New Repartition
// What is to be done?
The events around YUKOS have finally made the Russian economic and political elite think of where Putin’s regime is pushing the country.
I assert that since the spring of 2000, president Putin’s regime has been carrying out a creeping anticonstitutional coup d'etat. Attempts to redistribute property form a logical link in the same chain of changes in the political and state structure of the country. The consequences of this coup, if it takes place, will be commensurable to the tragedy that happened to Russia at the beginning of the past century.
In order to realize the scale of the problem, one has to look back at history and answer one fundamental question: why was Russia embroiled in a civil war after the revolution of 1917, while no civil war took place after the revolution of the 1990s.
The answer is obvious. The revolution at the beginning of the century resulted in the expropriation of private property, which belonged to specific people and these people risked their lives defending their hard-earned property. Whereas at the end of the century, it was a redistribution of state or in other words “nobody’s” property and a state official assigned “nobody’s” property for a paltry bribe to a private person without remorse.
There is no sense in discussing whether state property has been redistributed justly or not. Of course not. The redistribution of property is never just. What is important is that this redistribution has not led to civil war, and at present 80% of property in Russia belongs to private individuals. But at the same time this means that the new redistribution started by president V. Putin is taking place in a situation similar to one at the beginning of the 20th century, and it will thus have similar consequences.
What is to be done?
At this point the most important thing is to phrase the questions in the right way and try to answer them. There are three questions.
First question. What is the main source of civil war threat?
The main danger comes personally from the president, but not just him alone. General A. Lebed used to say: “In poor country the majority of people cannot be farsighted. Beggars do not think of tomorrow. They want to eat and eat everything at once.” The greater part of the population does not want to assume responsibility for its life and supports the idea of property redistribution. Summing up a poll of Romir-Monitoring company, Vedomosty newspaper of July 18, 2003, ascertains that people’s dreams have not changed over the past 86 years, 77% of citizens suggest the “take and share” formula.
But at the same time this irresponsible part of society cannot imagine the consequences of still another repartition. In this context president Putin is equal to the greater part of his people.
Second question. Who can resist it?
This can only be resisted by the elites, e.g., the smallest, but most farsighted and responsible part of the nation. By elite I mean an influential group that has common strategic interests. I will list the elites now and briefly describe their attitude towards power, as personified by president V. Putin.
The most powerful among all Russia’s elites are certainly the regional ones. They include governors (presidents), regional politicians and business connected with them. Their main and strategic interest is preservation and expansion of political and economic power in their region. Their attitude to president V. Putin is most negative. V. Putin has violated the RF Constitution, and he deprived them of their political power and weakened their economic independence when he redistributed financial flows in favor of the federal center.
Second in importance and influence is the bureaucracy. This elite’s strategic interest lies in the aspiration to serve the interests of power and be part of this power as much as possible. Bureaucracy is the backbone of Putin’s regime and its most powerful support. And Putin himself is by nature a bureaucrat, not a chekist (KGB officer). Chekist is V. Putin’s profession, while bureaucrat is his state of mind. The mind of a bureaucrat is fear of any initiative, diffidence, and a tendency to shift responsibility on to others. That is the main reason why a bureaucrat president is the greatest danger to the country: a bureaucrat has no strategy – he is merely a doer of somebody else’s will. And this will is not the will of society, nor even of the elites, but of those near the president, those who have their own personal aims, which are not the interests of a group, to say nothing of social interests.
Putin’s bureaucracy differs from that of Yeltsin in a qualitative way. Yeltsin’s bureaucrat did not believe in private property and redistributed state property for money. Putin’s bureaucrat woke up when all the property had been redistributed. He was sure that private property had become a reality and got busy redistributing property, but not state property, since there was too little left, but private property. It is the bureaucrat who poses the greatest political hazard for the country today. It is the bureaucrat who instigates society to civil war.
Third elite is the oligarchs, in other words, federal level business. They are not numerous, but they have tremendous influence. The main strategic priority of this elite is preservation of capital. This distinguishes them from the rich, whose main priority is increasing capital.
