Lev Ghammer : “ Grandfather is stuck, and there is no way out for him ”

Lev Gyammer is 25. A native of Kuzbass, a journalist, former activist of the Protest Kuzbass movement, coordinator of Navalny’s Headquarters in Krasnodar and editor-in-chief of Skat Media. Now he is an “ordinary activist” of Viasna . Left Russia in 2021. He has been wanted since 2023, and since 2024 he has been arrested in absentia in the case of “organizing the activities of an extremist community.” Lives in Poland. Lev Gyammer talks about why Putin started the war with Ukraine, and why he cannot stop it, and why even Putinists already feel that “something is going wrong” in the “Eyewitnesses” project.

Tell us about yourself.

— My name is Lev Glyamer. I am a journalist and former political activist. I'm from Novokuznetsk. I'm 25. Now I live and work in Warsaw.

Do you consider yourself a Siberian?

— In general, this is always such a local self-awareness, or something. Siberians, I think, residents of the Far East, the Urals, southerners, always have some kind of local, ah, self-awareness. Siberians have it too. We live on the outskirts of the country. The federal center treats us accordingly. And somehow, on our own, we often decide something, do something. Eh, the climate is terrible, but this only makes us stronger.

You lived in a depressed Siberian region. Did this influence your interest in political activism?

— I don’t think it was specifically the region that influenced it. That is, before I became active, when Navalny’s presidential campaign began, I was such a direct Russophobe, I dreamed of leaving, because again Kuzbass and the picture that was painted by the regional authorities, the federal authorities, that Kuzbass is such an electoral caliphate, which means everyone is for Putin, everything is for Aman Tuleyev, which means nothing, there are no options to change this. And somehow it all weighed on me. Well, that is, uh, I thought that, well, I was, what, 15-16 years old there, right? How could I change it in the past, yes, but in the future it’s as if I can’t change it. And I dreamed, I think, I’ll just leave, as if it all burns with fire, as if they themselves deserved it all, and I’ll go, that I’ll spend my life on this.

And then I saw how people began to gather around Alexei Navalny. I saw that all over the country there are people who care about what will happen to our country, who want a better future for it. And moreover, I saw such people in Novokuznetsk, which amazed me enormously. That is, this first rally, on March 26, which was on “He’s not Dimon for you,” when the film came out. After it there were these first rallies. We were sent to the outskirts of the city, and even on these outskirts of the city in Novokuznetsk, well, maybe 100 people gathered.

This, well, amazed me, because it seemed to me that we would end up with, well, three diggers, the cops would beat us all with sticks, and nothing would come of it. And quite a large number of people gathered under such circumstances. And somehow I realized that, well, no, it seemed like something else could be changed. And we must at least try to do everything possible so that the country in the future becomes at least closer to what we want it to be.

In April, six activists of the anti-war movement “Spring” received real sentences. Do you have anything to do with “Spring”?

— At the moment, I am an ordinary activist of the movement and, so to speak, have retired from the cause. It is, of course, very sad to see your friends behind bars, with these terrible sentences. I myself, thank God, left before all this and, as it were, also, yes, was involved. And now, I think, a verdict in absentia will be handed down in the near future. And before, I was a member of the Federal Coordination Council, and somehow we did a regional movement here in Kuzbass, in other cities.

Disproportionate sentences, of course. In general, the very fact of criminal prosecution, be that as it may, in particular from the “Spring” movement, is a nightmare, because, well, there are probably no more herbivorous activists than the “Spring” movement. These are the most stereotypical activists, who are here with placards now, that means, here is a dove of peace, we will now exchange everything with words and kindness for all the good against all the bad. We want everything to be wonderful. There are no armed uprisings there, there is something else there.

Yes, as soon as some activist mentioned some kind of violent protest, he quickly flew out of the movement amid general rejoicing, because, yes, we are for peaceful protest, for peaceful expression, and so on, and people, therefore, are judged as some kind of terrorists. Well, it’s very revealing. They will reach everyone.

Did the full-scale invasion on February 24, 1922 come as a surprise to you?

— Well, it was no longer a surprise on February 24, because everything that went before that led to this. And since the end of twenty-one, there has been news, we have been following it all. Actually, at that time I was already more involved in journalism. And somehow we kept wondering: “Well, it’s a bluff, not a bluff, that is, well, something unhealthy is happening.”

And, in fact, on February 22, it seems, when they announced the recognition of the so-called DPR and LPR, well, it became clear that there would, it seems, be a war after all. And, frankly, I expected that the war would begin exactly at that very moment, because these so-called republics had already leaked that they were recognized, and after that they announced that there would be some kind of speech by Putin. Well, it immediately became clear to us. Well, apparently, he will say that now we will fight for these so-called fraternal republics.

