Chapter 5 - The fate of Russia in imperial Eurasia
5.1 Geopolitical magic for national purposes
Russian national interests can be considered at several levels on the global, global, geopolitical, civilizational (this was discussed in the previous sections) and narrowly national, concrete, socio-political and cultural (this will be discussed in this part). How do the macro projects of continental imperial construction and the ethnic line of the Russian people relate to each other? Something has already been said about this. Here you should consider this problem in more detail.
"Imperialism-building orientation", "continentalism", "Eurasianism" ; all these terms and corresponding projects often frighten away those Russians who are poorly familiar with the symbolism of Russian history, do not understand the meaning of the historical trends of the nation, are used to operating banal everyday cliches when comprehending what is a people and what are its interests. This gives rise to many misunderstandings among the nationalists themselves, provokes empty discussions and meaningless polemics. In fact, the specifics of Russian nationalism consists precisely in its global nature; it is associated not so much with blood as with space, soil, and land. Outside the Empire, the Russians will lose their identity and disappear as a nation.
However, the implementation of the Eurasian plan should in no case lead to the ethnic erosion of Russians as the "axial" ethnic group of the Empire. Great Russians need to maintain their ethnic identity, without which the center of the continent will lose its civilizational and cultural certainty. In other words, within the framework of the supranational geopolitical Empire, there must be special norms (including legal ones) that would ensure that Russians maintain their ethnic identity. The specifics of the New Empire should be that, given the central role of Russians in the matter of geopolitical integration, this should not be accompanied by the “Russification” of non-Russian territories, since such “Russification”, on the one hand, will pervert the meaning of the Empire, reducing it to the level of a gigantic “nation-state” "and on the other hand dissolve the Russian community in a different national environment.
With regard to the Russian people, within the framework of the continental bloc, it should be emphasized that its role will not be “isolationist” (contrary to the projects of “small nationalism”) and not ethno-expansionist (contrary to the “ethnic imperialists” and, in part, to the Slavophiles). Of these two projects, it is necessary to take individual sides, discarding the others. At the strategic level, we will really talk about “expansionism,” but not of an ethnic but a geopolitical nature, which obviously excludes any form of Russian or Slavic racism. On the purely ethnic level, on the contrary, the “isolationist” version should be realized to one degree or another, with the rejection of the isolationism of the political and state.Russians will exist as a single national community in the space of supranational imperial complex. Ethnic reality will be consolidated within the people, and a superethnic mission will be expressed within the Empire. Only with this combination can one achieve at the same time the preservation of a healthy national core and the maximum expansion of geopolitical influence. In other words, the national factor will be determined on the basis of a completely new combination of ethnic and political, which was not in any of the previous stages of the national-state history of the Russians. Ethnic homogeneity existed in Russia only in the early stages of statehood within fairly limited territories. The tsarist model was based on the principle of a certain "Russification", and the Soviets, expanding the geopolitical boundaries of Russia, on the contrary, neglected the ethnic quality of the Russian people.In the New Empire, these factors should appear in a new proportion, corresponding to modern geopolitical and ethnographic conditions, as well as necessary to establish a stable ethnopolitical balance in the Russian people.
Russians in the New Empire act simultaneously in two roles:
As one of the large nations that are political entities of the Federal Empire of the Nations,
As the initiator of continental integration into this Federated Empire of Nations.
Consequently, the Russians find themselves in a privileged position, since, on the ethnic side, being one of several more or less equal ethnic components of the Empire, they geopolitically become the center of the entire political process. Such a dual function allows, during the implementation of the same imperial-building action, at the same time to increase its non-ethnic influence and consolidate intra-ethnic forces. Imperial building is the only way to preserve, strengthen and unite the Russian ethnos, without resorting to ethnic conflicts, wars, and the revision of political borders. All the political borders of Eurasia in the process of building a New Empire will be gradually abolished as political boundaries, and instead, there will be natural, organic ethnic borders that do not have the strictly separating value, as is the case with state borders. These ethnic borders will have nothing to do with what is meant by the word “border” in the current situation, since they will be held on an ethnocultural, confessional basis that does not imply political dominance over minorities just for the reason that these ethnic groups will not have full political sovereignty, being limited by the strategic interests of the whole Empire, which, in turn, is vitally interested in maintaining peace and harmony within its borders. In other words, the Russians within the framework of such an Empire will not find their national state as a political expression of an ethnic community, but they will acquire national unity and a gigantic continental state, in the management of which they will receive a central role.
