However, the symbolism of the Week of Enslaved Nations, which in 2022 fell on July 17-23, goes far beyond commemorating the struggle of Ukrainians against modern Russian aggression. The origins of the tradition date back to the Cold War. In 1959, the US Congress first addressed the President with an initiative to support the peoples behind the “Iron Curtain” by commemorating their struggle every year in the third week of July, “until freedom and independence are achieved for all the enslaved nations of the world.”
And although the Cold War ended with the collapse of the Communist bloc and the Soviet Union, the problem of national enslavement has not disappeared. Thus, the annual proclamations of the US presidents on the eve of the third week of July were preserved even after 1991.
This year, the Week of Enslaved Peoples is relevant not only for Ukrainians, but also for a significant part of the population of the empire that attacked Ukraine.
Repressed revival
Purely formally, Russia is a federation, it follows even from its official name – the Russian Federation. There are 83 regions in federal relations with the Moscow center (not including illegally annexed ones). Among them are 21 republics and 4 autonomous districts, which are forms of national-state self-determination of non-Russian peoples. At least a fifth of the population of the Russian Federation are not Russians, but representatives of a large “bouquet” of over 190 nations.
Russian ethno-federalism is a legacy of the USSR and the first post-Soviet years, when a new despotic regime had not yet formed in the country. In the 1990s, the republics of the Russian Federation were able to achieve a lot: they adopted declarations on state sovereignty, introduced the positions of presidents, and fought for broader powers in relations with the federal center. Chechnya and Tatarstan generally declared independence, and returning them to the orbit of its influence cost Moscow considerable effort.
President of independent Chechnya Dzhokhar Dudayev
In the history of the indigenous peoples of the Russian Federation, this was a short period of national revival. Then the status of their languages (recognized in the republics as state on a par with Russian) was raised, and culture and religion developed under fairly liberal conditions. National political parties and public organizations also functioned freely.
With the advent of Putinism, the Kremlin struck the first blow not at the neighbors of the Russian Federation, but at the national subjects of the federation. The rights of the republics were greatly curtailed, and the provisions of the first federal treaty (1992) were actually trampled upon. National parties are banned, the positions of the presidents of the republics are abolished, the state languages of the republics are actually removed from the field of education under the guise of “voluntary” learning.
Putin repeatedly criticized the Bolsheviks for the allegedly “artificial” national borders they established – both between the Soviet republics and within the Russian Federation. We and other countries acutely feel the dictator’s disrespect for borders, which became interstate in 1991. But his disdain for Russian federalism also remained for the whole world in the shadow of stormy foreign activity. Under the pretext of “consolidation”, 6 autonomous national districts were liquidated in Russia, and this process continues.
From the point of view of Putin’s “Russian world” ideology, polyethnicity and federalism are diseases that can be cured by Russification and centralization . Especially considering the plans to absorb new territories by Russia, the “foreignness” of which also requires time and effort to be “digested” by the empire.
Kalmyks protest against the appointment of Trapeznikov, a former militant of the DPR, as the head of the capital’s Elista administration, 2019
Unknown and lied to
Was there resistance to Putinism from the enslaved peoples? Definitely. Starting with forms of armed struggle, as in the North Caucasus, and ending with peaceful actions of civil disobedience in the Volga and Siberia.
However, at that time the world’s attention was focused not on national activists, but on the “all-Russian” democratic opposition. Kremlin propaganda succeeded in extinguishing the international community’s interest in national movements by labeling them as Wahhabis, terrorists, and nationalists.
Against the background of complete silencing, Moscow’s repression and terror against supporters of national sovereignty and culture were incomparably more brutal than against Navalny’s supporters.
Udmurt scientist Albert Razin pickets the building of the State Council of Udmurtia. In a moment he will commit an act of self-immolation. Izhevsk, 2019
Even before the start of the Russian aggression against Ukraine, the national movements in the Russian Federation were crushed. Some of the activists ended up behind bars, someone was killed or maimed “under unknown circumstances”, others stopped public activities or were forced to flee abroad.
This war caused an allergy to everything Russian in Ukraine and in the world. At the same time, dealing with the enemy directly, Ukrainians are forced to get to know him more deeply. And we also learned more about the peoples of the Russian Federation, meeting their representatives on our land – both as occupiers who cause hatred, and as emigrants who sincerely support the Armed Forces.
Single picket of Tatar activist Iskander Yasaveev in support of Oleg Sentsov. Kazan, 2018.
