Nikolai Karpitsky. Can Russia be civilized? ‘An entire generation is responsible for the terror in Ukraine’

Source: PostPravda.info 20.01.2025

URL: https://postpravda.info/en/stories/freedom-of-speech-en/can-russia-be-civilized-an-entire-generation-is-responsible-for-the-terror-in-ukraine-opinion/

Russia Threatens Europe Again, Just as the Soviet Union Once Did. Fear of this threat prompts two opposing reactions. The first is an attempt to convince oneself that there is no danger. In this case, the West must justify Russia’s actions, as pro-Russian politicians do. The second option is to find a true explanation for Kremlin policy. However, this requires accepting a dark reality, as analyzed in PostPravda.Info by Prof. Nikolai Karpitsky, a Russian opposition figure who fled Siberia in 2015 and settled in eastern Ukraine.

After the publication of the article “War as an End in Itself: Why Russia Won’t Run Out of Volunteers to Die in Ukraine?”, I received a question from Mr. Michał Talma-Sutt of Berlin, asking whether feudalism, deeply rooted in Russian history, is the best explanation for the “Russian fatalism” I had written about. This framing of the question reflects the perception of those in Europe who see a real threat from Russia. I am grateful to Mr. Michał for the opportunity to give a detailed answer, not just to him but to all representatives of European culture trying to understand Russia.

Is Russia’s Unresolved Feudalism a Relic of the Past?

Mr. Michał proposes explaining the dehumanization and aggressiveness of the Russian regime as manifestations of ancient feudalism. According to him, this reference does not fully explain the brutality of the current regime in Moscow, but it can partly describe its structure. Every political leader – whether a warlord or a feudal lord – irrevocably and unquestionably decides the fate of the people. He chooses who should live and who should die.

In Mr. Michał’s view, this unresolved feudalism, deeply embedded in Russia’s history, has led to the current power hierarchy in the country, with the main feudal lord – Putin – at the top, the master and ruler of life and death for those under him. The relationship between the lowest and highest levels of this pyramid is based on bribery – the modern equivalent of feudal tribute. This system, Mr. Michał writes in his letter, is quite terrifying.

Such an interpretation of the current Russian system indeed looks terrifying to a modern Western person, but from my point of view, it is overly optimistic. After all, by speaking of feudalism, Mr. Michał was referring to an archaic phenomenon. If this is the case, then Russia is moving against the tide of history, which means that time is on our side and works against Russia. But if it turns out that Russia’s current regime is not a relic of the past but a new historical phenomenon, then there is no hope that history is on our side.

Of course, Mr. Michał was referring to feudalism not in the strict historical sense but in a broader sense, as a manifestation of archaic relations based on non-economic coercion towards people of lower social status. The dictatorship in Russia is based on such relations, but it must be emphasized that these are characteristic of the entire post-Soviet space.

Although Ukraine is a democratic country, such archaic relations are also characteristic of Ukrainian bureaucracy and even academic circles. I was surprised to learn that in Ukraine, it is considered inappropriate if a scholar defending their doctoral dissertation does not pay a substantial sum of money to their academic supervisors. My Ukrainian colleagues did not see this as a bribe but as a completely justified tribute that a person must pay to move up the social ladder.

Since this is indeed a manifestation of archaic behavior, there is hope that the situation will change in the future. However, I believe that, unfortunately, the dictatorship in Russia is not a relic of the past but a modern phenomenon, although built on archaic relations.

Is There Social and Spiritual Progress in History?

Let’s imagine that we are not talking about states, but about small human communities. Take, for example, a gang of criminals willing to kill for money and, on the other hand, a group of volunteers who selflessly help people in need. They both seem to be representatives of the same species, homo sapiens, yet they are so diametrically opposed in every way, it’s as if they belong to different classes.

If we assume that the gang of criminals is archaic, a relic of the past, then there is hope that it will gradually disappear. But how would that happen? Would criminal organizations transform into charitable or volunteer organizations? We have to admit, that sounds absurd. Therefore, we might assume that criminal gangs existed and will continue to exist—not because they are remnants of the past that we haven’t yet shaken off, but because specific individuals choose to become criminals.

Becoming a criminal or a volunteer is a matter of individual free will. Unfortunately, most people are unaware that they have free will, and thus they make decisions inertially, adapting to the circumstances and social structure around them. However, the more rigid and aggressive that structure is, the more a person loses their independence, becoming just a function of that structure. Regaining independence is possible only by renouncing attachment to one’s social status, which provides normal living conditions. Few people are capable of this.

Therefore, if a criminal social structure already exists, one should not expect to be able to convince anyone within it to engage in charitable activities.

This illustration helps us understand why brutal despotisms have, for centuries, coexisted alongside cultured and free states. This has been the case throughout history, both in feudal times and in the present. In medieval Europe, there were kings and independent cities that enjoyed Magdeburg rights. There were ruthless despotisms like the Tsardom of Moscow, but there were also republics with a high level of socio-cultural development, such as the Novgorod Republic.

Even today, alongside modern civilized democracies, barbaric dictatorships exist. Unlike the obvious progress in technology, we do not see progress in humanism. Cruelty and violence are reproduced in each new era. This happens because technical knowledge can be accumulated and passed on to future generations, but values are only reproduced through free self-determination, and each generation must choose them anew. This is why different people choose good or evil, and based on that choice, incompatible social systems arise: a gang of criminals and a volunteer organization, the dictatorship in Russia and Western democracy. This has always been the case in human history.

Archaic relations persist in our lives as remnants of the past, but they can also mutate into entirely new phenomena. Indeed, today’s Russia is genetically derived from the cruel, archaic despotism of the Tsardom of Moscow, which saw its mission in “gathering lands,” that is, building an empire through ruthless conquests.

In the modern world, there is no place for such archaic societies, so at the beginning of the 20th century, the Russian Empire was replaced by a totalitarian dictatorship. The communist ideology of seeking class enemies caused a mutation of Russian imperial consciousness into a new form based on totalitarian ideology. The secret services, which carried out this terror, were indifferent to specific types of ideology. They lived in a world where absolutely anyone could turn out to be an enemy or an informant, even a close friend.

In 2000, it was none other than these very same people who ultimately and once again seized power in Russia. This led to the second mutation of Russian imperial consciousness into a new form – necro-imperialism. Its signs are that human life loses its value, personal identity means nothing, and death and destruction are seen not only as means but also as ends in themselves.

Attitudes Towards Good and Evil

In the face of the diversity of historical concepts, the average person doesn’t know whom to trust, and so begins to see historical teachings as an abstraction. Therefore, I propose looking at this problem on a personal level, which allows us to discuss the relationship to good and evil in history. Every individual and every generation makes its own choice between good and evil. Parents can influence their children’s choices through their authority, but they cannot make the choice for them. Historical inertia influences generational choices, but each generation must make a new decision between good and evil. The past is merely the material from which people build their own lives.

A generation’s self-determination begins with the choices made by individuals. Sometimes this happens as early as childhood. It can happen, for example, that a good school is located next to a school where bullying has become the norm because two or three students imposed this practice on everyone else. The rest agreed to participate in order to maintain their place in the social hierarchy. This is a form of adaptation. In a more supportive school, they would behave in the opposite way. This is exactly what is happening across Russia now.

Everything starts with an individual’s self-definition, through which a person realizes who they are. From this, their orientation towards good or evil is revealed, contributing to the formation of a social model of relations. The nature of this model determines what kind of social structures will emerge based on it. This could be a criminal gang or a group of volunteers. Moreover, these communities involve indecisive individuals in their activities, creating social inertia that influences generational choices. Based on these choices, some countries follow the path of civilized development, while others fall into dictatorship.

At what point did the wrong choice of generation lead to dictatorship in Russia?

The pivotal moment when a generational choice led to dictatorship in Russia occurred during the late 1990s. Throughout Russian history, inertia toward dictatorship had consistently gained strength, but after the collapse of the Soviet Union, there was a brief opportunity to reverse this course. This could have happened if the generation of the 1990s had made the right choice. However, it required substantial effort, and that opportunity was ultimately lost.

In the autumn of 1999, Russian citizens were gripped by fear due to a series of terrorist bombings targeting residential buildings. People were dying in the night, before they had a chance to wake up. The terror subsided only after the Moscow branch of the FSB was caught in the act, attempting to plant explosives in an apartment building in Ryazan. Russian society struggled to process this information.

Of course, it’s terrifying to fall asleep knowing your home could be bombed by terrorists, but there’s some comfort in hoping that security services might protect you. Far more terrifying, however, is the possibility that the security services themselves could blow up your home—and that no one could protect you from them.

