The eagerness to insert himself into global power struggles is not just a personal propensity of Putin's, but somehow a typical characteristic of Russian nature, which needs to find self-confirmation elsewhere, so as not to loose itself among the forests and steppes of its boundless territory.
A man full of life, passion, and humour, he was able to adapt to the harshest conditions. His soul, more than his ideas and programmes, counted. With death, Alexei Navalny becomes the embodiment of a defeated Russia, showing the inconsistency of its claims to domination and empire. And it lays bare the shame of Putin's Russian world.
The Ukrainian autocephalous Orthodox Church has removed the memorial of the holy Russian prince Aleksandr Nevsky from its liturgical calendar, teh saint who defeated Westerners in the 13th century and was the forerunner of the alliance with the Asian empires. While Kirill would like to canonise the great generals of Russian military history.
Internationally, 27 January is Holocaust Remembrance Day, but in Russia it also commemorates the lifting of the Siege of Leningrad. Now for Russians, the Holocaust is no longer about the extermination of the Jews, but as a Nazi crime against various peoples, starting with the Soviets. In Kirill and Putin’s version, Moscow is presented as the bastion against the "hegemonic genocide" of the West.
Russian state media depict Lenin as "the inventor of Ukraine", therefore the real culprit of the ongoing conflict, as opposed to the enlightened leadership of Stalin. In reality, Putin is the inventor of a new mythological Russia, who rereads ancient and recent stories in his own way to impose a new empire.
The final celebration of the Christmas season, which took place yesterday according to the Orthodox tradition, includes immersion in icy water in Russia as an experience of physical and spiritual rebirth. As the ritual is celebrated, the philosopher Alexander Shchipkov penned an article outlining the features of an “education in moral values", the heart of the union between religion and politics in vogue today in Moscow.
All private military companies similar to Wagner have now been assimilated by the new imperial opričnina. As at the end of Ivan's reign, even in Putin's twilight, after the final deification of the presidential elections next March, the real question will be how far the teams of power-mongers will be able to maintain an internal balance among themselves.
In Russia, Christmas falls on 7 January following the Julian calendar, highlighting especially this year, the proclamation by the Moscow Patriarchate that it is the "one true Church”. Yet, the revival of patriotic faith is not the only definition of Russian Orthodoxy today. There is also the path of those who, like the exiled Protoiereus Andrey Kordochkin, pray with the words: “Give me back my mother!”
Television in Russia serves to 'close ranks', to feel like a member of the military parade in front of the Kremlin, which is broadcast on every solemn occasion, including New Year's Eve in various formats, especially in these times of war.
For the first time, Ukraine is set to celebrate the Nativity of Christ in a unified way on 25 December, a symbolic event for its new identity. But the country’s real challenge is to take control of the game away from Putin, truly showing the world the face of a new people, beyond any rationale of war.
December 12 celebrated the 30th anniversary of the post-Soviet Constitution, approved by Yeltsin. Charter traced by Putin back to Stalinist totalitarianism, though without imposing a new one in his name. Even in the major revision of 2020 (over 200 amendments) the charade of "democratic Russia" remains. With the March 17 vote, the president intends to usher in "year zero of the new era."
Many people merge and mix with the figure of the president in economic, military, religious, and social affairs, but also for ideological and cultural reasons.
Convened in Moscow in the two symbolic places par excellence - the Cathedral of Christ the Savior and the Kremlin's Congress Hall - the "Sobor" became a celebration of a "multinational people," which in every way opposes the disintegration of the state, and defends its greatness beyond all borders.
Remembered with great passion in Ukraine and deep resentment in Russia, the “Revolution of Dignity” has brought into play not only the geopolitical and economic interests of the Ukrainian people and of the various parts of the "Russian world", but above all their deepest moral and spiritual interests that transcend the ideological.
Doubts are growing in the country as to the real existence of the president, who is given up for dead or replaced so much so as to be nicknamed 'the refrigerator man'. The supreme leader is an almost anonymous and impersonal expression. Kirill embodies the celebratory role, but power is in the hands of the obscure Secretary of the Security Council who speaks of the 'tsar Putin' in the past tense.
Hostility towards the West tickles the aggressive side of the Russian character, and most Russians take the bait of provocation, especially if Jews are involved. But the paradox is that Russia, because of its history and culture, is inextricably linked to the destiny of the Jewish people, as shown by a musical parody on the net.