But it turned out not. He said, came out, said: “Yes, we admit.” I pushed this lecture. And we just sat and waited. We thought: “Well, apparently it will start soon.” And so it began on the twenty-fourth. It's a nightmare, naturally. We still held on to some hope that maybe this was some kind of multi-move game, some kind of simple game. Well, he won’t - he is, of course, a fool, but not so foolish as to fight. It turned out that he was such a fool.

Why does Putin need this war? Does he want to stop her?

- Well, there is a wonderful answer to this from Boris Efimovich Nemtsov. I don’t know if it’s possible to swear, no, to quote. He's fucked up, Vladimir Putin, so you understand. A person wants to write himself into the history books. So he sees himself as, I don’t know, a collector of Russian lands, a Caesar, or anyone else at all. And in his mind, that is, it is clear that he wanted to conquer Ukraine, apparently, in 3 days. Apparently, again, no one believed him that he would actually go to war. And that’s why they really wrote reports that we would take everything in 3 days, they would greet us there with flowers normally. Well, it wouldn’t even occur to my grandfather to fight, but he did. He is stuck in this, and there seems to be no way out for him.

Well, that is, it’s good, he will end the war, a huge number of veterans of this so-called special operation will return. What to do with them? It will be a nightmare. I think he remembers very well what happened when the veterans of the Afghan war returned to Russia. Yes, and it was a disaster. And now veterans are already returning. This is already creating some problems. Then explain to people why people died in the first place, why do we need to wage this war?

And it turns out that the goal of the war is already war, that is, he no longer has any goal, I think so, to conquer Ukraine there or something else. He simply got bogged down in his own rhetoric, in his own non-ideological moment. And it seems to me that he will simply fight until the last, until the last Russian, until the last Ukrainian. That's who will end quickly. Well, either until it ends, or until it is finished.

What do those who started this war deserve?

- Well, with the first category of people, who are members of the Security Council there, that is, propagandists, let the court decide, no matter how much we want the people there and Putin, and all these wonderful, in quotes, people, yes, there to be quartered, maybe a ride along Red Square or along Khreshchatyk, maybe, I think that we still need a fair, honest court, independent, which will really sort out their crimes. They committed a lot of crimes. According to many articles of even Putin’s criminal code, which is elementary even in today’s Russia, they violated just a lot of laws. Judge them, that is, if there are too many of them, perhaps lustrate someone, yes, as some kind of compromise.

As it happened with Germany, for example. A huge number of people took part in this machine, but it’s impossible to put them all in prison, right? Firstly, because they will resist, and this will simply lead to a civil war, which, of course, would not be desirable. And, secondly, well, to contain such a huge number of prisoners, yes, who took part in this. This is a very big complex issue, and I think at the moment it’s a matter of skin of an unkilled bear. That is, unfortunately, we are still very far from this. But so, if I’m fantasizing and very briefly, then yes, the court.

How to convince Russians who support the war?

- Well, somehow I didn’t have a chance to communicate directly with the zetniks. I am communicating with someone who remains in Russia. I hear some television narratives, well, there, because a person is simply of such an age, yes, that, well, he watches TV, something slips through there, but in general it seems as if there is still some kind of understanding that, well, something is happening wrong, of course. And for the most part, there is no need to directly convince someone. People, unfortunately, have historically developed this way, yes, because of the history of regimes in Russia in general, which suppressed people, who turned them into a herd.

And people are used to this, and in general they are quite inert. That is, tomorrow, I don’t know, NATO troops will enter Russia, just like in that meme, a line will line up at the occupation administration. Well, that is, ah, people, I think, will quite easily accept some kind of change. Indeed, there is some kind of core, that is, uh, according to many polls, which, of course, are not the most accurate, yes, but one way or another there is some kind of picture that there are approximately equal shares of nuclear anti-war people and nuclear conquered people, and between them 80 percent, probably 60 percent, are inert people who, in general, would only be left alone. Just let us live in peace and that’s all.

They begin to speak out when something, some of their red lines are crossed. They've already completely arrived at them. That is, it’s good, the refrigerator is a little empty, we’ll get through it somehow. But, yes, farmers in Siberia, they started slaughtering their livestock, they have nothing else to do. That is, it is death for them. They went because they were already pressed against the wall. The mass Internet has now been cut off for people there. Well, the entire Russian economy now is tied to this. A huge part of it, yes. That is, these are businesses, which means communications. Some are distilling this unfinished Max.

People are also indignant, no matter who they are. People who are, well, straight up pro-Putinists, are indignant, some Goblin Puchkov is already saying quite seditious things, because they have pushed them into some kind of comfort zone, which is already important for them, and they already feel that something is wrong. And quite interesting statements are already being made about the authorities, and sometimes even about Vladimir Putin, that’s what Remess and I saw.

