Translated material
Putin's system: survival age
Will the people say to the regime: "I'm tired, I'm leaving" - with the text of the permanent NT columnist Andrey Kolesnikov, we begin a discussion about alternatives to a change of power in 2024
FROM THE EDITOR : How will the change of power take place in 2024, when the powers of the current president expire, and the Constitution - at least in the form in which it exists now - will not allow Putin to be re-elected for the next term? The answer to this question for many of us, as emigration statistics show, means life - and if life, then in what country - or, with a good outcome, a slow vegetative existence. To a certain extent, this discussion is a continuation of the previous one - "What Putin wants" , which we had last year and which is still waiting to be completed.
On March 4, 1953, one of the diplomats who worked at the American embassy in Brussels distributed a rhyme among colleagues: “Uncle Joe is sick in bed - / Rush in blood up in his head - / If he can't walk and he can't talk - / By whom now the Communists led? (“Uncle Joe is bedridden, high blood pressure hit him in the head, if he cannot walk and talk, then who will lead the communists?”) And thus expressed the main fears of the West: they were afraid not so much of Stalin, but of unpredictability after Stalin: Better the devil you know than the one you don't know.
The current situation for the West is somewhat more ambivalent. On the one hand, one has to put up with endless horror: it is impossible not only to agree on something with Putin, but any conversation is meaningless, because it will predictably end in nothing. On the other hand, I don’t want a terrible end: what if an unfamiliar devil really comes instead of a familiar one, and then what to do? Feeling of complete impasse. And there is no guarantee that the magical year 2024 will be the way out of it: the impasse is endless.
Of course, it is a shame to reduce Russian politics to one person. However, despite the fact that it is not completely reduced to him, Putin is not just its sign, he really makes up its basic meaning and content: an autocrat is an autocrat.
Actually, this has always been the case in Russian history: we say Russia under Lenin, Russia under Stalin, Russia under Khrushchev, Russia under Brezhnev, Russia under Gorbachev, Russia under Yeltsin. Even the agonizing regime had its own characteristics, marked by the views and character of the intermediate leaders engaged in the race on gun carriages - Andropov and Chernenko.
And the departure of almost every one of them, as a rule, for physiological reasons, with the exception of the deposed Khrushchev, who lost the country of Gorbachev and who left before Yeltsin's term, carried the seed of change. The liberalization of the regime began almost immediately after the death of Stalin, and the members of the Khrushchev-Malenkov-Beria triumvirate, although they were busy devouring each other, nevertheless immediately took up projects of various indulgences, and the “flower of fragrant prairies Lavrenty Palych Beria” was especially successful in this, but Comrades did not let him turn around - they took him and shot him.
Of course, the death of Brezhnev after a long 18 years of rule meant inevitable changes. The period of Andropov and Chernenko was the agony of Brezhnevism, it lasted for a little over two years, and already everyone - both the elites and ordinary citizens - were waiting for real changes. They even wanted Gorbachev in the party apparatus and regional committees.
The regime, despite being made up of many factions with very different interests, is united in that it needs to become increasingly repressive. Otherwise, the situation - in their view - cannot be kept
train rocking
It is also symptomatic that, feeling today's massive demand for change, but not wanting to change anything in the system, Putin and his manipulators imitate movement - just like in the joke about the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU, which, having drawn the curtains, shakes the car to prove to itself that the train is moving. From here - almost in a literal (!) rhyme to this anecdote - the violently painted "trains of change" launched in the Moscow metro with advertising of the volunteer movement (they say, guys, help yourself, we can't really do it anymore). Hence the new mantra, oh so reminiscent of “acceleration” (“Acceleration is an important factor, but the reactor could not stand it”) - Putin’s favorite word is “breakthrough”. So far, however, more and more breakthroughs of gas and sewer pipes are obtained.
As soon as the authorities switch to mobilization jargon, and the population begins to look for signs of a golden age in stagnation, write wasted: this means that there are no ideas, no real plans (except to collect more money from citizens and economic agents for a “breakthrough”), and endless depressive impasse becomes a natural and the only possible state. The establishment's anxiety is expressed in its growing concern for its own security, and the regime, despite being made up of many factions with very different interests, is united in that it needs to become more and more repressive. And already openly and shamelessly repressive - the chairman of the FSB publicly justifies the year 1937, senators forbid people to speak, etc. Otherwise, the situation - in their view - cannot be kept.
You can put children in paddy wagons and hold their parents accountable, raise old taxes and introduce new ones, but they don’t have real cartridges for more, just as they don’t have the resources for a real war
near zero
But of course it's not a good tool. Yes, you can keep the elderly scientist Viktor Kudryavtsev in prison in full view of the whole world, killing the last incentives for Russian scientists to work (at least in Russia), you can wave and rattle a gift to the Russians (on their own taxes) for the New Year in the form of a hypersonic complex Avangard , you can put children in paddy wagons and hold their parents accountable, raise old taxes and introduce new ones, but they don’t have real cartridges for more, just as they don’t have the resources for a real war.
