Recently, the Centre for Russian Studies decided to discuss a rather resonant topic about “good Russians” at one of its open meetings. It gained additional relevance, in particular, after the exchange of Russian murderers, thieves, and spies for a group of several “prisoners of the Kremlin,” as some figures in the West claimed.
The mere fact of imprisonment was enough to open the doors of the highest political offices, even the Oval Office in the White House, to the latter. Not to mention invitations to numerous conferences, seminars, awards, prizes, etc. Grants, scholarships, and social assistance poured down on their heads as if from a cornucopia.
This can only be welcomed, because empathy and the desire to help are one of the defining features of a modern democratic and at the same time humanistic society.
This is all the more logical when it comes to people who condemn the war, oppose Putin’s regime and want to build, as they claim, “a beautiful Russia of the future.” (With someone’s “light hand” – the participants in the discussion were unable to identify the author – these Russians began to be called “good Russians”).
But it is from this moment that the questions begin.
After all, their war is somewhat abstract: it simply “started” and it is unknown which country committed the crime of military aggression. It is led by one person – Putin, although “our boys” are dying in it.
It is also unknown who is the victim of aggression and whether it is worth helping the Ukrainian Defence Forces with weapons to resist this aggression. The question of helping volunteer associations of Russians who, with weapons in their hands, support the Ukrainian military defend not only the right of Ukrainians to exist but also the principles of the modern democratic world order remains in parentheses.
When some, even among the Russians themselves, who now live in the West, mention the right of NATIONS to self-determination, the fighters for the “bright future of Russia” raise an almost absurd cry. However, this right is enshrined in the UN Charter and is one of the fundamental principles of modern international law.
Incidentally, we note that this right does NOT apply to the POPULATION of the country’s administrative units, because it is NOT a nation – hello to the Crimean, LDN and other “self-determinations”. Self-determination of territories within a state is possible only within the framework of the constitutional procedures of the state of which they are a part, and, of course, not at the barrel of a machine gun.
But there is also complete silence about all this from the side of the “good Russians”.
Shamefully left out of the discussion of the “good Russians” is the issue of traditional Russian aggressiveness, which brought untold suffering to dozens of nations enslaved by Muscovy, Russia and the USSR. Not a word about the demilitarization of thinking, let alone practical demilitarization on the ground. And about nuclear disarmament – absolutely nothing.
Where can we find, against that background, a thesis about atonement for the guilt towards these nations, a willingness to compensate for the moral and economic damage inflicted on them?! Instead, we hear about a “common cultural background”, which sounds to them nothing more than ethical and psychological bullying. Or it demonstrates the total historical ignorance of those who say such things. Or both.
The fact that the narratives that the “good Russians” spread in their media often coincide with the Kremlin’s is a long-known “secret.” A study by the Pylyp Orlyk Institute for Democracy, which the authors presented during the discussion, was devoted to their detailed analysis.
Naturally, during the discussion, a methodological question arose: how to distinguish true democrats and liberals from “good Russians”? The author of these lines proposed 8 questions, the answers to which can become a kind of watershed between the imaginary and the real as well as dot the “i”s.
Here they are. The answers should be “black and white”: yes or no. The option “not everything is so clear-cut” does not work here.
Therefore:
- Do you consider Russia’s actions in Ukraine in 2014 and 2022 to be acts of military aggression, which is treated as a crime under international law? Yes/no.
- Should post-Putin liberal Russia immediately return to Ukraine all temporarily occupied Ukrainian territories? Yes/no.
- Should post-Putin liberal Russia apologize to the Ukrainian people for the crimes committed and pay Ukraine compensation for the damage caused? Yes/no.
- Is it correct to say that Russia’s aggression against Ukraine is not Putin’s war, but a war of the Russian people, the goal of which is the destruction of Ukrainians as an ethnic group? Yes/no.
- Should a Russian liberal help the Ukrainian Defence Forces today? Yes/no.
- Should post-Putin liberal Russia extradite Russian war criminals to an international court? Yes/no.
- Should post-Putin liberal Russia recognize the right of nations living on its territory to self-determination? Yes/no!
- Should a post-Putin liberal Russia continue to possess nuclear weapons? Yes/no.
Of course, this list is open. Because Georgians will add their own questions, Chechens – their own, Tatars, Crimean and non-Crimean, – their own. And so on – dozens, if not hundreds of times. “Good Russians” will have to answer them all. It is on the outcome of these answers that we will find out what kind of “beautiful Russia of the future” they want to build.
The same as now, only with itself at the helm, or another one that, after several generations of self-purification and atonement for its crimes, will perhaps come closer to the beginnings of democracy and justice?
One of the participants in the discussion suggested an even simpler way to understand who the “good Russians” really are: you just need to look into the archives of the Soviet KGB and the current FSB. That would be, of course, easier, faster, and more obvious, but where is it? Everything is under a secure lock! Therefore, we must stock up on strategic patience. And not lose hope, because, as we know, archives do not burn.
At the same time, there is no doubt that among the current Russian emigrants there, are decent people with genuine liberal-democratic beliefs. We thank them for their support and help! They are probably the only, albeit still quite theoretical, hope for the new Russia. But they can be counted on the fingers of a few hands. The trouble is that in Russia itself they do not represent anyone, because the number of Russians for whom liberal values matter is negligible.
And lastly. Why is it important to understand who the “good Russians” really are? Because the West believes them and has not yet asked the questions listed above. This is in vain. Because believing in fairy tales means risking once again stepping on the same stones of Yeltsin’s “democratic Russia”.
We have already seen how the West’s attempt to befriend “Russian liberals” ended after the collapse of the USSR. Of course, we could have ignored this if the Ukrainian people had not paid for those mistakes with their blood today.
PS. I would strongly advise some Ukrainian journalists, before inviting some “good Russians” to the studio, to ask them to answer these questions. Maybe then we will have a serious reduction in the Kremlin propaganda on the airwaves, which we are dragging towards ourselves with our own hands. Consciously or through our own stupidity.
Українська правда