Therefore, I think when, I hope, when some kind of global shift occurs, I don’t know, Vladimir Vladimirovich dies, there, I don’t know, Mishustin will become acting, for example, as one of the scenarios, something will be rolled back, I think people will calmly accept it, there won’t be any indignation, there will be a couple of outcasts who will be, well, like for Stalin, that under Putin everything was fine, a hand of steel and so on further, but this will be some kind of absolutely marginal stratum, and people will simply live their own lives.

Yes, most likely, it will be difficult for people, mass people, masses of people to explain Russia’s guilt for the war, or some kind of responsibility. This is a big job that will take decades. But this is not only the case here, the same thing happened in Germany. In Germany, to come to that awareness of the catastrophe of the war, to that awareness of the crimes committed by the Hitler regime and the Germans helping him, a lot of time passed, well, at least 20 years. That is, some methods simply did not work, yes, when there was a lot of pressure, it means that some methods worked better, some worse.

And it was only, probably, in the nineties that we roughly arrived at what we have now. And now it seems like a given. Well, the Germans have repented, yes. Well, it wasn't always like this. The Chancellor of Germany, who, therefore, got up on his knees, was seething with indignation in society. What are you doing? How? Why should we apologize for something like that? Concentration camps. So no, it’s all propaganda, it’s all fakes, right?

And now they will say that it’s AI, something else there in Bucha, yes, I think many will really not believe it, but over time, as with the crimes of the Stalinist regime, someone did not believe in them, yes, but over time somehow we came, now there has been a rollback, but for some time there was a consensus, plus or minus, in the mass consciousness that, well, yes, there was a Gulag, yes, there were Stalinist repressions, yes, there was this nightmare, and somehow people understood it. Therefore, we have a lot of work ahead of us, an important work that we have to do.

Who do you mean? Who will do this work?

— To us, meaning as a society, that is, not necessarily to me personally, although I, naturally, if such an opportunity presents itself, then, naturally, I will take part in this process. But I want to believe. That is, it is clear that we could die tomorrow in nuclear ash. Nobody knows. The planning horizon is a maximum of, well, a week. Now no one knows what will happen next.

But I want to believe. I don’t think that after Putin leaves there in one way or another, yes, we will immediately find ourselves in beautiful Russia. In the future, everything will be wonderful, unicorns will, therefore, run, polystyrene foam will be made of milk foam. No, this, of course, will not happen. But some positive changes will still happen. There will still be some kind of rollback, which means something, some processes will happen. And it is important for us to get into this window of opportunity.

And perhaps after some time we will succeed. Naturally, nothing is given on a silver platter. This is a lot of work ahead. There is still some chance. That is, Russia is not some unique case. This is not some kind of just hopeless hopelessness. There are many examples of countries that, well, just recently, were not very pleasant countries in terms of freedom. And yet they managed to make some changes. Still not perfect. There is no perfect place on earth. But there are places where it is more pleasant to live, there are places where it is a little less pleasant to live. And so I want to do something in Russia, so that Russia gets on the list of countries in which it is pleasant to live. Not perfect, but nice.

So you can return to Russia?

- Of course, like on the first flight. Well, not as soon as the government changes, rather, because I still have a burden of criminal prosecutions. As soon as it becomes clear that I will return, if I return to Russia, they will not screw me up at the airport and send me to a pre-trial detention center, as now, for example, yes, I will immediately, naturally, return to my homeland, because this is my home.

I didn’t want to leave Russia, I did it forcedly in 1921, in fact, when the first calls came about criminal cases. And, naturally, I want to return home. Why should I live somewhere as a guest, if I have my own home, my own country, how could these [__] take it over? Well, just like that, someone took over your apartment, right? Well, this doesn’t mean that now you need to forget about her. There seems to be a logical desire to return to your home.

Is it possible to restore relations between Russia and Ukraine in the future?

- Well, we probably don’t have any example of this. Well, that is, there are examples, of course, from other countries. Germany and France live wonderfully there now, they cooperate, although there is still, yes, at the level of humor or something else, such banter. The Germans are still, well, sometimes they make fun of them, but this is in a kind way. That is, in general, countries cooperate quite well, work together, and so on. But this is a Western European tradition, yes. There, the countries fought a lot among themselves, very bloodily.

There is an example of the Balkans, yes, where just recently a bloody war, a terrible war, was raging. There are simply no families in the Balkan countries, yes, that would not be affected by war crimes. Representatives of neighboring countries somehow live there. This is very surprising to me. Every time I manage to spend time in the company of guys from just different Balkan countries, they could be Albanians, Serbs, Croats, it would seem, yes, there are absolutely terrible things between them, literally their fathers slaughtered each other. Somehow they manage to communicate. Of course, not everyone does. There are people with great resentment. This is understandable.

