Winners at the wake

A civil war has only two outcomes: victory or defeat. Truce are concluded later, when one side crushed the resistance of the other, imposing its own order of things by force. Once upon a time, Mannerheim did this by buying his Finland its place under the liberal and democratic sun. Anyone who cannot afford this payment or is not convinced is doomed to lose, and both his supporters and future generations will pay for him.

The October 1993 invoice was presented for payment already in 2000. This October and even September (Decree 1400) could not have been prevented. The civil war, unfinished in August 1991, caught up with us. Questions of power and its redistribution, the tug-of-war by Khasbulatov - all this was secondary and not important.

The April referendum on the motive "yes, yes, no, yes" did not resolve the issue. For the answer was: yes, you would all go to ... re-elections. This made it possible to overthrow and re-elect the Supreme Council, which for a year and a half lay like a stone on the path of reforms. But at the same time it was necessary to give Yeltsin, and he could no longer pass. On Yeltsin, as on Atlanta, all our freedom rested, hopes were invested in him for the continuation of reforms. And the democrats said "no" to the re-elections on Vasilyevsky Spusk and raised the slogan: "God forbid the Soviets burn down, the deputies fail."

And the Democrats greeted the Decree of 1400 as a raised military standard and saluted him. We understood that in two years the people figured out the harsh truth of early capitalism and rushed back to the uncooled stall of "goulash-socialism", where they did not demand work, but gave rations.

Yeltsin did not use violence until the enemies went hand to hand. Nobody defended Moscow: neither the police, nor the state security. On October 3, it was no longer about reforms, but about life: Rutskoi and Baburin were scolding such decrees. For the support of Yeltsin, they promised death, and for the first and last time in our lives we shouted: “Yeltsin! Yeltsin! Shared parties, movements, families. The fate of the country was decided by two lines of barricades: at the Moscow City Council and at the White House. And it seems that both those and these repeated the words of a good military song: "Even if death in fire, in smoke does not frighten a fighter, and let everyone do what is due to someone."

The White and Red armies, adjusted for modernity, returned to the pending party. It was a fair game, and again, as in 1991, the country was saved by unarmed democrats who went to the Moscow City Council and inspired Yeltsin to resist. With this we bought our first Constitution and the replacement of the hated Soviets with ones that turned out to be no better than their mayor's office. But since then, the Red Army no longer went to the bayonet. They had to go to the polls and forget about the gallows. God bless Yeltsin for what he did in October, and for what he failed to complete: the role of Franco or Pinochet disgusted him. Yes, and the democrats turned out to be unsuitable for the role of gendarmes and executioners. We didn't get reforms, but the country got a reprieve until 2000. During this time, our enemies have learned to value money more than ideology and blood. "Bablo" slowed down Evil.

Those who were at the Moscow City Council are now living with clenched teeth. Colleagues fall around them: Galya Starovoitova, Sergei Yushenkov, Anya Politkovskaya, Magomed Evloev. And again we have no weapons, and now there is no Yeltsin either. And "they" finally took Ostankino, and the mayor's office, and Moscow, and the whole country. In the elections, legally. But each of us stands on his own individual "barricade": on the square, in the editorial office, in the blog, at school, at the university. And no one will leave this barricade to the end.

“The only Russia, my only, the only thank you for choosing me” (A. Voznesensky).

September 29, 2008