The very advancement of such a project immediately removes the threat of those potential conflicts that are ripening due to the division of Russians at present among the various newborn "states" within the CIS. The imperial building vector instantly translates the problem of the correlation of Russians and Kazakhs in Kazakhstan, or Russians and Ukrainians in Ukraine, or Russians and Tatars in Tatarstan into a completely different plane than ethnicity. This ratio ceases to be a political and state problem, which can be resolved only if a certain political and territorial damage is done to one side or another (for example, the ethnic division of Kazakhstan, separatism within the Russian Federation, military suppression of Chechnya, confessional and national fragmentation of Ukraine, Crimea problem, etc.)and it becomes a question of the coexistence of various ethnic groups within the framework of a single political space. And in this case, the ethnic consolidation of, say, Russians in Kazakhstan with Russians within the Russian Federation will not be seen as undermining the political sovereignty of the “Kazakh national state” in favor of the “Russian national state”, but will become an organic cultural and ethnic process, not infringing and not elevating either side for the reason that no “Kazakh national state” or “Russian national state” will simply exist. The Soviet model was somewhat similar to this project, but with one important caveat the concept of "ethnos" was considered in it as a kind of rudiment, as historical atavism,devoid of the status of an internal political subject. In the framework of the New Empire, on the contrary, an ethnos, not having a direct state expression, will be recognized as the main political value and supreme legal entity in all intra-imperial issues.
Summarizing this question, we can say that operations with global geopolitical projects, at first glance, not having any relation to the achievement of the narrow ethnic goals of the Russians, in fact, will lead to the best satisfaction of these specific national goals. By abandoning the insufficient and too small (the “Russian state within the framework of the Russian Federation”), not trying to increase this small in conquest and annexation in a bloody, fratricidal war, offering the peoples of Eurasia the construction of a continental bloc on equal terms, the Russians will be able to acquire that big and worthy of them that otherwise would remain forever an unattainable dream.
Having abandoned the ethnic state, we will gain the unity of the people and the Great Empire. Under current conditions, only in this way and in no other way can one save the Russian people from political weakness and ethnic degeneration, awaken it in all its grandiose volume for planetary achievements, and finally give it what it really deserves.
5.2 Russian nationalism. Ethnic Demography and Empire
The Russian people, in a narrowly ethnic sense, are in a difficult demographic situation. In the long run, this threatens with terrible consequences both for the nation itself and for the future Empire, since the replacement of the Russians as the main bearer of the continental associations by some other nation will inevitably lead to the deviation of the continental bloc from its natural civilization mission, will cause chaos and conflicts in Eurasia , will deprive the geopolitical structure of the most important cultural and political component.
Such a weak demographic position of Russians is especially alarming in comparison with the demographic growth of the Eurasian South, which, on the contrary, is rapidly developing in a quantitative sense. If these tendencies are maintained in the existing proportion, the Russians will inevitably be displaced from a central position in the Empire, the homogeneity of the nation will be eroded, and the ethnic group will be absorbed into the sea of southern peoples, or it will turn into a relict remnant worth living only in a reservation. Added to this is the lack of compact settlement of large Eurasian spaces by Russians, controlled by them only politically and administratively.This last factor may cause a violation of the ethnic balance in the Eurasian Empire and push the rapidly developing demographically peoples of the South to national expansion into Russian territories (especially in Siberia and the Far East).
This problem should be solved immediately, but it should be especially emphasized that its solution should not precede the creation of the Empire and not follow this creation. The implementation of geopolitical plans from the very beginning must be accompanied simultaneously by actions aimed at the demographic growth of Russians and their ethnic regrouping in order to compactly master the fullness of the "living space" of the nation. This goal can be achieved exclusively by political methods, which should lead directly to the desired result and predetermine economic measures in this area.