This fear led us, the Russian people, to place our trust in a representative of those security services—Vladimir Putin. A few months later, he was elected president. This generational choice was an act of betrayal, because those who voted for Putin betrayed the future of their children. It was this betrayal that catalyzed the second mutation of imperial consciousness and directly paved the way for the war with Ukraine. A generation that betrayed its own children will tolerate any crime to avoid the shame of waging a genocidal war against a neighboring nation.

The idea of historical progress, while offering hope for the future, can also lead to misguided political strategies. After all, if the current regime in Russia is seen as an archaic manifestation standing against the tide of history, wouldn’t it make sense to gradually civilize it by fostering cooperation with civilized nations?

This was the thinking of many European politicians before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. It’s akin to trying to civilize a gang of criminals by inviting them to the theater or ballet. However, if we recognize that Russian necro-imperial despotism is a new historical phenomenon, one that can only be defeated through force, this realization might motivate the civilized world to unite and fight to dismantle the criminal social system in Russia.

Nikolai Karpitsky. Russia is preparing for war with NATO. These are the strengths of the Kremlin and the West

Source: PostPravda.info 27.12.2024

URL: https://postpravda.info/en/stories/reports/russia-is-preparing-for-war-with-nato-these-are-the-strengths-of-the-kremlin-and-the-west-analysis/

The prospect of a future war with NATO is now an officially endorsed project by the Russian government. On December 16, Defense Minister Andrei Belousov stated that starting in 2024, his ministry is preparing for a potential war between Russia and NATO in Europe. Military spending accounts for nearly one-third of the federal budget. Such expenditures indicate that the country is indeed mobilizing for a prolonged war. While war is economically unviable, dictators think differently. For them, money equates to power. This power can be reinforced not just through wealth but also through military strength. This aligns with Vladimir Putin’s temperament, as he remarked just days after Belousov’s statement that life without war is boring. The Russian president acts as a subjective factor driving the world toward a potential World War III. But are there objective conditions for the outbreak of such a conflict?

Can Russia Really Avoid Waging War Elsewhere Due to its Engagement in Ukraine?

Optimists argue that Russia cannot attack anyone else because it is bogged down in Ukraine. Consequently, it has lost Syria for good. Indeed, without relying on Assad’s regime and with no logistics in place—especially as Turkey and Israel actively intervene—regaining control over Syria seems unlikely. If the optimists are correct, Russia might soon withdraw from Africa as well. However, if Russia manages to hold onto Libya and muster additional forces for military operations in Africa, the optimists would be proven wrong.

Here’s a historical precedent: late August to early September 1941. The Soviet Army faced an unprecedented defeat on the front lines. The Battle of Moscow loomed with questionable odds of holding the city. Could anyone have predicted that at this moment, the Soviet Union would find the strength to attack Iran and occupy its northern provinces? At one point, many also hoped that if Russia got bogged down in Syria, it would be incapable of fighting elsewhere. However, the war in Syria enabled Russia to construct a military machine designed for the war in Ukraine. The fact that Russia currently lacks sufficient resources for a new war should not be reassuring. Once a machine is built, fuel for it is bound to follow sooner or later. Although the Russian military is currently constrained by the war in Ukraine, its mobilization reserves still enable the possibility of expanding the conflict to other countries in the future.

In 2022, Russia deployed all its combat-ready military units to Ukraine, effectively disabling its ability to wage another war elsewhere. Furthermore, it lost a significant portion of its modern equipment in Ukraine and had to revert to old World War I-era tactics, relying on artillery barrages and infantry assaults. Based on this, optimists believe that the Russian military is exhausted and would need several years to recover before considering a war with NATO countries. I do not share this view.

Even during the war in Ukraine, the Russian army has repeatedly increased the number of combat-ready units, addressed missile shortages, and rebuilt its arsenal of modern tanks and other equipment. However, this reconstruction may hold little strategic importance, as such equipment would likely be destroyed within the first months of a war with NATO. The battles in Donbas demonstrate that the Russian army can launch infantry offensives even without the support of modern equipment.

The Military Machine’s Functionality

It is crucial to evaluate not just the strength of the military but also the functionality of its machinery—that is, what tasks it is designed to perform. A bulldozer is more powerful than a car but would lose in a race. The same applies to armies. The most powerful army, designed for offensive operations, can be helpless in defense, as evidenced by the Soviet Army’s collapse in the early months of its war with Nazi Germany. NATO armies are technologically superior to the Russian army, but they are structured for short, localized wars and are currently ill-suited for a prolonged continental war of attrition.

The Russian army of 2022 was also built for a blitzkrieg strategy. However, after the failure of its initial offensive, it was forced to retreat and reorganize. If Western nations had provided Ukraine with sufficient military support at that time, the war might have ended already. Instead, Russia used the breathing room to construct a new military machine, one capable of waging a large-scale, continental war of attrition.

This transformation marks a strategic pivot in Russia’s military doctrine, aligning it more closely with the demands of long-term, high-intensity conflict.

The Functioning of Russia’s Military Machinery

Western countries continue to operate in peacetime mode, where their militaries are just one of many elements within the broader structure of the state. In Russia, the situation is the opposite. The state itself has become a component of the military and intelligence apparatus. This means that during peacetime, the military is merely one of the state’s tools, but in wartime, the state transforms into a part of the military machine. All state and public institutions—media, courts, government and local administration bodies, social systems, and industries—are reoriented to support the fighting army, rendering them incapable of functioning normally in peacetime.

The operational mechanism of Russia’s military machine is determined by its method of resource distribution. Before 2022, the state acted as an adjunct or ballast to monopolies trading natural resources, with profits stored in Western countries. Due to sanctions, these revenues can no longer be stored in the West, so they are redirected to military production and the payment of contract soldiers. These funds then trickle into impoverished regions that previously suffered from underfunding. This creates a social support base for the war effort, as poverty drives people to enlist in contract service at such a rate that forced mobilization becomes unnecessary.

The deaths of contract soldiers evoke little sympathy, allowing the majority of the Russian population to simply ignore the war. This cycle sustains both the war effort and the state’s wartime economy. The reallocation of resources to military needs ensures continued social stability in poorer regions, while the indifference of the general population minimizes domestic resistance to the ongoing conflict.

This transformation underscores how deeply the Russian state has integrated into its military structure, operating as a single entity optimized for war. As a result, the distinction between peacetime governance and wartime mobilization has been effectively erased in Russia’s current political and economic system.

If the war were to end, Russia’s economy would need to transition to peacetime operations, and the flow of financial resources to impoverished regions would cease. A democratic country might invest in rebuilding industry and providing social protection for its population. However, a dictatorship, which has historically plundered its own nation, is unlikely to do so. Meanwhile, people in these regions have grown accustomed to their new income levels, and the sudden loss of this financial support could trigger widespread, spontaneous anger with unpredictable social consequences.

Additionally, hundreds of thousands of soldiers, morally degraded and socially detached after experiencing the war, would return from the frontlines. These individuals would demand privileges and channel their frustration and hatred toward others. This creates a volatile mix, making post-war stability difficult to achieve. As a result, if Russia withdraws from the war in Ukraine, it will face a stark choice: either descend into domestic instability or initiate a new conflict to divert attention and sustain the system.

The Likelihood of World War III

At present, the likelihood of a Third World War remains exceptionally low due to several factors. First, while the Russian army is making advances in Donbas, threatening the entire eastern front, the Russian leadership appears unwilling to divert its focus to other areas. Even when regions like Kursk faced attacks, no forces were redirected from Donbas to respond. This indicates that the Kremlin is unlikely to allocate resources for military operations against NATO countries in the near future.

The current priority for Russia is maintaining its momentum in Ukraine, as the leadership remains singularly focused on achieving its objectives there. This narrow focus, coupled with the resource limitations caused by the ongoing conflict, reduces the immediate risk of escalating the war to a global scale.

Several factors currently lower the probability of a Russian escalation toward a global conflict. First, Vladimir Putin is unlikely to take radical actions in a situation marked by uncertainty, especially as figures like Donald Trump intentionally amplify global unpredictability. Second, China has not yet decided on its strategic direction: while it continues to build military power and threatens Taiwan, it simultaneously seeks a technological breakthrough to overcome its economic challenges through peaceful development.

A world war is unlikely without strong allies. At present, only two nations—Russia and Iran—maintain imperial ambitions and seek to expand their influence through military force, making them natural allies. However, with Israel’s defeat of Hezbollah in Lebanon and the collapse of Assad’s regime in Syria, Iran’s imperial plans have faltered. This leaves Russia without significant allies in the event of a global conflict.

Should NATO Fear a Russian Invasion?

In the near term, it is unlikely that Russia poses a direct threat to NATO member states. However, the future is unpredictable, and the situation could shift if NATO countries fail to prepare for a potential conflict. If Russia were to free up hundreds of thousands of soldiers following a truce in Ukraine, it might attempt to challenge NATO. This warrants a deeper examination of a hypothetical Russia-NATO war scenario, using insights from the Russo-Ukrainian conflict.

