Vladimir Voinovich: Russia will be saved only by new restructuring

Vatutinki. Russia.

Vladimir Voinovich, one of the most famous dissident writers expelled from the USSR in the 1980 year (and deprived of citizenship from 1981 to 90-s), lived mainly in Germany and the USA. Then he returned to Russia. Now she lives at a dacha near Moscow in a village with the amazing name “Soviet Writer”. Resides in good health. He writes books and paintings. Best known for his trilogy about the adventures of the soldier Ivan Chonkin and the satirical anti-utopian novel “Moscow-2042.” As well as the anthem of the Soviet cosmonauts “Space cards loaded into tablets”.

What do you think about the phenomenon of Trump, as one of the main players in the American election race?

It's okay In the era of the electronic revolution and the Internet, Americans simply break stereotypes. They now have an African American president. Then, probably, the president will be a woman, and in the final she will fight with the American Zhirinovsky. It is clear how this will end, but there is intrigue. And then, on the terms of American laws and democratic institutions, even Trump should not be afraid of this post. In particular, all his positive rhetoric regarding Putin is actually just a pre-election move, nothing more.

Trump's attitude toward Putin will instantly change when he finds himself in the White House.

Why is America for many Russians, not to mention the leadership of the country, again became the enemy?

In the Soviet Union, enormous attention was also paid to anti-American propaganda. But the more violent she became, the more counterproductive her effect was. The more the party and government scolded America, the more Soviet youth fell in love with it as an ideal country. Young people idolized Western music, cooked jeans, and dreamed of Coca-Cola. In Moscow and Leningrad, young people called the main streets of the city - Gorky Street (now Tverskaya) and Nevsky Prospekt - nothing less than “Broadways”. “Let's go down Broadway!” they said. But then America was unattainable. She was a dream that seemed never to come true. Since then, the factor of unrealizability and mystery has disappeared. Most Russians will never get to America anyway, but it has ceased to be a dream for them. They hear on TV day and night that Obama is to blame for all Russia's troubles, and they believe it. They will never go to America, but they are terribly warmed by the annexation of other territories.

Why did the Russians en masse to the “Krymnash” slogan, which today covers not only the annexation of the Crimea, but also the war in Ukraine and even in Syria?

I sometimes ask these people: “Okay, before Crimea was not yours. And now to what extent is he yours? After all, even then we could go to Crimea and rent a bed, a room, a hut or a hotel room, and now we will rent all this. Only more expensive. What is the difference? What did this give us? Feeling of empire? In what sense. “Not our Crimea” - it is just as ours as “Krymnash”.

Maybe many people just continued to feel hurt feelings, like the feeling of humiliation from the 90's, after the collapse of the USSR.

Unfortunately, our people are proud of the fact that we are such a “powerful” country, and everyone is afraid of us. In the past they could not like the Soviet power, but in a sense, the feeling of belonging to such a great country even warmed them. And now they have experienced some kind of emotional rematch. But it will not last long. Everything collapses again. In Crimea, there is no success. The dream of Novorossia, as a revived Soviet Union, did not come true. The Russian world was a chimera. Eastern Ukraine will have to return soon. Even from Syria I had to leave. And now, many are disappointed.

What did Putin want to achieve? What was his purpose?

Putin was not given any peace by the laurels of the Great Victory (1945), and he also wanted to be known as a great commander, to go down in history as a collector of Russian lands, a unifier of the Russian world. And how tempting it all began: he took the Crimea without a single shot. It all looked like a miracle that even [Alexander] Suvorov could not manage. And so everything fell down.

Putin is accustomed in Russia to the fact that citizens show loyalty to his regime by believing any lies that they are fed daily. They are even specially, as a test of loyalty, presented with one lie more monumental than another. And, really, if a person, like Pavlov’s dog, every day all the time show red and call it green, and then show green and call it red, then soon the test person will believe that green is red, and that’s what and not otherwise, will perceive it.

And, in the end, Putin himself became a hostage of this lie. About Novorossia, about the Russian world, about the Kiev junta, about the "fascist punishers."

It was easier without a war, without all these deaths and destructions to invite 25 millions of Russians from all over the world to Russia than to protect them abroad. Come up with all sorts of programs for their placement and employment. They would be dissolved in Russia so that no one would have noticed. But they do not go. And do not go. Here is the answer about the Russian world.

But did Putin have a real chance to make history in a positive way?

