"Suppose Putin will go to the monastery"

Harry Kasparov offers Russia purification. Yakov Gordin says the country is tired, but the matrix will gradually be destroyed

In Russia, they suddenly began to discuss the future of the country after Putin, at least on social networks. The beginning of the discussion was laid by Harry Kasparov , written on January 2:

"Russia after Putin.
As history shows, for such dictatorships as the Putin regime, the collapse of the foreign policy aggressive course becomes a trigger for a protest explosion inside the country. I have already said - the rejection of the imperial concept is a fundamental task for Russia. We have to do what was not done 25 years ago and formulate, which should be a state called Russia. The country must get a vaccine from the imperial virus and finally get rid of the phantom pains of "lost greatness." It is on these imperial illusions that the Putin regime plays, providing support for a significant part of Russian society, despite the growing socio-economic stress. People should finally realize that all these things are interconnected. Obviously, after the collapse of the Putin regime of Russia, a period of “cleansing” is needed, during which people should understand that for everything - for the support of Putin, for Georgia, for Crimea and for the Donbass - will have to pay. Germany and Japan paid a terrible price for an unleashed world war and for 70 years the vaccination received. Our task is to prevent Russia from paying an equally high price, but people must understand that there is a price that they have to pay. They will have to listen to unpleasant things about what happened, that they, in fact, supported the crimes of the regime. They will be forced to admit that with their consent the country has been plundered, and the recovery process will take a long time comparable to the duration of the robbery.
For these reasons, I believe that immediately after the collapse of the Putin regime, it is pointless to hold the elections. For immediately after Putin those who try to "console" the people, having shifted all responsibility to the dictator and their closest environment - they say there were some excesses and minor deviations from the rule of law. And these are no excesses. The Putin regime is the heir to the totalitarian regime that destroyed the color of the nation. Putin's regime is a continuation of the criminal activity of an organization called the Cheka-OGPU-NKVD-KGB-FSB. We will need not only our historical “Nuremberg”, which will give a legal assessment of the crimes of the communist dictatorship, but also real criminal processes over the architects and accomplices of the current regime. In fact, total desovetization is needed, and especially the Decemberization of society, because With the ideological heritage of the CPSU, we coped the very least. The fact that lawless people today in the Kremlin, Duma and other corridors of the authorities are, first of all, the result of the fact that the KGB archives are still closed. "

The answer to this post was a hot discussion , where someone criticizes Kasparov’s position, someone-the critics themselves. In any case, the first days of the year spilled on social networks into a discussion of what will happen after the departure of Russian President Vladimir Putin from power. Harry Kasparov himself is now preparing a detailed article in response to the polemic arising and, wanting to put it as accurately as possible until he is ready to give interviews. In anticipation of this article, we asked to participate in the discussion of the historian and publicist, the editor -in -chief of the Zvezda magazine, Jacob Gordin , who spoke with how the transition periods in Russia and what the next transitional period were arranged in St. Petersburg:

- This conversation is somewhat academic in nature, because I perceive the expression of the "collapse of the Putin regime" as dreams. I do not believe, regardless of the attitude to what is happening that the catastrophe will happen, I do not believe in the realism of catastrophic scenarios, which are now being talked about. Naturally, the situation in Russia will change, but, in my opinion, it will change slowly. In general, I really do not like to act as a soothsayer, I envy Harry Kimovich’s determination, he is a hot man, I am not capable of such determination. Nevertheless, according to my ideas, this will be a slow transformation process. I think there is no such public energy that leads to political disasters in Russia. Russia is very tired. Russia is a tired country. Russia has experienced so many shocks for at least the last and a half that it has not recovered this time. And to wait for the explosion from below, which, obviously, is meant when they talk about the collapse of the regime, it seems to me, is not worth it. In 1991–93, attempts were made, as we recall, to arrange a trial of the CPSU, and none of this happened.

Era never ended overnight

In general, there is no single principle of transition from one model to another, they are all different. Russia has a special situation in this regard. I am not a supporter of the individual path of Russia, because there are general patterns, but nevertheless in history everything is individually to a certain extent. And our society for the most part in 1991 did not support these attempts. This is not Poland, not Czechoslovakia, not the Baltic republics with their unified national aspiration. Russia is a country of completely different mood. Just as then, I believe, it was impossible to bring to radical methods of purification, because it threatened with serious shocks. When they said why Yeltsin did not dissolve the KGB, because Yeltsin was a politician and understood that to throw tens of thousands of trained, trained and embittered people into the street is to create extraordinary dangers. He did what was more or less real. Putin will leave his post soon or later. Obviously, the elite today will also leave. Whoever replaces is very difficult to say. I think it will be such a flow of elites. In general, when they talk about the end of the era - the era never end overnight, they always difficult to flow into another. Just as after the catastrophic explosion of 1917, state-owned and to some extent political, political and psychological traditions of imperial Russia into the Soviet model gradually occurred. Serfdom has returned, excellent by Alexander the Second, and so on.

