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Socialist Review Index (1993–1996) | Socialist Review 183 Contents
From Socialist Review, No. 183, February 1995.
Copyright © Socialist Review.
Copied with thanks from the Socialist Review Archive.
Marked up by Einde O’Callaghan for ETOL.
The Russian army’s assault on the Chechen capital Grozny has led to at least 2,000 dead Russian soldiers and even more Chechen fighters and civilians killed. The city lies in ruins. But the war has also had its effect in Russia itself, accelerating the divisions among Russia’s rulers and the disillusionment of many Russians with Boris Yeltsin’s regime.
The invasion has shifted the political scene to the right. The fascist Zhirinovsky declared his support for the war from the start and called for an intensification of the fighting. This stand has strengthened his position. He was invited to a closed session with the prime minister Chernomyrdin, where there was almost certainly some sort of alliance worked out to defeat the opposition to the war in the Duma (Russia’s parliament).
Up to now Zhirinovsky’s party has been kept out of the government, despite the fact that it is one of the largest single groups in the Duma. But the concessions will strengthen his hand.
Although the fascists were the only party to wholeheartedly support the invasion, the opposition in the Duma has been undermined. Anti-war motions were scuppered by an alliance of Zhirinovsky’s fascists, the Communists, the Agrarians and the ‘Party of Unity and Accord’ (which has taken over the unofficial mantle of Yeltsin’s party). What all these groups have in common is Russian nationalism, and their criticisms were based on the bungled incompetence of the invasion rather than any principled opposition. As a result, one Russian political adviser has talked in private about ‘a wave of Russian nationalism in the Duma’.
The ‘Security Council’ has emerged as a major driving force behind the war and has been dubbed by some the ‘party of war’ which has taken over the government. This body is comprised of the ministers of defence, the interior, the secret service, and other military figures. It first came to prominence during the outbreak of fighting around the parliament in October 1993, when the armed supporters of the dissolved parliament were taking control of the television building and the mayor’s office. Yeltsin’s meeting then with the Security Council in the critical hours after the fighting had started lasted over eight hours, leaving many to speculate on what concessions they had demanded before agreeing to crush the rebellion. Even before the war, Russia’s economy was in deep crisis. The government announced the cost of the war would be l percent of GNP, but this is likely to be a very low estimate. The failure of the army in the face of combat has led to calls for increased military spending. The Security Council has been lobbying to be given control of the economy.
To understand what’s happening in the Russian ruling class, it is important to understand the level of continuity with the old system. This continuity consists not only of the desire to preserve a strong Russian empire, but also in terms of the people who make up this ruling class. All the generals, industrialists and politicians were part of the old system. They may disagree on which way Russia should go, but these are usually temporary and pragmatically based differences. The allies of yesterday can become the enemies of today and vice versa. Yeltsin sits at the top of this group and balances between them.
All Western leaders have supported Yeltsin throughout the war, declaring that it is ‘an internal problem’. He was declared to be ‘the West’s best friend in Russia’, and the links – both financial and military – between Russia and the US remain important. This is recognised even by the pro-war ‘hardliners’ in the Security Council. But the invasion has shown that these links can come under intense strain.
Initially there were protests against the invasion organised by the political opposition. The largest of these drew between 3,000 and 4,000 people in Moscow in December. Recent protests have been much smaller. The political parties which organised many of the first protests accepted the need to ‘maintain the unity of Russia’.
But a new opposition has emerged during January. This is the Committees of Soldiers’ Mothers. These groups were set up during the war with Afghanistan, when popular opposition grew to the steady flow of zinc coffins (Russia’s equivalent of body bags) filled with young conscripts fresh out of school. These committees have organised small but militant protests, which have huge emotional power. In one town mothers lay on railway tracks to prevent troop trains from leaving. The groups have encouraged soldiers to desert, and the level of desertion is reported to be high.
On 16 January a funeral of a Russian soldier killed in Chechnya was shown for the first time on Russian television. A distraught relative addressed the camera, ‘When will we end our silence?’ It seems clear that the flow of zinc coffins will not stop. The war in Chechnya has already developed into a guerilla war in the south. Those who say Chechnya is too small to sustain an Afghanistan type resistance forget that it is surrounded by seven other such republics, all with minority Russian populations. Over 7 million people live in these republics and could provide easy shelter for guerillas, as well as potential for fighting to spread.
When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991 it seemed to many that there would be no end to the forces pulling Russia apart. But in the last few years there has been a delicate balance between these forces and other (primarily economic) forces which have led to reintegration. Last year Georgia finally joined the CIS, dominated by Russia. If the result of the war in Chechnya is to upset this delicate balance, we may see the conflict spreading.
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