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Wojna „made in Russia”
Jedno z najbardziej wnikliwych i fascynujących studiów nad rosyjskim państwem i społeczeństwem, które pojawiło się od czasu pełnoskalowej inwazji na Ukrainę.
Siergiej Miedwiediew, przebywający na emigracji naukowiec, w zwięzły i niezwykle elokwentny sposób stawia tezę, że atak Rosji na Ukrainę nie jest kaprysem Putina, lecz wynika z dwóch dekad autorytarnej degradacji i postimperialnych nastrojów reżimu rosyjskiego. Przez wieki Rosja prezentowała się jako imperialna potęga, rozległe terytorium, kraj wysokiej kultury, eksploracji kosmosu i potęga militarna. W rzeczywistości jednak od wewnątrz trawił ją rak niewolnictwa, korupcji, tyranii, kłamstwa i okrucieństwa. „Przemoc opanowała państwo i nieuchronnie je obali”, uważa autor. Książka Miedwiediewa pozwala nam na nowo przemyśleć i zrozumieć, co stoi za decyzjami Putina i rosyjskiej elity. Pozwala zobaczyć jak brutalnym krajem na przestrzeni ostatnich dekad stała się Rosja.
Siergiej Miedwiediew, przebywający na emigracji naukowiec, w zwięzły i niezwykle elokwentny sposób stawia tezę, że atak Rosji na Ukrainę nie jest kaprysem Putina, lecz wynika z dwóch dekad autorytarnej degradacji i postimperialnych nastrojów reżimu rosyjskiego. Przez wieki Rosja prezentowała się jako imperialna potęga, rozległe terytorium, kraj wysokiej kultury, eksploracji kosmosu i potęga militarna. W rzeczywistości jednak od wewnątrz trawił ją rak niewolnictwa, korupcji, tyranii, kłamstwa i okrucieństwa. „Przemoc opanowała państwo i nieuchronnie je obali”, uważa autor. Książka Miedwiediewa pozwala nam na nowo przemyśleć i zrozumieć, co stoi za decyzjami Putina i rosyjskiej elity. Pozwala zobaczyć jak brutalnym krajem na przestrzeni ostatnich dekad stała się Rosja.
256 pages, Paperback
Published May 15, 2024
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About the author
Sergei Medvedev
13 books19 followersSergei Alexandrovich Medvedev is a Russian historian, journalist, television and radio presenter, and writer. He has worked as a professor at the Higher School of Economics in Moscow, at the Marshall Center for Security Studies in Germany, the Finnish Institute of International Affairs in Helsinki, the Istituto Affari Internazionali in Rome, and the Institute of Europe in Moscow.
Medvedev won the 2020 Pushkin Book Prize for his book The Return of the Russian Leviathan. The book was translated by Stephen Dalziel, and was widely praised in the US and UK.
Medvedev won the 2020 Pushkin Book Prize for his book The Return of the Russian Leviathan. The book was translated by Stephen Dalziel, and was widely praised in the US and UK.
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July 19, 2024
a state devoted to war and conquest
🇷🇺 In this extraordinary book, Medvedev describes what it has been like living in Russia under Putin from the beginning of the 21st century to the present. If only the horrors he opens our eyes to were the history of a distant Soviet past. But modern Russia is daily becoming more horrific than it was the week or month before.
We learn about the cult of 1945 that has Russians not looking forward to the future of a brave new world but reveling in what their grandfathers accomplished in helping defeat Nazi Germany. Then the Red Army was at its height and Eastern Europe was under Russian/Soviet dominance and control. They want another 1945. And they want those countries back. Ukraine is the beginning of that accomplishment - a huge war Moscow is determined to win. As Hitler believed he must exterminate the Jews, Putin believes he must exterminate the Ukrainians.
No matter the battlefield losses. Such things Russians are used to. No matter if the world condemns the war - Russians know it has always been “us” versus “them”, Russia versus the West. We find out that at the beginning of the war T shirts were being sold and worn that stated: I’m Not Ashamed.
Medvedev talks about the new secret police, as bad or worse than the old KGB, that ensures the populace stays submissive and cooperative out of fear. Russians support the war in Ukraine and whatever Putin chooses to do. They have no choice. There are, of course, those who truly support the Russia that Putin is creating or recreating and don’t need to be coerced.
It’s an astonishing, depressing and discouraging book to read for Russia comes off far worse than it does from watching the news. Here we have a personal record from an insightful and articulate man who has watched Russia become something worse in front of his very eyes. Once a professor at Moscow University, Medvedev fled Russia in January 2024 under, unsurprisingly, a barrage of death threats. He is still teaching in Europe. I pray he remains safe and alive though I am sure he is in as much danger as any of Russia’s courageous dissenters have been and still are.
🇷🇺 “Z” is very readable and is definitely an essential book. These are our times. These are the dangers a free world, especially a free Europe, faces. Our states must rise to the challenge of a Russia utterly devoted to war and conquest. And stand against those, wherever they may be, who support Putin’s dystopian ideology.
🇷🇺 In this extraordinary book, Medvedev describes what it has been like living in Russia under Putin from the beginning of the 21st century to the present. If only the horrors he opens our eyes to were the history of a distant Soviet past. But modern Russia is daily becoming more horrific than it was the week or month before.
We learn about the cult of 1945 that has Russians not looking forward to the future of a brave new world but reveling in what their grandfathers accomplished in helping defeat Nazi Germany. Then the Red Army was at its height and Eastern Europe was under Russian/Soviet dominance and control. They want another 1945. And they want those countries back. Ukraine is the beginning of that accomplishment - a huge war Moscow is determined to win. As Hitler believed he must exterminate the Jews, Putin believes he must exterminate the Ukrainians.
No matter the battlefield losses. Such things Russians are used to. No matter if the world condemns the war - Russians know it has always been “us” versus “them”, Russia versus the West. We find out that at the beginning of the war T shirts were being sold and worn that stated: I’m Not Ashamed.
Medvedev talks about the new secret police, as bad or worse than the old KGB, that ensures the populace stays submissive and cooperative out of fear. Russians support the war in Ukraine and whatever Putin chooses to do. They have no choice. There are, of course, those who truly support the Russia that Putin is creating or recreating and don’t need to be coerced.
It’s an astonishing, depressing and discouraging book to read for Russia comes off far worse than it does from watching the news. Here we have a personal record from an insightful and articulate man who has watched Russia become something worse in front of his very eyes. Once a professor at Moscow University, Medvedev fled Russia in January 2024 under, unsurprisingly, a barrage of death threats. He is still teaching in Europe. I pray he remains safe and alive though I am sure he is in as much danger as any of Russia’s courageous dissenters have been and still are.
🇷🇺 “Z” is very readable and is definitely an essential book. These are our times. These are the dangers a free world, especially a free Europe, faces. Our states must rise to the challenge of a Russia utterly devoted to war and conquest. And stand against those, wherever they may be, who support Putin’s dystopian ideology.
November 21, 2023
(The English review is placed beneath the Russian one)
Что же ты сбежал? Что ж ты не пошёл
Против "космонавтов" с калашами босиком да голышом?
Что же ты бензином не облил себя да не поджёг?
Чё, зассал? Ну ты и лошок...
Проблема с этой книгой в том, что, будучи россиянином, перед автором стояла задача понравиться западному читателю, не оскорбить украинцев и не обвинить близких автору людей из России, как например, российских олигархов и представителей российской интеллигенции. Что ж, у автора это получилось, ибо опять все в белом, кроме русского народа. Но русскому народу не привыкать - его всегда использовали как пугало для зарубежной аудитории (дать им свободу? так фашиста выберут!). Главное – не оскорбить уважаемых людей.
