Onward to the Past!

Russian elites pine for the USSR. But which one?

Ilya Grashchenkov

Sic transit gloria maxima. It seems that we are again returning to the strangely neglected topic of the transfer of power, a topic which may have been ignored but has not gone away. This is of great interest to our current elites, who have been involuntarily polarized into two extremes. It would be correct to divide the “Kremlin players” - meaning the Russian political authorities - and Russian business players into maximalists and moderates, who are constantly identified either with the party of peace and the party of war, or systemic liberals and security forces, or monetarists and inflationists, etc. - they have many masks, names and incarnations.

However, what matters is not what we call them, but what unites and separates them.

The only thing that matters to the first group is power, which is “sweeter than wine,” as Mr. Khrushchev was wont to say. For them, the state of the country's economy is not so important since, as we have seen in Venezuela or Iran, the devastation does not affect the personal well-being of those on top. Yes, the pleasure of power can be obtained even when it doesn't contribute to their material comfort or affect their domestic support, though for those on the outside life is much worse. The experience of the USSR will be instructive here. The latter group, on the contrary, do not want to part with luxury in their personal lives in exchange for more power. They are more moderate in everything, from their attitude towards the West to life itself. They could be called pragmatists, if only one does not forget that their pragmatism does not refer to solving the objective problems facing the country, but to ensuring personal interest and comfort.

The ideal of all these groups is the USSR, but of different periods, whether Stalinism, collective leadership, Khrushchev, Brezhnev, Andropov and even Gorbachev (without the upheavals of 1991, of course). Whichever one they choose, it will be the USSR without the Marxist-Leninist ideology, without the declaration of equality for all or social guarantees for workers, and without party control over the state security agencies that were the “shield and sword” of the system, but by no means its core. By the way, a party with real leadership would be nothing but a terrible nightmare for those at the top of our society, which is why United Russia may be called the “party of power” in quotation marks only. It does not appoint anyone or manage to do anything, but only ensures the perpetuation of the status quo.

The current situation, however it may be settled, is a struggle for control over the transfer of power. This is not just a spontaneous struggle of moderates and maximalists for one or another resolution of these events. What is happening in the background is the conscious struggle of these groups for the further transformation of the country towards their “ideal USSR.”

Unfortunately, this Soviet Union exists only in the combatants' brains, and furthermore is impossible to realize even in principle. The task they have taken on is the reproduction of the old system, but absent everything that made it not just attractive, but generally viable.

Not only is the elite not united in terms of strategy, but its political options are extremely limited. Due to the current situation, the transfer of power became possible only in two diametrically opposed directions. The first scenario ends with the final victory of the maximalists with the total defeat of the moderates. The second scenario sees the reconquest of the moderates via the economy. The first group is strong in the moment, because now, according to the laws of the “special operation” period we find ourselves in, they hold the trump cards to deal with competitors, since for them it is a causa sine qua non. However, by continuing to tighten the bolts, they run the risk of stripping the thread. The ability of Russian society to withstand constant pressure from the authorities is well known. But, for one thing, there are limits even to this, and for another, it is precisely the ability of the population to adapt to the initiatives of the ruling circles that often brings these plans to naught. Everything is sinking in a quagmire of quiet sabotage, which turns out to be more effective than the most radical resistance. It is enough to look at what the attempt to turn dissidents into “foreign agents” has led to. Despite calls for reprisals from the ultra-conservative camp, the authorities are clearly in no hurry to follow the slippery slope of McCarthyism, and are content with moderate control over foreign agents, some of whom continue to work officially in Russia. And the lists of "foreign agents" announced on Fridays have ceased to be replenished with the same frequency as prevailed in the first months of work.

The second group has the resources, including intellectual resources, necessary to overcome the consequences of the sanctions. The final battle of the Chekists against the Freemasons, it seems, is still ahead of us in the not too distant future, because the first group is now competing with even greater maximalists, who either go on a “justice march” to Moscow or offer to personally purge the elites of those who, from their point of view, are not enough like them. However, the outcome of this battle will be determined by the spontaneous development of events, which neither group is able to control. Or predict.

Translated by Dan Erdman