Syndrome of the aging Secretary General

"The main thing is that Putin worries today is personal safety"

Syndrome of the aging Secretary General

Personal safety is the main thing that excites Putin today, and it is here that we must look for the reason for the dismissal of the Minister of Defense Anatoly Serdyukov

September 25, 2012. Behind V.V. Putin is a “defense” Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin, but the Minister of Defense Anatoly Serdyukov is no longer in the retinue

14 years ago, in December 1998, I already wrote a column under such a heading. Then she concerned President Yeltsin, a sick and more and more helpless, consistently fired around him, who were devoted not only to him, but also to the cause - a dozen names can be called on the move, and replaced them from the KGB. Their ability to peep and eavesdropped, it seemed, it seemed, the suppression of disloyalty in the bud, and defended primarily from her. The fear of the conspiracy, the fear of the fate, if not a king strangled by a pillow, then Khrushchev, devoted to his nominants, - this fear pursued all the Soviet leaders who, leaving the Kremlin, sought exclusively on a carriage, but it was precisely this carriage served before the deadline that were most afraid. Putin is also afraid.

Thermal missiles

A week after the resignation of the Minister of Defense in the media, a whole heap of versions appeared, which served as a reason.

Version One: hardware. Her essence is the revenge of Sergei Ivanov, the current head of the presidential administration and the predecessor of Serdyukov as Minister of Defense. However, the interlocutor, who knows Putin’s very well, from such an intrigue from the threshold, dismisses: “Ivanov does not have such power (give a go -ahead for searches in the apartment of Evgeny Vasilyeva - part -time member of the board of directors of OJSC OPENSService, which is investigated by the UK, and even in the early morning, when the owner of the“ nuclear suitcase ”was there with an indisputable minister Serdyukov defense - The New Times). He will not even go to Putin for such sanctions. ”

The second version: corruption. It is so replicated that it does not need special details. And does not stand up to criticism. Corruption is systematic in our country, is a form of government (as violence was a form of control under Comrade Stalin), thereby a “Chekist hook”, for which to pull and, in the words of one observational lieutenant, “guts out”. In addition, the investigative case of kickbacks in the structures of Oboronservice began, at least in February 2012, one of the ladies of the OJSC was then caught by 18 million, but this did not prevent Putin from supporting Serdyukov in his dispute with directors of military factories about prices for products of the military-industrial complex.

The third version can be called populist, and it is closely intertwined from the previous one. Namely: Serdyukov, with his reforms, agonized not only generals who were dismissed without ceremony, however, not to the street, but to the “paradise groups” and to completely monetary places in various advice of the directors, but restored to himself and lieutenants, whose well -being bought apartments and salaries - they were still insulting for the state. And Putin, fearing the army rebellion, the next Kvachkov, who will lead the honor and glory of Russian weapons to the Kremlin, decided to raise his actions among people in uniform on Serdyukov’s dismissal: not all of him to get fun with tigers and steres, it is necessary to raise a steadily falling rating? And for the broad masses, the story is winning: Medvedev spoke a lot about his president about corruption in trillion, and Putin did not say: a throw over his shoulder, the corruption is lying.

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They sought to leave the Kremlin exclusively on a carriage, but it was precisely this carriage, who was served before the deadline, were afraid most of all

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And again the interlocutors waved: yes, Serdyukov was a hamovat, yes, he fired in packs, yes, he quarreled with the military-industrial commission under the Government of the Russian Federation, making its numbers into its plans for a defense order, neither to fulfill, nor to finance which could not be financed-and they did not fulfill, and did not finance. But the military reform is the initiative of Putin, it is no coincidence in the conflict of Serdyukov with the first deputy chairman of the military-industrial commission by Vladislav Putilin in the fall of 2010 Putin, then the prime minister, took the side of his Minister of Defense and Putilin soon resigned. And another argument: Putin does not like to dismiss without acute need, and even under pressure and at the crossing - even more so. “I clearly understand that others who have come to the place of dismissed will be the same as their predecessors” are Putin’s words from his article in the Russian Pioneer magazine, published in June 2009. And then the truth: in the system of curves of curves from the change of characters little changes, he knows - he himself built this system.