Читать опусы своих соотечественников всегда крайне трудно и хуже может быть только чтение пересказа государственной пропаганды. Да, связь тут прямая, только если государственная пропаганда тянет россиянина в одну сторону, то Сергей Медведев - в другую. Собственное, такие люди как Сергей Медведев будут настаивать на том, что это российское общество виновато в том, что с 24 февраля (а то и раньше) происходит в Украине. Значит ли это, что я поддерживаю операцию Z? Нет, я считаю это преступлением, за которое ещё предстоит ответить. Только в отличие от Сергея Медведева я не считаю, что за это должно отвечать абстрактное российское общество. Кто же? Элиты. Люди, которое должны направлять народ и они же кто получал больше всех благ от ельцинско-путинского режима. Кто конкретно входит в это понятие «элиты»? Согласно учебнику по политологии в понятие «элита» входят люди из таких сфер как политика, экономика, а также люди из военной и культурной области. Сергей Медведев, безусловно, является частью российской элиты, поэтому и он, с моей точки зрения, ответственен за всё то, что происходило в России с 1991 года. Уж кто-кто, а он точно понимал, что происходило в стране с 1991 года, однако в этой книге читатель не найдёт причин почему страна приняла Путина. Более того, после прочтения книги может возникнуть ощущение, что до 2000 года в России была демократия, но потом что-то вдруг произошло, и к власти в стране пришёл злой Путин, который уничтожил всю демократию и навязал народу Ильина. А как же выборы Ельцина в 1996 году, когда всему народу показали что ничтожество с 3% поддержки можно избрать президентом? А ничего! Господин Медведев этого предпочитает не замечать, а ведь именно это показало россиянам, что от их мнения ничего не зависит, что властям нет смысла сопротивляться и что «не всё так однозначно». Так почему же теперь Сергей Медведев хочет, чтобы россияне поверили, в то, что утверждает другая сторона конфликта о Буче, если именно при его любимом дедушке Ельцине страну научили сомневаться во всём (когда российские журналисты превратились в обслуживающих олигархов и Ельцина обслугу)? Но господин Медведев не хочет об этом говорить, как не хочет он указывать на тех, кто привёл Владимира Владимировича к власти. Может быть, Сергей Медведев пишет в своей книге об олигархах, которые помогали Путину? Возможно, он пишет о тех артистах, певцах, политиках, чиновниках ельцинского окружения и просто о богатых русских, которые поддержали Путина? Нет, всю ответственность за 24 февраля он сваливает на русский народ. Это, оказывается, русский народ выбрал себе такую власть и это он аплодировал милитаризации страны и захлестнувшему насилию со стороны силовиков. Но откуда же пришло это насилие, Сергей? Путин что ли принёс насилие к нам в дом? А может быть, это Ельцин познакомил россиян с бандитскими правилами жизни, которые сегодня расцвели в ДНР и ЛНР? Может, это перестрелки 90-х показали россиянам, что «прав тот, кто сильнее» и что силой оружия можно отжать что угодно? Хотя Путин и сказал, что «слабых бьют», вот только первым, кто привнёс норму «нужно быть сильным, возможно даже агрессивным», был Ельцин, которым спокойно смотрел, как страна погружается в хаос бандитизма и в дополнении к этому устроил ещё войну в Чечне. Почему-то Сергей Медведев всего этого не хочет замечать, и вся книга посвящена исключительно тому, какой оказывается плохой Путин, какой он диктатор (что правда) и что во всём виноват русский народ. Хочется спросить Сергея, где он был все эти 30 лет? Почему 30 лет его это не беспокоило? Что такое случилось с Сергеем, что он вдруг прозрел? Почему раньше не прозревал? Был занят строительством Северного потока — 2? Ой! Это, похоже, другие внезапно прозревшие (Who-is-Mr-Putin) граждане. Так вот, почему в грехах элиты, которая все эти 30 лет пила нефть и кровь россиян, а теперь пьёт кровь украинцев, должен отвечать простой народ, а не люди, которые обогатились за всё это время? Получается забавная ситуация, когда такие люди как Сергей Медведев хотят спихнуть всю ответственность со своих плеч, на чужие (что, на фронте всё так плохо, что вы решили побыстрее застолбить место «я завжди був на стороні добра»?). Только вот вы, Сергей, и должны отвечать, как представитель культурной элиты РФ. Очень легко всё свалить на абстрактное понятие «народ» и уйти от ответственности. Увы, но как показала история, включая историю Германии, за преступления элиты, редко когда отвечает сама элита. Всегда найдётся вот такой Сергей Медведев, который покажет и расскажет, откуда готовилось нападение, точнее, как условный «народ» аплодировал диктатору.
Что касается формата книги, то она выглядит как сборник постов из Facebook, где каждая глава занимает примерно 1-2 станицы формата А4. Всё что пишет автор, было много раз проговорено сторонниками внесистемной российской оппозиции и так называемой интеллектуальной российской элитой, что настроена антипутински, на сайте YouTube. Автор пытается изобрести что-то новое, как например, биополитика (biopolitics), но на самом деле это вся та же диктатура, авторитаризм, тоталитаризм. Чего-то особенного тут нет. Это было как в СССР и в средневековой Европе, так и во всех нынешних диктатурах, т.е. подавление человеческой воли и навязывание собственной, государственной.
Что касается неприятия народом вакцин от Ковида, то люди их не принимают, потому что не понимают, как страна может произвести настолько сложный продукт, если она даже гвозди не может производить? Так что и тут автор не понял свой собственный народ. Кстати, история с Ковидом в России хорошо иллюстрирует реальное отношение народа к правительству и правительственной пропаганде.
Ещё один раздел книги посвящён Владимиру Жириновскому. Учитывая, что этой личности автор посвятил аж несколько глав, именно бывший (политический) клоун виноват во всем, что сегодня происходит в Украине. Вот только пик популярности Жириновского пришёлся на середину 90-х и никогда больше не повышался, что ещё раз подтверждает мой тезис, что среди всего населения России, лишь 20-25% откровенно радикальных людей. Другими словами, для большей части населения РФ, Жириновский был клоуном, слова которого нельзя воспринимать всерьёз. Однако согласно Сергею Медведеву, именно товарищ Ж положил начало конфликту между Россией и Украиной и/или зарождению «фашизма» в РФ. Вот только автор почему-то забыл упомянуть, что в любом обществе есть люди, которые поддерживают таких радикалов как Жириновский и что нигде они не приходят к власти демократиче��ким путём. С моей точки зрения, ответственность Жириновского в конфликте Украины и России, не высокая, ибо Жириновский говорил лозунгами, идеями, а Владимир Путин, является самым неидеологическим политиком России. Россия вторглась в Украину не по идеологическим или идейным причинам, а сугубо по практическим – остаться у руля власти ещё на один срок (условно назовём это «операция Крым версии 2.0»).
Я бросил читать уже ближе к концу, когда автор стал размышлять на тему мобилизации: «Even so, the number of people who openly protested on the streets or voted with their feet at the borders was less than 1 per cent of the population; so the rest – and we are talking here about millions of people – accepted the call-up as a part of normal life and the rules of the game, and went off to the recruitment offices or tried to find some way of obtaining an exemption. Generally speaking, if we take Albert Hirschman’s triad of ‘Exit–Voice Loyalty’, we can say that a fraction of a per cent opted to raise their ‘Voice’; half a per cent chose ‘Exit’; and the rest, voluntarily or involuntarily, went for ‘Loyalty’.»
Редкостная мерзость, конечно. Во-первых, миллионы людей не были рекрутированы. Речь идёт о сотнях. Во-вторых, Россия является бедной страной, что означает, что у людей нет денег, чтобы сбежать за границу, но, похоже, Сергей Медведев настолько же далёк от простого народа как российские чиновники. В-третьих, страх внушался людям, начиная с 1991 года, а не с приходом Путина к власти. На протяжении 30 лет государство било, унижало и запугивало людей, внушало им идею, что им никто не поможет и что ничего от них не зависит. С приходом Путина эта политика стала проводиться ещё активней. И какой же нужно быть мразью, чтобы запуганных людей, которые к тому же 70 лет жили под властью КГБ, обвинять в том, что они не пошли с голыми руками на шеренги ОМОНа. Где же автор был все эти годы, почему он в не возглавил сопротивление, если он такой, блядь, умный и смелый? Всё это время сидел в своём сраном университете и получал деньги от государства, а сейчас возомнил себя совестью нации.
The problem with this book is that as a Russian, the author had the task to please the Western reader, not to offend Ukrainians, and not to accuse people from Russia who are close to the author, such as Russian oligarchs and Russian intellectuals. Well, it worked out well for the author because, again, everyone is in white, except for the Russian people. But the Russian people are used to it - they have always been used as a scarecrow for foreign audiences (give them freedom? They will elect a fascist!). The main thing is not to offend respected people.