They cannot “nationalize the elite” — return the fortunes, houses and children of loyalists to their homeland, to say nothing of persuading parents to send their boys en masse to fight with the same Ukrainian boys. Then we will have to close the border so that all these boys, minus the scumbags who sincerely love to fight and kill, do not run away to the West. Depriving the economy of incentives, nationalizing everything and everyone, transferring resources to several players - Sechin, Chemezov, Sobyanin and a few others, they are depriving themselves of sources of income. That is, not myself personally - everything is fine with this, but my system.
The strength of the regime is overestimated: it cannot take Belarus, which under Lukashenka, even though he is an autocrat, has become a nation-state. Our elites cannot believe this, just as they could not believe that Ukraine is a real independent state, and not a zone of influence, a satellite and a buffer. As a result, at a high and bloody price, they acquired another buffer - two more names in the collection of unrecognized "states", Donbass and Lugansk.
Putin's model, based on the principle of procrastination "Tomorrow, tomorrow, not today" and which the "technocrats" responsible for the "breakthrough" are trying to prolong the life of, is not viable. But no one can say for sure how much resource she has for the continuation of an inertial depressive existence with the calculation of percentages of GDP, reminiscent of searching for the last little thing in her pockets, and what is her real age of survival. And from what to count it - from 2018 or from 2024.
Is it really impossible to forget about Putin and talk about significant subjects - how to develop, what should be the program of action? What are we all about personalities and personalities again? It is forbidden. Under Putin - who has not really gone away - there will be no changes in the system
Putin as a safe-conduct
Here we return to the basic problem of 2024: is it really impossible to forget about Putin and talk about significant subjects - how to develop, what should be the program of action? What are we all about personalities and personalities again? It is forbidden. Under Putin, who has not really passed away, there will be no changes in the system. It will adapt to new problems - primarily social and economic, to settle down, as farmer Melnichenko says, in the ass. The age of survival will drag on against the background of erosion of the supporting structures with parallel painting in a cheerful chintz of a crackling facade.
Putin will not manage all the processes. As it does not manage now. It’s just that all the decisions made at different levels by the “little bird bastard” are motivated by one thing: what would Vladimir Vladimirovich do in my place? The system consists of many little Putins. If it had been otherwise, the regime would have collapsed long ago.
However, if Putin leaves, at least a significant part of his camarilla will immediately declare that they were just waiting for this, bringing the end of the regime closer, undermining it from the inside. Perhaps the president suspects that his elites are only thinking about how to wait for new times to throw a stone at him. Or maybe, having lost his political instinct for almost 20 years in power, he sincerely believes that everyone is happy, united and will always love him. There is no point in leaving either in the first case or in the second. If everyone is so happy, then you can still work. If dissatisfied, even becoming a lame duck is dangerous. And the example of Boris Yeltsin is inaccurate here - he was in power for less than ten years, Putin is already twice Yeltsin. He can't just get tired, get up and leave without securing a safety net.
Some people owe everything to Putin - fortunes, empires in which political power is equal to owning property. But even if a whole ministry is inherited from a father to a son, it cannot be carried away as an asset to a brighter future. Therefore, it is necessary to cheat with redoubled energy and supplement quasi-private property in the form of state-owned companies, state-owned banks and ministries with real property. But the next question is: where are the guarantees of its preservation under the new first person? Sobyanin's universal formula is known: "You can't hide behind papers about property acquired by fraudulent means." Any next boss can say that about the previous ones. Therefore, the “families” that have clung to Putin have a chance to survive only if he himself remains in power as a safe-conduct.
It is impossible to reconcile the interests of loyalists who make careers under Putin, but dream of his departure, with those “families”, primarily from power clans, who run the state as if they were their own property, but who understand the precariousness of the legal foundations for this, is impossible. Putin is balancing these clans now, but he is unlikely to be able to reconcile, even by leaving half to chair some State Council. The experience with the hyperloyal Medvedev was recognized as unsuccessful - even with the living Prime Minister Putin, the country suddenly began to straighten its shoulders and turn its face to the West.
In general, the opportunity to leave - for example, in 2007, or later, during the peak of the post-Crimean idiotic euphoria - was missed. To leave the Kremlin’s presidential corps quietly in 2024, Putin needs to bring the country to at least an economically normal state. But this is impossible, because authoritarian modernization is impossible - all attempts have failed, and the last two times (Strategy 2020; CSR program) have not even begun. There will be no political concessions. So, we are waiting for stiffening within the age of survival.
As if the people themselves in this situation would not say to the regime: "I'm tired, I'm leaving."