Kamil Galeev氏論考「ロシアの未来、3つのシナリオ：2. 帝国の再始動」仮蔵氏訳

Kamil Galeev @kamilkazani

Mass consciousness will choose a path of minimal suffering as it always does. And minimal suffering is secured through the glorification of vice. So Z-war will be glorious, Z-soldiers will be heroes and Russia will feel obliged to take revenge so that their death won't be in vain pic.twitter.com/JBqsfJWW99

Kamil Galeev @kamilkazani

There's no return to the status quo now. If Putin stays in power, he *must* regroup and attack again. Otherwise he gonna lose face and authority. In this revanche he will be supported by the majority of Russian society which shares the common imperial mythos and its values pic.twitter.com/9nYeQEshKZ

Kamil Galeev @kamilkazani

If you think I'm exaggerating consider the Chechen Wars. In the First Chechen War Russia lost and signed a Khasavyurt Peace. Which was widely viewed as the national shame. So in a few years Russians regrouped and attacked again to restore their imperial honour and pride pic.twitter.com/73eQ3I1Aru

Kamil Galeev @kamilkazani

Prime Minister Putin's invasion was widely supported by the political establishment. Chubays fully endorsed the war: "I truly think that today in Chechnya we are solving not the Chechen question but an incomparably more important one: Russian army is being revived in Chechnya" pic.twitter.com/kdHOSOgggo

Kamil Galeev @kamilkazani

A revanchist war is a return to normal. It is a way to solve domestic problems and restore our mythos. We can't just accept we've been defeated by a former colony: we must return and finish what we've started. Russian mythos doesn't allow to accept defeats and demands a revanche pic.twitter.com/6tB3EPECxo

Kamil Galeev @kamilkazani

Putin could consolidate his power because he went with the flow. He acted in accordance with the Russian imperial mythos. That allowed him to quickly consolidate his power. A noname became a national leader in just 5 months because he took revenge for a Russian defeat pic.twitter.com/QslMyHvlLk

Kamil Galeev @kamilkazani

Like Chechnya, Ukraine is a former Russian colony which complicates everything. It Russia accepts a defeat, it will shatter Putin's mythos and undermine Russian imperial mythos as a whole. While victory is all redeeming, a defeat will have the opposite effect. That's unacceptable pic.twitter.com/RCgZ3dl0Et

Kamil Galeev @kamilkazani

Consider comments when Russia "decreased military activities on Kyiv and Chernihiv directions" - That's ununderstandable - Haha, they ran out of money for war. They'll retreat by May 9 to organise the Victory Parade - America won. Putin's approval rate dropped - No step back pic.twitter.com/hjvRLNOCsk

Kamil Galeev @kamilkazani

- No step back! What are you doing?!!! We pushed the Nazis a bit and thats it? In three years we'll need to fight again? Putin, blink if they have captured you! - What for did we lose so many boys? - So many broken lives. So many kids, women, elderly died. And it was all in vain? pic.twitter.com/tcef5aPWjo

Kamil Galeev @kamilkazani

- That's it, Putin's power is over. That's a treason of our boys - Shame. Everyone will reject you, negotiators... - "Ukraine confirmed it's aspiration for neutral non-nuclear status". But it had same status before! What a crap! And now they have "aspiration"! Now that's a shame! pic.twitter.com/iiofv1sFhk

Kamil Galeev @kamilkazani

That's how Putin's core supporters feel. They don't view results as a victory. They percieve it as a shame. Putin rose stakes too high and his demands for neutral non-nuclear status are viewed as a domestic policy tool. He needs to present a victory, but nobody believes he's won pic.twitter.com/ruiHAO3zon

Kamil Galeev @kamilkazani

Apart from people lamenting current results as a shame and a defeat and calls for continuing the war, we see here a very smart and realistic comment. One commenter mentioned that Putin will retreat by May 9. Why May 9? Because it's a Victory Parade commemorating the WWII pic.twitter.com/XQAyDpHUAc