Of course it was. After the complex and difficult 90-s, when he came to power, the price of oil was the only thing that did it by leaps and bounds. They continued to steal more and more, but still it was cheaper than keeping dozens of communist parties, movements, and terrorist organizations around the world. And people really began to live better. This was especially noticeable in Moscow.

The peak of Putin's ascent was the organization, conduct and victory at the Sochi Olympics, despite all the predictions of his opponents and the assurances of critics that it would fail and sink in the mud of the Sochi thaw. People still did not feel then on themselves how much money had been invested in this Olympiad. If anyone felt, these are some of the oligarchs who are noticeably poorer.

And at this peak of popularity, he annexes the Crimea. People cheers. And, most importantly, without casualties and war. And such euphoria is transcendental. And people have a feeling that right now they will suddenly start using this Crimea to their pleasure, as if everything there will now be free for everyone.

Then spun: Give Novorossia! And Odessa will be ours!

And then suddenly everything began to deflate. On television, analysts, the presidents of all strategic funds, convinced the people that in two hours Kiev would be ours. But this did not happen and could not happen. Putin did not expect such resistance of the Ukrainian people. He quickly realized that he was losing the war. And lost. Passed and Novorossia, and the Russian world with her. Putin, after all, not only meant Ukraine, as part of the Russian world, but also Belarus and Kazakhstan. But this did not happen. Already in eastern Ukraine, Russia suffered a military defeat in the struggle for the Russian world. Moreover, it soon became extremely clear that the Russian world was not in a hurry to embrace Russia. Neither in Ukraine, nor anywhere else.

I think we are on the verge of a big disappointment. There are questions: Why did so many people die? For what purpose? The hangover is already coming.

Vladimir Nikolaevich loves dogs very much. Photo: Sergey Loiko

Putin abruptly began a military operation in Syria, but he stopped it even more abruptly and unexpectedly. What, in your opinion, could happen?

After the military failure in Ukraine, Russia can not afford to fight with Turkey. She will lose this war. And Putin himself understands this. And he needs only victories. And while the lungs. As in the Crimea.

What do you think about Western sanctions. Are they tough enough and weighty?

The Russian government itself weighed them down. By the principle - beat your own, so that others are afraid. Banned people from buying western products. It became barbaric to destroy them. This is a completely meaningless, monstrous savagery, especially from people who seem to have no idea how people live at all.

But many of our people still say: “We have never lived so badly as under Obama!” I also like the slogan: “Obama, hands off my pension!”.

Putin had to stop a military operation in the Donbass, in which regular units of the Russian army participated. What caused this decision? First of all, sanctions against his close circle?

I will repeat once again: the heroic resistance of the entire Ukrainian people. Ukrainians turned out to be much more passionate people than Russians. Putin realized that he didn’t even have a chance to seize the entire Donbass, that Ukrainians would violently resist at every segment of their land.

With this, everything is clear to everyone, including the Russian public. But most Russians still continue to believe in the myth that they are surrounded by enemies, that there are some dark forces that are trying to enslave Russia. In the Russian people in general such a relic of irrational suspicion is very strong. As mothers of Russian children in the past were very afraid of the evil eye.

When my first child was born, my wife's mother came from the village, a simple Russian woman. So, every time after the visit of strangers, although very benevolent people, she sprinkled a girl with water from a glass, saying: pah-pah-pah.

And so now, many people continue to believe that the world is against us. What we are about to jinx.

And the unprecedented-false propaganda warms them up in it daily. People are constantly being told that the whole world is jealous of us, because we are so good and live in such a right way. The only thing that can somehow defeat this lie is the refrigerator. In the fight against the TV.

When people lack something, they gradually begin to sober. Of course, they still do not understand everything about the Crimean referendum. Carry out such a referendum in the Kaliningrad region with a question whether they want to live in Germany, and 101% will be in favor, because at least one percent from other regions will come back. As one resident of the Kuril Islands at one time made a proposal to transfer the Kuriles to Japan along with the population of the islands. The main problem of the Crimea at that time was that the people there lived worse than in Russia. This problem is nowhere to go. The concept of territorial seizures today in the civilized world is meaningless.

Vladimir Voinovich. Photo: frame TV channel "Rain"

The culmination of all this frantic lies in Russia was the Savchenko process. What do you think about him and about Hope?