On November 1, 2023, Valerii Zaluzhnyi, Ukraine’s leading military strategist, published an essay in The Economist highlighting key takeaways from the war in Ukraine. He emphasized that Russia has drawn Ukraine into a positional war, where it holds an advantage. To reverse the tide, Ukraine must transition to maneuver warfare, requiring superiority in five priority areas. These insights are also relevant for other nations that might face Russian aggression.

The first priority is air power—control of the skies is essential for large-scale ground operations. In this domain, Russia outmatches Ukraine but would face significant disadvantages against NATO countries, which possess overwhelming air superiority. Some tasks traditionally performed by manned aircraft are now carried out by drones, an area both Ukraine and Russia are actively developing. However, Russia’s larger production capabilities give it an edge in drone warfare.

NATO’s technological and logistical advantages would likely outweigh Russia’s strengths in the event of a direct conflict. However, Russia’s ability to adapt, leverage asymmetric tactics, and sustain prolonged engagements cannot be underestimated. Ensuring readiness in air power, technology, and strategy remains critical for NATO to maintain its deterrence posture.

The second priority is electronic warfare (EW) aimed at jamming enemy communication and navigation signals. Over the past decade, Russia has modernized its EW forces, creating a new branch of the military and developing 60 new types of equipment, while Ukraine has only just begun to build this capability. In this area, Russia again holds an advantage but may lose it, as NATO countries’ information technologies are significantly more advanced. In the future, NATO countries could gain an edge in this critical area, especially considering advancements in artificial intelligence technologies.

The third priority is counter-battery fire, neutralizing the enemy’s artillery. Here, Russia holds an advantage not only over Ukraine but also over NATO countries. While NATO produces higher-quality munitions, it does not produce them in sufficient quantities. Kamikaze drones, which are actively used by both Ukraine and Russia, have partially taken over traditional artillery tasks.

The fourth priority highlighted by Valerii Zaluzhnyi is mine-clearing technology to enable effective offensives. However, after Ukraine’s transition to a defensive posture, it became apparent that its capacity to lay minefields to halt enemy infantry was extremely limited. In this priority area, not only Ukraine but also other European nations have been entirely unprepared, having signed the convention banning the use of anti-personnel mines and destroyed their stockpiles. How do they plan to stop Russian infantry attacks? Fortunately, the United States has not joined this convention, but will a decision to supply mines to Europe be made in time, despite legal and bureaucratic challenges?

The fifth priority is building reserves. Russia has developed a mechanism to replenish its army without forced mobilization and is gradually increasing the number of combat-ready units. While these forces are sufficient to breach Ukrainian defenses at various points along the front, they are insufficient to capitalize on breakthroughs, resulting in a slow offensive. According to military leadership estimates, confirmed by Valerii Zaluzhnyi at the end of 2023, Ukraine would need to mobilize 450,000–500,000 reservists to meet the army’s needs for 2024. However, mobilization was carried out late and faced significant challenges, so the number of recruits who joined the Ukrainian army fell far short of this goal. As a result, throughout 2024, the balance of power on the battlefield has been slowly shifting in Russia’s favor.

This situation is exacerbated by the fact that, on October 18, 2022, Ukraine passed Law No. 8109, which suspended conscription during the period of martial law. This means that in this critical area, Russia has an absolute advantage over Ukraine, and, in my opinion, it would hold a similar advantage over NATO countries in the event of a military confrontation.

In summary, by 2024, Ukraine lacked an advantage in any of the priority areas outlined by Valerii Zaluzhnyi, explaining the success of the Russian army. However, Zaluzhnyi did not consider another critical factor—the quality of military command. After his removal, a management crisis emerged within the Ukrainian armed forces, which has yet to be resolved, leading to tragic situations on the frontlines.

In the event of a war between Russia and NATO countries, Russia would hold an advantage in at least three of the priority areas. However, NATO countries would have an absolute advantage in the first priority area—air superiority—which extends beyond air power to include precision-guided missiles. This advantage could be decisive, allowing NATO to deliver a devastating, disarming first strike that might lead to victory.

But what if, after this initial strike, NATO opts for a ceasefire and begins negotiations with Russia to return to the pre-war status quo? In that scenario, Russia would recover from the blow and drag NATO into a positional war, where it would have an absolute advantage in three priority areas. If the conflict becomes prolonged, advanced technological weaponry would eventually be depleted, and the outcome would hinge on massed soldiers on the battlefield, much like the current situation on Ukraine’s fronts.

Russia could have been stopped in Ukraine both in 2022 and 2023, but there was no political will among Western nations to achieve this. If the war expands to NATO countries, they would have the capability to defeat Russia, but this would require the political resolve that has so far been lacking.

As for Putin, even he does not yet know what he will do. He is not currently ready for a war with NATO but is actively preparing for one and closely watching the actions of Western leaders. If they demonstrate a clear focus on victory rather than a temporary truce, he will likely refrain from attacking NATO countries—just as he might have refrained from attacking Ukraine had he seen a strong and decisive move from the West toward its defense.

Nikolai Karpitsky. Party of the Dead against Putin's Russia

Source: PostPravda.info 21.10.2024

URL: https://postpravda.info/en/stories/freedom-of-speech-en/party-of-the-dead/

On October 7, a “nicht verstehen” action against “Putinversteher” and Putin's policies was held in Bonn in front of the Russian consulate in Germany, timed to coincide with his birthday. The protest action was organized by the German branch of the “Party of the Dead”. Its founder, Maxim Evstropov, advocates the defense of the dead against the encroachments of the current Russian government. The activists placed a candle “for the repose of Putin's soul” and wished him a speedy “day of death”. The Party of the Dead emerged as an artistic and political project in 2017 in St. Petersburg and became known for its actions, performances and other events in Russia. The Kremlin authorities swiftly recognized it as a danger and began to persecute the members of the party. As a result many activists were forced to emigrate and now hold similar actions in different countries around the world. However, I think that such a party could only emerge in Russia and only in Russia the meaning of its actions is self-evident. It is connected to the special attitude towards death that is cultivated in modern Russia. 

The Cult of Death in Russia

Russia has waged wars of conquest throughout its history using the same tactics, ruthlessly expending masses of soldiers in suicidal attacks. This is the same tactic Russia is using now in Ukraine. What is surprising, however, is that Russian soldiers both before and now are willing to obediently march to their death over the corpses of their comrades. This willingness to die senselessly is linked to a special mood in which life ceases to be valuable enough to fight for. This special necrophilic mood is accompanied by a loss of the sense of life. In Russia it is somehow transmitted from one person to another, but outside Russia it is difficult to explain what it is at all. Maxim Evstropov describes it as follows: “While in Russia, I constantly felt that many people are in a state of ‘derealization’. It seems to them that they are not really living, nothing really happens to them. And in general, everything that happens in Russia seems to be “not real.” Some things that are common for Russians are really hard to comprehend, especially for an outsider. And the 'derealizer' is a psychological defense reaction against the horror that is going on.” (Derealizer is Maxim Evstropov's neologism, meaning a force or psychological mechanism that leads to the loss of a sense of reality).

Soldiers in the Russian army were always treated as expendable, but still the Orthodox Russian emperors believed that after death a person was no longer in their power, but in the power of God. However, the communists denied the existence of God and used the cult of dead heroes for their ideological purposes. Therefore, even now in Russia it is believed that if a hero survived, he is some kind of inferior hero. Only death can make a person a real hero. For example, pro-Russian propagandists used the fact that the Azov and other defenders of Mariupol surrendered and did not die as an argument that they are in fact false heroes. However, in the Ukrainian consciousness, real heroism is manifested not in death, but in the will to live, which the Azovites demonstrated by choosing captivity, which is more terrible than death.

The ideology of the Soviet Union contradictorily combined the ideals of a happy prosperous life with the cultivation of death and necrophilic symbolism. Soviet songs and movies cultivated heroic death, a mausoleum was built in the capital's Red Square, and the Kremlin wall was turned into a cemetery. Even the coat of arms of the Soviet Union was created in the likeness of a tombstone wreath. However, in the Soviet Union, the necrophilic attitude occupied a limited place in the system of ideology and propaganda, without canceling people's desire for a happy life. The current Russian authorities do not rely on any particular ideology, despite what many might believe, but instead promote such an idea of the world, in which the necrophilic attitude is expressed not in ideological formulations, but in a vague feeling that distorts the perception of events and devalues life. 

