R.: As for the world economy, Putin has been nodding to the world economy since 2011, saying that, “the world economy has fallen a little,” well, we have sank a little” (this idiotic terminology belongs to Putin, candidate of economic sciences, if anyone doesn’t know).
But Putin, of course, lied, because at that time there was no crisis in the West, including North America. In the USA in 2013, this is before Crimea and before Ukraine, GDP growth was 4% per year. In Russia, which considered itself one of the developing markets, the BRICS countries, where economic growth, in theory, should be even higher than in developed countries, according to official figures, it amounted to only 1.3% of GDP growth. This is three times slower than in the US. With oil prices above $100 per barrel in 2013, economic growth in Russia slowed to almost zero. Therefore, in 2013, it was completely obvious to everyone that the Russian economic system was no longer working - regardless of the price of oil.
But no one has ever been able to deceive the laws of economics, like the laws of physics - Putin’s entire economy said “stop” and went downhill - despite the fact that a barrel of oil cost more than $100! And then the moment came when Putin realized that he would soon have to answer for the economic collapse in the country, which he himself had caused. Because it was he and no one else who destroyed the socio-political system and began to destroy the economic structure: from developing capitalism, he turned it into gangster neo-feudalism. He began to transform the political system of a developing democracy, first into an authoritarian and then into a dictatorial regime. But he didn’t want to answer. Therefore, he decided to turn the arrows on the external enemy, to do this, seize Crimea, unleash a hybrid war in the Donbass - and off we go. Brainwashing began, terrible propaganda in the media, pseudo-patriotic frenzy, stories about these boys crucified by the fascist junta. And, having suffered defeat in Ukraine, Putin went to the Middle East precisely in order to abruptly change the agenda and make the average person forget about this defeat.
Why do you think this organized crime group, which sits in the Kremlin, pushed for the completely illegal postponement of the Duma elections from December to September next year? The fact is that financial, economic and socio-political processes do not begin and develop simultaneously. And, as a rule, some serious changes for the worse in the financial and economic plane lead to consequences in the social and political planes with a delay of approximately 1 to 2 years. Therefore, in the upcoming elections (if they take place at all), they need the lowest possible turnout. To do this, for the first time in Russian history, they announced plans to move the start of the school year so that the elections, which are scheduled for September, would take place before the start of the school year, with a clear goal: to prevent as many people as possible from coming to the polls. Among other things, they quite rightly fear that discontent among the population by December 2016, when elections should have been held by law, will be significantly higher than by September 2016. They count the days: even these 90 days are important for them. They are temporary workers.
However, it is not a fact that these elections will take place at all. They are actually counting not just months, but counting days until the moment when the population explodes. Therefore, it is possible that Putin can cancel any democratic sham and cancel elections to the Duma, cancel presidential elections, introduce a state of emergency or martial law, and remain in power for life.
In this case, is all this rattling of nuclear missiles serious, or blackmail?
This is pure bluff. Moreover, I think that they know perfectly well the plans of both the Pentagon and NATO on how to act if it occurs to someone to reach out to the red button. I am familiar with this scenario, and I think that it is not a secret for the Kremlin either. They simply won’t have time to click anything.
It turns out that all these movements that are taking place there in the Kremlin are not intended to defeat or conquer someone, but simply to close the country under the pretext that there are enemies all around, turning it into such a giant North Korea - and under this pretext to rule forever.
This desire is definitely visible. But here’s the thing: they won’t succeed here either. It is very difficult to turn modern Russia into North Korea. The Russian economy has integrated into the international economic system. The Russian financial system has integrated into the global financial system. Russia has been following this path for the last 20 years, until 2014. In 2014, not only was this movement stopped, but there was a 180-degree turnaround. Despite the fact that Russia, in terms of its GDP of two trillion dollars, was until recently the eighth largest economy in the world.
In order to build a closed system, it was necessary not to follow the path of integration into the world economic and financial system, not to participate in globalization. It was necessary to move towards North Korea from the moment of the collapse of the USSR - and now, perhaps, we would have built it. But, fortunately, this was not done, because at that time we wanted to get as far away from North Korea as possible.
And today, an attempt to turn the country at full speed in the exact opposite direction will lead Putin not to lifelong power, no matter how much he wants it, but to the fact that everything will go downhill, and we, in fact, are already observing this process.
It turns out that all of Putin’s undertakings ended in failure.
By definition, he cannot have any strategic plans, because he does not think strategically, his brain is structured differently. He has tactical thinking, which he was taught at the higher school of the KGB of the USSR in the 70s, and he simply does not know how to think differently. Any of his tactical decisions looks something like this: how else can I annoy this Obama, how can I piss on his shoe. Well, for example, how to divert the attention of the population so that they don’t riot. Well, let's wrest Crimea and Donbass from Ukraine. Something went wrong, let's bomb Syria. These are primitive reactions, like Pavlov’s dog...
Slava Rabinovich, Russian financier