“Cannon fodder” from the national outskirts
Full-scale Russian aggression against Ukraine sharply exacerbated the national issue in the Russian Federation. Putin throws nations into the crucible of war; it can no longer be hidden that a disproportionate number of “nationals” die compared to Russians. For almost six months, Dagestan has maintained the first place among the subjects of the federation in terms of the number of participants of the so-called “special operation” killed in Ukraine . Among the individual peoples of Russia, Buryats are the first to bear colossal losses.
The national factor in the war has grown so much that Russia has already begun to create “national battalions” fighting against Ukraine under the flags of their republics. After so many years of repression and terror, this is an unheard of example of flirting with local patriotism.
Russian-recruited fighters of the Bashkir battalion named after Dostavalova with the national flag
It is convenient for the Kremlin to fight with Ukrainians by the hands of enslaved peoples. By mobilizing the province, Putin “protects” Russian residents of megacities who are able to create problems for the authorities in the media and in the central squares of the country. In contrast to the aborigines of socially backward regions, the financial motivation to go to war for Muscovites and St. Petersburg residents is clearly insufficient. Therefore, despite the already noticeable shortage of personnel, general mobilization is not announced in Russia .
At the same time, using young men from the Caucasus and Transbaikalia in the war, Putin solves the strategic task of reducing polyethnicity and curtailing federalism in Russia. Through actual ethnocide of small nations.
In addition to everything else, Russian propaganda also deliberately highlights the role of Chechens and Buryats , directing the anger and hatred of Ukrainians primarily at them, and not at ethnic Russians. Against the background of “wild foreigners”, the reputation of Russians is bleached for the promotion of the Pan-Slavic concept of “Russian peace” in Ukraine. Conversely, burning bridges between Ukrainians and the enslaved peoples of the Russian Federation should make it impossible for them to cooperate in the cause of the collapse of the empire.
Window of opportunity
But it was precisely the war that opened a “window of opportunity” for peoples to say goodbye to the empire once and for all. Putin’s adventure is costing the Russian Federation dearly. The economy suffers from sanctions, military families receive funerals all the time, the state’s reputation in the international arena is completely destroyed. The “second army of the world”, which for a long time was a threat to its neighbors, turned out to be shockingly weak. All this increases the chances of the start of turbulent processes in Russia, the result of which may be its complete or partial disintegration.
Already on March 11, 2022, the Prime Minister of Tatarstan’s government-in-exile in the United States, Wil Mirzayanov, called on Tatars to fight for the republic’s independence.
Some of the emigrants are fighting in the defense forces of Ukraine under their national flags, such as the two Chechen battalions and the Idel-Ural volunteer unit. Others unite politically and hold representative events to acquire their own subjectivity.
Inyazor (chief elder) of the Erzyan people Syres Bolyaen in the ranks of the ZSU.
The Forums of the Free Peoples of Russia were held in Warsaw on May 8, and in Prague on July 22-24 . The day before, activists of the Bashkir, Buryat, Ingermanland, Cossack, Kalmyk, Tatar and Erzyan national movements united in the League of Free Nations . The League marked this year’s Enslaved Peoples Week by holding rallies in several cities in the United States and around the world.
Despite the total suppression of dissent, national movements within the Russian Federation are raising their heads again. In March, Ukraine was publicly supported by the Council of Elders of the Erzyan people in Mordovia , as well as the Congress of the Ayrat-Kalmyk people in Kalmykia . It is not necessary to describe the risk to which the organizers and participants of such gatherings expose themselves.
Dissatisfaction is gradually penetrating into the heart of imperial policy – the army. And reports such as the fact that 500 Buryats terminated their contracts with the Ministry of Defense and returned to Ulan-Ude due to their unwillingness to fight in Ukraine are only the first swallows. It is quite possible that the “national battalions” created by Putin, like many “veterans of special operations”, will soon ask very uncomfortable questions to politicians and seek justice in their usual way – with weapons.
Buryat activist Rajana Dugar-DePonte during the action of the League of Free Nations near the White House on the occasion of the declaration of Enslaved Peoples Week, 2022
Ukraine no longer has any legal and moral obligations to Russia regarding its sovereignty or territorial integrity. Moscow was the first to trample the principles of civilized coexistence with us. Therefore, the initiatives of Ukrainian parliamentarians, such as the draft Resolution on recognition of the state sovereignty of the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria , should not be surprising. On the contrary, Kyiv must invest even more in supporting the struggle of the peoples enslaved by the Kremlin.
After all, in the best scenario, we will no longer have a neighbor in the east whose “deep people” time and again give birth to bloodthirsty regimes and send a real or nominal “second army of the world” to war with us.
LB. Ua