The difference between the necrophilic attitude in the Soviet Union and in present-day Russia is evident in the way Victory Day over fascism is celebrated. In the Soviet Union, death was glorified, but the holiday itself was perceived as a reminder of a tragedy that should never be repeated. Victory Day in today's Russia is held under the slogan “We can do it again!” and has turned into a celebration of imperial grandeur, for the sake of which any human sacrifice is justified. A neologism has emerged to name this bacchanalia - “pobedobesie”, which can be roughly translated as “victoradness”, i.e. - victory madness, but it's important to note, that the word “besit’sa”, to act crazy, has the same root as the word - “bes”, an imp or demon, so may be “victorimping” or “demonry” would be a better translation.  It is in fact a “substitution of the Victory Day celebration with a mad rampage of demonic forces”. 

In 2011, journalists from the independent TV2 television company in Tomsk decided to counter this bacchanalia of imperial grandeur with the “Immortal Regiment” procession. They naively hoped that if ordinary people came out with portraits of their dead ancestors, they would shame those who turn the memory of the war into a necrophilic carnival. However, the Russian authorities appropriated the initiative of the “Immortal Regiment” and themselves began to organize processions with portraits of the dead, not in memory of the tragedy, but in support of imperial ambitions. This was their way of saying: “Even the dead support us! Our power extends not only to the living, but also to the dead!” Only the fear that portraits of those killed in Ukraine would appear in the “Immortal Regiment” procession, and thus people would recognize the scale of military losses, forced the Russian authorities to cancel this necrophilic social event.  

No one has the right to appropriate the voices of the dead

The Party of the Dead opposes the use of the dead as another resource for power and cultural and political necrophilia in contemporary Russia, which manifests itself in a militaristic and patriotic death cult and the absence of a project for the future. Maxim Evstropov, the party's founder states: “Posts in support of Putin are now distributed even from the social media accounts of those long gone. When votes are counted in elections, dead people vote. There were even cases when dead deputies voted in the State Duma. The dead are not allowed to be dead, the living are not allowed to be alive.” The Party of the Dead opposes this with a principle enshrined in its charter: “No one - no social group or individual living person - has the privileged and exclusive right to speak on behalf of the dead.”

To describe its activities the Party of the Dead uses the term “necroactivism”, which includes public art events and political actions in the form of street performances, where protest ideas are expressed through artistic means. For example, in 2018, at the May Day demonstration in St. Petersburg, Varya Mikhailova was detained for walking in the Party of the Dead column with the painting “9 Stages of Decomposition of the Leader”. It was a collage of a series of photographs capturing grass sprouting through Putin's portrait. Varya was awarded a colossal fine for those times, and the artwork itself was ordered by the court to be destroyed, despite the fact that the work was a digital collage and not a physical object.

The Party of the Dead is built on anarchist principles. Participants of street actions could gather in one place, could act synchronously in different places and even countries, despite the fact that sometimes they do not know each other personally. The party lacks centralized management and the usual signs of organization. Its activities are coordinated either by its ideological inspirer Maxim Evstropov or by the initiators of specific actions. During the actions, the Party of the Dead members hide their faces with skull masks, preserving their anonymity. In this way they symbolically identify themselves with the dead. If the Russian state speaks on behalf of the dead as a usurper of power over them, the participants of the actions do not separate themselves from the dead, they perceive themselves as their equals, believing that in a sense, albeit symbolically, the dead themselves gain subjectivity through such actions and act as critics of the state, war, hierarchies and ideas, exposing the absurdity of power.

Persecution of the Party of the Dead in Russia

Until 2022, Russian authorities systematically detained and fined Party of the Dead members, but criminal prosecutions began after the large-scale invasion of Ukraine, when the Party of the Dead spoke out against the aggressive war and Russian military necropolitics. Many party members were forced to emigrate, establishing branches in different countries. The most active branches currently operate in Georgia and Germany. Those who stayed in Russia live under constant threat of arrest.

Thus, while staying in Georgia Maxim Evstropov learned from the media that in January 2023 a trial started against him, and in February 2023 the court decided to arrest him in absentia. I'm trying to imagine what a court hearing might look like. The judge is asking questions to an empty chair where the defendant, who has no idea he is being tried, should be sitting. The court-appointed lawyer answers instead of the absent person accused, asking to soften the measure of restraint, to replace the usual arrest in absentia with house arrest in absentia... Theater of the absurd! However, in Russia, the line between absurdity and reality has long been erased and now, it seems, everything is possible.

The basis for the prosecution was an anonymous message in social networks describing a then-upcoming action of the Party of the Dead, which Maxim did not even attend. Here I will provide the text in full and in its original form, with no capital letters, so that everyone can evaluate for themselves how insignificant a reason for mass searches, political persecution and criminal punishment can be. This short message is rather artistic in nature, as it uses the artistic device of alternating fragments of two different texts, one of which is an Easter greeting:

in the very heart of the russian world - in the russian cemetery - a bright easter holiday took place recently. no one rose from the dead.

“russia will rise free,” says death

“if,” say the spartans

death hopes for the best

christ is risen!

- and the conscript has not yet

by death trampling death

- the groom has arrived

christ is risen

-  and we have flies over here 

christ is risen indeed

- and patriarch kirill of the russian orthodox church blesses the war and thinks that turning cities into ruins, exterminating their inhabitants, as well as raping and pillaging for the sake of some pseudo-imperialist bullshit in a z-shaped circumvention of all the commandments is ok fine and sacred

well, godspeed!”

The author's black humor, which is typical for the performances of the Party of the Dead, peeks through the lines of this message. I know Maxim very well, we graduated from the same philosophy department, we worked together, I knew his son and his wife, who was my student, and therefore I can say that the performances of the Party of the Dead, albeit in a sarcastic manner, express his absolutely serious attitude towards death as well as his existential, not just political, rejection of the regime in Russia. If ordinary politicians cover up their non-seriousness by imitating serious activity, in the Party of the Dead it is the opposite, a serious attitude to death and power is covered up by grotesque play and black humor.

Is the Party of the Dead a political opposition?

The Russian opposition is increasingly making me feel ashamed, but this is quite natural. After all, Russians have no common self-identification or understanding of themselves as one people, so there can be no all-Russian opposition. There are people who wish to identify as the Russian opposition, but are engaged in imitation instead. Maxim Evstropov is not an oppositionist, but a political artist, an art activist. But he is also a philosopher, so he gives a philosophical understanding of his political activity. I respect Maxim as a philosopher, as a colleague, and as a professional - a candidate of philosophical sciences, author of scientific articles and monographs, but his philosophical language is very different from mine, and is not always clear to me. Therefore, I will try to present his position as I understood it, although he may disagree with my interpretations in some respects.

The political situation in Russia is such that the complete helplessness of the opposition only causes despair. Maxim explains that political despair is a situation of political impossibility, loss of hopes and illusions. It can be called “political death,” which is quite akin to the position of an animal or a corpse. This despair is total and becomes the background of every action and every thought. However, Maxim believes that the possibility of overcoming despair lies in despair itself. To do this, one must despair absolutely. One must despair in order to act. This is how “political death” becomes the starting point of political struggle. Humor is one of the keys to turning despair into action. When there is nothing left to lose, all that remains is laughter. 

Humor makes it possible to look at any situation from two perspectives: a serious one, where everything has unconditional significance, and a non-serious one, where all significance turns into nothing. Laughter is affective in its nature - it is an affect that exists both inside and outside of a lived experience, of a situation, it is a transcendence of the self, an outsider's view. In the moment of ridicule, things lose their defined boundaries. However, in a situation of political despair, humor becomes black. It does not justify or legitimize political death in any way, but at the same time it opens a way out of the life situation into the space of freedom. Maxim believes that the “way out” of despair lies in a paradox: to get rid of despair, one must despair. Black humor lives political death and forms a new phenomenon with it, which we can observe in the street actions and performances of the Party of the Dead.

Let me give an example of how political desperation in a situation where elections are impossible led the Russian opposition to a dead end. Some members of the opposition called for a protest vote, others for an election boycott, and as a result neither strategy was implemented. The Party of the Dead translated this political despair into action and called for a vote for the dead, stating, “We remind you that this sub-fascist police state is essentially dead (strength is in truth, and truth is in death), it has buried its future, it is made up of apartment pyramids of corpses who still can't admit that they are already dead. They will persist for a long time to come, but the soil is more persistent.” The black humor of such an appeal really broke down the boundaries into which the Russian opposition had driven itself. 

The philosophy of the Party of the Dead allows us to better understand what is happening not only inside Russia, but also on the front. When the AFU captured a bridgehead in the Kursk region, many hoped that the Russian command would transfer forces from Donbass to this region, which in turn would lead to a weakening of the Russian offensive in that direction. But nothing of the sort happened. Maxim Evstropov explains it this way: “It must be that the task of the so-called ‘special military operation’ is to seize and turn the Ukrainian territories into the ‘Russian world’, i.e. into something uninhabitable. In this case, the loss of its own territories (Kursk, Belgorod region, etc.) is of no significant importance for the Russian Federation, because they already represent the “Russian world”, i.e. they are not designed for life. The fact that some people still live there is more of an unfortunate coincidence from the authorities' point of view”.