Kamil Galeev @kamilkazani

That doesn't mean that Putin *will* retreat by May 9. It means May 9 commemorating the end of the War with Germany is a benchmark. It's a deadline that exists in Putin's head and the heads of other Russians. Some sort of resolution must be achieved by that date pic.twitter.com/Iyg5RJWCO5

Kamil Galeev @kamilkazani

That makes total sense. Russian military operations have been often motivated by the need to meet symbolic deadlines. For example Russians suffered enormous casualties during the Siege of Plevna in 1877 because commanders wanted to take the fortress by the Alexander II's nameday pic.twitter.com/vq7Isj88OO

Kamil Galeev @kamilkazani

"There's a huge kurgan near Plevna Corpses haven't decomposed there yet To cheer the Tsar in his nameday They killed many thousands of their own. A nameday pie with the human meat Is a gift to the emperor" (Olhin's poem on the Siege of Plevna) pic.twitter.com/TSrZfIMbmA

Kamil Galeev @kamilkazani

Back then Russian state cult was largely centered around the Emperor and his family. So military operations were planned in a way to achieve strategic success by some family holiday that was a symbolic deadline. That was suboptimal military-wise but very efficient state cult-wise pic.twitter.com/C6bsVEbn8X

Kamil Galeev @kamilkazani

Now what constitutes Russian state cult now? I believe this Russian nationalist account summarizes it pretty well. It is the cult of WWII, which is called победобесие - "being possessed by the victory" in Russian. That's indeed a form of ancestral cult, cult of the dead pic.twitter.com/ty5cP9DOiI

Kamil Galeev @kamilkazani

That's once used to be predominantly Christian. But then it was violently secularised by the Communists. So what do we have after this Bolshevik de-Abrahamization? Paradoxically, getting rid of Abrahamic values, Russia didn't move forward. It has fallen millennia back pic.twitter.com/hgB70qUPM0

Kamil Galeev @kamilkazani

Being violently de-Christianized Russia didn't enter the era of progress and reason. Instead it fall back to the Neolith. Russian cult of WWII is a form of a neolithic ancestral cult. It is thoroughly cleansed from any Abrahamic values and centered around the worship of the dead pic.twitter.com/yvfLC0GfQM

Kamil Galeev @kamilkazani

WWII cult became Russian state religion for two reasons. First, people didn't believe in the bright future anymore. When Soviets were sincerely building Communism, WWII wasn't worshipped. But by the times of Brezhnev nobody believed we are building Communism or any future at all pic.twitter.com/8YgbZQ5zcs

Kamil Galeev @kamilkazani

If a country is building its future, people will be obsessed with it. But if we don't, then we'll be obsessed by the past. WWII cult is literally the past devouring the future. It's a form of ritual cannibalism interwoven into the ancestral cult pic.twitter.com/AQdULGGULI

Kamil Galeev @kamilkazani

Russian society is indeed highly tolerant to war casualties in Z-context. That's not wrong. But who exactly is tolerant to casualties? The elderly. Fascist warmongering dead worshipping babushkas and dedushkas are more than willing to sacrifice their youngsters for the Victory pic.twitter.com/6KRyuYIWQj

Kamil Galeev @kamilkazani

Polls support this view. What data we have on political preferences in Russian society? Analysts often refer to the Levada as the only independent sociological organisation in Russia. But "the only independent" sounds too much as a controlled opposition. Let's use something else

Kamil Galeev @kamilkazani

Consider this poll ordered from the Russian Field agency by a politician Roman Yuneman. Despite his German surname, he is a Russian ethnonationalist. He argues that decision to rush Z was a mistake but now Russia has no choice but to fight till the victory dropmefiles.com/oNhnB pic.twitter.com/MGG1vXEDKl

Kamil Galeev @kamilkazani

It's a small poll, 1000 Moscow respondents but its results are interesting. Question "Do you support Special Operation in Ukraine?" reveals age asymmetry. Elderly mostly stand for Z while youngsters 18-29 are divided. There are less youngsters who support Z than those who don't pic.twitter.com/KQ6FaB4T2e