This weekend sees the resumption of the 2009-2010 European Nations Cup. As well as the glory of winning the cup, the winning team and second place team in this year’s ENC will qualify automatically for the 2011 Rugby World Cup in New Zealand.

At the half-way mark, Russia currently lie second in the table, a point behind leaders Georgia, and a point ahead of third placed Portugal. All three sides have an excellent chance of making it to the finals; either through one of the two automatic qualifier spots, or through the absurdly complex playoff that the third placed team will be entered into.

Russia’s first and last matches will be key this year.

They kick off the season with a home match against Portugal, and given that they won 18-14 in Lisbon last year, they’ll be fairly confident that they can pull off the win they need. Last week’s comfortable win over Namibia, who have already booked their place in the World Cup will have helped to boost confidence, and to sharpen the players skills as well. Portugal, though, will be no push-over. They’ve been to the World Cup before, and will want to go again. And, when they travelled to Georgia last season they matched the title favourites all the way to a sensational 20-20 tie – they’ll be hoping to go a point better against Russia.

If (big if) the results this season follow the formbook exactly, Russia’s last match of the season against great rivals Georgia will be the title decider. Russia’s ‘home’ match last year was played in Ukraine because of tensions between the two countries following the 2008 war, and Georgia defeated Russia 29-21 in a bruising encounter. To ensure parity, and because tensions are still pretty high, this season’s fixture (nominally a home match for Georgia) will be played at a neutral venue in Turkey. Georgia normally draw fanatical crowds of 40,000 plus for their home matches, so Russia will be hoping that the more subdued environment in Turkey lead to a more subdued performance from the Georgian rugby team, too.

Other big matches to watch this season will be Portugal’s return encounter with Georgia on February 13th (in fact, these first two games will decide Portugal’s entire season), and Romania’s matches with all three sides – Romania are no-where near as good as they were in their ‘glory days’ during the 1980s, but they remain a tough team to beat, and still harbour hopes that, if the results go their way and they pull off a shock or two, they could sneak into third place by the end of the season.

Over the next couple of months we’ll be keeping you up to date with the latest results as, fingers crossed, Russia fight their way through to their first ever appearance at the Rugby World Cup.

Here’s this season’s full fixture list:

European Nations Cup Fixtures 2010

Check out Russian News Online for the latest stories from all the top Russia Blogs.

European Nations Cup 2010 – Fixtures and Preview

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1. Rugby: Georgia beat Russia to top European Nations Cup table
2. Russia disappoint in Rugby IRB Nations Cup
3. Rugby: Russia beat Romania to go top of table

In this week’s cartoon, Berlusconi visits Belarus, and leaves behind a lovestruck Lukashenko. You can find more of Spanish illustrator Juan Rodriguez Morales’ cartoons at Spanish language Russia blog La Mirada al Este.

Check out Russian News Online for the latest stories from all the top Russia Blogs.

Cartoon: Berlusconi in Belarus, Lovestruck Lukashenko

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Former Doctor Who actor David Tennant has just finished recording a radio play based on the autobiography of Craig Murray, the controversial former British ambassador to Uzbekistan.

The play, in which Tennant plays the role of Murray, chronicles the former Ambassador’s disgust at what he perceives to be British complicity in tortue in Uzbekistan, his decision to publicly speak out, and his subsequent falling out with the Foreign Office.

Playwright David Hare, who is well known for writing political plays (see ‘Stuff Happens’ and, most recently, ‘The Power of Yes’) adapted the play from Murray’s autobiographical Murder in Samarkan. He apparently didn’t want to just take Murray’s word at face value, and travelled to Uzbekistan to further research the play and to speak to people who knew Murray at the time, in order to get a more balanced view. However, the play is said to be relatively sympathetic to Murray – to quote the Guardian newspaper:

The play reveals different sides of Murray: he is an idealist, who takes an immovable moral stance, but also a drinker and womaniser.

Murder in Samarkand will be broadcast on Radio 4 in England on 20 February, and David Tennant’s participation ensures that Murray’s story will receive a far wider audience that it otherwise would have. Whether this is a good thing or not, I’ll leave for you to discuss in the comments…

Check out Russian News Online for the latest stories from all the top Russia Blogs.

Doctor Who actor David Tennant to play Craig Murray

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Formula One team Renault have signed Vitaly Petrov as their second driver for the 2010 season. Petrov, seen here perched uncomfortably on his new car’s rear tyre, will become the first ever Russian to race in F1 once the season’s first race begins this March, in Bahrain, and he’ll be hoping to play more than just a supporting role to Polish team-mate Robert Kubica (pictured, left).

Petrov is a well known and very successful racer – he finished second in last season’s F2 championship. He is, according to his Wikipedia page, known as the Vyborg Rocket in Russia – presumably because he’s from Vyborg and, erm, goes really really fast. Or, possibly, just because someone in the media was searching for a nickname, and was feeling uninspired that day.

Renault’s decision to sign Petrov will have been based mostly on his performance to date in lower formulas, but it won’t have hurt his chances that he also brings what is rumoured to be between $10 million and $15 million in personal sponsorship with him from top Russian bank Sberbank and natural gas company Gazprom. Petrov beat out two other Russian drivers to become the first Russian in Formula 1 – Sergey Zlobin and Roman Rusinov are reserve drivers for the Minardi and Midland teams, but presumably didn’t make the cut because they didn’t bring quite such impressive sponsorship packages to the table grid.

Check out Russian News Online for the latest stories from all the top Russia Blogs.

Formula 1 – Renault signs Russian Vitaly Petrov

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The long awaited 5th generation Russian Stealth Fighter, classified as the Sukhoi Pak-FA T50, flew its first test flight on 29 January 2010. 

Piloted by Sergei Bogdan, a test pilot for Sukhoi, the T50 made a successful 47 minute testflight, taking off and landing from Sukhoi’s factory runway. On touching down, Bogdan told reporters that everything went well, and that he was impressed by the way the T50 handled:

“In the course of the flight we’ve conducted initial evaluation of the aircraft controllability, engine performance and primary systems operation, the aircraft had retracted and extracted the landing gear. The aircraft performed excellently at all flight-test points scheduled for today. It is easy and comfortable to pilot”

Here’s a video report of the test flight, courtesy of Russia Today:

The T50 is Russia’s first 5th generation plane, and is their answer to the US F22 and F35 fighters, and the long awaited European Joint Strike Fighter.  It has stealth capabilities, much improved on board electronics (which will take a lot of load off the pilot) and the ability to fly at supersonic speeds for the entire length of its flight, but opinion is divided as to it’s true quality. 

Obviously, Sukhoi and the Russian government are talking up it’s qualities, but others are less impressed.  Military analyst Pavel Felgenhauer (who, it should be noted, is usually critical of the Russian military and government) had this to say:

“It’s a humbug.  It’s just a prototype lacking new engines and a new radar. It takes new materials to build a fifth-generation fighter, and Russia lacks them.”

When you combine this with cautious statements from Prime Minister Putin, who called the test flight of the Pak-FA “a big step forward,” but tempered his praise by noting that “a lot remains to be done in terms of engines and armament”, it’s fair to observe that Russia’s plane may not be of quite the high quality of its US and European competitors.

Nonetheless, Russia has pumped almost $10 billion into research and development for their new stealth plane.  In order to recoup all that money, they won’t be able to just reserve it for the Russian military.  Yes, the Russian air force will order around 150-200, at a cost of around $100 million apiece, but the investment will be realised when Sukhoi makes them available on the international market.  India, who were partners in the development of the fighter are said to be going to buy around 200-250 and, if the Pak-FA is of good enough quality and at the right price point, it wouldn’t be a surprise to see global sales top a thousand pretty quickly.

(By the way – in a surprising move, there are rumours that the Pak-FA’s sold to India may actually be constructed in India, in order to keep costs down.  If this proves an profitable strategy, we may see the production of even more Russian military equipment outsourced to countries where labour is cheaper.)

For more information, check out our post on Sukhoi Pak-FA concept designs, and on Russia’s aircraft carrier expansion programme.

Check out Russian News Online for the latest stories from all the top Russia Blogs.

Sukhoi Pak-FA T50 (aka Russian Stealth Fighter) makes its first test flight

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Note: Since writing this review, the publishers of VernX have written to let me know that they’ve reduced the price of VernX to free (yes, they’re giving it away), and that, in response to customer demand, they’ve changed the game’s name to vparticle.

VernX is a deceptively simple, and deceptively addictive, new puzzle game for the iPhone.

The basic idea (which you can see from the video above) is that you have to take the swarm of little red dots that you control from one end of a maze to the other as quickly as you can, picking up other little dots along the way for bonus points. You control your swarm by tilting your iPhone from side to side – tilt to the right, and they roll to the right, gathering speed as they go. Tilt your iPhone to the left again and they slow down – but don’t tilt too far, or too hard, or they’ll turn tail and start swarming the other way.

The thing that really sets VernX apart from other puzzle games on the iPhone is the concept of the swarm. It’s really easy to get one of your dots through the maze, but trying to keep 20-30 of the little buggers together across the course is a bafflingly difficult challenge at times.