I call Russia's current state system necroimperialism because it cultivates death and is unacceptable for the living. Maxim Evstropov believes that it is unacceptable not only for the living, but also for the dead. 

Translation: Sasha Starost.

Appeal to the Honourable Prime Minister of India, Shri Narendra Modi from Prof. Nikolai Karpitsky

To the Honourable Prime Minister of India, Shri Narendra Modi

Dear Mr. Prime Minister!

In the year 2011, the Russian authorities tried to ban Bhagavad Gita as extremist literature. India was the only country in the world that supported Vaishnavas in Russia and showed that defence of Dharma is more important than political gains. Now Dharma in Russia is in even greater danger. So we again hope for the support of the government and people of India. The Russian government has created a quasi-religion of hatred to justify new colonial wars - expansion of the “Russian world”. The Russian Orthodox Church leadership was the first to fall under its influence and for this reason supported the persecution of Vaishnavas in 2011 and now supports the war. However, many members of the Russian Orthodox Church disagree, they have openly defended the Bhagavad Gita, and now they refuse to pray for Russia's victory. For this reason they are being persecuted and suffer repression. Now the Russian government is imposing a quasi-religion of hate on all faiths. Many Vaishnavas have been forced to leave Russia, but many remain and out of fear support the quasi-religion of hatred and the war against Ukraine. But they still remain alien to the adherents of the ‘Russian world’, so, sooner or later Vaishnavism may again be banned in Russia. Your authority in the international arena may persuade many to abandon moral relativism and evaluate the war against Ukraine from the position of the universal moral law of all humankind, which in India is called Dharma. You can convince the international community that this is not the age of archaic colonial empires, and therefore, all countries need to unite to issue an ultimatum to Russia. Either Russia will abandon the imperial form of state structure and transform itself into a democratic federation safe for the world, or it will cease to exist as a single state.

A participant in the defence of the Bhagavad Gita trial in 2011 Prof. Nikolai Karpitsky

Registration Number : PMOPG/E/2024/0149253

Nikolai Karpitsky. Followers of Hare Krishna go to fight for Ukraine. War has changed Krishnaites

Source: PostPravda.info 23.09.2024

URL: https://postpravda.info/en/stories/reports/followers-of-hare-krishna-fight/

War is rapidly changing people’s consciousness. These changes are visible as if through a magnifying glass in religious communities that previously distanced themselves from political life and preached pacifism, but now support the Ukrainian Armed Forces. If before the war Russian and Ukrainian believers of Hare Krishna were unaware of their differences, now it is as if they live on different planets. Having lost their common language of communication, they no longer understand each other.

The Hare Krishna movement: pacifists or warriors?

The Hare Krishna movement preaches the principle of non-violence – ahimsa. Its representatives, the Vaishnavas or, as they are called, Krishnaites, are vegetarians and refuse to kill not only humans but also animals. Therefore, the Ukrainian government has recognized their right to alternative civil service. The Hare Krishna movement originated in Bengal in the 16th century, and in the second half of the 20th century it spread throughout the world, including Ukraine. Its largest association in Ukraine is the “Society for Krishna Consciousness,” but there are others related to it.

They all come from the same root and there is no contradiction between them. They differ only in their “religious flavor.” Krishnaites preach love for one God, whom they call Krishna, and practice repetition of the Hare Krishna mantra. Everything a Krishnaite does in his daily life, even when he takes a shower or cooks a meal, he does it for Krishna, to please God. There is simply no room for violence in such a life. Before the war, it was hard to imagine that these peaceful people dancing in Indian costumes on the streets of Ukrainian cities would become warriors.

How many of them are now in the Ukrainian Armed Forces? It’s hard to say exactly, because the Krishnaites don’t have records of members. Ukraine’s spiritual leadership claims to know exactly about 80, while Mykhailo Tashkov, head of the Spiritual Matter Project, a supporter of the Hare Krishna movement and an Officer in the Ukrainian Armed Forces, claims to have identified 136 Krishnaite warriors, and there may be more than two hundred in total. For a relatively small “pacifist” religious community, that’s a lot, as there were about 40,000 of them in Ukraine before the war, and perhaps twice as many now.

Mykhailo Tashkov says that 29 Krishnaite warriors are already known to have died, four more are missing, and one is in captivity. His “Spiritual Matter” project aims to promote a theological justification for the need to defend one’s country with weapons, and from this position he and his fellow warriors are engaged in a fierce polemic with the community’s leadership. So what motivates members of a “pacifist” religion to voluntarily go to war with an aggressor?

Hare Krishna followers who died during the war in Ukraine. Photo: Facebook

A view of war in the Hare Krishna movement

The Hare Krishna movement is one of the strands of Hinduism. According to Hindu ideas, the world is governed by a universal moral law – dharma, which at the same time manifests as an inner duty, and each person has his own, according to his inner nature. For spiritual people, dharma is to know the truth, to devote oneself to the service of God, for warriors – to protect the weak, for peasants and merchants – to ensure material life.

In line with this, there is the concept of warnas in India. They are something like social states. The varna of priests – brahmins, the varna of warriors – kshatriyas, the varna of peasants and merchants – vaisyas. In some strands of Hinduism, the varnas are believed to be defined by birth, but in the Hare Krishna movement the varnas are believed to be an indicator of a person’s personal qualities, which do not depend on the family into which they are born. Because of this understanding, people of different nationalities from all countries can join the movement.

“Hare Krishna” is a brahminical movement oriented exclusively toward spiritual life, with the goal of devotional service to God. Therefore, its followers had little participation in public life, since such participation is the duty of a kshatriya, not a brahmin. The political beliefs of the Krishnaites are generally the same as those they held before joining the movement, and generally reflect public sentiment. Religious leaders tend to take a neutral stance on political issues and try to keep any political disputes out of community life. They viewed wars as an inevitable evil. According to Vedic ideas, we live in the age of wars, viz. in Kali-yuga, and salvation can only be achieved through devotional service to God.

However, when the February 24, 2022 the large-scale Russian invasion began, it became clear to Ukrainian Krishnaites that this was not just one of the Kali-yuga wars on the outskirts of their country, but a genocidal war against all Ukrainians, a war of annihilation. No one is safe in Ukraine now; Krishnaites are dying just like other Ukrainians. The occupiers have destroyed three Krishna temples. In the Kherson region, a drunken Russian soldier shot a Krishnaite family in their home for no reason. At the moment, the deaths of five civilian Krishnaites are known, but how many were killed in total is still unknown.

If in the past total focus on God and detachment from material problems was seen as a sign of spirituality, in the context of genocidal war it is seen quite the opposite – as moral relativism. After all, such complete detachment when people, children are dying all around, shows indifference to suffering and unwillingness to take responsibility for what is happening around us. Does God need such an irresponsible follower?

Thus, a division has emerged among Ukrainian Krishnaites between those who believe it is necessary to lead a religious life as before and those who believe it is necessary to take an active part in defending their country. The fierce polemic between the two is sometimes accompanied by unfair mutual accusations. However, both are opposed to Russia’s aggression, they only argue about whether and in what form this aggression should be fought. Ukrainian Krishnaites do not even enter into discussions with supporters of an openly pro-Russian position, so the split between Ukrainian and Russian Krishnaites cannot be overcome.

Relations between Ukrainian and Russian Krishnaites

Before the war, Ukrainian and Russian Krishnaites felt no differences between them and paid no attention to the fact that a dictatorship had been established in Russia. At least until 2011, when the Russian government made a clumsy attempt to outlaw the Krishna Consciousness Society. To that end, the FSB initiated a trial in the Siberian city of Tomsk to admit the Krishnaite holy book as extremist. At the time, there were still remnants of civil society in Tomsk that supported the Krishnaites, but the support of the public and the Indian government played a decisive role. The holy book managed to be protected.

Ukrainian Krishnaites morally supported their Russian co-religionists, and it came as a shock to them that their spiritual brethren, who themselves almost became victims of repression by the Russian government, supported the occupation of Crimea and the 2014 military invasion of eastern Ukraine. Initially, Ukrainian Krishnaites tried to reach the minds of their Russian co-religionists, but now such attempts have finally ceased. The fact is that the existential experience of war between the two is so different that they simply don’t understand each other, even if they both advocate for Ukraine and against the war.