A political decision can only be one highlighting the concepts of Russian nationalism. This nationalism, however, should not use state, but cultural-ethnic terminology, with special emphasis on such categories as “nationality” and “Russian Orthodoxy”. Moreover, this Russian nationalism should have a completely modern sound and avoid any attempts to directly restore those forms that have historically exhausted themselves. It is nationalism of a populist, ethnic, ethical-religious type, and not "statehood" and not "monarchism" that should be priority in this situation. It should be instilled in all Russians the basic idea that the personal self-identification of each individual is a secondary, derivative value from the national self-identification. Russians should realize that, first of all, they are Orthodox, secondly Russians and only third people. Hence the hierarchy of priorities in both personal and public life. Above all, the Orthodox self-awareness of the nation as a Church, then a clear understanding of the indivisibility, integrity, totality and unity of the Russian ethnic organism, consisting not only of living, but also of ancestors and future generations, and only then, last but not least, the experience of a specific person as an independent atomic unit.
In practice, the implementation of such nationalism in politics should mean the total churching of Russians and the transformation of all cultural institutions into a continuation of the One Church, not in the organizational and administrative, but in the spiritual, intellectual and ethical sense. Such a churching should deprive culture and science of their profane isolation from the foundations of life, involve them in the process of spiritual homebuilding, turn pragmatic and decentralized technical development into the realization of the central provincial covenant of the Church, into a subordinate tool of the supermaterial plan. Only in such a radical way can Russians really be returned to the bosom of the Church, which lies at the basis of their historical national existence and which in its main features shaped what is called Russian in the highest sense.It is the total restoration of the Orthodox worldview with all the ensuing consequences that can bring people back to their spiritual source. Any relative revival of the Church as a narrowly confessional, religious structure, any limited to cults and external rituals restoration will be ineffective. Churching in the framework of Russian nationalism is not subject to individuals, but to all Russian culture, science, and thought combined. Only in this way will the collective vertical identity of the nation be given a spiritual vertical, which, in turn, will turn the problem of demographic growth into a kind of spiritual task based on Orthodox ethics, which prohibits, for example, contraception and abortion.
The next level is ethnic identity itself, the idea of people as a single body and one soul. Moreover, the existence of this single organism should be understood as something timeless, not limited by either spatial or temporal categories. Russian nationalism must appeal not only to the present nation, but also to its past and its future, taken simultaneously as the totality of a single spiritual being. This "creature" the great Russian people in its superhistorical totality must be realized by every Russian and recognized in himself. The fact of belonging to the Russian nation should be experienced as a chosen one, as an incredible existential luxury, as the highest anthropological dignity.The propaganda of this national exclusivity (without the slightest touch of xenophobia or chauvinism) should become the axis of the political education of the people. First of all, the demographic surge will be provided ideologically, culturally, ethically. The people should be led to the idea that, by giving birth to a Russian child, each family participates in the national myth, replenishing the spiritual and mental wealth of the whole people. Children should be understood as a national treasure, as a physical expression of the internal energy of a great nation.
Given the difficult demographic situation of today, it is necessary to start national propaganda as quickly as possible and use any political and ideological methods. At the same time, it is necessary to push nationalist tendencies to the limit, provoking a dramatic and rapid awakening of a great and powerful ethnos.
It should be noted that no economic measures by themselves will ever give a positive demographic result without appropriate religious, ethical and ideological support. The demographic decline can be stopped to zero, and then provoke the reverse process only with the help of the appropriate ideology, which would focus on the change of consciousness of people, on the transformation of their thinking, on the introduction into the everyday sphere of hundreds and thousands of characters, explicitly or implicitly orienting people to national interests. Within the framework of the Russian ethnos, Russian nationalism should be the only and total ideology that can have its different versions and levels, but always remains constant in everything that concerns the setting of the category of "nation" over the category of "individuality". Ultimately, a radical slogan should be put forward: "the nation is everything, the individual is nothing."