VernX is a very slick production. Everything works just the way it should and, although the graphics aren’t slick, I think a lot of thought has been put into making them so simple, so that they don’t distract from the gameplay at all. There are plenty of concepts in the game, from moving blocks that bar your way forward to electric force fields that zap unwary little red dots off to the starting line again. These concepts are introduced to the game via an elegant set of tutorials at the beginning, but really they are so well integrated that you can easily play the game and figure out what to do next just by picking up your iPhone and playing.

VernX has certainly been my game of choice on my iPhone over the last few weeks – it’s the perfect game to pick up when I’ve got five minutes to spare, so you’ll often see me on my morning commute, manically tilting the screen of my iPhone from side to side, cursing under my breath as one of the little red balls under my charge goes astray.

The development of any new Russian puzzle game is inevitably going to draw comparisons with Tetris, the ultimate computer puzzle game. So, is VernX the new Tetris. Well, no. But that’s not to say that it’s not a great puzzle game in its own right. It’s innovative, easy to pick up and difficult to master, and it’ll keep you playing (and possibly swearing) for a good long while to come.

And, at only $0.99 free from the iPhone apps store, VernX is a steal.

Rating: 8/10

Check out Russian News Online for the latest stories from all the top Russia Blogs.

VernX review – the new Russian iPhone game

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Comrades Medvedev and Putin welcome the new year with a quick song and dance video, found courtesy of the newly refurbished Sean’s Russia Blog.

Op-Pah!

Check out Russian News Online for the latest stories from all the top Russia Blogs.

Putin and Medvedev Sing and Dance into 2010

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This week’s cartoon by Spanish cartoonist Juan Rodriguez Morales is called “Rock, Paper, Scissors!” You can find more of Juan’s cartoons at Spanish language Russia blog La Mirada al Este.

Check out Russian News Online for the latest stories from all the top Russia Blogs.

Cartoon: Rock, Paper, Scissors!

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Just a quick post to wish you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

I also wanted to let you know that the Global Voices initiative is now five years old. David Sasaki has written a great retrospective of Global Voices’ first five years that I really recommend you read if you get the chance.

The team over at Global Voices have done an amazing job over the past half-decade promoting and supporting bloggers and journalists across the world (including in Russia and every country of the Former Soviet Union), and they really deserve every plaudit they get.

Global Voices are funded partly by charitable donations, so if you were looking for someone to donate a little money to this Christmas, I think they’d really appreciate your help!

Check out Russian News Online for the latest stories from all the top Russia Blogs.

Merry Christmas

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You can find more cartoons by Spanish cartoonist Juan Rodriguez Morales at Spanish language Russia blog La Mirada al Este.

Check out Russian News Online for the latest stories from all the top Russia Blogs.

Cartoon: Layer Up!

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I was amused to stumble across this Russia Today video report about the 70th anniversary of the battle of Khalkhin Gol.

Why amused?

Well, do you notice that the title of Russia Today’s report from August 2009 is almost exactly the same as the title of the article I wrote in January 2008 – an article called ‘Khalkhin Gol: The Forgotten Battle That Shaped WW2‘.

Sadly, I’m told that you can’t copyright blog titles. So, rather than being annoyed, I’m instead going to settle for being smug/amused that Russia Today reporters use Siberian Light for their research.

And for their copy writing.

Check out Russian News Online for the latest stories from all the top Russia Blogs.

Russia Today steals my blog titles :-)

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Rumours are circulating (again!) that former gymnast Alina Kabaeva has given birth to a bouncing baby boy, who just happens to be Vladimir Putin’s son.

These rumours come not long after almost identical rumours swept the world’s media in May – I reported about the phantom Alina Kabaeva baby here on Siberian Light at the time. As you can guess, the rumours turned out to be untrue… much like the rumours that Kabaeva and Putin were secretly engaged.

Mostly the stories coming out this week have been reported in Indian newspapers (see the Indian Times for an example) and Indian blogs, but a couple of Canadian newspapers have also picked up the story.

The common theme to all the stories this time round is that, again, absolutely no Russian newspapers are covering this story. The cynical will, of course say that the Russian press is terrified of stepping out of line, for fear of facing Putin’s wrath, but as far as I can tell, the real reason is that there is absolutely no substance to the stories – from my reading, it seems as if this week’s stories are just re-hashes of the May story. Even some of the quotes are recycled.

Still, it gives me the opportunity to quote this excellent gem of Russian political incorrectness, which turned up entirely unattributed in the Inquisitr:

“…one analyst told us, “Putin is very careful about his public image. Still, considering Russia’s Muslim population is about 30 million, it might not hurt him politically to have a beautiful, half-Muslim wife.”

I wonder if this story will get far enough off the ground to result in another Kabaeva / Putin denial?

Check out Russian News Online for the latest stories from all the top Russia Blogs.

Has Alina Kabaeva given birth to Putin’s Son (again)?

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Siberia is known for its abundance of natural resources, with huge deposits of gas and oil, and precious minerals – including natural diamonds. Although remote location and challenging environmental conditions have presented challenges for those finding and mining diamonds, the efforts made have paid handsome dividends. The foundation for diamond mining in Siberia was in fact the start of the Cold War. Diamonds are most famous for their jewelry applications but many don’t realize the immense industrial and military need for diamonds. For example, the hardness of diamonds means that they can be used to abrade almost any material, making them invaluable for drills for mining and manufacturing alike. Diamond powder is also used as an abrasive to form other precision tools and military equipment. With the De Beers diamond cartel controlling virtually all of the world supply of gem and industrial diamonds, Stalin feared the disruptions to manufacturing capabilities that would be caused by bans on diamond sales to the country. A supply of diamonds had to be found that was not subject to foreign control.

The hunt for diamonds on Russian soil began in earnest in the late 40s. Eventually, after years of research using sophisticated equipment, similarities were found between the geological features of Yakutia province and those of known diamond rich areas in South Africa. The search immediately began in earnest for kimberlite pipes in the area. Kimberlite pipes are formations that have a high probability of containing diamonds. In 1955 geologist Yuri Khabardin found such a foundation. This was named the Mirny Pipe – and shortly thereafter the Mirny Diamond Mine. Facing extreme weather conditions during the winter, engineers nevertheless succeeded in establishing a working mine, and producing large quantities of diamonds. In fact, many international experts were surprised or even skeptical of the volume produced as mining continued at the Mirny mine, with some believing that more than one mine must be in operation in the country.

Although the Russian Diamond mines were established to reliably supply diamonds for industrial use, plenty of gem grade stones were also produced. In fact, during the 60s these diamonds were the country’s most valuable export. The diamonds produced were generally small compared to those on the market, but the De Beers company still feared that the oversupply of the new Russian stones could damage their careful control on the international price of diamonds. To deal with this problem, De Beers made a secret deal to buy diamonds from Russia so that they could continue to control world supply.

The volume of small gem grade diamonds now held by De Beers meant that they actually had to change public perceptions of small diamonds in order to avoid a buildup of the Soviet diamonds in their vaults. Previously, large stones had been the popular choice for westerners. De Beers launched a massive advertising campaign to counteract this, promoting rings and jewelry made up of multiple smaller stones in preference to single large stones. As a result of this, the smaller diamonds became highly sought after. This is reflected by the fact that the size of an average stone fell to 0.28 carats in the mid 70s – down from an average of 1 carat per stone in the 40s.

Although De Beers was able to continue selling small Russian stones, as time went on they began to struggle to keep up with the pace of production from the Siberian mines, which were producing far more diamonds than could be explained given the size and scale of operations. The secrecy surrounding the Russian mines has made it hard to find reliable information even today. However it is worth noting that in parallel with their program of exploration and mining for diamonds, Russian scientists had been working on ways to synthesise diamonds in the laboratory. They had been producing abrasive grade industrial diamond powder since the 60s, but had continued to develop their technology to the point that they were able to produce marketable, clear gem quality lab created diamonds which stood up to examination from trained gemologists. It is said that these stones were not cost effective to produce, but one can imagine some Tesla-esque advance in the technology being used to produce diamonds at a profit. It’s interesting to note that the machines use to produce the current popular ‘Chemical Vapour Deposition’ diamonds in America were reportedly sourced from Russia in the 90s.

Since their creation, Russian diamond mines continued to expand, and the diamonds mined now account for a significant component of GDP – particularly in some areas. Almost all modern diamond production in Russia occurs in the Sakha Republic, with these stones accounting for up to 25% of annual world diamond production and valued at US$1.5 billion. Although an important part of the region’s economy, mining operations are not without some controversy and undesired side effects. Pollution caused by mining, including some nuclear explosions intended to expedite the diamond mining process, have affected the river systems which are relied on as part of the drinking water supply. Work to manage pollutants and improve the quality of water continues, particularly in the Lena river basin – the largest river system in Russia.

Check out Russian News Online for the latest stories from all the top Russia Blogs.

Russian Diamonds

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Those of you with long memories will remember the series of interviews I did with top Russia bloggers, back in early 2007. Well, after a very long hiatus, I’ve decided it’s time to resurrect the series again – and who better to start with than Anatoly Karlin of Sublime Oblivion.

Previously blogging at Da Russophile, Anatoly has made quite a mark for himself in quite a short space of time,. Over the past couple of years, he has published plenty of insightful and in-depth articles over the past year or so, quite a few of which have been re-published in Johnsons Russia List and, as you’ll see from the interview, is already working on a book (although sadly it won’t be about Russia).