It is clear to Ukrainian Krishnaites that Russia is waging a war against all Ukrainians for the purpose of destruction, that this is a special war that differs from any other war in that it is being waged not for any political gain, but for the purpose of destroying Ukraine and Ukrainian identity. However, even for those Russian Krishnaites who oppose the war and wholeheartedly sympathize with their Ukrainian co-religionists, this is just one of the Kali-yuga wars, which is being waged not by Russia, but by the Russian government, supposedly separate from Russia. This gap in perceptions of the war prevents communication even among those who oppose the political regime in Russia.

Hare Krishna followers in Ukraine. Photo: Facebook

Most Russian Krishnaites try to maintain neutrality, which easily degenerates into moral relativism and equating the victim with the aggressor. The most common opinions are: “Everyone is to blame for the conflict, Russia, Ukraine and the West”; “Vaishnavites should not get involved in politics”; “Demons fight demons, and Vaishnavites should remain neutral”; “War is a punishment for meat-eating people, everyone is guilty, there are no innocents.”

Along with supporters of this neutral position of moral relativism, there are many among Russian Krishnaites who trust Russian propaganda. They blame the war on either Ukraine, where Russians are allegedly oppressed, or the West, which is allegedly fighting Russia with Ukraine’s hands. There are also those who see it as a global conspiracy of “architects” who secretly rule the world. The ideas of pro-Russian Krishnaites about what is happening in Ukraine are absurd and grotesque. For example, I know a Russian Krishnaite who claimed that Russians are being caught in Kharkiv, and then Russian passports are nailed to various parts of their bodies. At the same time, he categorically refuses to communicate with his Ukrainian co-religionists.

However, with the onset of the large-scale war, Ukrainian Krishnaites faced another problem. The fact is that in the Hare Krishna movement, as in Hinduism in general, the guru, or one’s own spiritual teacher, has absolute authority. God Himself is believed to act through him. However, before the war, Ukraine had no teachers of its own, and the initiation of Ukrainian Krishnaites was carried out by teachers from other countries, including Russia, namely Bhakti Vigyana Goswami (Vadim Tuneev), the spiritual leader of the Krishna Consciousness Society in Russia, and also Chaitanya Chandra Czaran das (Alexander Chakimov).

Vadim Tuneev resigned from the leadership of the Russian Krishna Consciousness Society, emigrated and morally supports Ukraine and Ukrainian co-religionists, but Alexander Chakimov took the opposite stance. Not only did he spread the Russian propaganda narrative that Ukraine had been bombing the Donbas for eight years, but he also urged Russian Krishnaites to obey the mobilization decree, saying that it was Krishna’s duty and will to fight, and if a Vaishnav dies fighting against Ukraine, it will be a glorious death that will purify him of karma. Unfortunately, Alexander Khakimov has a large number of disciples in Ukraine, many of whom absolutely disagree with his position, but cannot abandon the teacher, as it contradicts the creed.

So Ukrainian Krishnaites faced a theological challenge – how to explain that a spiritual person, a teacher through whom God Himself acts, takes a demonic position? The situation improved somewhat when, in the spring of 2024, the spiritual leader of the Krishna Consciousness Society in Ukraine and Moldova, Achyuta Priya (Artem Chumachenko), became a guru (teacher) with the right to give initiations, while at the same time recommendations for initiations from Russian teachers were banned. However, what to do with those who have already taken initiation from Alexander Khakimov is an open question.

Dominant trends among Krishnaites

It is difficult to accurately gauge the prevailing trends in the Krishnaite community, but one can certainly speak to the mood among those Krishnaites with an online presence. Yulia Fil, a researcher at the UAN Institute of Oriental Studies, conducted an online survey in April 2024 to determine how the war has affected relations between Ukrainian and Russian Krishnaites. More than a third of Ukrainian Krishnaites do not want contact with Russian co-religionists at all (36.7%), and slightly less than a third are willing to restore relations only if their Russian co-religionists take responsibility for Russia’s crimes in Ukraine.

In other words, two-thirds of Krishnaites take a radically pro-Ukrainian position and are not ready to make any compromises in the name of communication. Before the war, such principledness on political issues could not have been imagined. The war has changed the Krishnaites a great deal. Only 13.3% responded that it was necessary to restore communication with the Russians, leaving aside political issues. If at the beginning of the war Ukrainian Krishnaites actively engaged in discussions on social networks in an attempt to change the minds of their Russian co-religionists, now only 5% express such an intention. This is in line with the general mood throughout Ukrainian society, where the desire to convince Russians has been marginalized.

The position that, for the sake of communication, one should agree with the position of Russians is somewhere within the statistical error – less than 2%. As the survey of Russian Krishnaites in Tomsk shows, the mood there is different. Slightly more than half (52%) take a position of political neutrality and favor restoring communication with Ukrainian co-religionists, without raising political issues. Slightly more than a quarter (27%) believe that it is necessary to meet with Ukrainian co-religionists, recognizing their right. The rest take a pro-Russian stance: a little more than a tenth (11.5%) believe that one should not communicate with Ukrainian co-religionists at all, and another 10% believe that one should try to convince them that Russia is right.

I think these figures reflect the situation of social consciousness in Tomsk as a whole, which is a university city and a cultural center. In Russia’s depressed cities, the situation is probably much worse; I think Russian propaganda of hatred for Ukraine absolutely dominates there. The genocidal war is changing everyone, and it is already clear that neither the Hari Krishna movement nor other religions in Ukraine will remain the same. Disputes and crises within religious communities reflect similar disputes and crises throughout Ukrainian society, and Ukraine’s future will depend on how it overcomes these internal contradictions.

Nikolai Karpitsky: About the current situation in a few short theses

The reason for the Russian-Ukrainian war is the messianic idea of collecting land. After the rebirth of the imperial consciousness into a necro-imperial one, this idea was transformed into the idea of destroying evil, which is seen in everything that is beyond the control of the Kremlin junta.

The reason for the weak support of Ukraine from Western countries is the rejection of values in favor of conformism under the influence of the illusion that everything can be rationally explained by vested interests, which means that it is possible to come to an agreement with the enemy.

The reason for the suspension of aid to Ukraine from the US is the ochlocratic uprising led by Trump. In the information society, thanks to the Internet, ochlos gained access to information and influence on politics that he did not have before. The US two-party system is like an airplane with two engines, and the first engine – the Republican Party – has already broken. If the ochlos breaks the second motor, disaster will follow.

The reason that Ukraine does not have time to mobilize the country and military production, does not use the potential of diplomacy to unite forces against the aggressor, and makes critical mistakes - post-Soviet inertia, weakness of civil society, incompetent bureaucracy.

The reason that Russia was able to rebuild itself for an endless war of attrition is an aggressive ideology and a totalitarian system that makes it possible to redirect the aggression and inertia of a degrading society into one stream.

The cause of the Third World War is the interaction of totalitarian regimes and laziness in democratic civilized countries against the background of weakness and conformity of Western political elites.

Victoria Arnold. RUSSIA: Pacifist Christian musician fined, banned from internet posting

 17 August 2023.

Victoria Arnold, Forum 18

Musician and teacher Anna Chagina has been handed a fine and a ban on internet posting for opposing Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. She stood accused of "discrediting" the Russian armed forces more than once in a year. "I also want to remind you of a simple ethical rule – do to others as you would have them do to you," Chagina said in her final statement. Elsewhere, Mikhail Simonov, the first person to be sentenced to jail for opposing the war from a religious perspective, has lost his appeal against his 7-year jail term.

A court in Siberia has handed musician and teacher Anna Chagina a fine and a ban on posting on the internet as punishment for her opposition to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Chagina stood accused of "discrediting" the Russian armed forces more than once in a year – firstly, by displaying a poster reading “Blessed are the peacemakers (Matthew 5:9)" at an anti-war protest, and secondly, by making anti-war posts on social media, including reposts of texts by religious philosopher Nikolay Karpitsky.

Anna Chagina

Private

On 7 August 2023, Soviet District Court in Tomsk fined Chagina 150,000 Roubles under Criminal Code Article 280.3 Part 1 ("Public actions aimed at discrediting the use of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation in order to protect the interests of the Russian Federation and its citizens, [and] maintain international peace and security") and prohibited her from publishing anything online for 2 years (see below).

Judge Roman Zaynulin imposed the punishment “with the aim of restoring social justice and preventing [Chagina] from committing a new offence." He reduced the fine to 100,000 Roubles to account for time spent under restrictions. 100,000 Roubles is equivalent to almost 6 weeks’ average wages in Tomsk Region as of May 2023. It is unknown whether or not Chagina will choose to appeal. In the meantime, Chagina must abide by travel restrictions and a good behaviour order. According to the verdict, her laptop will be returned when the verdict comes into force, but her mobile phone will remain confiscated as it was “used in the commission of the offence." (see below).