Reading the opuses of one's compatriots is always difficult, and only reading a retelling of state propaganda can be worse. Yes, the connection here is direct: if state propaganda pulls a Russian in one direction, Sergei Medvedev pulls a Russian in the other. People like Sergey Medvedev will insist that it is Russian society that is to blame for what has been happening in Ukraine since February 24 (or even earlier). Does that mean I support Operation Z? No, I consider it a crime for which there is still a responsibility to be met. Only, unlike Sergei Medvedev, I do not believe that abstract Russian society should be held responsible for it. Who is? The elites. The people who are supposed to guide the people and they are the ones who have benefited the most from the Yeltsin-Putin regime. Who exactly is included in this notion of elites? According to a political science textbook, the term elite includes people from such spheres as politics and economics as well as people from the military and cultural spheres. Sergei Medvedev is certainly part of the Russian elite and therefore, from my point of view, he is responsible for everything that has happened in Russia since 1991. He understood exactly what was going on in the country since 1991, but in this book, the reader will not find the reasons why the country accepted Putin. Moreover, after reading the book, you may get the feeling that before 2000, there was democracy in Russia, but then something suddenly happened and the evil Putin came to power in the country, who destroyed all democracy and imposed Ilyin on the people. What about Yeltsin's election in 1996, when the whole nation was shown that a lowlife with 3% support could be elected president? Nothing! Mr. Medvedev prefers not to notice this, but it showed Russians that nothing depends on their opinion, that there is no point in resisting the authorities, and that "not everything is so clear-cut". So why now does Sergei Medvedev want Russians to believe what the other side of the conflict claims about Bucha if it was under his favorite Yeltsin that the country was taught to doubt everything (when Russian journalists turned into servants of oligarchs and Yeltsin)? But Mr. Medvedev doesn't want to talk about it, just as he doesn't want to point out those who brought Vladimir Vladimirovich to power. So, maybe Sergei Medvedev is writing about the oligarchs who helped Putin? Or perhaps he is writing about those artists, singers, politicians, officials of Yeltsin's entourage, and rich Russians who supported Putin? No, he blames all responsibility for February 24 on the Russian people. It was the Russian people, it turns out, who chose such a government and who applauded the militarization of the country and the overwhelming violence of the security forces. But where did this violence come from, Sergei? Did Putin bring violence into our home? Or maybe it was Yeltsin who introduced Russians to the thuggish rules of life that are now flourishing in the DNR (Donetsk People's Republic) and LNR (Luhansk People's Republic)? So, maybe it was the shootings of the '90s that showed Russians that "he who is stronger is right" and that you can take anything by force of arms? Although Putin said that "we showed ourselves to be weak and the weak get beaten," the first one who introduced the norm "you have to be strong, perhaps even aggressive" was Yeltsin, who calmly watched the country plunge into the chaos of banditry and in addition to that organized war in Chechnya. For some reason, Sergei Medvedev doesn't want to notice all this, and the whole book is devoted exclusively to how bad Putin is, what a dictator he is (which is true), and that the Russian people are to blame for everything. I would like to ask Sergei, where was he all these 30 years? Why didn't it bother him for 30 years? What happened to Sergei that made him suddenly have an epiphany? Why didn't he see it before? Was he busy building Nord Stream 2? Ouch! These seem to be other sudden epiphany (Who-is-Mr-Putin) citizens. So, why should the sins of the elite, which has been drinking oil and the blood of Russians for 30 years and now drinks the blood of Ukrainians, be the responsibility of ordinary people and not the people who have enriched themselves during all this time? It is a funny situation when people like Sergei Medvedev want to shift all responsibility from their own shoulders to someone else's (is everything so bad on the front that you decided to quickly secure the place of "я завжди був на стороні добра"). You, Sergey, are the one who should answer as a representative of the cultural elite of the Russian Federation. It is very easy to blame everything on the abstract concept of people and avoid responsibility. Alas, but as history has shown, including the history of Germany, the elite itself is rarely responsible for their own crimes. There will always be a guy like Sergei Medvedev who will show and tell how the conventional "people" applauded the dictator.
As for the format of the book, it looks like a collection of Facebook posts, where each chapter takes up about 1-2 A4 pages. Everything that the author writes has been said many times by supporters of the non-systemic Russian opposition and the so-called intellectual Russian elite, which is anti-Putin, on YouTube. The author tries to invent something new, such as biopolitics, but it is the same dictatorship, authoritarianism, and totalitarianism. There is nothing special here. This was the case in the USSR and medieval Europe as well as in all current dictatorships, i.e., suppression of human will and imposition of one's own - state will.
As for the people's rejection of COVID-19 vaccines, people don't accept them because they don't understand how a country can produce such a sophisticated product if it can't even produce nails. So, here too, the author has failed to understand his own people. By the way, the story of COVID-19 in Russia illustrates well the real attitude of the people to the government and government propaganda.
Another section of the book is devoted to Vladimir Zhirinovsky. Considering that the author devoted several chapters to this person, it is the former (political) clown who is to blame for everything that is happening in Ukraine today. But the peak of Zhirinovsky's popularity came in the mid-90s and never increased again, which once again confirms my thesis that among the entire population of Russia, only 20-25% of radical people. In other words, for the majority of the Russian population, Zhirinovsky was a clown whose words could not be taken seriously. However, according to Sergey Medvedev, it was Comrade Z who started the conflict between Russia and Ukraine and/or the birth of "fascism" in the Russian Federation. But the author somehow forgot to mention that in any society there are people who support radicals like Zhirinovsky and that nowhere do they come to power democratically. From my point of view, Zhirinovsky's responsibility in the conflict between Ukraine and Russia is not high because Zhirinovsky spoke with slogans and ideas while Vladimir Putin is the most non-ideological politician in Russia. Russia invaded Ukraine not for ideological or idealistic reasons but purely for practical reasons - to stay in power for one more term (let's call it "Operation Crimea version 2.0").
I quit reading near the end when the author began to reflect on the topic of mobilization:«Even so, the number of people who openly protested on the streets or voted with their feet at the borders was less than 1 per cent of the population; so the rest – and we are talking here about millions of people – accepted the call-up as a part of normal life and the rules of the game, and went off to the recruitment offices or tried to find some way of obtaining an exemption».
A rare abomination, of course. First of all, millions of people were not recruited. We're talking about hundreds. Second, Russia is a poor country, which means that people don't have money to flee abroad, but it seems that Sergei Medvedev is as far removed from the common people as Russian officials. Third, fear has been instilled in the people since 1991, not since Putin came to power. For 30 years, the state has beaten, humiliated, and intimidated people, indoctrinating them with the idea that no one will help them and that nothing depends on them. Since Putin came to power, this policy has become even more active. And what kind of scum do you have to be to accuse intimidated people, who have lived under the KGB for 70 years, of not going with bare hands against the OMON. Where was the author all these years, and why didn't he lead the resistance if he was so fucking smart and brave? All this time, he was sitting in his fucking university and receiving money from the state, and now he thinks he is the conscience of the nation.
Что же ты сбежал? Что ж ты не пошёл
Против "космонавтов" с калашами босиком да голышом?
Что же ты бензином не облил себя да не поджёг?
Чё, зассал? Ну ты и лошок...
Проблема с этой книгой в том, что, будучи россиянином, перед автором стояла задача понравиться западному читателю, не оскорбить украинцев и не обвинить близких автору людей из России, как например, российских олигархов и представителей российской интеллигенции. Что ж, у автора это получилось, ибо опять все в белом, кроме русского народа. Но русскому народу не привыкать - его всегда использовали как пугало для зарубежной аудитории (дать им свободу? так фашиста выберут!). Главное – не оскорбить уважаемых людей.
Читать опусы своих соотечественников всегда крайне трудно и хуже может быть только чтение пересказа государственной пропаганды. Да, связь тут прямая, только если государственная пропаганда тянет россиянина в одну сторону, то Сергей Медведев - в другую. Собственное, такие люди как Сергей Медведев будут настаивать на том, что это российское общество виновато в том, что с 24 февраля (а то и раньше) происходит в Украине. Значит ли это, что я поддерживаю операцию Z? Нет, я считаю это преступлением, за которое ещё предстоит ответить. Только в отличие от Сергея Медведева я не считаю, что за это должно отвечать абстрактное российское общество. Кто же? Элиты. Люди, которое должны направлять народ и они же кто получал больше всех благ от ельцинско-путинского режима. Кто конкретно входит в это понятие «элиты»? Согласно учебнику по политологии в понятие «элита» входят люди из таких сфер как политика, экономика, а также люди из военной и культурной области. Сергей Медведев, безусловно, является частью российской элиты, поэтому и он, с моей точки зрения, ответственен за всё то, что происходило в России с 1991 года. Уж кто-кто, а он точно понимал, что происходило в стране с 1991 года, однако в этой книге читатель не найдёт причин почему страна приняла Путина. Более того, после прочтения книги может возникнуть ощущение, что до 2000 года в России была демократия, но потом что-то вдруг произошло, и к власти в стране пришёл злой Путин, который уничтожил всю демократию и навязал народу Ильина. А как же выборы Ельцина в 1996 году, когда всему народу показали что ничтожество с 3% поддержки можно избрать президентом? А ничего! Господин Медведев этого предпочитает не замечать, а ведь именно это показало россиянам, что от их мнения ничего не зависит, что властям нет смысла сопротивляться и что «не всё так однозначно». Так почему же теперь Сергей Медведев хочет, чтобы россияне поверили, в то, что утверждает другая сторона конфликта о Буче, если именно при его любимом дедушке Ельцине страну научили сомневаться во всём (когда российские журналисты превратились в обслуживающих олигархов и Ельцина обслугу)? Но господин Медведев не хочет об этом говорить, как не хочет он указывать на тех, кто привёл Владимира Владимировича к власти. Может быть, Сергей Медведев пишет в своей книге об олигархах, которые помогали Путину? Возможно, он пишет о тех артистах, певцах, политиках, чиновниках ельцинского окружения и просто о богатых русских, которые поддержали Путина? Нет, всю ответственность за 24 февраля он сваливает на русский народ. Это, оказывается, русский народ выбрал себе такую власть и это он аплодировал милитаризации страны и захлестнувшему насилию со стороны силовиков. Но откуда же пришло это насилие, Сергей? Путин что ли принёс насилие к нам в дом? А может быть, это Ельцин познакомил россиян с бандитскими правилами жизни, которые сегодня расцвели в ДНР и ЛНР? Может, это перестрелки 90-х показали россиянам, что «прав тот, кто сильнее» и что силой оружия можно отжать что угодно? Хотя Путин и сказал, что «слабых бьют», вот только первым, кто привнёс норму «нужно быть сильным, возможно даже агрессивным», был Ельцин, которым спокойно смотрел, как страна погружается в хаос бандитизма и в дополнении к этому устроил ещё войну в Чечне. Почему-то Сергей Медведев всего этого не хочет замечать, и вся книга посвящена исключительно тому, какой оказывается плохой Путин, какой он диктатор (что правда) и что во всём виноват русский народ. Хочется спросить Сергея, где он был все эти 30 лет? Почему 30 лет его это не беспокоило? Что такое случилось с Сергеем, что он вдруг прозрел? Почему раньше не прозревал? Был занят строительством Северного потока — 2? Ой! Это, похоже, другие внезапно прозревшие (Who-is-Mr-Putin) граждане. Так вот, почему в грехах элиты, которая все эти 30 лет пила нефть и кровь россиян, а теперь пьёт кровь украинцев, должен отвечать простой народ, а не люди, которые обогатились за всё это время? Получается забавная ситуация, когда такие люди как Сергей Медведев хотят спихнуть всю ответственность со своих плеч, на чужие (что, на фронте всё так плохо, что вы решили побыстрее застолбить место «я завжди був на стороні добра»?). Только вот вы, Сергей, и должны отвечать, как представитель культурной элиты РФ. Очень легко всё свалить на абстрактное понятие «народ» и уйти от ответственности. Увы, но как показала история, включая историю Германии, за преступления элиты, редко когда отвечает сама элита. Всегда найдётся вот такой Сергей Медведев, который покажет и расскажет, откуда готовилось нападение, точнее, как условный «народ» аплодировал диктатору.