So, without further ado, over to Anatoly.

Why did you start blogging about Russia?

First off, I would like to thank Andy for the interview and express my sincere admiration for his work in bringing together such a cluster of diverging and often highly-charged viewpoints together in a civil “interview” format over the years, as well as to offer my apologies for the six month delay in completing this interview.

Let’s start at the beginning.  As I’ve spent the majority of my life as a Russian immigrant in the UK, I became acutely aware of how the sentiments of many Westerners towards Russia ranged from ignorance to disdain, with a large degree of overlap. This is unsurprising and understandable, of course. The countries in the NATO alliance had spent the last fifty years living under the threat of nuclear war with the Soviet Union. And the inhabitants of Western Christendom have had a primal aversion to the dark steppe to the east since times immemorial. Scratch a Westerner, and you wound a Russophobe.

This essentialist worldview is systematically reinforced by the Western media, whose distortion of Russia ranges from the blatant and despicable – e.g. referring to Chechen terrorists as “freedom fighters” during the Beslan crisis; to the more subtly mendacious, in which it sees fit to assume the role of judge, juror and executioner regarding the Kremlin’s exclusive guilt in reducing gas subsidies to Ukraine (“energy blackmail”), the death of Litvinenko (“FSB assassinations”), and the 2008 war in South Ossetia (“revanchist Russian imperialism against a beacon of democracy”). All this constitutes a real information war against Russia by Western media outlets working to the “propaganda model“. (So what if I cite Chomsky? All he does is point out the obvious).

As if the Western media on Russia being little more than a brief for the prosecution wasn’t enough, I then happened upon a certain blogger who gloried in calling “herself” a “Russophobe” and tried “her” best to attach a stigma on a word supposed to have much more positive connotations – “Russophile”, in the most underhanded and low-life ways imaginable. Even semantics are ammunition in the information war. And this was the ultimate trigger that inspired me to create the original Da Russophile in January 2008. Translitered into Russian, it’s supposed to read, “Да – Руссофил!”, that is, “Yes – I’m a Russophile!” (and proud of it).

What spurred me to action was not the even the perceived duplicity of most Russia coverage, but the lack of an opposing interpretation. I believe the prosecution has made its case and as such I didn’t bother laying claim to objectivity; instead, I explicitly admitted to my pro-Russia partisan bias (as Howard Zinn said, “you can’t be neutral on a moving train”, and those who pretend otherwise are hypocrites or naïve). This is in stark contrast to most bloggers (journalists, humans, institutions, etc), who present themselves as – and even frequently believe themselves to be – paragons of objectivity. The former Economist Russia journalist Gideon Lichfield put it best: “The truth is like a quantum superposition state: it is not one version or the other, but a strange combination of all them”.

What are your goals for Sublime Oblivion?

First, the need for alternate Russia coverage is far less pressing now than it was a year ago. The Kremlin is realizing the value of soft power and has acquired some heavy artillery over the past two years, such as the Russia Today TV channel and the Russia: Other Points of View information portal. As such, I now rarely feel the need to comment on current Russian news – demolishing the same Russophobe myths gets repetitive and boring after a while (much like grenade fishing), – speaking of which, I think I now understand why similar “Russophile” bloggers like Konstantin, Fedia Kriukov, and Kirill Pankratov jumped ship after a year or two.

Second, after a few months of blogging, I became more adventurous in my scope and ambitions. This moved me to make some major changes to the original Da Russophile, the biggest of which were: the transition from Blogger to self-hosted WordPress, the abandonment of the pseudonym stalker (yes, I love the film) in favor of my “true name“, and a certain moderation in rhetoric. I have largely abandoned activism in favor of observation and analysis. Most importantly, I’ve expanded the blog beyond focusing exclusively on Russia, to a more of an about-me-and-my-interests kind of thing – which at the moment and for the foreseeable future happen to be Russia, geopolitics, and future global trends.

As for my current plans:

• Continue my series of Sublime Strategic Reports on the global trends, regions, and geopolitical dynamics that will shape the 21st century.
• Build up the Sublime Oblivion Forums community.
• Do more Russian-English translations of uncommon and interesting material.
• Continue monitoring developments in Russia’s demography, on which I have an extensive and original portfolio.
• Expand my presence on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube (videoblog), and LiveJournal (на русском).
• Make forays into journalism and / or related research as time permits.
• My most ambitious project is my forthcoming book on future history, which I hope to finish by spring 2010 and publish soon after. See the last question for more details.

What have been your best & worst experiences about blogging so far?

I’ll be indecently honest here. By far the best experience is the ego trip. I love fan mail and Googling my name to find snippets like this or this. Best of all is getting recognized by the VIP’s. It feeds my narcissism and encourages me in my endeavours.

I think that praise and criticism are really two sides of the same coin, so I’m 100% cool with the latter – even of the sort La Russophobe and “her” minions like to dish out. In fact, especially of that sort – they provide lots of lols, just read the list of insults Russophobes have thrown against me! I sympathize with Andy on how there are too many zealots polarizing the Russia “debate”, but I don’t think it annoys me quite as much as it does him. After all, it’s been a constant feature of the Russia debate throughout history. (That said, the attacks do tend to become boringly repetitive after a while, hence I tried to automatize their refutation by compiling a list of Responses to common Russophobe “Arguments”, in addition to the classic Top 50 Russophobe Myths and Russophile Core Articles.)

As for the worst experiences, they are stunningly banal. Writer’s block – I spend at least as much time procrastinating on teh internets as actually writing, and managing complexity – juggling between a big number of online projects, academia, and social life can be enervating. Not that terrible, but still vastly more aggravating than the sum wrath of the LR collective.

Which blogs about Russia and the FSU do you most enjoy reading?

There is a Zen temple in Japan, Ryōan-ji, which has a rock garden arranged in such a way that you can only ever see a maximum of fourteen rocks out of a total of fifteen from any horizontal vantage point. I think it is an excellent metaphor for truth; though it is always elusive when sought from a single perspective, it can be probabilistically narrowed down to an ever smaller region by looking at things from different locations, different interpretations, etc. If you are serious about attaining enlightenment on any subject, it is best to become acquainted with all interpretations – in Russia’s case, be they “Russophile” (Peter Lavelle, Nicolai Petro), Marxist (Sean Guillory), postmodern “virtual-political” (Andrew Wilson), cultural path-dependency theoretic (Streetwise Professor, Stratfor, the Eurasianists, etc), and – yes – all-out “Russophobe”.

As such, I subscribe to most of the main Russia blogs on my Google Reader, though I certainly don’t read all or even the majority of the posts. Life is short. After all, some interpretations aren’t really about observing rocks, but crawling under one. That said, here’s a list of my favorite Russia blogs:

• Sean Guillory @ Sean’s Russia Blog – intelligent, eminently readable.
• Andy Young @ Siberian Light – I love(d) the weekly best blog posts and interviews. (*hint*)
• Eternal Remont – for the lolz.
• Eric Kraus @ Truth and Beauty (…and Russian Finance) – his newsletters are far more interesting than the admittedly goofy-sounding name suggests. PS – get a proper blog!
• Fedia Kriukov @ Russia in the Media – used to be an excellent blog for debunking Russophobe drivel, now sadly dead of ennui (just like Konstantin @ Russian Blog & Kirill Pankratov
• poemless – lovely humorous blog that exploded into our lives like a fluffy pink grenade.
• Yuri Mamchur, Charles Ganske et al @ Russia Blog – somewhat dull and too “official”, but they published my stuff so they’re cool.
• Craig Pirrong @ Streetwise Professor – an unremitting “Russophobe” with a penchant for distortion, but intelligent unlike the others.
• “Untimely Thoughts” – An Expert Discussion Group on Russia, Johnson’s Russia List, and Stratfor – not blogs, of course, but all three are IMO excellent sources of information for amateur and professional Russia-watchers alike.
• State statistics service Rosstat, polling company Levada Center, and demography portal Demoscope are invaluable resources, which I highly recommend to all fact-challenged Russia-watchers.

What first sparked your interest in Russia?

The central theme of my identity is my lack of one. I was sundered from my native Russian land at a young age and I assimilated most of my “cultural assets” during my period of exile in Britain. The reason I call it an “exile” is that I always felt as a a stranger in a strange land there; I was never accepted as British by its denizens, even though I spent the vast majority of my life there. My resulting mentality is aptly labeled “diasporic” by Konstantin Krylov; a state of profound amorality, rationalism, and apathy for the host society’s values – for someone who sees all values as relative cannot have any other attitude.

However, the “diasporic mentality” is a profoundly unnatural – and hence unstable – state of affairs, since the human soul yearns for unity, belief, and sobornost. This may explain the dawning of my sentimental interest towards Russia, which was only reinforced by my socio-cultural alienation and rising political awareness (e.g. of the nauseating moral hypocrisy inherent in Western cultural imperialism towards nations pursuing sovereignty like Russia and Venezuela).