On 14 August, Forum 18 wrote to Soviet District Court and Tomsk Regional Prosecutor’s Office, asking why a Biblical quotation (as in Chagina’s first, administrative prosecution) and reposts of Karpitsky’s observations on the war were considered "discreditation" of the Russian armed forces, and whether the prosecution intended to challenge the court’s verdict. No response has been received (see below).

In court, Chagina did not deny making the internet posts which led to her conviction but pleaded not guilty, stating that she had always held pacifist views: "There is the right, enshrined in law, to express any opinion publicly. ‘No to war’ is [my] position, regardless of which war" (see below).

“I also want to remind you of a simple ethical rule – do to others as you would have them do to you," Chagina told the court in her final statement. "I believe that we will be able to overcome this deepest crisis that has arisen between our peoples, and I urge everyone to find strength in ourselves and stop hating. Don't believe what they say. We have no greater enemies than ourselves" (see below).

"When military action finally comes to an end and those who survive return – and sooner or later, that will happen – the [Russian Orthodox Church] will have to answer for its ideological support of the war," Chagina told Forum 18 through friends on 11 August, before the verdict came into legal force. "I think a global crisis of faith awaits us inside the ROC [Russian Orthodox Church]" (see below).

Mikhail Simonov, the first person to be sentenced to imprisonment for opposing the war in Ukraine from a religious perspective, appealed unsuccessfully against his conviction on 25 July 2023 at Moscow City Court (see below).

On 30 March, Forum 18 asked the Federal Investigative Committee and its Moscow branch, as well as Moscow City Prosecutor's Office, in what way Simonov's comments could be construed as motivated by hatred of a political or social group, and why it was necessary to have a 63-year-old man with health problems placed in detention. Forum 18 has received no reply to any of these questions (see below).

On 30 March, Simonov had received a 7-year prison term under Criminal Code Article 207.3 ("Public dissemination, under the guise of credible statements, of knowingly false information on the use of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation") for making online comments condemning the war, including one which said "We, Russia, have become godless. Forgive us, Lord!" He is currently in transit within the prison system and it remains unknown where he will serve his sentence (see below).

Ongoing and new cases

Guard brings Fr Ioann Kurmoyarov into Kalinin District Court, St Petersburg, 6 February 2023

Rferl.org (RFE/RL)

Father Ioann Kurmoyarov (of a branch of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia not in communion with the Moscow Patriarchate), the only person currently on trial for opposing the war in Ukraine on religious grounds, has been in custody in St Petersburg’s Kresty-2 prison since June 2022. The judge in his case rejected his latest petition to be placed under lesser restrictions on 28 June 2023.

In August 2022, Darya Lebedeva, head of the joint court system press service for St Petersburg, insisted to Forum 18 that Fr Ioann had to be held in detention because: "if at liberty and not isolated from society, Kurmoyarov may continue his criminal activity, conceal himself from investigators and the court, destroy evidence and otherwise interfere with the criminal proceedings".

Fr Ioann is on trial under Criminal Code Article 207.3 ("Public dissemination, under the guise of credible statements, of knowingly false information on the use of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation") for posting anti-war videos on YouTube, and is next due to appear in court on 22 August 2023.

Yury Sipko, June 2019

Svoboda.org (RFE/RL)

In early August, the Investigative Committee in Moscow opened a criminal case against Baptist pastor Yury Sipko, the former head of the Russian Baptist Union. He is under investigation under Criminal Code Article 207.3 ("Public dissemination, under the guise of credible statements, of knowingly false information on the use of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation"), Part 2 Paragraph D ("based on political, ideological, racial, national, or religious hatred or enmity, or based on hatred or enmity against any social group"). Investigators raided Sipko’s home in Moscow, but could not arrest him as he had already left the country – they have now had him placed on the Interior Ministry’s wanted list (see forthcoming F18News article).

Federal Security Service (FSB) investigators in Kaluga also searched the home of Pentecostal bishop Albert Ratkin on 8 August, and took him in for questioning. He was later released and is so far being treated as a witness in Sipko’s case (see forthcoming F18News article).

Administrative Code cases for opposition to the war on grounds of faith or with the use of religious imagery and quotations continue to be brought. Cases in 2023 have included Eduard Charov, who was fined in April for "discrediting" the Armed Forces and "inciting hatred" towards state authorities after he criticised Russia's invasion of Ukraine on social media, asking "Would Jesus Christ have gone to kill in Ukraine?".

Conscientious objectors to military service have been jailed, such as Pentecostal Andrey Kapatsyna who refused to fight in Ukraine, telling commanders that "in accordance with his religious beliefs, he could not take up arms and use them against other people." On 29 June 2023, a Vladivostok court sentenced him to 2 years, 10 months' imprisonment under new legislation punishing non-fulfilment of orders in a period of combat operations. There is no legal or practical provision for alternative civilian service (ACS) during mobilisation, despite the Constitution guaranteeing this right for every citizen.

“Discreditation" and “False information"

Specific penalties for criticising Russia's actions in its renewed war against Ukraine came into force on 4 March 2022. These include Administrative Code Article 20.3.3 ("Public actions aimed at discrediting the use of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation"), which is used against apparently any form of anti-war statement either in public spaces or online, and Criminal Code Article 207.3 ("Public dissemination, under the guise of credible statements, of knowingly false information on the use of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation").

If individuals commit an offence covered by Administrative Code Article 20.3.3 more than once within a year, they may be prosecuted under Criminal Code Article 280.3 ("Public actions aimed at discrediting the use of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation in order to protect the interests of the Russian Federation and its citizens, [and] maintain international peace and security").

On 28 March 2023, a series of amendments to the Criminal Code came into legal force, increasing penalties for disseminating "false information" about and repeatedly "discrediting" the Russian Armed Forces (Criminal Code Articles 207.3 and 280.3). The amendments also widen the definition of these offences (and of Administrative Code Article 20.3.3) to include criticism of "volunteer formations, organisations and individuals who assist in the fulfilment of tasks assigned to the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation" (that is, private mercenary units).

Under Criminal Code Article 280.3 ("Public actions aimed at discrediting the use of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation in order to protect the interests of the Russian Federation and its citizens, [and] maintain international peace and security"), Part 1, the maximum prison sentence was raised from 3 years to 5 years. Under Part 2, the same offence if resulting in "death by negligence", harm to health or property, or mass public disorder, the penalty was raised from 5 years to 7 years.

Under Criminal Code Article 207.3 ("Public dissemination, under the guise of credible statements, of knowingly false information on the use of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation"), Part 1, the maximum prison sentence was raised from 3 years to 5 years (Part 2 remains unchanged).

Russian Orthodox (ROCOR) priest Nikandr Pinchuk was the first person to receive a criminal conviction for opposing Russia's war in Ukraine on religious grounds. On 17 October 2022, a court in the Urals fined him two months' average local wage under Criminal Code Article 280.3, for a social media post condemning the "horde of the Antichrist" attacking Ukraine. Neither Verkhoturye District Court nor Prosecutor's Office replied to Forum 18's questions on why expressing religious views on the war in Ukraine should be considered "discreditation" of the Armed Forces and incur such a large fine.

Tomsk: Fine and ban on internet posts for “discrediting" the army

Soviet District Court, Tomsk, August 2021

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On 7 August 2023, Anna Sergeyevna Chagina (born 29 November 1979) made her tenth and final appearance at Soviet District Court in Tomsk on a charge of repeatedly “discrediting" the Russian armed forces.

Judge Roman Zaynulin found her guilty and imposed a fine of 150,000 Roubles and a 2-year ban on making online publications. He reduced the fine to 100,000 Roubles to take into account the one day Chagina was detained after her arrest, and the time she spent under restrictions during the investigation and awaiting trial. 100,000 Roubles is equivalent to almost 6 weeks’ average wages in Tomsk Region as of May 2023.

In her final statement to the court, Chagina – a viola player and music teacher – said that she believed that war, “no matter what it is called – a special military operation, or something else – causes irreparable harm [and] damage to our countries and human destinies," the Vtomske.ru local news website reported on 7 August. “I believe that no one can win a war. Only love, which always remains, can win. Even now, when our soldiers are shooting at each other, when people are dying, it still remains."

“We have the opportunity to finish this as soon as possible. This is our responsibility. I want to remind those who consider themselves Christians that Kiev is the mother of Russian cities," Chagina added.

“I also want to remind you of a simple ethical rule – do to others as you would have them do to you. I believe that we will be able to overcome this deepest crisis that has arisen between our peoples, and I urge everyone to find strength in ourselves and stop hating. Don't believe what they say. We have no greater enemies than ourselves."