V. Putin has not provided the needed stability for this elite. And the latest events around YUKOS have allowed this elite to define their attitude towards president V. Putin and his regime once and for all.
The fourth elite is special services. Its main strategic priority is control over power and its use. On the one hand they are part of the bureaucracy, and on the other hand they are an independent force that claims president Putin’s special favor (but as I’ve explained above, quite groundlessly, since he is not a chekist, but a bureaucrat).
This elite’s elite does not recognize V. Putin as its leader: for these people he is an upstart – he had proved to be too undistinguished in his service. And of course this elite dreams of someone like Yury Vladimirovich Andropov, or at worst, Evgeny Maksimovich Primakov. But as an interim option V. Putin is convenient for them, although with implicit and serious reservations: too easy on his people and yields too much to the US and other western countries altogether.
The fifth elite is the army. Its main strategic priority is to be an indispensable force defending the interests of the homeland in the outside world. The army has traditionally been the most patriotic part of Russian society, and in view of sincerity of its convictions, it is absolutely discontented with V. Putin. He has won no battles; neither has he let his army win one. Where is the swift and convincing victory he promised in Chechnya in the fall of 1999 while he was acting prime minister?
It gets even worse: influence in other countries has been brought to naught, military bases in Cuba and Vietnam have closed, influence in the Middle East has been nullified, the policy on Iraq was all about the concentration of uncertainty and weakness. But the greatest defeat was the loss of influence over all the post-Soviet space.
Undoubtedly, the army does not trust its Supreme Commander-in-Chief and his dull protégé, Minister of Defense S. Ivanov.
The above-mentioned five elites are the participants in most important state-level decision-making processes. Below, I name three more elites, but they only go along with decision-making by these five.
The sixth elite is the journalists. They are conductors of opinion from the basic part of society and elites to government and vice versa. It is noteworthy that in Yeltsin’s Russia this elite was among the most important and influential. It was the most important participant in the decision-making process, and it certainly is discontented with such a major loss of status and is not happy with V. Putin’s regime.
The seventh elite is the church. The main strategic priority of this elite must be spiritual and moral leadership of the nation. The situation here is transparent. True believers do not believe that V. Putin is a believer and hence do not believe the president. Those who do not believe are only associated with the church by their titles, while in reality they are merely church bureaucrats. And of course, they accept the president. But their spiritual and moral influence over society is trifling.
And finally the last, eighth elite is the intelligentsia. Unfortunately it is really the last one, the last in terms of influence on society and authorities. This elite is the carrier of the cultural and scientific tradition of the nation. In the period of cataclysms that Russia is now undergoing its main strategic priority is self-preservation. This elite traditionally has had no will at the most crucial moments of our history. And yet it becomes a significant support for society when the vector of historical development turns to freedoms.
Thus of all the elites I’ve mentioned, president V. Putin can with confidence rely on the bureaucracy alone and have the support of one more elite – special services. But even this is rather conditional: bureaucrats always nestle up to power and as soon as president V. Putin starts losing it, they will betray him straight away.
Therefore, the main point is not the motivation of the elites : the overwhelming majority of them are discontented with president V. Putin in essence.
Third and main question. How do we prevent Russia from slipping into civil war?
The answer is to realize what is going on, overcome fear, display will and determination, and organize ourselves, but the main thing is to act. Not wait until the authorities indulgently consider still another of our complaints, in which cowardice peeps out from every line, but use our constitutional right to mass meetings, demonstrations, processions, pickets, e.g., acts of disobedience. Even in countries with a stable democratic order, citizens guard it by action. And this action always runs counter to the intentions of executive authority. This happened in the USA when millions of ordinary citizens stopped the war in Vietnam; this happened in Eastern Europe and in Russia, when people overthrew hateful regimes; this has happened not long ago around the world, when hundreds of millions of ordinary citizens protested against the war in Iraq.
Even action cannot always change the situation, as the example of Iraq clearly shows. But inaction is always carte blanche for state despotism.