I do not recall there being any “first spark” to my interest in Russia, the ideological evolution began in my mid-teens and is an ongoing process. We shouldn’t forget that dismissing and dissing Russia was fashionable in the 1990’s, when Yeltsin’s “family” were pillaging the nation and many Russians, especially émigrés, felt “betrayed” by the Russian state (partially to justify their own flight abroad and spiritual descent into self-interested, amoral poshlost). There’s also a generational aspect here. Whereas the “fathers” tended to gleefully indulge in Russia-bashing – and embraced all aspects of Westernization with the fanaticism of the new convert - the effect was sometimes quite different on Russia’s “sons”. As Susan Richards points out, contrary to Western delusions, it the youngest Russians which constitute the most “anti-Western” cohort, who according to Nicolai Petro “embraced patriotism as a defense mechanism against the blanket criticism of Russia’s past that left them with nothing of their own to believe in”.

Though I personally have no doubt been influenced by the above developments, I cannot really partake of this spiritual reawakening in Russia. Whenever I visited Russia, most of my relatives insisted on labeling me as English; and if I tried protesting it, many rejoined that I was talking nonsense, or had no idea of “how Russia really works”. The message is clear. I am rejected as Russian by the Russian narod, which correctly perceives me as contaminated; a spiritual threat to the cohesiveness of the community. Like the typical second-generation European Muslim emigrant, divorced from both their indigenous culture and their host society, I have no “real” identity. I’m not just an inostranets (foreigner), but a bezstranets, a dude without a country, a rootless cosmopolitan who ought to be hunted down and shot for treason by all humanity.

It is thus of no surprise that I’ve found a home, of a kind, in California – a state which Fukuyama identified as the most “post-historical part of the United States”, and more specifically, in the liberal oasis that is The Bay. It is here that I realized that I could reconcile my “Russophilia” with my social liberalism, environmentalism, Marxism, predilection for postmodernist thinking, and dislike of Western chauvinism, by embracing Third-Worldism. This perhaps finally resolves my internal contradictions in a way that is both logically consistent and politically correct.

Anyway, the point I was making was that my interest in Russia is not whimsical or academic (that would be China), but lifelong and quasi-spiritual.

What do you most love / hate about Russia?

Drinking vodka with friends. Cheap flying, parachuting, and bootleg IP. The unsettling but intoxicating blend of license and insecurity. The Russian village and peasant wisdom, now sadly in its death throes. The greater “reality” of life in Russia. The profound mysticism of the Russian Orthodox Church, and the primeval mysticism of Russia’s endless plains, dark forests and Slavic skies.

Aggravating though it frequently is, the bureaucracy is tolerable. I’ve never been forced to pay bribes, with the exception of traffic police requisitions. There seem to be many more daily quirks, inefficiencies, and stupidities of various kinds. But ultimately, are these not just affirmations of Russia’s greater scope of humanity, life, and spirit?

My greatest concern about Russia is its continuing lack of civilizational confidence and cultural submissiveness before the West (the “преклонение перед Западом” that Soviet ideologists rightly warned against), which manifests itself – and I might add to a much greater degree that in Western countries – in the crass materialism and historyless ideologies of its current crop of elites.

If you could recommend one book about Russia, what would it be?

As Oswald Spengler said, Tolstoy is Russia’s past and Dostoevsky is its future, so “The Brothers Karamazov” would make as good a choice as any.

On balance, do you think Vladimir Putin’s Presidency has been good or bad for Russia?

Let’s approach this from the viewpoint of the Russian “silent majority”, instead of the quack Kremlinologists and limousine liberals who claim to speak for them. First, there can be no doubt that the vast majority of socio-economic indicators improved markedly under Putin. This is not to deny that many Russians lead hard lives, and that the prevalence of material poverty remains much higher than in the West (which contrary to some common Russian rose-tinged perceptions, is not itself a land of limitless milk and honey) – but exactly where did I claim otherwise?

With that caveat, I daresay – to a greater extent than Russians living in Russia – that on average their living standards have improved greatly since 1998. Though they may go on about how inflation and bureaucracy makes their lives unbearable, it does not resound well when set against their ringing cell phones and new cars parked outside (consumerism exploded in the 2000’s). This is an excellent example of creeping normalcy – some Russians fail to appreciate the strong secular trend towards improving average real living standards since 1998, focusing more on present day concerns like rising prices and poor government services. Nor is this improvement limited to Moscow and the rich, as some Russophobes like to assert. Statistics hint that the economic revival is broadbased across regions and social classes, and I can personally confirm that even small, depressed towns like Kolomna and Volokolamsk have seen vigorous economic expansion in recent years. This has been matched, from around 2006, by an accelerating cultural and demographic revival.

Second, the more sophisticated Russophobes counter that yes, there have been real economic improvements, but only at the cost of shrinking democratic freedoms; in their view, a more liberal regime would have would have undoubtedly performed better. The problems with this viewpoint are manifold. First, most Russians believe they live in a democracy and as pointed out in a BBC poll, some 64% of them believe Putin has had a positive impact on Russian democracy – and who are we to say otherwise? Second, they conflate “democracy” and “liberalism”, which are in fact two very different things. As Vlad Sobell points out, Russia remains “an evolving, post-totalitarian democracy, which unsurprisingly continues to suffer from the baggage of its difficult history” – heck, even Khodorkovsky admitted that Putin is “more liberal and more democratic than 70% of the population” – and as argued by Nicolai Petro, the second phase of the “Putin Plan” for Russia’s modernization is liberalization, which follows on from the first phase – “consolidation” of the Russian state. In their view, Putin’s “soft authoritarianism” was necessary to curb the “roving banditry” of the 1990’s predatory-oligarchic state to allow the development of real liberalism. (The sad experiences of 1990’s Russia and post-Orange Revolution Ukraine illustrate the perils of “anarchic liberalization”). Third, they arrogantly assume that Western-style democracy is an unalloyed good thing, even an end-of-history eschatology, whereas in reality, it is just an expression of hubristic Western egocentricity. In my opinion, nations like Russia and China are fully capable of developing their own, indigenous versions of democracy; if anything, Russia needs a “sovereign democracy”, unbeholden to foreign influence, in order to organically evolve the institutions required for the long-term survival and incubation of liberal ideals within its borders.

Though at times he may be diverted from the task by national security exigencies and adjudication of disputes amongst the Kremlin clans, I believe this is precisely the long-term goal Putin is pursuing – consolidation, modernization, liberalization (in this order of priority). The recent moves by an alliance of Surkov’s “GRU” clan and the civiliki (economic liberals) to investigate corruption and mismanagement of strategic companies under Sechin’s “FSB” clan – which has the implicit blessing of the Russian President, Medvedev – may be the opening shots in a coming purge of the most egregiously corrupt siloviki. This will help the Kremlin in its efforts to modernize Russia, which may in turn lay the foundations for an eventual liberalization by the 2020’s.

On the modernization front, there have been some little-noted successes, e.g. a partial revival of manufacturing from its post-Soviet nadir, helped in part by a new mercantilist industrial policy (contrary to popular belief, a calculated measure of state intervention has been central to all successful development stories). The state reigned in the most rapacious oligarchs and since the mid-2000’s expanded its support for the hi-tech sector (e.g. nanotechnology) and strategic industries. That said, a great deal of work remains to be done, such as reviving the hypertrophied military-industrial complex and developing a real “innovation economy” – these will be some of the big projects of the 2010’s.

I will refrain from making value judgments on whether Putin was “good” or “bad” for Russia, except to the extent of noting that his consistently sky-high approval ratings amongst Russians, usually above 70% since 1999, indicate the former (though then again, some would ascribe this to a “traditional” Russian penchant for a paternalistic Tsar-savior). Instead, the argument may be advanced that a Putin was inevitable.

The Russian Empire has always been subject to cyclical collapses due to its inherent tendencies towards illiberal anarchy (the “Time of Troubles”, the Civil War, the 1990’s). These collapses were followed by  ”white riders” (the early Romanovs, Lenin, Putin) who checked the collapse, restored order with a firm hand, and reconstituted “the Empire”. Bismarck remarked that “the art of statesmanship is to steer a course on the stream of time”; as an inheritor of the Tsarist and Soviet historical and cultural legacy, it is to be hoped that the Putin system eventually manages to fulfill the Kremlin’s dreams of reconciling sovereignty with liberalism, instead of succumbing to anarchy like Boris Godunov or metamorphosing into a “dark rider” like the late Ivan Grozny or Stalin. We’ll see.

Do you think the average Russian’s life today is better, or worse than it was in 1989? Why?

On the one hand, the “average” Russian became unprecedentedly empowered as a consumer by the mid-2000’s, though this was accompanied by massive new inequalities (the 1970’s-80’s Soviet Union had no concept of consumer sovereignty and devoted all its additional, shrinking production growth to the military-industrial sector). There were also a great many more social and political freedoms, despite the continued social prevalence of illiberal “post-totalitarian” attitudes, especially amongst the bureaucracy and security forces. Russians also opine that they became happier.

However, the only people to immediately benefit from the Soviet collapse were the ambitious, unscrupulous, and well-connected; and even today, for a great many Russians – especially in the provinces and amongst the elderly – real living standards remain both substantially worse and buffered by a much weaker social safety net. The comparison becomes even worse when one also accounts for a host of social ills (crime rates, alcoholism, ethnic tensions, AIDS, etc) that germinated in the late USSR, but only exploded once society was opened up. Some 45% of Russians believe people are now worse off than under Communism, whereas only 33% take the opposite stand (though it should be noted that this is slightly better than average for the former socialist bloc). I can personally sympathize with this viewpoint. Furthermore, this pattern of nostalgia for an imagined past of a bright socialist future, to a greater or lesser extent, is common to all post-socialist nations (for instance, 57% of East Germans now defend the GDR).