This political orientation towards nationalism should also be supported by measures of a purely economic nature, since purely material instruments are also needed to achieve the national goal. Support will be provided to mothers and large families, and social conditions will be provided for a large male working man. But this economic component will have an effect only under the condition of domination of the national ideology, which should not only economically support the demographic growth of Russians, but generally orient the economy in a purely national way, put the material interests of the ethnic group above the individual interests of the individual. In other words, economic support for fertility is a special case of the general trend in the economy, which as a whole should be derived just from national interests, not from individualistic egoistic motivations or utopian abstractions.
Applying to nationalist ideology, at first glance, it seemed, it should have provoked ethnic conflicts, worsened ethnic relations between Russians and neighboring ethnic groups, and generated many unsolvable contradictions. This would indeed happen if Russian nationalism spread its claims to statehood in the classical sense of the term. Representatives of other ethnic groups and religions would hardly want to live in a Russian nationalist Orthodox state. But live close by with the Russian Orthodox people professing national ideology, within the framework of a single continental Empire, united geopolitically and strategically, but flexible and differentiated in its internal structure, on the contrary, does not present any difficulties for anyone, since there will always be a higher authority, before whose face ethno-religious communities have equal status and which is guided by the impartial principles of imperial harmony and justice. The project of the New Empire at the ethnic level consists precisely in the fact that not only the Russian people should triumph and establish a pronounced national-religious ideology, but this applies to all other peoples that will be part of the Empire. Thus, a conglomerate of "positive nationalisms" with a common denominator vertical imperial orientation.
It is important that only in this way the most radical Russian nationalism can be fully realized, since the main obstacles to its development in this case will be eliminated; none of the neighboring nations will feel humiliated or depressed by the Russian nation, since cultural and ethnic the confessional borders between the peoples of the Empire will not have any political significance. Russians will live in their national reality, Tatars in their own, Chechens in their own, Armenians in their own, etc. even if we are talking about ethnic enclaves or national minorities among other people. Nationalism, free from the problem of statehood and borders, will only strengthen the mutual understanding of nations, giving them both freedom of contact with each other and freedom of ethnic isolation.
For the survival of the Russian people in the current difficult conditions, for the demographic takeoff of the Russian nation, for the improvement of its difficult situation in the ethnic, biological and spiritual senses, it is necessary to turn to the most radical forms of Russian nationalism, without which all technical or economic measures will remain powerless. But this nationalism will be possible only in organic unity with the principle of the geopolitical continental Empire.
5.3 Russian question after the coming Victory
Apparently, from a theoretical point of view, one should consider the position of the Russians in which they will find themselves after the possible victory of the Eurasian Empire over Atlantism. Of course, this is such a distant prospect that seriously analyzing the problems that arise in this case is now almost pointless. However, it should be borne in mind that the collapse of Atlanticism can occur almost instantly at any stage of Eurasian imperial construction, since the geopolitical stability of the West is based solely on the correct and skillful handling of geopolitical categories, and by no means on real industrial, economic or military power. The Atlantist construction is in fact extremely fragile, and it only takes one of the strategic axes to be knocked out of it, for example, Central Europe, the Pacific area or the Eurasian continental South, how the whole gigantic edifice of atlantism collapses, so powerful and stable at first glance. At a time when the geopolitical strategy of the Trilateral Commission will be at least somewhat blocked by an alternative Eurasian project, a serious malfunction in the functioning of the entire Atlantist complex can be expected, and further events can unfold rapidly and collapse, as was the case with the collapse of the Soviet Empire and its satellites. Therefore, although the victory over Atlantism is an extremely distant prospect, several theses should be formulated regarding the position of Russians in the hypothetical post-Atlantic world.