Что касается формата книги, то она выглядит как сборник постов из Facebook, где каждая глава занимает примерно 1-2 станицы формата А4. Всё что пишет автор, было много раз проговорено сторонниками внесистемной российской оппозиции и так называемой интеллектуальной российской элитой, что настроена антипутински, на сайте YouTube. Автор пытается изобрести что-то новое, как например, биополитика (biopolitics), но на самом деле это вся та же диктатура, авторитаризм, тоталитаризм. Чего-то особенного тут нет. Это было как в СССР и в средневековой Европе, так и во всех нынешних диктатурах, т.е. подавление человеческой воли и навязывание собственной, государственной.
Что касается неприятия народом вакцин от Ковида, то люди их не принимают, потому что не понимают, как страна может произвести настолько сложный продукт, если она даже гвозди не может производить? Так что и тут автор не понял свой собственный народ. Кстати, история с Ковидом в России хорошо иллюстрирует реальное отношение народа к правительству и правительственной пропаганде.
Ещё один раздел книги посвящён Владимиру Жириновскому. Учитывая, что этой личности автор посвятил аж несколько глав, именно бывший (политический) клоун виноват во всем, что сегодня происходит в Украине. Вот только пик популярности Жириновского пришёлся на середину 90-х и никогда больше не повышался, что ещё раз подтверждает мой тезис, что среди всего населения России, лишь 20-25% откровенно радикальных людей. Другими словами, для большей части населения РФ, Жириновский был клоуном, слова которого нельзя воспринимать всерьёз. Однако согласно Сергею Медведеву, именно товарищ Ж положил начало конфликту между Россией и Украиной и/или зарождению «фашизма» в РФ. Вот только автор почему-то забыл упомянуть, что в любом обществе есть люди, которые поддерживают таких радикалов как Жириновский и что нигде они не приходят к власти демократиче��ким путём. С моей точки зрения, ответственность Жириновского в конфликте Украины и России, не высокая, ибо Жириновский говорил лозунгами, идеями, а Владимир Путин, является самым неидеологическим политиком России. Россия вторглась в Украину не по идеологическим или идейным причинам, а сугубо по практическим – остаться у руля власти ещё на один срок (условно назовём это «операция Крым версии 2.0»).
Я бросил читать уже ближе к концу, когда автор стал размышлять на тему мобилизации: «Even so, the number of people who openly protested on the streets or voted with their feet at the borders was less than 1 per cent of the population; so the rest – and we are talking here about millions of people – accepted the call-up as a part of normal life and the rules of the game, and went off to the recruitment offices or tried to find some way of obtaining an exemption. Generally speaking, if we take Albert Hirschman’s triad of ‘Exit–Voice Loyalty’, we can say that a fraction of a per cent opted to raise their ‘Voice’; half a per cent chose ‘Exit’; and the rest, voluntarily or involuntarily, went for ‘Loyalty’.»
Редкостная мерзость, конечно. Во-первых, миллионы людей не были рекрутированы. Речь идёт о сотнях. Во-вторых, Россия является бедной страной, что означает, что у людей нет денег, чтобы сбежать за границу, но, похоже, Сергей Медведев настолько же далёк от простого народа как российские чиновники. В-третьих, страх внушался людям, начиная с 1991 года, а не с приходом Путина к власти. На протяжении 30 лет государство било, унижало и запугивало людей, внушало им идею, что им никто не поможет и что ничего от них не зависит. С приходом Путина эта политика стала проводиться ещё активней. И какой же нужно быть мразью, чтобы запуганных людей, которые к тому же 70 лет жили под властью КГБ, обвинять в том, что они не пошли с голыми руками на шеренги ОМОНа. Где же автор был все эти годы, почему он в не возглавил сопротивление, если он такой, блядь, умный и смелый? Всё это время сидел в своём сраном университете и получал деньги от государства, а сейчас возомнил себя совестью нации.
The problem with this book is that as a Russian, the author had the task to please the Western reader, not to offend Ukrainians, and not to accuse people from Russia who are close to the author, such as Russian oligarchs and Russian intellectuals. Well, it worked out well for the author because, again, everyone is in white, except for the Russian people. But the Russian people are used to it - they have always been used as a scarecrow for foreign audiences (give them freedom? They will elect a fascist!). The main thing is not to offend respected people.
Reading the opuses of one's compatriots is always difficult, and only reading a retelling of state propaganda can be worse. Yes, the connection here is direct: if state propaganda pulls a Russian in one direction, Sergei Medvedev pulls a Russian in the other. People like Sergey Medvedev will insist that it is Russian society that is to blame for what has been happening in Ukraine since February 24 (or even earlier). Does that mean I support Operation Z? No, I consider it a crime for which there is still a responsibility to be met. Only, unlike Sergei Medvedev, I do not believe that abstract Russian society should be held responsible for it. Who is? The elites. The people who are supposed to guide the people and they are the ones who have benefited the most from the Yeltsin-Putin regime. Who exactly is included in this notion of elites? According to a political science textbook, the term elite includes people from such spheres as politics and economics as well as people from the military and cultural spheres. Sergei Medvedev is certainly part of the Russian elite and therefore, from my point of view, he is responsible for everything that has happened in Russia since 1991. He understood exactly what was going on in the country since 1991, but in this book, the reader will not find the reasons why the country accepted Putin. Moreover, after reading the book, you may get the feeling that before 2000, there was democracy in Russia, but then something suddenly happened and the evil Putin came to power in the country, who destroyed all democracy and imposed Ilyin on the people. What about Yeltsin's election in 1996, when the whole nation was shown that a lowlife with 3% support could be elected president? Nothing! Mr. Medvedev prefers not to notice this, but it showed Russians that nothing depends on their opinion, that there is no point in resisting the authorities, and that "not everything is so clear-cut". So why now does Sergei Medvedev want Russians to believe what the other side of the conflict claims about Bucha if it was under his favorite Yeltsin that the country was taught to doubt everything (when Russian journalists turned into servants of oligarchs and Yeltsin)? But Mr. Medvedev doesn't want to talk about it, just as he doesn't want to point out those who brought Vladimir Vladimirovich to power. So, maybe Sergei Medvedev is writing about the oligarchs who helped Putin? Or perhaps he is writing about those artists, singers, politicians, officials of Yeltsin's entourage, and rich Russians who supported Putin? No, he blames all responsibility for February 24 on the Russian people. It was the Russian people, it turns out, who chose such a government and who applauded the militarization of the country and the overwhelming violence of the security forces. But where did this violence come from, Sergei? Did Putin bring violence into our home? Or maybe it was Yeltsin who introduced Russians to the thuggish rules of life that are now flourishing in the DNR (Donetsk People's Republic) and LNR (Luhansk People's Republic)? So, maybe it was the shootings of the '90s that showed Russians that "he who is stronger is right" and that you can take anything by force of arms? Although Putin said that "we showed ourselves to be weak and the weak get beaten," the first one who introduced the norm "you have to be strong, perhaps even aggressive" was Yeltsin, who calmly watched the country plunge into the chaos of banditry and in addition to that organized war in Chechnya. For some reason, Sergei Medvedev doesn't want to notice all this, and the whole book is devoted exclusively to how bad Putin is, what a dictator he is (which is true), and that the Russian people are to blame for everything. I would like to ask Sergei, where was he all these 30 years? Why didn't it bother him for 30 years? What happened to Sergei that made him suddenly have an epiphany? Why didn't he see it before? Was he busy building Nord Stream 2? Ouch! These seem to be other sudden epiphany (Who-is-Mr-Putin) citizens. So, why should the sins of the elite, which has been drinking oil and the blood of Russians for 30 years and now drinks the blood of Ukrainians, be the responsibility of ordinary people and not the people who have enriched themselves during all this time? It is a funny situation when people like Sergei Medvedev want to shift all responsibility from their own shoulders to someone else's (is everything so bad on the front that you decided to quickly secure the place of "я завжди був на стороні добра"). You, Sergey, are the one who should answer as a representative of the cultural elite of the Russian Federation. It is very easy to blame everything on the abstract concept of people and avoid responsibility. Alas, but as history has shown, including the history of Germany, the elite itself is rarely responsible for their own crimes. There will always be a guy like Sergei Medvedev who will show and tell how the conventional "people" applauded the dictator.
