Putinism?

25 Years of Putin

Vladimir Putin became President of Russia 25 years ago today. No leader in modern history, except for Xi of China, has had his record of accomplishment and achievement.

And yet the West insists that he has failed – that the Russian economy is teetering on the verge of collapse – and Putin risks being overthrown. We have the President of the United States— with supposedly the most advanced information resources in the world— saying as much—despite a 10 year old with Google knowing better.

This is ideological thinking— a characteristic of Western culture that goes back centuries, belief replacing reason

Putinism

Putinism in the 21st century has become as significant a watchword as Stalinism was in the 20th. Arnold Beichman .

Stalinism, Maoism, now Putinism.

In each case, we have an “ism” named after a leader. And in each case a narrative distorting public understanding of these people and the cultures they represent to inculcate fear, if not hatred.

“Isms”are perpetuated by myths.

In my research on Vladimir Putin, I found myself continually blocked by popular, governmental and academic prejudices, based on debased history and propaganda. I had to check and recheck every assumption and take nothing for granted. I had to assume that everything I learned in college and university was suspect and that the media lie as much as they tell the truth.

Holodomor

Here’s on example – the “Holodomor”—which is used to justify (Banderite) Ukrainian hatred for Russia—a putative genocide. It is taken as fact – and to deny it is like denying the Nazi holocaust.

Yet, it is a myth, created to propagate fear and hatred.

Due to natural and climatic conditions and low agricultural productivity, famine in pre-revolutionary Russia was a constant phenomenon with a cycle of 5 to 20 years. The level of agricultural culture was very low. Literally every 3-5 years there were crop failures due to natural causes: droughts with fires, torrential rains, storms, dry winds, late and snowless winters, early frosts, spring frosts, epidemics of agricultural diseases, invasions of insect pests, locusts, etc.

Collectivization? The Kulaks?

In the 1990s and 2000s, liberal media characterized the kulaks as the best part of the peasantry. Yes, the kulaks were energetic, enterprising, better educated than the bulk of the peasants. But their social basis was exploitation, egoism, and greed. Predatory rural acquisitive, usurers, speculators, and exploiters of other peasants. The kulaks hid the grain, often it simply disappeared, waiting for the moment when it could be sold at a higher price. By their example they infected other wealthy peasants, the middle peasants. Their share among the peasantry was small (5-7%), but the power of political, economic and psychological influence on fellow villagers was significant.

The authorities had introduced food taxation and requisitions even before the Bolsheviks and White Guards. The wave of problems grew with each passing year, including the breakdown of economic ties and the destruction of the transport system during the Civil War, and led to a new famine in 1921–1923.

Exaggeration?

In fact, the archives show deaths of 640-650 thousand people—almost one fiftieth of the maximum figures stated. No historian or commentator in the West could know for sure before 1990 since:

a.) these historians and commentators were in the West

b.) Soviet archives were not opened until after the USSR collapsed.

The “Holodomor” was popularized in the 20^th Century by Robert Conquest, a British MI6 agent using Praeger Press, the CIA publication house. He had an audience during the Cold War because the archives were secret and there was nothing to contradict him,. Before that, the word “Holodomor” was not common, although there were other terms using the Ukrainian “holo” which means “hunger”.

When the archives opened. they showed that the famine had natural purely causes and that the Soviets did everything they could to stop it and save people.

But today the Holodomor is “fact”. Just look for “Holodomor denial” on Wikipedia!

In the case of China, the famine that came along with the Great Leap Forward is also understood as a quasi genocide – but in fact it was just one of East Asia’s periodic famines that have struck the region throughout history,

And China did rather better than some nominally capitalist countries.

I interviewed numerous workers and farmers in Shandong and Henan and never met one who said that Mao was bad. I talked to a scholar in Anhui who grew up in rural areas and had done research there. He never met one farmer that said Mao was bad nor a farmer who said Deng [Mao’s successor] was good”. As historian Gwydion Williams dryly observed, “The peasants, heavily armed for the only time in history, took no action. Had their faith in Mao been shaken, would the survivors have shown the enthusiasm for his Cultural Revolution that they demonstrated from 1966 onwards? Historian Han Dongping quoted by Godfree Roberts.

Of course, people died in the Great Russian Famine of 1930 to 1933. And, certainly the government made mistakes. But it was not intentional, not a genocide.

The same applies to the Great Leap Forward. Yes, the famine hit many people very hard and Mao made mistakes.

Neither Stalin nor Mao were quite the monsters they are now seen as. And during WWII, Stalin was kindly “Uncle Joe”.

And Mao?

Young Mao during the Revolution

Chappy Says:

A man's most valuable trait is a judicious sense of what not to believe. Euripides IV: Helen.

In other words, choose your kibble by smell and taste.

Do not believe— test and taste.

If would like to support Chappy and Ichi’s classical studies, and keep me cleaning the toilets, please buy us coffee. As you can see, the article on Putin is covering a lot of territory Click HERE!