NEW – September 9, 2022
It is worth figuring out who is considered the elite
All my life, I have heard from liberals, patriots and ordinary people about the raw materials backwardness of the Russian economy. The hard version is that the oil and gas era is coming to an end, and soon all Russians will starve to death. Soft – income from raw materials is unearned, they are simply God-given, and without them, Russians would be in dire straits, because they can’t produce anything themselves. To my arguments that the share of oil and gas in Russian GDP is only 20%, and oil and gas itself is a complex and high-tech business that has long had little in common with the Soviet oil and gas industry, many only smiled. And the claims that the financial and social well-being of the European Union is based on Russian energy carriers are a laugh. Now, however, there is no talk of backwardness in raw materials. Time has put everything in its place.
But there is still talk of a terrible elite that has sold out or will sell out the country. Then there are two options: either the elite needs to be nationalised, or with such an elite, Russia is doomed. Here, of course, time will also put everything in its place. But it will not be superfluous to insert one’s five cents. I feel bad for Russia that it’s being called either a raw material appendage or that its elite is not what it should be. Excuse me, the elite is the elderly Madame Broshkina [Alla Pugachyova – SZ] and other similar public? Only a very virgin or very inflamed brain can believe this. Of course, there is a problem. The elite of tsarist Russia was largely cut out by Trotsky and his militant forces. After the October revolution of 1917, many of Russia’s best people were forced to leave the country. By the 80s of the last century, the Soviet party elite had completely degenerated and, as a result, could not save the country. We, Russians, are a nation without a head. Some, especially in the West, even believed at the time that we didn’t have much time left.
However, in place of the USSR, bourgeois Russia has long been on the map. And it is definitely worth figuring out who is considered the elite. There is a joke that Russia is run by oil workers and security officers, but, as is known, there is some truth in every joke. In the West, it was a very fashionable story that people who make key decisions in the Kremlin keep their money in the West, which means that they can be managed. Perhaps it was, but a long time ago, in the very, very distant 1993. Back then, after Yeltsin’s October 1993 coup, officials and oligarchs were really closely connected to each other. The main problem of Russia in the early 90’s is not that the property was divided unfairly, it was basically impossible to divide it fairly. But the fact is that key assets initially went to very dubious people, for whom the concept of patriotism and social responsibility of the state and business is an empty phrase. People who make key political decisions in Russia do not have money or serious corporate shares (equity) in the West. Sometimes they talk about Istanbul and Dubai, but this, of course, is not the West. The business elite of modern Russia. What’s good for Ford is good for America. We have long been America, i.e. a large economy with companies with revenue and operating profit in the tens of billions and net profit in the billions of dollars. Major shareholders and CEOs of major companies. Igor Sechin (Rosneft), Aleksey Mordashev (Severstal), Vladimir Bogdanov (Surgutneftegaz), etc. Everyone is very different, but “caring-about-Russia” people. Think of Gusinsky, Berezovsky, and Khodorkovsky, and you’ll understand right away.
Intellectual and creative elite. We also have it – Aleksandr Prokhanov, Nikita Mikhalkov, writer and blogger Marina Yudenich, military expert, participant of October 93, Vladislav Shurygin, philosopher Aleksandr Dugin, who gave for Russia the most valuable thing that he had – his own daughter, TV presenter Vladimir Solovyov and some participants of his program, my like-minded Eurasians Pavel Zarifullin and German Sadulaev. A great patriot of our country was the recently departed writer with a capital letter – Eduard Limonov. The leaders of the most important Russian regions: Chechnya – Ramzan Kadyrov and Tatarstan – Rustam Nurgalievich Minnikhanov. The list goes on and on.
But the main elite of Russia is the people who actually created the modern bourgeois Russian republic. Without them, even a great and powerful leader like Vladimir Putin would hardly have had such a stunning success. One of my closest friends took Grozny in 1995, received the Order of Courage for his participation in military operations, and then worked in the highest positions in leading investment holdings. The author of these lines himself spent most of his life working in the analytical services of financial companies, while simultaneously working on the creation of a modern Young Eurasian movement, actively promoting the idea of a single Eurasian currency – “altyn”. There are many people like us. Our destinies are very different, but they have one thing in common – the sacred concept of the Motherland. At the same time, each of us made ourselves, working at our own peril and risk all our lives in the private sector. It’s just that unlike liberals, we have always assumed that it’s you who owe Russia, and not the opposite way round.
Our centuries-old Russian-Turkic civilisation is younger, and therefore aggressive and successful, than Europe. It’s high time to stop being shy about it, loudly and clearly stating this to the whole world. And the elite is no worse here now than in the USSR and tsarist Romanov Russia. Just do not forget who is considered elite, and who is cosmopolitan rabble without a clan and tribe. For our own, we have one commandment – love thy neighbour, and for the enemies of the Motherland – die today, and I tomorrow.
Aleksandr Razuvayev
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