The fourth version is conspiracy. Serdyukova took off the Chekist clan, for whom he is a stranger. Both the FSB and the SVR had their own interests in the weapons business and views of the dimensionless military budget. “There was, of course, the interlocutor thought,” the interlocutor thought, “and they, of course, were collected on him (to Serdyukov), and they put Putin on the table: either now they put something completely murderous, or this version must also be raised.”

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Morality, family values, which the president rushed to defend, something from the series “Today you dance jazz, and tomorrow you will sell your homeland”? Be a god of God ...

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As for the fact that Serdyukov is a stranger to the Chekist clan, this is true, but “he was checked in the“ Yukos case ”, and this is very important,” recalls another interlocutor. It was when Serdyukov to the head of the Federal Tax Service (2004-2007) that the tax authorities presented the company of Khodorkovsky claims in the amount of over $ 23 billion, which allowed to expry its assets and destroy the company.

Finally, the most bright version is Amur. Morality, family values, which the president rushed to defend, something from the series “Today you dance jazz, and tomorrow you will sell your homeland”? Be a god of God ... However, this version excited the minds of even advanced users of social networks, what can we say about the viewers of the “Russian sensations” on NTV or “let them talk” on Channel One? I must admit: from all the “thermal missiles” (they are launched to take the enemy’s rocket from an important military target), this is the most successful. The main electorate of Putin - grandmothers and single women appeared objects for empathy. And certainly - not Serdyukov.

October 24, 2012. Anatoly Serdyukov in the State Duma: Searches will be the next day

Between the Kremlin and the White House

In a strange way, few paid attention to the fact that in the last two years of the presidency of Dmitry Medvedev, Minister of Defense Anatoly Serdyukov was increasingly looking for and found support precisely in the Kremlin, and not in the White House, where Putin was sitting then. And this concerned not only the very French helicopter carriers of Mistral (€ 1.2 billion), the transaction on which President Medvedev then spoke a lot and enthusiastically, but things are much more serious - the budget of the Ministry of Defense.

In May 2010, this budget was determined by the government of Vladimir Putin in the amount of 13 trillion rubles. However, Serdyukov did not agree with this, and in June, at a meeting with President Medvedev, he stated that the goals of military reform require significantly large investments - 28 trillion rubles. The then Minister of Finance Alexei Kudrin, as they say, was furious: within two months he prepared a detailed note in which he indicated that such defense costs not only put a cross on any modernization of health and education, but they simply do not need them: there are no sufficient capacities that can master these trillions. Putin, as they say, was rather on the side of Kudrin, but did not intervene. As a result, at the end of 2010, the budget was approved in the amount of 20 trillion rubles. Kudrin, this story, as you know, was worth a resignation, although it happened a year later.

Those who observed these passions on the military budget were absolutely amazed: “Serdyukov allowed himself to jump over Putin’s head, the BB does not forgive, he is a corpse,” this amazement was put on such words. Meanwhile, the “corpse” continued to jump: so, in the Epistle of President Medvedev, the Federal Assembly instead of numbers and the list prepared by the military-industrial commission appeared completely different: the text claims that with the lively participation of Serdyukov, he was already corrected directly in the presidential administration.

Why did Medvedev need an alliance with the Minister of Defense - I see. Being de jure, the Supreme Commander-in-Chief, to whom all the security forces subordinate, he controlled few de facto: the loyalities of the same Chekists were exclusively in the prime minister’s office. Medvedev then began to seriously think about the second period and was interested in the support of Serdyukov: no matter what they say there, and he had his own deduced generals, his own intelligence, his “sunflowers” ​​- a vocated team of the Airborne Forces near Moscow, in Solnechnogorsk.

Autumn President

Then it was September 24, 2011-the famous Congress of United Russia, then discouraged Bolotnaya and Sakharov, Putin's famous election speech in Luzhniki-“Moscow behind us!”, Inauguration, defiantly tough stripping and arrests, in early August-a mysterious film about the beginning of the war with Georgia in 2008. The film did not have authors, but there were famous speaking heads like the resettled general of the army of Baluevsky: from the film it followed that the war was preparing in advance, and Prime Minister Putin made all decisions. Who was the addressee of this film? Medvedev? Serdyukov? Generals? Then the flight with the Siberias and the summit in Vladivostok, after which the president decided to “work with the papers” (TM © Boris Yeltsin) in his residence in Novo-Ogarevo and to Moscow (so as not to interfere with drivers and not create unnecessary traffic jams)-not a foot. Meanwhile, new red daddy laid down on the table in his office in the country - they were clearly demonstrated in the famous NTV film for Putin's anniversary. The viewers learned with interest that the president does not watch television - so, only if in the record, because the information from the red daddy, which flows first to the center, and then to it on the table - that is, the encryption of various Russian intelligence services, is much more accurate and more complete. Whether Putin was the second meaning in this story - who knows, but one became obvious: the president, as it was with his predecessors, was hooked, in the expression of the deceased Alexander Nikolayevich Yakovlev, on the “Chekist needle” - encryption, which become the main, if not the only source of information. Which, as you know, rules the ball.