I once wrote a very sharp letter to Putin on this topic. In it, I, in particular, wrote: “If the young Ukrainian heroine Nadezhda Savchenko dies in a Russian prison from starvation, it may not offend the feelings of your electorate. But you should think about the impression it will make on world public opinion. It is possible and easily predictable that it will react to it even more acutely than to the annexation of the Crimea and the war in the Donbas. People are so arranged that sometimes the death of one person shakes them more than the death of hundreds on the battlefield. The attitude to you outside our country is unenviable right now, but after Savchenko’s death, you better not appear in the capitals of Western states. Crowds of people will greet you with insulting cries and throwing something foul-smelling at you. And the name Savchenko will become a household name. Legends will be written about her, writing books, making films and calling her the name of the street and square. ”

What else is there to add? The process once again disgraced both Putin and Russia in the eyes of the whole world.

Recently, Ukrainian television interviewed me. The correspondent asked me what I thought about Savchenko as a possible candidate for the presidency of Ukraine when - and if - she was released. A strange way to pose the question. Nadezhda is undoubtedly a heroine, but this does not mean that she is endowed with the ability to rule the state.

In your anti-utopian satirical novel “Moscow 2042” you predicted in 1982 that the power in Russia would be such a totalitarian Orthodox one. Do not you think that this is already happening everywhere?

Indeed, today we see the dominance of Orthodoxy, which the authorities are implanting everywhere. It’s not for nothing that from time to time we see Putin with a candle in his hand. The result of this is the swell of the ranks of atheists. Just as on the eve of the 1917 revolution, schoolchildren hated the Law of God as a compulsory subject in the school curriculum. So it is now - the same merging of the state and Orthodoxy is increasingly pushing people away from the church and from religion. The time is not far off when atheism will once again become the dominant religion in Russia. The end result will be that soon there will be no respect for Orthodoxy in the country at all.

Photo: Sergey Loiko

In the same book, you very accurately predicted that a KGB officer would come to power in Russia. However, several years ago you also said in an interview with me that Putin’s regime would not last even two years. Did your amazing gift of visionary fail you?

I now refrain from political predictions. I can only say that then I was over-impressed by the 100-thousand-strong rallies in Moscow against the manipulation of the election results. But it cost them a little to threaten, and the whole protest was exhausted. Today, the opposition has no chance. The revolution in Russia today is possible only from above, in the form of some kind of new restructuring. This is hardly possible during Putin’s rule, but the leader who succeeded him, some new Khrushchev or Gorbachev, will be forced to announce a new restructuring. Hiding mass theft and corruption at the top is no longer possible. But they themselves do not hide it. With the continuing deterioration of people's lives, the situation will get hot. Do not expect any active actions by the Russian opposition. But the people themselves will see clearly. Offended by exorbitant extortion, truck drivers have already made political demands.

It is possible that in the near future we can expect a local insurrection by forces that were loyal to Putin, but now consider him to be their enemy. I'm talking about people like Strelkov-Girkin, who returned from the war in the Donbass with the confidence that Putin betrayed them.

It may be necessary to declare the restructuring, including to prevent such insurrections, when there is simply no other way out. It is clear that long before that, Russia will already withdraw its troops from Ukraine. But even to those who replace Putin as president, it will not be immediately possible to return the Crimea.

In this sense, the West and the US will need to carefully, without easing the sanctions, follow the development of events in Russia so that the signs of this restructuring in Russia will not be missed, and act accordingly. Russia will then again need help from outside.

What do you think about the television broadcast throughout the country of bed scenes with the participation of Mikhail Kasyanov, one of the opposition leaders?

I think it was such a Russian campaign start.

The restructuring in the USSR brought the books of dissident writers, including yours, closer. The books of Solzhenitsyn, Voinovich and other forbidden authors were read in secret, passed from hand to hand, and steadily brought the collapse of the Soviet Union nearer. Can literature today play a role in the revolutionary changes in Russia?

To do this, the authorities have to ban books. They have already banned a lot of things, but not yet literature. As soon as they begin to prohibit it, we will have books again that everyone will read.

Books by Vladimir Voinovich can be purchased on the Amazon website:

Life and extraordinary adventures of the soldier Ivan Chonkin

Crimson Pelican

I want to be honest

Life and unusual adventures of the soldier Ivan Chonkin. Gift Edition

Personality Dispatched Personality: Ivan Chonkin

The Ivankiad (English and Russian Edition)

See also:

Ulitskaya: Those who write off, remain in the second year. For a second term. For the second century

Vladimir Pozner on patriotism in the USA and Russia, immigrants and failed interviews

A war that was not supposed to be. An excerpt from the novel "Airport" Sergei Loiko

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