Prosecutors had sought a fine of 200,000 Roubles and a 3-year ban on posting material online. The maximum punishment Chagina could have received under Criminal Code Article 280.3 ("Public actions aimed at discrediting the use of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation in order to protect the interests of the Russian Federation and its citizens, [and] maintain international peace and security"), Part 1, was 3 years’ imprisonment. This was because her alleged offence took place before the March 2023 increase in possible sentences.

The verdict has not yet entered legal force. Chagina has not yet decided whether to appeal, she told Forum 18 through friends on 11 August - she has 15 days to do so from the date the verdict was issued. Akt-Produkt, an independent St Petersburg-based record label with which Chagina has collaborated, noted on VKontakte on 13 August that supporters had already managed to raise enough money to pay the fine.

In the meantime, Chagina must abide by travel restrictions and a good behaviour order. According to the verdict, her laptop will be returned when the verdict comes into force, but her mobile phone will remain confiscated as it was “used in the commission of the offence."

First conviction

Criminal Code Article 280.3 punishes those who “discredit" the Russian armed forces more than once within a year. Chagina's first conviction for this was for displaying a poster reading “Blessed are the peacemakers (Matthew 5:9)" at an anti-war protest in Tomsk in March 2022, just two days after the new offence of “discreditation" came into force.

“Many times after [the arrest for the poster], I inwardly turned to these words of Christ and realised that peacemaking begins with what is in a person's heart," Chagina told Forum 18 through friends on 11 March 2023.

On 14 March 2022 she was fined 45,000 Roubles under Administrative Code Article 20.3.3 ("Public actions aimed at discrediting the use of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation"), Part 1, also at Soviet District Court in Tomsk.

Second accusation of “discreditation"

The second accusation of “discreditation," which led to Chagina’s criminal prosecution, derived from a number of posts she made on her profile page on the VKontakte social network, which a witness allegedly came across by chance and reported to an acquaintance in the FSB. In summer 2022, Chagina had begun to notice that she was being followed. After her arrest in autumn 2022, the investigator remarked that all the local police already knew her, media outlet Govorit Ne Moskva (which specialises in regional stories) noted in December 2022.

Maksim Khalturin shows ankle monitoring bracelet, February 2019

CurrentTime TV

After her second arrest on 30 November 2022, the court placed her under specific restrictions, including a night-time curfew, a ban on using the internet and postal service, and the use of an electronic tag. Chagina continued to have to wear the tag for more than seven months, until prison service officials removed it at the start of July to use on another person, as they had run out of devices.

Those internet posts cited in the August 2023 court verdict, seen by Forum 18, comprise a post on 12 May 2022 saying that she had signed human rights defender Lev Ponomaryov's change.org petition against Russia's renewed invasion of Ukraine, and another on 7 June 2022 saying “NO TO WAR" (with a link to a news report on the State Duma’s proposed creation of more war-related criminal offences), as well as three reposts of texts from the Facebook page of Nikolay Karpitsky.

Karpitsky is a religious philosopher from Tomsk who now lives in Slovyansk in Ukraine. He has documented the experience of wartime life almost every day since the invasion and produced a series of videos on YouTube entitled “War from the point of view of religion."

Karpitsky’s texts which feature in the court’s written verdict are those (of 3 May, 28 May, and 11 June 2022) which accuse Russian forces of targeting Ukrainian homes and civilian infrastructure. These include: “After all, they will not spare anyone. First, they will demolish everything they can with artillery. Then, on the cleared territory, the intelligence services will look for ‘Nazis’, that is, to torture and kill all those who are suspicious. And then the city will be given to the gopniks [thugs, delinquents] for plunder, who will kill just for the sake of entertainment. Thus they have already acted in Bucha and other cities."

The Investigative Committee and experts for the prosecution determined that these posts characterised Russian troops’ actions as “predatory, dangerous, [and] violent."

A number of other materials from Chagina’s VKontakte page contributed to the Investigative Committee’s 30 November 2022 decision to charge her (seen by Forum 18), though do not appear in the final indictment or verdict.

These included a 17 May 2022 repost from the “Libertarnaya Teologiya" VKontakte page, with information about and links to download a book entitled “The long road of Russian pacifism: the ideal of international and internal peace in the religious-philosophical and socio-political thought of Russia" (ed. T. Shchapov, Institute of World History, Russian Academy of Sciences, 1997). This included the quotation: “Saints who acquired inner peace, according to hagiographic literature, almost always became peacemakers in both the private and political life of ancient Rus' .. With their lives, they testified that only by renouncing selfish aspirations, life ‘according to the elements of this world’, affirming oneself in love for God and neighbour, can a person defeat evil – not to slay it with a sword, but to absorb it into oneself and dissolve it by the effort of faith and love."

In court, Chagina did not deny making the posts but pleaded not guilty, stating that she had always held pacifist views: “There is the right, enshrined in law, to express any opinion publicly. ‘No to war’ is [my] position, regardless of which war."

August 2023 verdict

Judge Zaynulin found no mitigating or exacerbating circumstances in the case, and “taking into account the effect of the chosen punishment on the correction of the guilty person" and “with the aim of restoring social justice and preventing [Chagina] from committing a new offence," decided to impose a fine and 2 years’ “deprivation of the right to carry out activities related to administration of sites on electronic and information-telecommunication networks, including the internet, and the posting of information on them for public access."

Forum 18 wrote to Soviet District Court and Tomsk Regional Prosecutor’s Office on 14 August, asking why a Biblical quotation (as in Chagina’s first, administrative prosecution) and reposts of Karpitsky’s observations on the war were considered “discreditation" of the Russian armed forces, and whether the prosecution intended to challenge the court’s verdict. No response has been received.

“A global crisis of faith awaits us inside the Russian Orthodox Church"

“As far as my religious life is concerned, everything has remained the same: I go to church, nobody has tried to limit my freedom of belief in any way," Chagina told Forum 18 through friends on 11 August, before the verdict came into legal force.

“When military action finally comes to an end and those who survive return – and sooner or later, that will happen – the [Russian Orthodox Church] will have to answer for its ideological support of the war. If Russia openly recognises its defeat, the Church will be emotionally responsible for this before society.

“There are already few people now in the churches, on weekdays there’s almost nobody at all. And after the war, I think a global crisis of faith awaits us inside the ROC [Russian Orthodox Church]. There are priests who are generally afraid to speak, and this fear is not just of the state, but also of the people. It is as if an abyss has grown between pastor and flock."

Moscow: 7-year prison sentence upheld

Mikhail Simonov being led into Moscow’s Timiryazevsky District Court, 30 March 2023

Antonina Favorskaya/SOTAvision

Mikhail Yuryevich Simonov (born 27 January 1960), the first person to receive a prison sentence for his religiously motivated opposition to the war in Ukraine, appealed unsuccessfully against his conviction on 25 July 2023 at Moscow City Court.

The Investigative Committee’s case against Simonov was based on two comments he made on the VKontakte social network in March 2022: "Killing children and women, on Channel One [television] we sing songs. We, Russia, have become godless [bezbozhniki]. Forgive us, Lord!"; and "Russian pilots are bombing children."

On 30 March 2023, the capital’s Timiryazevsky District Court found Simonov guilty under Criminal Code Article 207.3 ("Public dissemination, under the guise of credible statements, of knowingly false information on the use of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation"), Part 2 Part D ("based on political, ideological, racial, national, or religious hatred or enmity, or based on hatred or enmity against any social group"). He was sentenced to 7 years’ imprisonment.

On 30 March, Forum 18 asked the Federal Investigative Committee and its Moscow branch, as well as Moscow City Prosecutor's Office, in what way Simonov's comments could be construed as motivated by hatred of a political or social group, and why it was necessary to have a 63-year-old man with health problems placed in detention. Forum 18 also asked Moscow City Prosecutor's Office why prosecutors had requested such a long prison sentence of 7 years. Forum 18 has received no reply to any of these questions.

Simonov is still in transit within the prison system, a person following the case told Forum 18, and as of early August, he was being held at Investigation Prison No. 2 in Tsivilsk in the Chuvash Republic. It is as yet unknown where he will serve his sentence.

Simonov remained in detention throughout the investigation and trial and between his conviction and appeal, and is therefore deemed to have already served 13 and a half months of his prison term. He is thus likely to be due for release in June 2029 – after which he will be subject to a 4-year ban on some online activities.

At Simonov’s appeal hearing, his lawyer Aleksandr Aldayev argued that Criminal Code Article 207.3 contravenes international law, RusNews reported on its Telegram channel on 25 July. Simonov himself stated that he “did not fully understand the essence of the charge against him," and that pleaded guilty only to the offence of “Public dissemination of knowingly false information under the guise of authentic information" (ie. Article 207.3 Part 1), denying that he had been motivated by “political hatred." The appeal judge refused, however, to reclassify the charge against him. (END)