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Putin began to be afraid of his own environment - as he was afraid of Brezhnev, Gorbachev, Yeltsin

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September 20, 2012. Anatoly Serdyukov still in Putin's retinue during a visit to Kyrgyzstan

On September 21, Putin meets with the Minister of Defense and the head of the General Staff: according to the State Academy of Sciences, they showed - Putin demanded more energetically to solve issues of providing housing for military personnel. In early October, the UK suddenly again acutely begins to be interested in the work of Obornservice. October 25 - large -scale searches in the Ministry of Defense, in the structures of the "Oboronservice" and Mrs. Vasilyeva. “Only Putin could give the order - and no one else: this is exclusively the competence of the first person,” says the interlocutor. In the evening, Serdyukov seeks the president’s reception: how he was justified what he asked - it is not known, the president under the cell says that a thorough investigation should be conducted. Nobody believes in Serdyukov’s resignation: commentators talk about the intrigues of the head of the administration, Sergei Ivanov, and so amicably that an outside observer begins to suspect a single source of this version. “Serdyukov is his own, but Putin does not give his own” - the leitmotif of the whole next week. On November 6, on the eve of the symbolic parade on Red Square, like a bolt from the clear sky: Putin sent Serdyukov to resign - "to ensure the conditions for conducting investigative actions and taking into account the situation around the Ministry of Defense." “Putin confirmed his unpredictability. He was taught this: if the enemy can calculate you, then you have already killed ”,“ Putin did not act according to the rules: he had to offer him another post ”,“ Putin created an extremely unpleasant precedent for “his”, the same Ivanov and Chemezov: if he could do this against Serdyukov, he could do the same in relation to them ” - puzzled comments poured from all sides. What happened these days between October 25 and November 6? What information was in the next “red daddy” of the president - is it not a version of the Spanish El Pais, released back in 2008, about Serdyukov’s relations with old furniture trade familiar - St. Petersburg bandits who had long left the fatherland, but interested in the joint business of illegal sale of weapons? Or, perhaps, about a carefully prepared house outside of Russia, where Romeo and Juliet intended to move, leaving the mansion in Milk Lane in Moscow, and growing the fruit of late love, which, now, by rumors, will no longer (in the media there was hints that Evgenia Vasiliev did not run abroad, as some network reporters thought, but was in the hospital, but was in the hospital, and was in the hospital, but was in the hospital Where did she do a small operation. Why didn’t Putin allow Serdyukov to voluntarily resign, but completely defiantly fired him? Was the Minister of Defense the Prime Minister Medvedev, which was still publicly humiliated by Prime Minister Medvedev (he commented on the resignation in line with the party line, but quite restrained)? Will Medvedev himself follow? Finally, what fate is prepared by Serdyukov: “It will let him sit out quietly, and then he will come out somewhere”-as some think, “a prison-following the example of friends from the People’s Republic of China”-as others believe? The answers to all these questions are in the head of one person. But it seems obvious: Putin began to be afraid of his own environment - as Brezhnev, Gorbachev, Yeltsin were afraid of him. So, new high -profile deeds and resignations are just around the corner. (So, for example, Mikhail Gorbachev, a year before the August Putch, dismissed like -minded people - Shevardnadze and Yakovlev and, conversely, brought him up to the chairman of the KGB Kryuchkov, and Yeltsin fired Chernomyrdin after the heart attacks, and he appointed General of the KGB Bordezhu.) And it means that Putin will reduce Putin to a minimum minimum. His circle of communication - more and more relying on those who put him the same “red daddy” on the table.

As it would be glorious if life refuted this version.

Photos: Getty Images / Fotobank, Dmitry Dukhanin / Kommersant, Dmitry Azarov / Kommersant