Suppose Putin decided to go to the monastery

- This is that 25 years ago, when the dismantling of the Soviet system was carried out, the elite was not carried out, there was no complete investigation, and this led to the current situation. Kasparov, obviously, is trying to find an antidote from such repeatability endless.

- Theoretically, he is right. In those days, I had to speak quite a lot publicly, and I said about this, although in a less sharp form. And very quickly it became clear that this was impossible, for this there was no physical opportunity. There was no this new elite, not even the elite, but in general a personnel reserve that would replace the Soviet apparatus. In 1917-18, everything was different, because the country really fell apart, social hatred splashed out, which, by the way, was not in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Then the bourgeois was killed, and here, fortunately, no one killed anyone, nor party workers, nor the KGB officers were lynched. Yeltsin and the people who were with him understood that they did not have a personnel reserve who would quickly and entirely replace the apparatus operating at all levels. Therefore, the government was new, new people really came, and in the army and power structures there were 90% of the former, because there was no place to take others from. To create a Cheka with unlimited powers - it naturally did not occur to anyone. Each situation in history is individual. 1917, when it was possible to conduct total cleaning of the previous regime - this is one, 1991–92 - this is a completely different situation. There was no possibility for this. Suppose Putin decided to go to the monastery, his main assistants and associates leave with him - and if you start what Kasparov offers, it is not entirely clear what will lead to and who will do this. Powerful social forces are capable of such promotions. Unfortunately, our democratic movement, in which I at one time took an active part, is not in today's form that can do this. Behind Kasparov, a talented, smart, strong man, but, I am afraid, not a politician, in essence, this power is not worth it. Therefore, it is not forbidden to dream, as they say, but I don’t understand what the real mechanism is.

Will our population want to do such a difficult matter as an audit

- There is an interesting thing - the responsibility of the people. That is, at the same time, this force should arrange the Nuremberg Tribunal, and the same power should indicate the people to its responsibility, its mistakes. Accordingly, the people should support a certain power that will speak unpleasant things in the face of the same people. Can this be imagined?

- It is very characteristic that you say - some power. What power will it be and how will she say it in the face of the people? And most importantly, whether the people want to hear this and once again realize how it was partly in 1956 after the so-called exposure of the personality cult and how it was in the late 1980s, when a lot of revealing, terrible materials appeared, then some part of society really felt a feeling of common guilt, although, as I understand it, it was not common enough. Whether the people want, and in general, what such a "people" in relation to our current population are also extremely vague terms. Whether our population will want, very different, to do such a difficult matter as an audit of the last quarter century, with gesture legal consequences arising from here, I have great doubts.

The basis is laid down that the matrix is destroyed

- There is a thing in which you need to give yourself. Look, Kasparov says that it is necessary to destroy the imperial virus. In fact, the point is that the situation is reproduced. If you say that the cleansing is unrealistic, then let me ask the question: does this mean that this cycle will be repeated? As long as there is no fact that Kasparov calls the process of purification when society is aware of its responsibility when a new elite comes, which will cleanse, conduct a complete revelation, will this matrix repeat? You yourself say that the 1917 revolution occurred, then serfdom returned, which, incidentally, was canceled in tsarist Russia. There was a 1991 revolution, and we see now, in many ways the matrix is repeated, again there is an attempt to build an imperial consciousness to build something like an empire. Suppose, Putin’s regime will go to the monastery, as you witnessed, it means that at the next round the same thing is again, if there is not what Kasparov offers?

- I think not. Not everything is so bad. Indeed, there is cyclicity. But after 1991, for the first time in the entire Russian history, I have my attitude to the 90s, not coinciding with the attitude of many people close to me, my friends-I believe that this is a great time. Because, in spite of everything, I perfectly understand all the disadvantages and all the negative aspects of this era - for the first time Russia was free. And she proved herself as soon as she could show herself. And how it was - this is another matter. It turned out 10-13 years, completely different from what was before. Therefore, this is not a literal repetition. Moreover, what is happening now - I do not begin to say what will happen tomorrow, I have serious fears - sorry for the banality, historical experience teaches this, there is never a complete and endless restoration. What happened in the 1990s happened, then the rollback began, but precisely because it was 1991, precisely because it was the end of the 80s with these hundreds of thousands of free people on the streets, because nevertheless in the 90s there were quite adequate elections-this memory did not go anywhere, therefore, on the basis of the past experience, some future can be built. It is completely optional that after the departure of the current model the Soviet model repeated. In the 90s, both the economic and psychological, if you like, was laid down, the political basis for not a literal repetition, so that this matrix would eventually be destroyed.