As for the format of the book, it looks like a collection of Facebook posts, where each chapter takes up about 1-2 A4 pages. Everything that the author writes has been said many times by supporters of the non-systemic Russian opposition and the so-called intellectual Russian elite, which is anti-Putin, on YouTube. The author tries to invent something new, such as biopolitics, but it is the same dictatorship, authoritarianism, and totalitarianism. There is nothing special here. This was the case in the USSR and medieval Europe as well as in all current dictatorships, i.e., suppression of human will and imposition of one's own - state will.
As for the people's rejection of COVID-19 vaccines, people don't accept them because they don't understand how a country can produce such a sophisticated product if it can't even produce nails. So, here too, the author has failed to understand his own people. By the way, the story of COVID-19 in Russia illustrates well the real attitude of the people to the government and government propaganda.
Another section of the book is devoted to Vladimir Zhirinovsky. Considering that the author devoted several chapters to this person, it is the former (political) clown who is to blame for everything that is happening in Ukraine today. But the peak of Zhirinovsky's popularity came in the mid-90s and never increased again, which once again confirms my thesis that among the entire population of Russia, only 20-25% of radical people. In other words, for the majority of the Russian population, Zhirinovsky was a clown whose words could not be taken seriously. However, according to Sergey Medvedev, it was Comrade Z who started the conflict between Russia and Ukraine and/or the birth of "fascism" in the Russian Federation. But the author somehow forgot to mention that in any society there are people who support radicals like Zhirinovsky and that nowhere do they come to power democratically. From my point of view, Zhirinovsky's responsibility in the conflict between Ukraine and Russia is not high because Zhirinovsky spoke with slogans and ideas while Vladimir Putin is the most non-ideological politician in Russia. Russia invaded Ukraine not for ideological or idealistic reasons but purely for practical reasons - to stay in power for one more term (let's call it "Operation Crimea version 2.0").
I quit reading near the end when the author began to reflect on the topic of mobilization:«Even so, the number of people who openly protested on the streets or voted with their feet at the borders was less than 1 per cent of the population; so the rest – and we are talking here about millions of people – accepted the call-up as a part of normal life and the rules of the game, and went off to the recruitment offices or tried to find some way of obtaining an exemption».
A rare abomination, of course. First of all, millions of people were not recruited. We're talking about hundreds. Second, Russia is a poor country, which means that people don't have money to flee abroad, but it seems that Sergei Medvedev is as far removed from the common people as Russian officials. Third, fear has been instilled in the people since 1991, not since Putin came to power. For 30 years, the state has beaten, humiliated, and intimidated people, indoctrinating them with the idea that no one will help them and that nothing depends on them. Since Putin came to power, this policy has become even more active. And what kind of scum do you have to be to accuse intimidated people, who have lived under the KGB for 70 years, of not going with bare hands against the OMON. Where was the author all these years, and why didn't he lead the resistance if he was so fucking smart and brave? All this time, he was sitting in his fucking university and receiving money from the state, and now he thinks he is the conscience of the nation.
February 7, 2025
I don't remeber the time when I have sighed so much while reading a book.
It's absolutely terrifying but explains why Russia is the world's biggest bully.
It's absolutely terrifying but explains why Russia is the world's biggest bully.
June 28, 2024
Prawda jest przerażająca. Bardzo mocno polecam
June 21, 2024
Dla mnie bezsprzecznie jedna z najlepszych książek o współczesnej Rosji jakie czytałam. Zresztą nie tylko o samej Rosji, bo i sporą część swojego dzieła Siergiej Miedwiediew poświęca na analizę, przybliżenie i wytłumaczenie - zwłaszcza zachodnim - czytelnikom długotrwałego konfliktu, a teraz i wojny, na linii Rosja - Ukraina. I jest to analiza zaiste niezrównanie trafna i wnikliwa, pokuszę się o stwierdzenie, że najdoskonalsza i najcelniejsza z jaką miałam do czynienia.
Miedwiediew wyczerpująco, jak najbardziej wiarygodnie i zrozumiale tłumaczy genezę nienawiści Putina do Ukrainy (jak i innych państw byłego ZSRR i Zachodu) i udowadnia, że z tym dyktatorem u władzy eskalacja konfliktu i pełnoskalowa inwazja Rosji na Ukrainę były nieuniknione. Autor doskonale też objaśnia tę, kompletnie dla nas mieszkańców zachodu niezrozumiałą, pasywną i bierną reakcję, a i przyzwolenie „zwykłych” Rosjan zarówno na związany z wieloma uciążliwymi dla obywateli konsekwencjami (sankcje, obowiązkowy pobór synów/mężow/braci) atak Rosji na Ukrainę jak i od lat wszechobecną legitymizację przemocy i ogrom nieludzkich, nie mających sensownego wyjaśnienia zakazów i nakazów jakie Putin wprowadził w kraju.
U mnie ta książka ląduje w wykazie obowiązkowych lektur - w przypadku gdy ktoś będzie mnie pytał o książki o Rosji. Bardzo bym polecała tę książkę „na start” dla osób, które chcą bardziej zagłębić się w temat Rosji - idealnie sprawdzi się jako wprowadzenie, bo doskonale tłumaczy specyfikę tego kraju i zachowania Putina, które nam Europejczykom jawią się jako kompletnie niezrozumiałe, szalone i irracjonalne.
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Miedwiediew wyczerpująco, jak najbardziej wiarygodnie i zrozumiale tłumaczy genezę nienawiści Putina do Ukrainy (jak i innych państw byłego ZSRR i Zachodu) i udowadnia, że z tym dyktatorem u władzy eskalacja konfliktu i pełnoskalowa inwazja Rosji na Ukrainę były nieuniknione. Autor doskonale też objaśnia tę, kompletnie dla nas mieszkańców zachodu niezrozumiałą, pasywną i bierną reakcję, a i przyzwolenie „zwykłych” Rosjan zarówno na związany z wieloma uciążliwymi dla obywateli konsekwencjami (sankcje, obowiązkowy pobór synów/mężow/braci) atak Rosji na Ukrainę jak i od lat wszechobecną legitymizację przemocy i ogrom nieludzkich, nie mających sensownego wyjaśnienia zakazów i nakazów jakie Putin wprowadził w kraju.
U mnie ta książka ląduje w wykazie obowiązkowych lektur - w przypadku gdy ktoś będzie mnie pytał o książki o Rosji. Bardzo bym polecała tę książkę „na start” dla osób, które chcą bardziej zagłębić się w temat Rosji - idealnie sprawdzi się jako wprowadzenie, bo doskonale tłumaczy specyfikę tego kraju i zachowania Putina, które nam Europejczykom jawią się jako kompletnie niezrozumiałe, szalone i irracjonalne.
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July 23, 2024
"The state in Russia has effectively destroyed society and the fundamentals of citizenship, everyone is trapped in their own cell of the corporate and territorial structure, and owes all the elements of their life not to their own merits, but to the state, which distributes benefits, privileges - and repression."
There are a growing number of books looking at Putin, Russia and the war Russia is waging against Ukraine. It is hard to know where to start. Sergi Medvedev has been writing about the auto-cannibalism of his country for some time. In the introduction to his book he asks "... is the war in Ukraine Putin's personal war, or is it all of Russia's war? Or more broadly, is the present regime a random occurrence created by one man, or the natural consequences of Russia's long-term evolution...". After a comprehensive introduction the following three sections, split into bite sized chapters, attempt to dissect how we got to where we are today.