Civil society does not only mean clubs for nature, pet or beer lovers, it is above all civil institutions that can control authority and control it rigidly, opposing it in action. The power of democracy as compared to totalitarian regimes lies in constant open confrontation between society and the authorities.
Conclusion
I want to specifically show what a dangerous business president V. Putin is up to, when, in fighting his existing and potential political opponents, he constantly comes back to the revolutionary events of the 1990s.
A criminal portrait of V. Putin based on the information of various national and foreign mass media in the period of 1990-1999. I cite only a small part of these reports.
1. On May 13, 2002, in Vaduz, Liechtenstein’s capital, lawyer Rudolf Ritter, brother of Liechtenstein’s minister of economics, was arrested. A little earlier, in April, a report of the German special service BND, which called Ritter an agent of the Ochoa brothers’ Columbian drug cartel and Russian organized crime leaked out in the western press. The report mentioned, in particular, the company SPAG founded by Ritter, which used money of the Columbian drug mafia to buy real estate in St. Petersburg. The press asserted that SPAG’s as well as Ritter’s “roof” (racket) in St. Petersburg was Vladimir Putin, who was responsible for foreign economic relations in the St. Peterburg city administration. Officially, Putin remained the firm’s consultant until May 23, 2000.
In 1992-1996, when Putin was Head of the Foreign Economic Relations Committee of St. Petersburg and a consultant for the German real estate company SPAG (St. Petersburg Immobilien und Beteiligungs AG), created in 1992 on the initiative of the St. Petersburg City Administration, which became SPAG’s co-owner, and the firm became a center for money-laundering in Europe.
In particular, Russian criminals transmitted money via SPAG through the Romanian IRB Bank with the view of buying real estate in Russia. Through this same company they sold property in St. Petersburg on the money from the drug trade.
In the mid-1990s, a group of Lensovet (Leningrad Council) deputies headed by Marina Salye and Yury Gladkov investigated Putin’s activities concerning the issue of licenses for raw material and non-ferrous metal exports.
Lawmakers of Petersburg accused Putin of inefficient use of his powers and corruption. The committee’s findings mentioned in particular a story about the issue of licenses for exports of raw materials against deliveries of foodstuffs, which never actually arrived in the city. It was recommended to Governor A. Sobchak to discharge Putin from his post.
2. V. Putin took part in privatization, namely of:
Baltic Marine Shipping Line (BMP). Control over BMP allowed Putin to organize the sale of Russian ships at understated prices, all his actions were performed through I.I. Terebin, a criminal boss;
Samtrest distillery (through criminal boss M.M. Mirilashvili – “Misha Kutaissky”); Astoria hotel.
3. With the help of St. Petersburg governor Grishanov (formerly Commander-in-Chief of the Baltic Fleet) Putin sold ships from the naval base through Lomonosov Port. This port, situated on the territory of a former naval base and set up by Sobchak, Putin and Cherkessov, is a checkpoint for natural resources contraband and foreign goods importation.
4. In the spring of 1998, about 30 million dollars was transmitted from Tsarskoselsky Bank to Swiss Bank. The transaction was controlled by Putin, Cherkesov, Grigoryev (B.O. Desyatnikov, head of SKROSO UFSB Service, kept the materials).
5. Head of the Vasileostrovsky District administration, V. Golubev, has known Putin since his service days in the 1st Service of the UKGB of the USSR in Leningrad. Former colleagues organized a number of firms, through which budget money is funneled and then appropriated.
6. While still vice-mayor, Putin organized the sale of submarines abroad through the Leningrad Admiralty Association. In 1994, the deputy general director of the Association was murdered (according to one of the versions – for refusing to sell munitions abroad illegally).
7. Baltic Financial Group (BFG, general director – Kapysh) rendered financial assistance to Putin and Cherkesov on a monthly basis. In 1994-1995, Kapysh got into a conflict over the oil terminal of the seaport with one of its founders and ordered the murder of this founder. For $50 000 he persuaded the other founders to settle the conflict, whereupon Kapysh’s foe left for Israel.
