9 March 2014
In 1994 Putin declared: “What happens to ethnic Russians beyond our borders is for us an existential question.” To a ruler inside the frame of law it should, of course, be a political question.
This means that the current Crimean affair cannot be resolved inside a political structuration of any existent system.
This means, in turn, that attention must be paid to the man, not the maps.
If permitted, this fantastic doctrine, then the following, in logic, would be legitimised: a referendum in Kashmir, a referendum in Tibet, a referendum in Xinjiang, a referendum in Catalunia, a referendum in the Basque Country, and there are more. Some of these may be deemed worthwhile but the categorics of the present legal world-frame do not allow it.
Further, with a Russian minority of over 38% it must follow that the next target will be Kazakhstan. Again, if reason is to be applied, there is no way China could allow Russia along that enormous and vulnerable frontier it shares with Kazakhstan.
The Ukrainian people must allow the slow reaction from Europe, anxious though they must be, because this programme launched by the Russian dictator is in its nature, not its essence, but through and through, irrational. More than that it is an anticipatory act of a coming self-destruction.
Putin did not drop out of the sky. In fact, he came from below-stairs. He is not a K.G.B. boss, he operated below stairs – where people were tortured and silenced. He was imposed on the political class by an alcoholic in his final phase of disintegration. Using the new oligarchs he took advantage of the remarkable chaos caused by the world financiers’ greed, and in the shortest time grabbed power.
Utterly devoid of any knowledge tracing to deep cultural seams in the Russian and European past, he exists on a world-view that thinks political and power values simply began with Lenin. Everything before that is a fog. We are dealing with a man not only without background (the past), but without foreground (the present).
He has scraped together a media silhouette – martial arts, fishing, a horse. He has adopted a glare at world conferences. Walking and sitting are difficult for him, for they show his lack of upbringing. His Russian is limited and often low-life. He met Solzhenitsyn, but certainly he dare not read him. His ignorance will be his downfall.
In the year 50 B.C, Cicero wrote to Atticus:
“The political system alarms me deeply, and so far I have found scarcely anybody who is not for giving Caesar what he demands rather than fighting it out. The demand is impudent no doubt, but more moderate than was expected. And why should we start standing up to him now? It is no worse a thing than when we gave him his five years’ extension or when we brought in the law authorising his candidature ‘in absentia’. Or did we put these weapons into his hands only to fight him now that he is equipped and ready?”
Today, 2014 we can declare: “What happens to educated Russians inside its borders is for us a political question.”
In their hands, and their hands only, lies the path to a new society after long darkness.
Russian Version coming soon