Perhaps missing from this work is a full historic overview of how a triumphalist neoliberalism which swept the world in the wake of the Soviet collapse had no regard for the misery it inflicted on millions, or how it enabled a criminal elite for whom the free market and its complete deregulation of the global economy (which tore up any social contract that accepted that society needed a system of wealth redistribution and a means to control the excesses of capital) provided the perfect conditions for the explosion of global mafia deformed version of capitalism. The book really looks at the aftermath of what happens when the state is overthrown and mammon is raised to the status of omnipotent deity. Ironically the state while destroyed in the Soviet collapse turned out to be the best means for the new criminal elite to consolidate their hold once again over society (they clearly were not alone in realising this). When Putin rose to power I have to say his apparent ability to rescue Russia from ashes impressed me. From a country of warring mobsters something approximating a functional state reappeared and now with a sober, apparently professional politician at its head. It is little surprise that for Russians who had lost everything in the preceding decades Putin should appear as a saviour delivering economic stability and a country they could once again feel proud of. The problem with all this was, however, that it rang alarm bells too, there are historic similarities between 2000's Russia and 1930's Germany. This is something that Medvedev alludes to in his book and for those with a good grounding in European history it is an inescapable thought as you read his words.
Medvedev looks at the historic relationship between the state and the individual in Russian history and describes how "external wars and internal colonisation" have built Russia and its empire leading to a system of "surveillance and police control, with virtually no place for civil organisation or local autonomy", a pattern which has survived ideological changes in the imperial centre. (It might be possible to challenge his assertion about local autonomy, historically there are many examples of local autonomy in the Russian empire which have benefited the centre, but as long as the autonomy remained loyal to the centre.). Internally Medvedev looks at how the state has declared "...absolute control over the physical body of the citizen...". He identifies what he terms the four "wars":
The War for Space (territory)
The War for Symbols (signs of power and authority)
The War for the Body (of the citizen, sexuality, etc)
The War for Memory ( the control of history and its interpretation and celebration)
This war has now been conducted over two decades gradually chipping away at what was left of civil society and in the process carrying the bulk of the population along in support. While Medvedev says that this process has lacked a popular ideological motivator (something which for Jade McGlynn in her "Russia's War" is intentional and important as an atomised and demobilised population that cowers under the threat of an all powerful state is less threatening to that state than an ideologically mobilised and possibly unpredictable mob) it has not been without its cheerleaders. An array of nationalist, xenophobes and fascists have sought the Kremlin's ear and have attempted to guide or direct state policy, from the Eurasianism of Dugan, to the unhinged rantings of proto-fascist Zhirinovsky and Yuriev's "The Third Empire: Russia as it Should Be", a sort of "Turner Diaries" xenophobe's guide to making Russia great again. In a similar vein, Medvedev notes Vladislav Surkovs' (a "former Kremlin chief ideologist") "Where Has Chaos Gone? Unpacking Instability" which calls on Russia to be an "exporter of chaos". This is the global manifestation of the Putin regime in which revenge for the worlds crimes against it is seen as the motivator, especially the crimes of the "liberal West" (a subject examined well by Belton in "Putin's People" and Shekhovtsov in "Russia and the Western Far Right: Tango Noir"), where by aligning with those who seek to undermine Western liberal democracy Russia's greatness can be restored at the head of a sort of fascist international.
The Russian war against Ukraine should not then, argues Medvedev, be seen as "a regional conflict on the edge of Europe". While it may not have played out as envisaged it is just a part of a greater plan. It is "... a world war, unleashed by Russia to overturn the modern liberal world order. It has many open and hidden global supporters, and there are neutral countries watching carefully to see how this challenge that has been thrown down to mankind pans out. The war in Ukraine is a mere prelude, and it does not matter whether Putin's regime triumphs (whatever he might call a "victory") or he has to back down, he will continue to try to break the modern world, by either using "hybrid wars" or open aggression, information sabotage or nuclear blackmail, until he suffers a decisive military defeat and the regime is utterly destroyed." . During the Cold War liberal democracies were careful to try to keep their populations onside and relatively happy with social welfare and crumbs from the table. With Cold War victory they neglected their populations and the social promises that legitimised their existence. It is not surprising given the experiences of the Global South over decades and the declining life experiences of a global majority that Putin, and his allies globally, have found a niche they can exploit and expand in. This is a rather bleak outlook, and currently with Putin likely to soon have an ally back in the Whitehouse, and the populist extreme-right on the rise pretty much everywhere, and playing the long game, with Western liberal democracy wrongfooted and a victim of its own hubris, the future looks dire and assuredly nasty, violent and fascist.
This is an important book which seeks to interpret our world and where it is heading, the urgent and difficult task for those who care for peace and stability and a future is how to change it.
"Militarism became the ideology of the state, war seized the imagination of the nation, Chekov's guns were hung on all the walls; yet we stubbornly refused to take all this seriously, regarding it simply as a postmodern game and political theatre."
There are a growing number of books looking at Putin, Russia and the war Russia is waging against Ukraine. It is hard to know where to start. Sergi Medvedev has been writing about the auto-cannibalism of his country for some time. In the introduction to his book he asks "... is the war in Ukraine Putin's personal war, or is it all of Russia's war? Or more broadly, is the present regime a random occurrence created by one man, or the natural consequences of Russia's long-term evolution...". After a comprehensive introduction the following three sections, split into bite sized chapters, attempt to dissect how we got to where we are today.
Perhaps missing from this work is a full historic overview of how a triumphalist neoliberalism which swept the world in the wake of the Soviet collapse had no regard for the misery it inflicted on millions, or how it enabled a criminal elite for whom the free market and its complete deregulation of the global economy (which tore up any social contract that accepted that society needed a system of wealth redistribution and a means to control the excesses of capital) provided the perfect conditions for the explosion of global mafia deformed version of capitalism. The book really looks at the aftermath of what happens when the state is overthrown and mammon is raised to the status of omnipotent deity. Ironically the state while destroyed in the Soviet collapse turned out to be the best means for the new criminal elite to consolidate their hold once again over society (they clearly were not alone in realising this). When Putin rose to power I have to say his apparent ability to rescue Russia from ashes impressed me. From a country of warring mobsters something approximating a functional state reappeared and now with a sober, apparently professional politician at its head. It is little surprise that for Russians who had lost everything in the preceding decades Putin should appear as a saviour delivering economic stability and a country they could once again feel proud of. The problem with all this was, however, that it rang alarm bells too, there are historic similarities between 2000's Russia and 1930's Germany. This is something that Medvedev alludes to in his book and for those with a good grounding in European history it is an inescapable thought as you read his words.
Medvedev looks at the historic relationship between the state and the individual in Russian history and describes how "external wars and internal colonisation" have built Russia and its empire leading to a system of "surveillance and police control, with virtually no place for civil organisation or local autonomy", a pattern which has survived ideological changes in the imperial centre. (It might be possible to challenge his assertion about local autonomy, historically there are many examples of local autonomy in the Russian empire which have benefited the centre, but as long as the autonomy remained loyal to the centre.). Internally Medvedev looks at how the state has declared "...absolute control over the physical body of the citizen...". He identifies what he terms the four "wars":
The War for Space (territory)
The War for Symbols (signs of power and authority)
The War for the Body (of the citizen, sexuality, etc)
The War for Memory ( the control of history and its interpretation and celebration)
This war has now been conducted over two decades gradually chipping away at what was left of civil society and in the process carrying the bulk of the population along in support. While Medvedev says that this process has lacked a popular ideological motivator (something which for Jade McGlynn in her "Russia's War" is intentional and important as an atomised and demobilised population that cowers under the threat of an all powerful state is less threatening to that state than an ideologically mobilised and possibly unpredictable mob) it has not been without its cheerleaders. An array of nationalist, xenophobes and fascists have sought the Kremlin's ear and have attempted to guide or direct state policy, from the Eurasianism of Dugan, to the unhinged rantings of proto-fascist Zhirinovsky and Yuriev's "The Third Empire: Russia as it Should Be", a sort of "Turner Diaries" xenophobe's guide to making Russia great again. In a similar vein, Medvedev notes Vladislav Surkovs' (a "former Kremlin chief ideologist") "Where Has Chaos Gone? Unpacking Instability" which calls on Russia to be an "exporter of chaos". This is the global manifestation of the Putin regime in which revenge for the worlds crimes against it is seen as the motivator, especially the crimes of the "liberal West" (a subject examined well by Belton in "Putin's People" and Shekhovtsov in "Russia and the Western Far Right: Tango Noir"), where by aligning with those who seek to undermine Western liberal democracy Russia's greatness can be restored at the head of a sort of fascist international.
The Russian war against Ukraine should not then, argues Medvedev, be seen as "a regional conflict on the edge of Europe". While it may not have played out as envisaged it is just a part of a greater plan. It is "... a world war, unleashed by Russia to overturn the modern liberal world order. It has many open and hidden global supporters, and there are neutral countries watching carefully to see how this challenge that has been thrown down to mankind pans out. The war in Ukraine is a mere prelude, and it does not matter whether Putin's regime triumphs (whatever he might call a "victory") or he has to back down, he will continue to try to break the modern world, by either using "hybrid wars" or open aggression, information sabotage or nuclear blackmail, until he suffers a decisive military defeat and the regime is utterly destroyed." . During the Cold War liberal democracies were careful to try to keep their populations onside and relatively happy with social welfare and crumbs from the table. With Cold War victory they neglected their populations and the social promises that legitimised their existence. It is not surprising given the experiences of the Global South over decades and the declining life experiences of a global majority that Putin, and his allies globally, have found a niche they can exploit and expand in. This is a rather bleak outlook, and currently with Putin likely to soon have an ally back in the Whitehouse, and the populist extreme-right on the rise pretty much everywhere, and playing the long game, with Western liberal democracy wrongfooted and a victim of its own hubris, the future looks dire and assuredly nasty, violent and fascist.