8. XX Trest Corporation created by Putin jointly with the deputies of the Legislative Assembly Nizheshin and Goldman, transmitted budget money assigned for construction, including the Peter the Great Business Center, to Spain. A hotel was purchased in the Spanish town of Torrevieja. Putin spent part of the stolen money to buy a villa in the Spanish town of Benidorm (the materials are available at KRU Ministry of Finance of the RF of St. Petersburg and Leningrad Region)
9. On October 12, 1997, a jeep transporting Putin at high speed (on a legal basis, with a government flashlight) killed five-year-old Denis Lapshin (Novaya Gazeta, #8, February 14-20, 1999). Putin’s driver, B.B. Zykov, was not arrested and in 1999 was amnestied.
At the same time one can state, that V. Putin was not doing too well in his official duties, while heading the FSB (Federal Security Service). At this time, Russia was stunned by a number of serious crimes that have never been solved. They include:
murder of Juridical Petersburg Today editor-in-chief Anatoly Levin-Utkin (August 20, 1998);
murder of Dagestan mufti Sayid-Mahammad Abubakarov and his brother in the yard of the Cental Mosque of Makhachkala (August 21, 1998);
murder of the president of AO Petersburg Fuel Company Dmitry Philippov by radio-controlled mine. He was a former candidate for the post of St. Petersburg governor, and an authorized delegate of Gennady Seleznev. (Dmirty Philippov died from wounds on October 13, 1998, after the explosion of Ocober 10, 1998);
wounding of G. Seleznev’s advisor and sponsor Mikhail Osherov in St. Petersburg, the result of a murderous assault (October 16, 1998);
murder of Galina Starovoitova in St. Petersburg (November 28, 1998);
murderous assault on 1st deputy prefect of the Central Area of Moscow Petr Biryukov (November 28, 1998);
slaughter of three Englishmen and a New Zealander in Chechnya (the foreign specialists were kidnapped on October 3, 1998; their beheaded bodies were found on December 10, 1998);
explosion of a car near the US Embassy in Moscow (January 17, 1999);
murder of the editor of Russian Lawyer magazine A. Polyakov in Moscow (March 4, 1999);
Kidnapping of the RF Interior Ministry plenipotentiary general Gennady Shpigun in Grozny (March 5, 1999);
pogrom in a Novosibirsk synagogue (on the night of March 8-9, 1999);
explosion in a market in Vladikavkaz: more than 60 people were killed and more than 100 injured (March 19, 1999);
attempt to fire a grenade launcher at the US Embassy in Moscow (March 28, 1999);
murder of Dagestan deputy prosecutor- general Kurbat Bulatov (March 31, 1999);
explosion near the wall of FSB building at Lubyanka (April 4, 1999);
mining of Jewish Sholom Theater in Moscow ( May 10, 1999);
murder of the mayor of Kyzyl, leader of the Tuva department of DVR party of Genrikh Ell (July 21, 1999);
and others.
The failure to solve these crimes can at best be qualified as professional impropriety and at worst…
Please do not consider this article as a written request either to the General Prosecutor’s Office of the Russian Federation, or to the Attorney-General of any other country – since anyone (including vice-mayor of St. Petersburg Mr. Putin) who was not sleeping on the stove in the 1990s could have been indicted for a crime just because the old laws were no longer working and the new ones were not yet working. Such are the consequences of any revolution.
According to the Constitution, the President of Russia is its guarantor. He must realize that it is not “equidistancing” of business from power, but equality of all citizens of the country before the law, including the RF president, that guaranties the country’s stable development and society’s confidence in the government’s reliability.
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Information from the Editorial Staff
The material has been published by request of the owner of Kommersant Publishing House, Boris Berezovsky. The argumentation, spelling and punctuation of the original letter have been preserved.
B. Berezovsky, Leader of the Liberal Russia Party
All the Article in Russian as of July 24, 2003
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Photo: Dmitry Azarov
