The tragedy of Russia is that it could be one of the most livable countries on earth, peacefully competing with China and the US. Then the phantom pains of perceived inferiority would disappear. But it’s just light years away from that.
Not a day goes by when news from Russia or statements by Putin and company about their murderous policies don’t make your blood run cold. But there are also pictures from the largest country on earth that leave you stunned, for example when clergymen declare the Christian commandment that you shall not kill to be sound and incense and give soldiers their blessing before they go to war for a ruler, who thinks of himself as an emperor somewhere between Peter the Great and Stalin, but is actually a destroyer.
Putin managed to turn his empire into the saddest country in the world. Russia is something of a particularly perfidious version of a failed state. The state works. But a single ruler and his kleptocratic gang made him their prey and erected a edifice of rulership of the kind known from African countries. The concentration of power on Putin has taken on feudal forms. Even his paranoia about getting sick or being murdered fits into the image of emperors and kings of earlier centuries. Incidentally, also the ridiculous pomp when the lord of the overly long tables strides through the huge halls of his palace, past soldiers in imitation uniforms from the time when Russia was a real and not just perceived empire.
Of course, there are also bizarre (self-)presentations in Western countries. However, politicians (and monarchs) do not take themselves so seriously there and do not celebrate their appearances in the way that the ruler in the Kremlin prefers. If Putin ever had a sense of when self-importance seems silly, he has lost it. Otherwise he would know that exaggerated patriotism today quickly ends up in the realm of satire. This was shown during the crazy annexation show in the Kremlin, when Putin and the separatist leaders he was directing put their hands on each other and cheered, with shouts of “Rossiya,” an act that violated international law.
However, Putin does not notice that either. He has successfully sealed himself off from criticism and outside influence. Perhaps Putin is so delusional in his megalomania that he actually believes that millions of Ukrainians voted in referendums to join Russia. You have to be careful with pathologization – but with Putin there is some evidence that he is no longer from this world, but driven by his own brain ghosts who constantly tell him: You are the very greatest. you are the emperor
How else could Darth Wladi say loads of nonsense without pausing or bursting out laughing. In all seriousness, the aggressor invokes the UN principles of “equality and self-determination of peoples” when it comes to annexing Ukrainian state territory. We remember: The United Nations is the institution that Putin despises and abuses. “We are calling on the Kiev regime to stop the shelling and all fighting immediately and to return to the negotiating table,” says Putin the Enraptured, the warlord who had his neighboring country invaded. The attacker asks the attacked to stop counterattacking. This is madness that doesn’t need a psychiatric test to recognize.
There are other very sad countries on earth too, many of them in Africa. Or Afghanistan. But these states, all ex-colonies of Western countries, have had little real chance in their recent history to turn the tide towards democracy. Not to mention North Korea. However, after the (temporary) end of the Cold War, Russia had the opportunity to become a modern state, opening up and preserving its identity, building a modern industry and living not only on raw materials and vodka.
The door was open to leave the time of power-obsessed rulers behind and to resolve the ambivalence that has plagued Russia for decades: rejecting the West and yet being as Western as possible. To emulate the West, to regard it as a measure of one’s own successes and at the same time to despise it, must inevitably lead to an ordeal, which is now erupting in the war against Ukraine.
Anyone who allows punk must also tolerate odd-looking figures in the street scene. Both is not possible. And so gradually came the condemnation of everything liberal that had reached Russia from the West. The extremely innovative cultural scene is as good as dead, it only takes place in niches (or abroad). In the end, human rights also fell victim to this spiral of physical and verbal violence. Humanity counts for nothing in the saddest country in the world, but archaic brutality. Consider that the head of Russia’s Chechen Republic, Ramzan Kadyrov, proudly proclaims that he will send three of his underage sons to war against Ukraine. That’s crazy too.
That a 21st-century European warlord would dare to regard hundreds of thousands of men as cannon fodder speaks to a complete lack of respect for the human creature. For Putin – another post-feudal approach to governance – citizens are either soldiers or claqueurs, in any case supporters of his cause. Otherwise, if you are not with him, you are against him. The interests of the general population, especially in the areas far from Moscow and St. Petersburg, play a subordinate role. Putin is only interested in them when he realizes that things are getting tight for him.
The poverty is blatant, since only a tiny part of the Russian population benefits from the country’s wealth and Putin’s grace. The author of these lines had the honor of helping the Ukrainian Julia Solska to publish her diary from the first days of the war in Germany. In it she writes about looting that allows conclusions to be drawn about the standard of living in Putin’s empire. “The Russians invade a country, murder and destroy in order to steal computers and shoes. If we had known that Putin’s soldiers want flat screen TVs and tablets, we would have sent them to them. Then they could have spared themselves and us the war. “
The tragedy of Russia is that it could be one of the most livable countries on earth, peacefully competing with China and the US. Then the phantom pains of perceived inferiority would disappear and Russia would no longer need to blame the West for its own shortcomings. Perhaps the world will live to see this Russia. It would be a blessing to mankind.