Well, somehow this works out. I don’t know, I, of course, would like it to be possible to repent and restore the relationship - this is, naturally, a normal desire. Whether it will work out, I don’t know. Maybe this is an important point here. Ukrainians will want this or not. That is, it is clear that we, on our part, can do, in principle, everything, but the Ukrainians have the right to accept it or not, our apologies, repentance, and so on, they can send us, say: “Guys, after what you did, there’s no way at all.” Понятно, что на личном уровне, конечно, и сейчас до сих пор многие россияне, украинцы спокойно между собой общаются, естественно. Но на уровне вот как это национальном таком, да, общественном, ну, поживём, увидим. Я не знаю, хотелось бы верить, конечно. Мне бы хотелось, разумеется, восстановить эти отношения.

Живя в Польше, вы много сейчас общаетесь с украинцами?

— Да, постоянно. Ну, поскольку я живу в Варшаве, Варшава — это такая такой восточный Париж. Здесь огромное количество представителей самых разных стран и, в частности, э-э, как это поляки называют, восточных стран, да, то бишь вот как раз постсоветского пространства. Огромное количество и россияне, и украинцы, белорусы. И вполне себе хорошо происходит это общение.

То есть, честно говоря, я ни разу вот так вот сходу не вспомню ни разу, чтобы был какой-то конфликт на фоне того, что вот я россиянин, там, например, кто-то украинец там или белорус или ещё что-то. Как-то вот мы общаемся и все, ну, все, что называется, все свои, все понимаем, мы плюс-минус, да, на одной, на одних координатах находимся политических, да, у нас плюс-минус одно отношение к вещам. Понятно, в деталях может различаться, там могут быть разные политические взгляды, там экономические, да, ну, это понятно мелочи.

Поэтому общение происходит абсолютно нормально. То есть люди здесь и бизнесы открывают совместные, что-то делают, какие-то, значит, и волонтёрские организации помогают. Вот Хельсинкский фонд по правам человека тоже здесь огромная просто выборка. Это внушает оптимизм какой-то. То есть это вот показывает, что в целом-то люди, ну, они есть люди, это самые обыкновенные люди там с разной историей, с разным происхождением, и ничто не мешает им общаться. This is good.

What are you most afraid of?

— Ну, естественно, побаиваюсь, если вдруг Путин настолько ёбнутый, что решит ещё и на Польшу напасть. Вероятность этого, я не скажу, что прямо большая, наверное, на мой взгляд, но она не нулевая. Как бы Путин что угодно может себе решить. Это, конечно, было бы неприятно. Ну, какого-то глобального хаоса, наверное, который тоже возможен, да, как я и говорил, завтра можем не проснуться в целом, да, в ядерном пепле оказаться. Это, конечно, тоже не очень приятный сценарий.

А вообще [вздыхает] чего-то осязаемого близкого, наверное, нет. И это очень облегчающее чувство. Первое время после эмиграции, я сначала эмигрировал в Грузию, первое время после эмиграции, как бы я и кошмары мне снились, да, с обысками мне снилось, что вот сейчас вот врывается кто-то в квартиру, а ещё вид из окна очень похожий, да, такой постсоветский, и не до конца понимаешь, особенно когда резко эмигрируешь, что ты уже не в России. И полиции я шугался и как-то вот так вот.

А потом со временем поймал себя на мысли, что как-то спокойнее сильно стало. То есть понятно, есть всё ещё этот исторический контекст, всё ещё идёт война, всё ещё идут репрессии, но находясь при этом в относительной безопасности от этого всего, становится сильно легче с этим работать. Потому что, когда ты находишься в контексте, мало того, что у тебя большое напряжение, собственно, от вот от осознания этого всего, от работы с этим всем, параллельно у тебя есть вот еще вот этот страх, что вот завтра к тебе придут или там завтра тебя убьют, завтра тебя посадят, еще что-то. Здесь этого страха нет. Я об этом вообще теперь не думаю. То есть вот вспоминаю, что, ну да, я уголовник, там, экстремист в России, — это всё хихоньки-хахоньки. Пока вот не вспоминаю, да, что по этому же делу там мои друзья сейчас сидят. В личном контексте — это такое освобождение.

What are you dreaming about?

- Live. [смех] Просто жить. Желательно на родине, желательно с семьёй, с друзьями. А просто жить обычную жизнь, какие-то маленькие радости, просто спокойно жить, чтобы вот эта вся [ __ ] этой жизни не мешала, не вставляла палки в колёса, чтобы можно было с родственниками нормально видеться, встречаться, чтобы там, значит, с друзьями можно было обсуждать всё, что захочется, да, чтобы музыку можно было слушать такую, какую захочется, чтобы люди в соседней стране не умирали просто потому, что какому-то деду это взбрело. Ну, какие-то простые базовые, на самом деле, вещи.