Why? The fundamental reason is that though there undoubtedly appeared a general apathy in late Soviet society, it still retained a deep sense of social solidarity, or sobornost – a catch-all term for a deep sense of internal peace and unity between races, religions, sexes, etc, within a society, or in the words of the Russian philosopher Nikolai Lossky, “the combination of freedom and unity of many persons on the basis of their common love for the same absolute values”. However, by the late 1980’s the costs of keeping the Soviet system were perceived to exceed the benefits; the burden of complexity became too great to bear. The Soviet state, bereft of its most powerful tools (economic coercion) yet still burdened by immense obligations (welfare and warfare), unraveled under the strain. By the early 1990’s, the “Empire” crumbled and Russia reverted to anarchic stasis in an economic hyper-depression – a neo-feudal oligopoly extracting rents from a demoralized population wracked by social insecurity and demographic crisis, under the guise of virtual politics. Russia’s place on the Belief Matrix shifted towards poshlost – another untranslatable Russian word which denotes cultures that have lost belief in themselves and their own future in favor of vulgarity, commercialism, and pessimism. Most Russians viewed this development as an unmitigated disaster (hence Putin’s infamous comment that the Soviet collapse was the “greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the 20th century”), and yearned for a “white rider” who would restore order and return them to the future. They got Putin.

It should come as no surprise, then, that Russia’s resurgence – especially visible after 2006 – has been marked by what I perceive as an accelerating drift back towards a Eurasian Empire (not only or even mainly in the territorial sense); a more informal, smarter, and reinvigorated USSR-2. As I outlined in “VII. Return to the Future” in Russia’s Sisyphean Loop, the evidence for this includes: a) the continued consolidation of state power, including Surkov’s ideological invention of “sovereign democracy” (in 2006), and its increasing overspill into active management of Russia’s economic development in what is the latest round of Russia’s “defensive modernizations”, b) a marked improvement in social morale, as attested to by opinion polls and a demographic stabilization that is likely to be sustained in the long-term, and c) the continued deterioration of social attitudes towards the West (especially the US), coupled with increasingly active – and successful – Kremlin efforts to restore its hegemony over the post-Soviet space.

The poor, chaotic, and colorful interlude of poshlost is at an end, most poignantly symbolized by the demise of the eXile in 2008 (I’m sure they’d agree; one of their last issues bewailed the demise of the gopniki, Russia’s equivalent of “white trash”, and a good metaphor for poshlost). A new Eurasian Empire is coalescing in its place, which has started to and will probably return sobornost to Russian life within the decade. And that will mean far more to the average Russian than any amount of Chinese trinkets or London mansions.

Do you think Russia will ever embrace the style of democracy now favoured in most of the rest of Europe, or will it take a different path?

Probably not. For that matter, perhaps not even many European democracies will survive in the next few decades, or more specifically their liberal characteristics. They have a host of problems such as rapid aging, overly generous welfare states, below-replacement level fertility rates, simmering ethnic tensions, national rivalries and varying interests undermining the EU project, and severe structural economic and / or fiscal solvency problems. These will soon by joined by resource shortages and the effects of climate change.

As for Russia itself, I’ve identified several likely directions it could go in “VIII. Return to the Future: Forking Paths” in Russia’s Sisyphean Loop – “sovereign democratization”, “return to the natural state”, “liberalization”, and “totalitarian reversion”.

In “sovereign democratization”, Russia continues implementing Nicolai Petro’s vision of the “Putin Plan“, modernizing and liberalizing Russian society in a new “revolution from above”, or as Vlad Sobell puts it, “this new ‘USSR’ has shed its totalitarian and imperial character and is building genuine democracy à la russe”. Look to Gaullist France, with its emphasis on populism, sovereignty, and dirigisme, as an example. The Sechin silovik clan of ‘former’ FSB officers will be purged or sidelined and by the Year 2020 (a date which has assumed a somewhat millenarian status in Kremlin rhetoric on development), Russia will be a prosperous, innovative, liberal, and patriotic nation. I think this is an optimistic, though still realistic, vision; however, it is contingent on the survival of globalization and the continuation of Russia’s economic and demographic resurgence, both of which are far from assured.

Another strong possibility is a “return to the natural state”, i.e. the reinforcement of Russia’s current paternalistic and neo-feudal features, and continuing economic nationalism, silovik cronyism, and resource dependency. A powerful Tsar will dole out transitional rent-gathering rights unto his boyars, in return for their political loyalty and tax payments. This ‘Muscovite model’, or neo-Tsarism, is socially unjust, Pareto inefficient, and ineffective at either generating economic prosperity or sustaining resource mobilization. Russia will restore its Empire and military might, but as Steven Rosefielde noted, it will be a giant with feet of clay – weakened by economic frailty, undermined by separatist and dissident-revolutionary movements, and contained by the Atlantic powers, it will lapse into a zastoi reminiscent of the Brezhnev era. This ‘middle variant’ tends to be favored by analysts who perceive that Russia is run by a gang of kleptocratic neo-Soviet revanchists and believe the country is doomed to secular decline on account of what they perceive are its disastrous demography and moribund economic system.

“Liberalization” (in the anarchic 1990’s or today’s Ukrainian sense) or “totalitarian reversion” are very unlikely today. The Russian liberals, or “liberasts” as they are sometimes unflatteringly called, are now irrelevant, discredited relics of an older and not-too-soon-forgotten time (of troubles). Nor do Putin and his associates have a death wish to become all-out “dark riders” in a neo-Stalinist mold. Though there is now substantial support for disparate extremist movements (neo-Eurasianism, Strasserism, White Nationalism, etc), they remain confined to the political fringe as in the rest of Europe – though we shouldn’t forget that all it takes for this to change is a weakened state, social disillusionment, and a well-organized, ambitious Party with a skilful demagogue. That said, it is not impossible to imagine a scenario in which a Muscovite “natural state” collapses under its own failings by the 2020’s, unleashing a destructive wave of “liberalization” that returns Russia to poshlost, ushers in renewed social disillusionment, and engenders a violent reaction against liberal ideals that culminates in a totalitarian despotism, and one probably far more ‘racialist’ than its predecessors – not to mention armed with thousands of nukes.

Which of these paths Russia will go down is still impossible to predict with full certainty, though there are certainly signs, Aesopian language, etc, that the Kremlinologist should observe for hints of Russia’s future trajectory. In particular, the outcome of the brewing GRU / civiliki vs. FSB clan war will be a major portent of things to come.

If you could advise the Russian government to do one thing it isn’t already doing, what would it be?

No more mindless idolization of the West (преклонение перед Западом). Instead, develop civilizational confidence by rejecting “Europe” and recognizing Russia’s status as a unique Eurasian civilization, not inferior (or superior) to any other. This does not imply an irrational rejection of useful Western technological and even cultural imports, as urged by some extreme Slavophiles. That said, this does not mean Russia should worship everything Western, because many Western imports clash too much with indigenous Russian traditions to be of any real benefit. Furthermore, the speed, zeal, and “totality” with which Western imports were forced on Russia by its rulers tended to exceed anything seen in the West itself due to Russia’s habit of attempting to “leapfrog” the gap separating it from the West, as happened during the Bolshevik Revolution (from feudalism / early capitalism to socialism) or the 1990’s (from socialism to market fundamentalism) – i.e., to whatever utopian end-of-history the West appeared to be moving towards at the time. Needless to say, the short-term effects were tragic and the long-term effects were enervating, resulting in long periods of retreat and stagnation. It’s time to break this cycle.

If Russia’s elites were to fully embrace this wiser mentality, a number of consequences would follow. They would pay less attention to what foreigners think of their actions, and will thus possess greater freedom to act in Russia’s real national interests. For instance:

• More state control over natural resources extraction, mainly to limit activity so as to leave more reserves in the ground in a world of limits to growth.
• Free trade is only good as long as it really is free, which it isn’t. Russia should be bolder about incubating promising infant industries, encouraging domestic savings, and pursuing strategic trade.
• In particular, Russia must give the formation of a proper domestic financial system top priority in order to gain independence from Western credit flows – their sudden disruption in 2008 was the major cause of Russia’s economic crisis.
• Russia has no need for billionaire oligarchs, especially since they are almost all de facto employed by the state; a few millions should be enough of an incentive.
• Don’t be afraid to reintroduce the death penalty for corruption and sabotage – it works in China, it worked in the Soviet Union, and there is no reason it shouldn’t work in Russia again. The Council of Europe can fume all it wants.

That said, there’s no need to be impolite and in-your-face about all this. Again, follow China’s rhetoric on “peaceful rise” (even as it builds up the world’s largest industrial economy, acquires neo-colonial spheres of influence, steals the most advanced Western technologies, and pursues military modernization). Most importantly, remember that socio-economic modernization is most successful when generated indigenously, not forced upon from outside via Westernization, which is undesirable because of the internal social conflicts in provokes in non-Western societies. Don’t become blindfolded by Western ideological imports like Marxism or neoliberalism. Instead, work patiently and eruditely to explain to the domestic “liberast” intelligentsia - many of whom are actually patriotic, if misguided – why their prostration before the West is unproductive to Russia’s interests (or just ignore them). Breaking up their small rallies with the OMON just reveals insecurity and is counterproductive.