The dramatic events of the Gaza-Israel conflict are also having repercussions in Russia, where today the People's Unity Day is being celebrated in memory of the victory over the Poles in 1612. On this occasion, Patriarch Kirill of Moscow approached St Seraphim of Sarov, one of the most representative saints of the Russian identity, which today is experiencing a renewed need for self-awareness, the Russian samobynost so often evoked also by Putin.
On 25 October, the supreme leader of "All the Russias" convened two groups to address and solve the problems of the entire world. The first meeting brought together military officials and nuclear weapons specialists. After this, he joined religious leaders, who had patiently waited for him in the most solemn halls of the Kremlin.
Kirill's appeal to all the heads of the Orthodox Churches against the ban on Russian jurisdiction of Orthodoxy in Ukraine sanctioned by the Kiev parliament has gone unanswered. While the sending of Metropolitan Tikhon to Crimea, the most contested front line, many are wondering whether this is yet another punishment or a possible ecclesiastic and political exaltation.
The "piecemeal world war" evoked for years by Pope Francis is indeed turning into an increasingly global confrontation. Russia sees in this, the realisation of its "mission" to challenge the domination of the "collective" West. Solzhenitsyn's words about the troubled relationship between Russians and Jews come to mind.
The president gave a new keynote address to the plenary of the 20th Club Valdaj, one of the 'ideological' venues. To 'intellectuals' the invitation to build a 'new world'. The evocation of the axis with China, the Arab world and India against the West, whose support for Ukraine is becoming uncertain. The 'synodality' (sobornost) that sums up Putin's justifications for the conflict.
Russia's problem is the uncertainty of its position, an unresolved fluidity between East and West, North and South. It is unable to find a true unity, as evinced by its institutions, but also as seen in the diatribes among Soviet dissidents of old and today's pacifists.
Kadirov's illness and Azerbaijani Aliev's coup sweeping away the Armenian enclave dominated the week. While Baku makes Europe weigh the strength it has acquired at Moscow's expense in the gas market, the Kremlin leaves it at that, accusing the Armenians of having flirted too much with the West. Russia is trying not to lose the Caucasus, its 'Middle Eastern side' as well as Ukraine.
The leader of the Kremlin welcomed the dictator of Pyongyang to discuss low-level weapons and technology. Xi Jinping kept himself far from the two "thugs" while the Russian president used "underworld" jargon in the meeting. Patriarch Kirill renewed his "material and spiritual" support for the holy war.
The misunderstandings between Francis and Ukrainian Greek Catholics are not simply a personal issue related to today's context. The Vatican's search for harmony with the "Third Rome" of modern czars and emperors (down to party secretaries and federal presidents) has been a constant in history for more than a millennium. So have the complicated relations between the Holy See and the "Uniates" of the Kiev frontier.
The Kremlin claims to have cut ties with the West and turned east, but the facts say otherwise. Putin's Russia has renewed with its old 19th century imperial image, captured by the mid-century Crimean War when Russia was at odds with everyone in the Old World. As Moscow neglects its Eurasian expanses, Beijing is stepping in to fill the gap.
Prigozhin's ghost, dead or alive, will hover over Russia for a long time to come, as indeed happened with so many tsars and tsarevichs of the past. After the "conquest of Bakhmut" - a meaningless clash of months and months transformed into a heroic legend - the narration of the "alternative army" no longer held up the scene, and mythology showed all its inconsistency.
In Putin's mind, the flight of the Americans from the Afghan capital triggered the spring of the 'great revenge'. Russia now regularly invites Kabul's representatives to Moscow for consultations, despite the fact that the Taliban are still considered an unwelcome 'terrorist organisation'. And the other former Soviet countries are also in solidarity with the Kremlin in officially condemning the Afghan government, at the same time considering it a necessary partner.
Under the Soviet regime, education too was the subject of state attention. Now, with the new textbooks, Stalin’s glorious victory on 9 May 1945 becomes Russia’s “new baptism”, subsuming Soviet ideological rhetoric and the latest incarnation of sobornost, the universal union of peoples led by Moscow.
Putin's operation has not shifted the territorial balance but has touched the heart of the (former) empire. Radio-controlled aircraft are becoming a decisive factor in the War of the Two Worlds. In Moscow and the rest of Russia, people have lost the defensive barrier that protected their mental landscape, while, for Putin, "everything is going according to plan." The apocalypse for Christian Orthodoxy is after Russia, nothing.