First of all, it should be emphasized that the geopolitical defeat of the United States will pose many problems for the Eurasian Empire itself. At that moment, the main factor that underlies the project of geopolitical unification of nations and peoples into the New Empire will disappear. The principle of the “common enemy” will disappear. This consolidating energy will lose its significance, and even the very meaning of the continued existence of the Eurasian Empire will be called into question. In such a situation, the transition from the new bipolar world order of Eurasia against the Atlantic to a multipolar model may begin. At the same time, it is necessary to emphasize the fact that a multipolar model will become possible only after victory over atlantism, and not before. As long as Atlantism, as a force claiming to be universal, exists, there can be no talk of any multipolar device. Only within the framework of the New Empire, within the framework of the global Eurasian project and in the course of strategic opposition to Atlanticism, objective prerequisites can arise for the emergence of a more or less balanced multipolarity and not before that. Embryos of multipolarity will only be formed when the differentiated imperial model is adopted that affirms the status of a political subject behind certain organic, cultural and spiritual categories of people, ethnos, religion, nation, contrary to the current dominant system, which deals only with the legal status of states and individuals ("human rights"). Clash of Civilizations (as Huntington put it) in a multi-polar world, it will only be possible if these civilizations can establish themselves and claim their right to exist in the context of an anti-Atlantic strategic alliance. At present, there is only one "civilization" of the atlantist, western, liberal-market, opposing all other historical organic cultural models.
The collapse of Atlantism will pose the peoples of the New Empire, its individual sectors, with a serious problem: will geopolitical unity continue to be maintained or will large civilizational blocs within the Empire be consolidated as an independent geopolitical reality? But in any case, national differences between peoples and faiths will come to the fore.
In this case, the best option would be to maintain the imperial structure as the most harmonious system for resolving all internal contradictions. By analogy with the once-existing doctrine of Jus Publicum Europeum, i.e. The "European Civil Law", common to all the peoples of Europe, the Eurasian Empire in the post-Atlantic era could be based on a similar but expanded doctrine of Jus Publicum Euroasiaticum. Having lost its military-strategic importance, the imperial continental complex could act as the highest legal authority, which would relieve tension between the Eurasian nations, whose connection will inevitably weaken after the victory over the “common enemy”. Such an exit would be ideal.
But one can also assume the collapse of continental unity and the formation in Eurasian spaces of several civilizational blocs of the Russian-Slavic (wider Orthodox), European, Far Eastern, Central Asian, Islamic, etc. The correlation of each of them with the others, and even their boundaries and structures, is now, of course, impossible to foresee. However, in such a hypothetical perspective, a model taking into account the distant future (and only after the end of Atlantism) the independent participation of Russians in world history, which returned to its organic and natural course after a long period of atlantist anomaly. In this case, the Russian nation must be prepared for the creation of its own statehood or for the formation of a wider natural ethno-state formation, held together by the unity of tradition, culture, religion, fate. The question of the Russian state may arise fully, but this refers exclusively to the post-Eurasian period, which in itself is problematic and hypothetical.
But already at the present moment, Russians should put all their efforts into national consolidation, spiritual, cultural and religious revival of the people, their final formation and full awakening so that in the future (if necessary) they could defend their national Truth not only from enemies, but also from allies in imperialism, who have their own historically predetermined national worldview. The Russians do not just have to maintain their identity in the imperial context, they must affirm it, heat it up and deepen it to the utmost. And in the long run, after the collapse of Atlantism, the Russians must be prepared to defend their own civilizational mission, to defend their universal industrial national path.
Be that as it may, the Russians will in any case find themselves in a strategically central place in the Eurasian imperial space, and therefore, in the matter of the civilizational priorities of the Empire in the post-Atlantic period (if the Empire still survives) they will be in a privileged position. Consequently, to some extent, this entire Empire will be connected with the Russian Idea, which is indeed eschatological and universal by definition, merged with gigantic spaces and cosmic sense. If the continental bloc begins to disintegrate into components, the Russians, who have regained their strength due to the nationalist period and the vigorous process of imperial construction, will again be in a geopolitically advantageous position, occupying the central a position among the liberated peoples and states of the continent, which will make the possible Russian State, Russian Empire, a stable and stable geopolitical reality based on strong national soil.
Both of these opportunities should be considered today.
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