This is an important book which seeks to interpret our world and where it is heading, the urgent and difficult task for those who care for peace and stability and a future is how to change it.
"Militarism became the ideology of the state, war seized the imagination of the nation, Chekov's guns were hung on all the walls; yet we stubbornly refused to take all this seriously, regarding it simply as a postmodern game and political theatre."
January 6, 2025
A few days after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Russian historian and journalist Sergei Medvedev left is home country. It is clear from this book that he will not be returning any time soon, if ever.
Medvedev’s central point is that Russia invaded Ukraine not because Putin wanted to (though of course that is true in the most trivial sense), but as a result of nearly three decades moral, political and economic degradation. In that sense, it was a war made in(side) Russia.
After quickly making this claim, the rest of the book is a description of this degradation, or in other words, how Russia is literally the worst place ever. At its best it is an lively polemic, but at times it reads like a long and repetitive diatribe.
Unfortunately this book also lacks a clear structure. The chapters and sections are not built toward making an argument, and there is a fair bit of repetition and even contradiction. At least a dozen times Medvedev claims to be identifying the ‘most important’, ‘defining’, ‘key’ or ‘main’ factor in Russia’s moral and political decay. But if all factors are important, none are. A War Made in Russia strikes me as a collection of essays made into a book and this is to its detriment.
Medvedev also makes a great number of claims about Russian society without proof. Just one example is the claim that the wives of Russian soldiers tell their husbands what is worth taking from Ukrainian homes, and to '”[g]o ahead and rape the Ukrainian bitches, just take precautions.”’ No citation is offered for this or other similar stories throughout the text.
Another claim worth addressing here concerns Russia and fascism. While I am not sure who was the first to call the Putin regime a fascist one, there has certainly been a lively debate on the topic since historian Timothy Snyder published his essay, ‘Russia’s War on Ukraine Shows That It Is Fascist’ in the New York Times in May 2022. Well-known political scientist, Alexander Motyl, made the same claim some months before in The Conversation. The Economist later agreed, too.
Personally, I am sceptical of the label. For one, as a short piece in Politico notes, fascism is future orientated and whatever ideology has gripped Russia looks back in time for inspiration, not forward. Medvedev also rightly points out that:
It is odd, then, when Medvedev insists on the fascist moniker, albeit with a ‘qualifying prefix’. He endorses American philosopher Mikhail Epstein’s term, schizo-fascism: ‘fascism behind the mask of a battle against fascism’. But this definition makes no effort to define a fascism for the twenty first century (that is, a post-industrial era), which Medvedev’s point above surely necessitates. To make matters worse, Medvedev then goes on to say that this means that the Second World War never really ended, because the war in Ukraine represents irredentism by fascist power. This is at best a stretch and at worst an unforgivably inaccurate interpretation of European history and the present conflict.
Nevertheless, Medvedev makes a number of interesting points and some accurate analysis.
Throughout the text, Medvedev employs philosophical concepts, showing he clearly favours a philosophical analysis over a social scientific one. Occasionally, this obscures the point he’s trying to make, though certainly not in the case of his utilisation of Michel Foucault’s idea of ‘biopolitics’. Especially its application to policies of violence against the body (torture, imprisonment, criminalisation of homosexuality). Medvedev even goes on to argue that because of its often random and anonymous nature, violence by the Russian state is comparable to that seen during the Great Terror. ‘[W]e can speak,’ he says ‘of “a new 1937” not just metaphorically, but more literally'. Once again, however, I think the historical parallel is an unneeded stretch.
At a number of points, Medvedev shows how the Putin regime has 'established a cordon anti-sanitaire' around Russia: a belt of lawless regimes along its southern boundary: Chechnya, the non-recognized republics of the Caucasus (Abkhazia and South Ossetia), through Donetsk, Luhansk, and Crimea, and finally Belarus. They are outside the normal Russian legal order, and run with the aid of terror. This is an interesting conceptualisation.
Later on, a section on the recently deceased Vladimir Zhirinovsky is also interesting. Medvedev explains how he was a trail blazer for so many of the ideas that have gained purchase under Putin. He was the first major figure to talk about Russia's humiliation, and how Russia had a right to take offence at how it had been treated after the fall of the USSR. He is, Medvedev says, Putin's 'spiritual father' and we are today 'living in the post-apocalyptic world dreamt up by Vladimir Zhirinovsky.’
Medvedev’s central point is that Russia invaded Ukraine not because Putin wanted to (though of course that is true in the most trivial sense), but as a result of nearly three decades moral, political and economic degradation. In that sense, it was a war made in(side) Russia.
After quickly making this claim, the rest of the book is a description of this degradation, or in other words, how Russia is literally the worst place ever. At its best it is an lively polemic, but at times it reads like a long and repetitive diatribe.
Unfortunately this book also lacks a clear structure. The chapters and sections are not built toward making an argument, and there is a fair bit of repetition and even contradiction. At least a dozen times Medvedev claims to be identifying the ‘most important’, ‘defining’, ‘key’ or ‘main’ factor in Russia’s moral and political decay. But if all factors are important, none are. A War Made in Russia strikes me as a collection of essays made into a book and this is to its detriment.
Medvedev also makes a great number of claims about Russian society without proof. Just one example is the claim that the wives of Russian soldiers tell their husbands what is worth taking from Ukrainian homes, and to '”[g]o ahead and rape the Ukrainian bitches, just take precautions.”’ No citation is offered for this or other similar stories throughout the text.
Another claim worth addressing here concerns Russia and fascism. While I am not sure who was the first to call the Putin regime a fascist one, there has certainly been a lively debate on the topic since historian Timothy Snyder published his essay, ‘Russia’s War on Ukraine Shows That It Is Fascist’ in the New York Times in May 2022. Well-known political scientist, Alexander Motyl, made the same claim some months before in The Conversation. The Economist later agreed, too.
Personally, I am sceptical of the label. For one, as a short piece in Politico notes, fascism is future orientated and whatever ideology has gripped Russia looks back in time for inspiration, not forward. Medvedev also rightly points out that:
The problem is that the classic fascism of the twentieth century was a product of a mass industrialized society, while Putinism has come out of a post-Soviet, post-industrial and post- mass society, based on demobilization and atomization.
It is odd, then, when Medvedev insists on the fascist moniker, albeit with a ‘qualifying prefix’. He endorses American philosopher Mikhail Epstein’s term, schizo-fascism: ‘fascism behind the mask of a battle against fascism’. But this definition makes no effort to define a fascism for the twenty first century (that is, a post-industrial era), which Medvedev’s point above surely necessitates. To make matters worse, Medvedev then goes on to say that this means that the Second World War never really ended, because the war in Ukraine represents irredentism by fascist power. This is at best a stretch and at worst an unforgivably inaccurate interpretation of European history and the present conflict.
Nevertheless, Medvedev makes a number of interesting points and some accurate analysis.
Throughout the text, Medvedev employs philosophical concepts, showing he clearly favours a philosophical analysis over a social scientific one. Occasionally, this obscures the point he’s trying to make, though certainly not in the case of his utilisation of Michel Foucault’s idea of ‘biopolitics’. Especially its application to policies of violence against the body (torture, imprisonment, criminalisation of homosexuality). Medvedev even goes on to argue that because of its often random and anonymous nature, violence by the Russian state is comparable to that seen during the Great Terror. ‘[W]e can speak,’ he says ‘of “a new 1937” not just metaphorically, but more literally'. Once again, however, I think the historical parallel is an unneeded stretch.
At a number of points, Medvedev shows how the Putin regime has 'established a cordon anti-sanitaire' around Russia: a belt of lawless regimes along its southern boundary: Chechnya, the non-recognized republics of the Caucasus (Abkhazia and South Ossetia), through Donetsk, Luhansk, and Crimea, and finally Belarus. They are outside the normal Russian legal order, and run with the aid of terror. This is an interesting conceptualisation.
Later on, a section on the recently deceased Vladimir Zhirinovsky is also interesting. Medvedev explains how he was a trail blazer for so many of the ideas that have gained purchase under Putin. He was the first major figure to talk about Russia's humiliation, and how Russia had a right to take offence at how it had been treated after the fall of the USSR. He is, Medvedev says, Putin's 'spiritual father' and we are today 'living in the post-apocalyptic world dreamt up by Vladimir Zhirinovsky.’