Finally, there is strength in numbers; as the greatest champion of “The Rest” against “The West” since the Revolution (or even gunpowder Muscovy), Russia should resume pushing for Third World solidarity and participating in its manifestations like the BRIC’s and G20. The words of Russian philosopher Nikolai Trubetzkoy are as relevant today as when he first wrote them in 1920:

Without the support of Europeanized peoples, the Romano-Germans will not be able to continue the spiritual enslavement of the whole world. Quite simply, upon realizing its mistake, the intelligentsia of Europeanized nations will not only stop helping the Romano-Germans, but it will try to thwart them, at the same time opening the eyes of other peoples to the true nature of the “benefits of civilization”.

In this great and difficult work to liberate the world from spiritual slavery and from the hypnosis of the “benefits of civilization”, the intelligentsia of all the non-Romano-Germanic nations that have set out on the path to Europeanization or are planning to do so must act together in the spirit of full cooperation and agreement. They must never lose sight of the true problem and not be distracted by nationalism or by partial, local solutions such as Pan-Slavism and other “pan-isms”. One must always remember that setting up an opposition between the Slavs and the Teutons or the Turanians and the Aryans will not solve the problem. There is only one true opposition: the Romano-Germans and all the other peoples of the world – Europe and Mankind.

Russia has developed a much more assertive and confrontational approach to foreign policy over the past couple of years, particularly in its Near Abroad. From Russia’s perspective, what do you think are the benefits and drawbacks of this approach?

As I pointed out above, Russia is returning to the Empire. The state is expanding its power on multiple dimensions – political, economic, geopolitical. It is almost inevitable that it will eventually expand territorially as well (as foreshadowed by 500 years of history); to an extent this is already happening, as South Ossetia and Abkhazia have become virtual Russian protectorates after it repelled Georgia’s invasion in August 2008. This is an accelerating process and I agree with Stratfor that in one form or another (ranging from closer integration into already-existing institutions like EurAsECand the CSTO, to a full-fledged neo-Soviet Union), a new empire will appear on the map of northern Eurasia by 2020 at the latest.

From Russia’s perspective, the effects will be almost entirely positive (at least until it reaches the point of ”imperial overstretch”, when the benefits are canceled out by Western containment and perhaps Polish- and Turkish-instigated separatism; but this is still far off). Rebuilding the Empire will 1) further legitimize the state, 2) increase sobornost, 3) expand the military-industrial power at Moscow’s disposal, and 4) provide a much larger “scope” for autonomous economic development. All these factors reinforce the Empire’s power and “sovereignty”.

Nor is this going to be a particularly difficult undertaking. Kazakhstan, Belarus, and Armenia are already firmly within Russia’s orbit. Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan are dependent on Russia for their security, and Uzbekistan realigned itself with Russia in 2006. The prize jewel is Ukraine – as Brzezinski pointed out, Russia has never been a proper Empire without it. However, Ukraine is now a weak, “failing state”, close to fiscal insolvency; the Orange movement is fully discredited (President Yushenko’s approval ratings hover in the low single digits and overall support for democracy fell from 72% in 1989 to just 30% in 2009); both the next two prospective Presidents, Timoshenko and Yanukovych, are campaigning on pro-Russian platforms; and there is more popular support for Eurasian integration than for entry into NATO or even the EU. Facing a resurgent Russia and an America increasingly absorbed with other problems, there is a moderate-to-high likelihood that Ukraine will either return to Russia’s orbit or split down the Dnieper River within the next five years.

The deterioration of Russia’s relations with the West, especially the US and its allies, went in tandem with Putin’s consolidation of the Kremlin’s power and Russia’s post-2006 “return to the Empire”. Considering the number of humiliations and broken promises Russia previously received from the West – NATO expansion, the bombing of Serbia, color revolutions, the media war, missile defense, etc – it is not at all surprising that Russia began to push back once it regained a position of strength by the mid-2000’s. Now that it has begun, I doubt it will stop. The late Soviet and Yeltsin-era naïveté about kind Western intentions towards Russia is gone, thanks largely to the West’s own exploitation of Russian weakness. Now Russia has reverted to thinking in 19th century terms, and back then its Army and Navy were its only friends.

You describe yourself as “not just an inostranets (foreigner), but a bezstranets, a dude without a country, a rootless cosmopolitan.” There’s been a bit of a trend recently of people with Russian roots (for want of a better term) returning to Russia, often to do business. Do you think Russia benefits from this influx of bezstrani?

Yes. Technological transfer, new management skills, etc. But its overall economic impact is minimal. Unfortunately, of the middle-aged researchers who left Russia in the 1990’s, only a few are going to go back even in a best case scenario. I applaud Medvedev’s recent initiatives to lure back Russian emigrants, but it is too little, too late.

Furthermore, I should also note that far from all emigrants have a favorable impression of Russia, even despite the spiritual revival mentioned above. Many are stuck with the clichés of the 1990’s with which they left Russia; on top, there are the clichés of the famously “objective” Western media. Gangster capitalism plus FSB authoritarianism drenched in vodka. This is not to imply that this caricature doesn’t contain a kernel of truth, but as Sean Guillory points out, going back to Russia for a while will give a much needed wider perspective. That said, many diaspora Russians are psychologically averse to equanimity on Russia; in many cases, they are huge fans of whatever country they immigrated to, and of the West in general, as if to justify their own immigration to themselves. Consequently, some even view any “defense” of Russia, no matter how justified, as a personal attack on themselves and respond ferociously. For obvious reasons, I do not see many of these people going back.

The only way to get a big stream of high-quality talent to come is to modernize and implement a good immigration system with minimal bureaucratic hassle (Canada is a good model, I think). Russia is currently lagging behind on all three factors. Perhaps that will change by the 2020’s, but by then it will have to be tailored to second-generation immigrants who will have minimal social investments in Russia (friends, relatives, lives, etc). I suspect it is a leap very few will be willing to take, no matter how many incentives the state gives.

I see you’re writing a book. I know you don’t want to give away too much at this stage, but could you give us a brief preview?

For more info see Sublime Oblivion – The Book. I hope to have it finished by spring 2010 and published soon thereafter.

It is essentially a work on future history – a vision of the effects today’s global trends are going to have on different regions and the world system in the decades to come. One of the wellsprings of my analysis is that we live in a time of change far more rapid than anything seen in history, and that anything at all is possible.

Let me demonstrate. Today, there are two particularly influential “schools” on the future. Both germinated in the 1970’s and are regarded as diametrically opposite each other. On the one hand, you have the technological singularitarians, who point out that computing power per dollar has been doubling every two years since the 1960’s and will “inevitably” continue to do so. This miniaturization will eventually allow us to scan the brain with enough precision to record all its details and replicate it electronically. Or perhaps a consciousness will emerge out of Web. The resulting “strong AI”, easily able to quickly replicate and recursively improve itself, will make biological humanity obsolete. Ray Kurzweil, one of the high priests of this school, places the Singularity at 2045.

On the other hand, the “Limits to Growth” schools asserts that our world is finite, and posits that industrial civilization will soon run up against limits to growth in the form of resource depletion and pollution overload. We will need to make ever greater efforts to achieve the same “benefits” in resource extraction and agricultural production, as the system comes under the strain of flattening agricultural yields, topsoil loss, peak oil, higher-EROEI energy sources, runaway climate change, global dimming, political and geopolitical flux, etc. Barring a rapid transition back towards sustainability or the discovery of a technological silver bullet, humanity will massively overshoot the carrying capacity of the Earth, destroy the physical basis of its own existence, and usher in an unprecedented Malthusian dieoff in famine, plagues, and wars. The “standard”, business-as-usual Limits to Growth model places the date of collapse at around 2030-50 (furthermore, the current statistical evidence indicates that the world system closely tracked the original 1972 predictions to today).

So which trend will win out? Will we “transcend” just as industrial civilization begins to finally collapse? Or will the world’s last research lab be burned down by starving rioters just as the world’s first, and last, strong AI pops into super-consciousness inside? I think this is the big question of this century and it forms the defining theme of the book.

That is not all, of course. Other trends I will highlight encompass geopolitics, economics, demography, politics, culture, and wars, as well as the intersections between them and their impact on the world’s disparate regions, nations, and cultures. Russia-watchers will not be disappointed; as a potential superpower that stands to benefit from resource depletion and global warming (relatively speaking), Russia will play a major role.

This is a cyberpunk future – a world system wracked by neo-colonial resource wars and under severe ecological strain, tipping over into outright failure throughout the Third World; yet also a world ever more tightly intertwined into an information ether, where fantasy displaces reality. By the 2030’s, as mounting stresses approach critical levels, some of the Great Power-”fortresses” decide to cooperate in a last-ditch effort to save the System from collapse – they start on the construction of a massive, space-based power generation and geoengineering project. Simultaneously, there emerges a global super-conscience, a strong AI– “the last invention that man need ever make”, from within the cathedrals of cyberspace. Salvation beckons. Yet who can presume to know the mind of God?