June 19, 2024
"The letter 'Z' instantly became the symbol of Russia's war against Ukraine...What does this symbol mean? Military specialists say that from the start of the war these were the signs chosen to mark vehicles of the western and eastern groups of forces for the invasion of Ukraine: 'Z' for zapad ['west'], and 'V' for vostok ['east']. But whatever these letters are supposed to signify, the instant promotion of 'Z', the appearance of thousands of billboards and quality pictures taken by drones of Z-performances, the fervour with which officials put it on the facades of public buildings, all point to a massive PR campaign, thought out well before the start of the war and, it seems, approved by the Kremlin." (124-25)
In 2018, my wife and I lived in Ukraine for the summer, specifically in Lviv, to teach English to college students from Ukrainian Catholic University (UCU). Unbeknownst to us, or just being ignorant Americans to the politics (symbolism) at the time, our last name is Zdinak, so we had these giant brand-new name tags for our luggage with a giant red 'Z' on them, for Zdinak. By the time we had landed in Kyiv and then hopped over to Lviv Danylo Halytskyi International Airport on our connecting flight, the nametags were gone. We were so disappointed, our first taste of Ukraine had been thievery. It wasn't until 2020-2021 I realized what had most likely taken place. The airport workers probably saw the nametags and instead of stealing them, saved us any ridicule by throwing those name tags out. I never got to find out if that was the case, but I'm 99% sure this is what happened, and I never got to thank those workers, so 'Thank You, and I hope we did not insult you!"
Russia has been after Ukraine since it first existed, most people don't realize that Ukraine was the mother country-city to Russia before Russia existed as it does today. Kievan-Rus was the first city in the late 800s. I was rocking my newborn to sleep the night of February 23 in Ohio when the first shots and attacks rang out in the night on February 24th in Ukraine. I remember looking at my wife and saying World War III and the Second Cold War had officially begun. I sobbed in the chair, rocking our sweet baby girl and thinking to myself that Europe has not seen a war like this since 1945, and unjustly and provoked attack from one civilized country to another. I was in awe.
This book written by Sergei Medvedev speaks to that sentiment. Looking not only at Russia as a whole, but her leaders, especially Putin, which he describes as being a product of Russian aggression, rather than the other way around like most people believe. He opened my eyes to many things that I had studied in school as a history and political science double major, but hadn't looked at it in that light. I think also, the fact that Medvedev is a Russian citizen who also disagrees with Putin and is speaking outright, is extremely brave, especially after what has happened to so many of her critics, like Alexei Navalny most recently.
I give this book 4 stars, as it is very well written and well thought out, coming from the side of view of the attacking country that sides with the victim country. I gave it 4 because there was a lot of repetition in parts, but for people who don't know or understand the geopolitical sides of this war, I think those repetitive statements were important.
This war has to stop, and to prevent things like this from ever happening again we have to learn our global history, we must understand and punish those who inflict harm on others, to prevent these genocidal wars from continuing. World War I & II should have been lessons enough, as well as the Cold War. Russia's government and leaders have been an issue for the last 100 years, and no one has learned a damn thing.
"Without a radical solution to 'the Russia problem', global security cannot be guaranteed. This demands a coordination of resources by the international community not seen since the Second World War. For too long, Russia has been waving in front of itself the mystical figure of '1945' and the slogan, 'We Can Repeat It!', and the end result of that was the invasion of Ukraine. But in fact it is the West that should repeat 1945." (164)
By the war's end in 1945 one dictatorship had been overthrown to strengthen the Empire of another, as the author states in the last line of the book, " It is time for the West to finish the work of 1945." (164). We must stop this tyrant! 'Slava Ukraini!'
In 2018, my wife and I lived in Ukraine for the summer, specifically in Lviv, to teach English to college students from Ukrainian Catholic University (UCU). Unbeknownst to us, or just being ignorant Americans to the politics (symbolism) at the time, our last name is Zdinak, so we had these giant brand-new name tags for our luggage with a giant red 'Z' on them, for Zdinak. By the time we had landed in Kyiv and then hopped over to Lviv Danylo Halytskyi International Airport on our connecting flight, the nametags were gone. We were so disappointed, our first taste of Ukraine had been thievery. It wasn't until 2020-2021 I realized what had most likely taken place. The airport workers probably saw the nametags and instead of stealing them, saved us any ridicule by throwing those name tags out. I never got to find out if that was the case, but I'm 99% sure this is what happened, and I never got to thank those workers, so 'Thank You, and I hope we did not insult you!"
Russia has been after Ukraine since it first existed, most people don't realize that Ukraine was the mother country-city to Russia before Russia existed as it does today. Kievan-Rus was the first city in the late 800s. I was rocking my newborn to sleep the night of February 23 in Ohio when the first shots and attacks rang out in the night on February 24th in Ukraine. I remember looking at my wife and saying World War III and the Second Cold War had officially begun. I sobbed in the chair, rocking our sweet baby girl and thinking to myself that Europe has not seen a war like this since 1945, and unjustly and provoked attack from one civilized country to another. I was in awe.
This book written by Sergei Medvedev speaks to that sentiment. Looking not only at Russia as a whole, but her leaders, especially Putin, which he describes as being a product of Russian aggression, rather than the other way around like most people believe. He opened my eyes to many things that I had studied in school as a history and political science double major, but hadn't looked at it in that light. I think also, the fact that Medvedev is a Russian citizen who also disagrees with Putin and is speaking outright, is extremely brave, especially after what has happened to so many of her critics, like Alexei Navalny most recently.
I give this book 4 stars, as it is very well written and well thought out, coming from the side of view of the attacking country that sides with the victim country. I gave it 4 because there was a lot of repetition in parts, but for people who don't know or understand the geopolitical sides of this war, I think those repetitive statements were important.
This war has to stop, and to prevent things like this from ever happening again we have to learn our global history, we must understand and punish those who inflict harm on others, to prevent these genocidal wars from continuing. World War I & II should have been lessons enough, as well as the Cold War. Russia's government and leaders have been an issue for the last 100 years, and no one has learned a damn thing.
"Without a radical solution to 'the Russia problem', global security cannot be guaranteed. This demands a coordination of resources by the international community not seen since the Second World War. For too long, Russia has been waving in front of itself the mystical figure of '1945' and the slogan, 'We Can Repeat It!', and the end result of that was the invasion of Ukraine. But in fact it is the West that should repeat 1945." (164)
By the war's end in 1945 one dictatorship had been overthrown to strengthen the Empire of another, as the author states in the last line of the book, " It is time for the West to finish the work of 1945." (164). We must stop this tyrant! 'Slava Ukraini!'
August 2, 2025
Read this thanks to references in “Null” by Szczepan Twardoch. The book focuses on challenging the opinion that the war against Ukraine is “Putin’s war” and we shouldn’t blame the whole Russian society for it.
Interesting parts are showing a Russian citizen’s perspective and describing facts from everyday life and from social media that are not known outside. You may suspect things are bad in Russia, but the book will for sure surprise you and demonstrate it's far more abnormal than you can imagine. The author makes it very clear that a big part of the society approves violence, and it’s not just due to the recent 30 years; it goes back to the 19th century and even further.
The bad parts are that the author gets repetitive in expressing frustration with modern Russia, obviously hoping for something better. Also sometimes wastes time trying to find a clear reason and logic behind events, even when they are probably a result of random factors. The structure has flaws, with repetitions of the same facts and thoughts across chapters. But the negative aspects aren't too painful because the book is short.
Interesting parts are showing a Russian citizen’s perspective and describing facts from everyday life and from social media that are not known outside. You may suspect things are bad in Russia, but the book will for sure surprise you and demonstrate it's far more abnormal than you can imagine. The author makes it very clear that a big part of the society approves violence, and it’s not just due to the recent 30 years; it goes back to the 19th century and even further.
The bad parts are that the author gets repetitive in expressing frustration with modern Russia, obviously hoping for something better. Also sometimes wastes time trying to find a clear reason and logic behind events, even when they are probably a result of random factors. The structure has flaws, with repetitions of the same facts and thoughts across chapters. But the negative aspects aren't too painful because the book is short.
December 5, 2023
This is a polemic, and as a polemic it is first-rate.
Medvedev is angry at how Russia misused and lost the post-Soviet moment of opportunity. His anger is expressed mostly at Russian targets, but he also points out Western missteps along the way.
Maybe not the best book for someone's "first book" on recent history or the roots of the Ukraine War, but it certainly should be read by people who care about the current war and need to be reminded about what is at stake.
Medvedev is angry at how Russia misused and lost the post-Soviet moment of opportunity. His anger is expressed mostly at Russian targets, but he also points out Western missteps along the way.
Maybe not the best book for someone's "first book" on recent history or the roots of the Ukraine War, but it certainly should be read by people who care about the current war and need to be reminded about what is at stake.
June 19, 2024
Great read. Highly recommend to anyone who has doubts about Putins intentions going further than Ukrainian borders.
July 17, 2025
chcesz wiedzieć dlaczego rosja to agresor? przeczytaj
July 25, 2025
Bardzo ciekawy opis współczesnej faszystowskiej Rosji Putina. Warto
przeczytać książkę rosyjskiego dysydenta.
przeczytać książkę rosyjskiego dysydenta.
September 14, 2025
Loved when it explained how the war affected civil life via symbolism and activities in school.
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