RAFO

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This week’s cartoon by Spanish cartoonist Juan Rodriguez Morales is called “Police – This is a Robbery!” You can find more of Juan’s cartoons at Spanish language Russia blog La Mirada al Este.

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3. Cartoon: Berlusconi in Belarus, Lovestruck Lukashenko

1987. The iconic red telephone had been on Gorbachev’s desk for two years, and Glasnost was just getting into gear. America wasn’t quite the enemy it used to be, and new freedoms meant that American rock music was suddenly not just cool, but almost accepted by the old timers in the Kremlin.

Soviet music lovers who had grown up on a diet of bootleg Beatles were keen to see their heroes in the flesh. The question was, who would be the first hero to come and visit?

Step forward our hero – Billy Joel, who stumped up $2.5 million of his own cash, and became the first American rock star to tour the Soviet Union with a fully staged show.

In all, Joel played six concerts – three in Moscow, three in Leningrad. Each concert played to a packed house, but not all of them went exactly according to plan as confused and subdued audiences took a while to warm up to the sight of Joel bouncing around the stage to his high energy music.

The problems were partly because many in the audience had no idea how to behave at a rock concert. In the early concerts, especially, tickets were given away to Communist Party functionaries, as a perk, rather than to rock fans. Unsurprisingly, with much to lose and not quite sure how to behave, many stayed awkwardly seated at first.

The technical crew’s decision not to turn down the concert hall lights didn’t help, either. They had a good reason – they were filming a documentary of Joel’s tour and wanted him to look good on screen – but the harsh lighting served only to intimidate the audience into staying firmly in their seats.

A frustrated Joel dealt with the problem in true rock style. He tipped over his piano and trashed the stage.

Joel later recounted:

“Remember, this was the Soviet Union in 1987, and they’d never had a major rock concert before. There was a film crew filming a documentary, and they turned very bright lights on the audience. The audience was having a good time—until they turned the lights on. They froze; they turned paranoid. There was a lot of anxiety—why are we being looked at? And whenever they turned the lights on, anyone who was overreacting was being pulled out of the audience by a security guard. I wasn’t yelling at the audience—I was yelling at the film crew. So I threw the piano, and that got their attention. Then they stopped lighting the audience, and everybody started rocking out.”

The New York Times, in a 1987 article, approvingly explained how Joel’s passion (combined with a well timed rendition of the Beatles’ Back in the USSR) won over the crowd.

The audience, as is often the case with Soviet rock concerts, was much more heavily weighted to staid Russian matrons and button-down men in their 40’s than to the young people who predominate in Western rock audiences. But at the end, the matrons were clapping and gyrating along with their children.

”Back in the U.S.S.R.,” Mr. Joel sang to them, after the chants of ”Bee-lee, Bee-lee,” brought him back for an encore. ”You don’t know how lucky you are, back in the U.S.S., back in the U.S.S., back in the U.S.S.R.” Soldiers Keeping Time

By the time that Beatles song had ended, even the soldiers were keeping time, the rhythmic bouncing of their knees looking oddly incongruous below their stern faces.

I said above that Joel was the first American rock star to tour the USSR with a fully staged show. That’s a true claim, but it has to be said, a hyped one, made by Joel and his entourage. Other Western rock stars had been to the Soviet Union before, notably Elton John in 1979, and Bonnie Raitt, James Taylor, Santana, and the Doobie Brothers who had headlined the joint Soviet-American ”Summit” concert held in Moscow earlier in 1987. But Joel was the first to tour with a fully fledged, American style rock show.

Joel sunk $2.5 million of his own money into making this tour happen, and needed it to be a big success – not just in the Soviet Union, but in the rest of the world too. So the tour was hyped up mercilessly. In an attempt to recoup his money, the concerts were simulcast on radio around the world, a live concert album was released, an HBO special was aired, and a documentary of the tour was released on video.

Joel reportedly never made back all of his $2.5 million, but the impact in the Soviet Union was huge. It inspired future cultural exchanges – Russian rockers Boris Grebenshchikov and Gorky Park were inspired to release albums in America – and inspired regular Soviet citizens. Just take a quick look at the excitement shown in this archive US news footage (sorry, embedding for this video has been disabled, so you’ll have to visit Youtube directly).

Check out Russian News Online for the latest stories from all the top Russia Blogs.

Billy Joel’s historic Soviet concert tour

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2. The Soviet bailout of Iceland
3. Back in the USSR

As a change of pace, I thought it would be fun to feature some cartoons on Siberian Light.

This cartoon is called ‘The East is the East’, and is by Spanish cartoonist Juan Rodriguez Morales. His cartoons about Russia are regularly featured on La mirade al Este a Spanish magazine/blog covering Eastern Europe, Russia and the Former Soviet Union.

If you have the misfortune not to speak Spanish (like me!), I’d thoroughly recommend checking La mirada al Este out via Google Translate.

Check out Russian News Online for the latest stories from all the top Russia Blogs.

Cartoon: The East is the East

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3. Cartoon: Berlusconi in Belarus, Lovestruck Lukashenko

If you love Russian literature, then you’ll hopefully be delighted to learn that Russian Life Books (an offshoot of the company that produce Russian Life magazine) are about to release a new translation of The Little Golden Calf, one of the Soviet Union’s most famous satirical novels.

The Little Golden Calf tells the tale of Ostap Bender, who, through illicit means, comes into a fortune of a million roubles. Of course, in the Soviet Union, where there are no legal millionaires, being filthy rich isn’t as easy as Ostap thought it would be…

According to the blurb at Russian Life, Anne O Fisher’s translation marks not only the first modern translation of the Little Golden Calf for almost 50 years, but is also the first ever unabridged and uncensored English translation (why previous US and UK based publishers saw fit to censor the novel isn’t mentioned).

Update: Publisher Paul Richardson emailed to explain that “previous versions of the novel in English (there were 2) have been based on censored Soviet texts. In addition, the translators for strange reasons (all explained in Anne Fishers excellent intro) also left out some important passages. The novel was first published in serial form in 1931, and that text was not censored.”

The Russian Life edition is the first translation of Ilya Ilf an Evgeny Petrov’s famous work. The translation itself is by Anne O Fisher, who has previously translated Ilf and Petrof’s American Road Trip, an account of the authors’ 1935-6 road trip through the United States. She is currently working on a translation of The Twelve Chairs, the prequel to the Little Calf, as well as a biography of Ilya Ilf.

For the film buffs among you – or just those who don’t like reading – you’ll be thrilled to know that The Little Golden Calf has been made into both a film (in 1963) and a TV mini-series (in 2005). Here’s a trailer for the TV series:

Anyway, I digress. Moving back to the book itself – The Little Golden Calf will be released on 1st December, and is available for pre-order from Russian Life for the very reasonable price of $20. Possibly the perfect Christmas present, either for yourself, or for the Russian literature buff in your life.

Check out Russian News Online for the latest stories from all the top Russia Blogs.

The Little Golden Calf

Related posts:

1. Russian Film Festival London 2009
2. A 1960s exchange student in Moscow

All over London, adverts for snob.ru, the online magazine for Russia’s affluent elite have been popping up, targeting the British Russian ex-pat community. I took this picture on the London Underground at Euston yesterday:

And this massive billboard towers over Earls Court (see original on Flickr):

Has anyone else seen any more examples of snob.ru advertising to the ex-pat community around the world? Send me a picture and I’ll publish it here.

Check out Russian News Online for the latest stories from all the top Russia Blogs.

snob.ru – Adverts appearing across London

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2. Baltika beer in Britain
3. Bigga than Ben: The Russians’ Guide to Ripping Off London

The Third Russian Film Festival London kicks off on 30 October this year, with a bundle of fascinating films from Russia, both old and new, including 10 new UK premieres.

Headlining the festival is Anna Karenina, film director Sergei Soloviev’s adaptation of the Tolstoy classic. The film, shot on location at Tolstoy’s former estate at Yasnaya Polyana apparently took 14 years to make, and is the final part of his ASSA, ASSA 2, Anna Karenina trilogy.

Other new premieres include the aforementioned ASSA-2, an adaptation of Chekov’s Ward 6, Paper Soldier, a drama set in the Soviet space program of the 1960s, and The Event, which is based on a play by Nabakov. I don’t know about you, but it seems to me that Russian film at the moment is rather retrospective, borrowing heavily on either history or the old masters, rather than bursting with fresh new ideas.

More interesting (to me at least) films on offer include the controversial mockumentary (fake documentary) Russia 88, which investigates the rise of nationalism and xenophobia in Russia, and the co-produced Japanese-Russian animation First Squad, which introduces anime superwarriors to the German Army in 1942, against which the Soviet heroes are unable to defend – until, that is, a 14 year old girl starts recruiting the souls of her dead friends from the underworld.

Most interesting of all, though, promises to be the series of Soviet musicals. I must confess that, until now, I had never really realised that there even was a Soviet musical genre, but I’m really looking forward to watching films like The Shining Path, Spring, and Volga-Volga, which I understand was supposed to be Stalin’s favourite film. And indeed, how could the tale of two amateur theatrical choirs from the Urals fail to warm the heart of even the most ruthless dictator?

This festival of Russian films is a part of the 53rd London Film festival – the films themselves will be screened at the Apollo Cinema, and panel discussions will be hosted at the BAFTA. For more information about the 3rd Russian Film Festival in London, including details of how to book tickets, visit the official Academica Rossica website.

Check out Russian News Online for the latest stories from all the top Russia Blogs.

Russian Film Festival London 2009

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1. Russian Winter Festival in London
2. Russian Winter Festival
3. Bigga than Ben: The Russians’ Guide to Ripping Off London

For the first time in history, an England football game will not be shown on British TV. Instead, football fans will this weekend either be forced to pay to watch England v Ukraine live online, or to take a trip to their local Odeon cinema, where the game will also be broadcast live.

The ground breaking decision to broadcast the match live on the internet was taken by rights owner Kentaro after Irish-owned TV company Setanta, who had previously owned the rights to broadcast this match, went bust. Kentaro tried to sell the rights to another British broadcaster, such as BBC, ITV or Sky Sports but, as England have already qualified for this summer’s football World Cup in South Africa, nobody was interested in paying the high asking price for a match that would effectively be a friendly match, and which the England manager Fabio Capello will probably use to test a number of fringe players.

Therefore, Kentaro decided to take the brave step of partnering with online sports broadcaster Perform for a very publicly trialing pay per view online football viewing. They’ve set up a website – ukrainevengland.com – and are offering exclusive access to the match via a live internet stream.  Prices for the game have been set on a rising scale depending on how late in the day you book your access.

• £4.99 – Book by the end of Wednesday
• £9.99 – Book on Thursday or Friday
• £11.99 – Book on Saturday

The low cost obviously gives an incentive to book early.  But to add another incentive, Perform have announced that they will cap the number of people who can register to watch the game at 1 million.  This is to ensure that they don’t overload their servers.

Still, even if every single one of those million subscribers watches England play pays a mere £4.99, the match will net a cool £5 million.

In another interesting development, Perform seem to have set up some further partnership deals (presumably on the affiliate model) with top British newspapers. There are Times Online and Telegraph versions of the site that presumably take a cut of the profits when you book. These newspapers are also offering an additional way of watching the Ukraine vs England match – if you set up an account at UK online bookmaker Bet365, and ensure that your account is in credit, you get to watch England vs Ukraine live online for free.

Personally I think this is a great experiment, and I’ll be fascinated to see how it turns out.  Fans on the other hand aren’t all that keen – they’ve been grumbling about the game not being shown on terrestrial, free to air tv.  What do you think?  Will you be watching England vs Ukraine live online?  Or will you wait until to see the match highlights online later, when they are shown for free?

Check out Russian News Online for the latest stories from all the top Russia Blogs.

Football: How to watch England vs Ukraine Live Online

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1. Football: Inspired Russia come from behind to beat England 2-1
2. Row over artificial football pitch Russia will use to beat England
3. England World Cup bid deal with Russia?

I’m off on holiday for a few weeks so no more updates until the end of September. If you’re looking for Russia related reading in the meantime, please do feel free to check out the Russian News aggregator I built a few months ago.

(Update: Sorry, I know the BBC News feed isn’t working. They’ve changed the settings on their site – I’ll fix it as soon as I’m back!)

As well as covering Russian News on the homepage, it also has a page listing the latest posts from all the Russian Blogs I know about, all of which are well worth checking out. (PS – if your blog isn’t on there, it’s an oversight – please let me know and I’ll add it as soon as I get home.)

At the moment, I’m particularly enjoying reading Poemless’ new Russia blog and Sublime Oblivion, the English edition of Soviet Russia, News from the Eastern and Lyndon’s Scraps of Moscow.

Check out Russian News Online for the latest stories from all the top Russia Blogs.

Holiday Reading

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1. New Russia Blog
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3. New Blog: Rick Docksai’s Russia News

Just a quick post today. I came across this fascinating post of Soviet Magazine Covers that I thought you might find interesting.

Lyndon in particular might notice that they’ve linked back to Scraps of Moscow.

My favourite cover image has to be #4 The Atheist, which brilliantly depicts a Soviet worker dumping a shocked Jesus (halo and all) out of a wheelbarrow.

Check out Russian News Online for the latest stories from all the top Russia Blogs.

Soviet Era Magazine Covers

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Google Translate has added Belorussian, yet another language from the former Soviet Union, to its stable of languages.  This brings the total number of languages that it can translate to 51, a number which includes all 23 official languages within the EU, as well as 6 of the former Soviet languages – Russian, Ukrainian, Belarussian, Estonian, Lativian and Lithuanian.

On their blog, Google do note that, because Belarussian is newly added to their stable, some of the translations may be a little rough at first, but they promise that over time, the translations will improve.  I think a large part of this improvement usually comes from user suggestions, so if you feel like giving Google a hand, head over to their site now and give it a try.

I’ve been really impressed with the way that machine translation has improved over the past few years – it’s still far from perfect, but the translations usually seem to make sense these days.  I’m actually considering whether it would be worth adding an automatic translator to Siberian Light.  What do you think?  Has anyone had any experience of adding a translation plugin to a blog?  Are there any that you would recommend.

Finally, for fun, I thought I’d see how the Russian and Belarussian translators dealt with this article. First the Russian translation:

Google Translate добавил белорусский, еще один язык из бывшего Советского Союза, ее стабильным Языки. Таким образом, общее число Языки, что можно перевести до 51, число, которое включает в себя все 23 официальных Языки в рамках ЕС, а также 6 бывших советских Языки – русский, украинский, белорусский, эстонский, Lativian и литовском языках.

На своем блоге, Google отмечают, что делать, потому что белорусский является недавно добавленный на их стабильное, некоторые из переводов может быть немного грубым вначале, но они обещают, что с течением времени, переводы будут улучшаться. Я думаю, что большая часть этого улучшения обычно поступают от пользователей предложения, поэтому если Вы хотите дать Google стороны, зайдите на их сайт и дадут попробовать.

Я был действительно впечатлен тем, как эта машина перевода улучшилась за последние несколько лет – это еще далеко от совершенства, но переводы обычно кажется, смысла в эти дни. Я действительно рассматривает вопрос стоило бы добавить автоматический переводчик Siberian Light. Что вы думаете? Кто-нибудь имел опыта размещения перевода плагина для блога? Существуют ли, что вы бы не рекомендовал.

Наконец, для удовольствия, я решил посмотреть, как русский и белорусский переводчик рассматриваться с этой статьей.

And, second, the Belarussian translation:

Google Translate дадаў беларускі, яшчэ адзін мову з былога Савецкага Саюза, яе стабільным Мовы. Такім чынам, агульная колькасць Мовы, што можна перавесці да 51, лік, якое ўключае ў сябе ўсе 23 афіцыйных Мовы ў рамках ЕС, а таксама 6 былых савецкіх Мовы – руская, украінская, беларускі, эстонская, Lativian і літоўскай мовах.

На сваім блогу, Google адзначаюць, што рабіць, таму што беларускі з’яўляецца нядаўна даданыя на іх стабільны, некаторыя з перакладаў можа быць крыху грубым напачатку, але яны абяцаюць, што з цягам часу, пераклады будуць паляпшацца. Я думаю, што большая частка гэтага паляпшэння звычайна паступаюць ад карыстальнікаў прапановы таму калі Хочаце даць Google боку, наведайце іх сайт і дадуць паспрабаваць.

Я быў сапраўды уражаны тым, як гэтая машына перакладу палепшылася за апошнія некалькі гадоў – гэта яшчэ далёка ад дасканаласці, але пераклады звычайна здаецца, сэнсу ў гэтыя дні. Я сапраўды разглядае пытанне варта было б дадаць аўтаматычны перакладчык Siberian Light. Што вы думаете? Хтосьці меў вопыту размяшчэння перакладу плагіна для блога? Існуюць Ці, што вы б не рэкамендаваў.

Нарэшце, для задавальнення, я вырашыў паглядзець, як руская і беларускі перакладчык разглядацца з гэтай артыкулам.

What do you think?

Check out Russian News Online for the latest stories from all the top Russia Blogs.

Google Translate adds Belarussian

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2. Online Russian translators – compared
3. Cartoon: The East is the East

It looks like August is going to be yet another busy month for bad news in Russia, and yet another busy month for those among the commentariat who think that Russia is well on its way to Hell in a handcart.

With a week still to go in August 2009, Russia has already seen three disasters that have been big enough to warrant global media attention, making August 2009 a bad month, even by the usual Russian standards:

• an explosion in a Siberian dam that killed at least 70, and has caused massive damage to the local economy;
• a suicide bomb attack that killed 20 in Ingushetia and re-emphasises the Russian government’s inability to impose order in the troubled North Caucuasus region;
• and a very public hunt for a missing, presumed hijacked freighter that so alarmed the Russian government that they sent the entire Atlantic fleet on a frantic hunt for it.

While thinking about Russia’s least favourite month, I stumbled across this graphical timeline of Russian disasters so far in the 21st Century. A quick count up of the totals reveals that, of the 28 disasters listed, 7 took place in August – a full 25%.

Does anyone have any rational explanation for Russia’s unfortunate sequence of Augusts? Are there some local factors that make Russia (or maybe even the rest of the world) more likely to suffer from a catastrophic event during the height of summer, or is it just a run of plain bad luck?

Check out Russian News Online for the latest stories from all the top Russia Blogs.

August: Russia’s month of Disaster

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