Are Russia's Revoluntionaries Finally Tamed?
Dmitry Shlapentokh, The Straits Times (Singapore), 1/17/05
In January 1905, exactly 100 years ago, a crowd of workers approached the Winter Palace, the residence of the Tsar in St Petersburg. They petitioned the 'Little Father' to improve their lot.
But they were repulsed by the fire of the soldiers, and hundreds were killed or wounded. There was public shock from the massacre in both Russia and the West. The New York Times devoted an entire issue to the tragedy.
Combined with Russia's defeat in the Russian-Japanese War - the first time in modern history that non-Westerners had defeated Europeans - this was the beginning of what is called the 1905 to 1907 Revolution, the start to years of revolution and turmoil that have marked Russian history from that time to the present.
During the Soviet regime, this anniversary would have been celebrated with much pomp. But today, it is scarcely mentioned, almost ignored, as was the case in 2003 for the anniversary of the birth of the Bolshevik Party.
There are several reasons for this. It is obvious that the regime of President Vladimir Putin wishes to erase revolution and spontaneous violence from people's memories.
The regime may also dislike the 1905 Revolution, and the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution that followed it, for other reasons. Those revolutions finally made Russia a great power, the ruler of half of Eurasia. But now, the Putin regime is trying to solve the problems of 17th-century Russia - including unification with Ukraine.
It is not just the party of power that is silent. The event is hardly mentioned even by the opposition, including the communist party, despite the fact that monuments, names of metro stations and symbols of the 1905 Revolution are still common in Russia.
Repression
The anniversary would have provided opposition parties a great chance to rally the Russian people to fight for their rights. Their silence cannot be explained just by the fear of government repression. There are other, more important, reasons why the opposition has seen the 1905 Revolution as basically irrelevant to present-day Russia.
In particular, in sharp contrast to 1905, present-day Russians are remarkably passive. The shootings of January 1905 - Bloody Sunday, as it is called by contemporary historians - led to violent events. The strikes caused almost complete paralysis of railway transportation and led to bitter fighting between Red detachments and Tsarist troops. There were mutinies in the army and fleet, and waves of peasant revolts. By all accounts, the regime was close to collapse. Nothing of that magnitude can be seen in recent Russian history.
In 1993, then-President Boris Yeltsin's troops shelled the Russian parliament from the exact place where detachments of rebels had fought desperately against the imperial army in 1905.
This time, no uprising or strike followed. Moreover, Muscovites assembled near the scene watched the fighting as a sort of theatrical event. Later, there were sporadic strikes, but they never reached the level of 1905 to 1907, and they evoked no public response.
The passivity of the population has become even worse during the Putin era. Last year, Mr Putin decided to 'monetarise' the benefits received by the elderly and World War II veterans. For example, pensioners would receive a fixed sum of money instead of free drugs.
The proposal was aimed at reducing state costs for support to the poor by monetary compensation that would never replace the benefits. These changes drastically worsened the condition of most of the elderly.
As this year opened, there were some protests by the helpless pensioners. But they were few in number and definitely no threat to the authorities. In fact, no one supported them except a small group of maverick 'National Bolsheviks', who protested against the government actions last year. They were also absolutely isolated.
Bunch of slaves
Still, the authorities immediately sent them to prison to languish for many years. One contributor to the Chechen website 'Kavkaz' - one of the very few who recall the 1905 Revolution - proclaimed that the Russians had changed irrevocably over the past 100 years and had became a bunch of slaves with whom the authorities could do whatever they wanted.
One might state that after 100 years of turmoil, the revolution is finally over. Indeed, this is the wish of Moscow. Mr Putin has often repeated Tsarist minister Piotr Stolypin's statement that Russia needed order to be a great state.
But the Russian revolution may not be over, and the present tranquility may be deceptive, as it was a century ago on the eve of the upheaval. Indeed, in 1905, Russia had not experienced revolutionary violence since the great peasant revolt led by Emelian Pugachev at the end of the 18th century. This was in sharp contrast with events during that time in the West, especially in France.
And it was not accidental that a score of Russian intellectual luminaries - from conservative to radical - professed that Europe would be engulfed by revolutionary violence. They either scorned or praised the docility of the Russians but, regardless of their political views, they did not believe that the streets of Russian cities would be similar to Paris in 1789 to 1794, 1830, 1848 and 1871. And they proved to be wrong.
The same might be said about the stability of post-Soviet Russia, and revolutionary violence might erupt unexpectedly as it did a century ago. And if this happens, future generations may look at the 1905 Revolution as the event that opened a new era in Russian and global history, the era of revolutions that never end.
In January 1905, exactly 100 years ago, a crowd of workers approached the Winter Palace, the residence of the Tsar in St Petersburg. They petitioned the 'Little Father' to improve their lot.
But they were repulsed by the fire of the soldiers, and hundreds were killed or wounded. There was public shock from the massacre in both Russia and the West. The New York Times devoted an entire issue to the tragedy.
Combined with Russia's defeat in the Russian-Japanese War - the first time in modern history that non-Westerners had defeated Europeans - this was the beginning of what is called the 1905 to 1907 Revolution, the start to years of revolution and turmoil that have marked Russian history from that time to the present.
During the Soviet regime, this anniversary would have been celebrated with much pomp. But today, it is scarcely mentioned, almost ignored, as was the case in 2003 for the anniversary of the birth of the Bolshevik Party.
There are several reasons for this. It is obvious that the regime of President Vladimir Putin wishes to erase revolution and spontaneous violence from people's memories.
The regime may also dislike the 1905 Revolution, and the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution that followed it, for other reasons. Those revolutions finally made Russia a great power, the ruler of half of Eurasia. But now, the Putin regime is trying to solve the problems of 17th-century Russia - including unification with Ukraine.
It is not just the party of power that is silent. The event is hardly mentioned even by the opposition, including the communist party, despite the fact that monuments, names of metro stations and symbols of the 1905 Revolution are still common in Russia.
Repression
The anniversary would have provided opposition parties a great chance to rally the Russian people to fight for their rights. Their silence cannot be explained just by the fear of government repression. There are other, more important, reasons why the opposition has seen the 1905 Revolution as basically irrelevant to present-day Russia.
In particular, in sharp contrast to 1905, present-day Russians are remarkably passive. The shootings of January 1905 - Bloody Sunday, as it is called by contemporary historians - led to violent events. The strikes caused almost complete paralysis of railway transportation and led to bitter fighting between Red detachments and Tsarist troops. There were mutinies in the army and fleet, and waves of peasant revolts. By all accounts, the regime was close to collapse. Nothing of that magnitude can be seen in recent Russian history.
In 1993, then-President Boris Yeltsin's troops shelled the Russian parliament from the exact place where detachments of rebels had fought desperately against the imperial army in 1905.
This time, no uprising or strike followed. Moreover, Muscovites assembled near the scene watched the fighting as a sort of theatrical event. Later, there were sporadic strikes, but they never reached the level of 1905 to 1907, and they evoked no public response.
The passivity of the population has become even worse during the Putin era. Last year, Mr Putin decided to 'monetarise' the benefits received by the elderly and World War II veterans. For example, pensioners would receive a fixed sum of money instead of free drugs.
The proposal was aimed at reducing state costs for support to the poor by monetary compensation that would never replace the benefits. These changes drastically worsened the condition of most of the elderly.
As this year opened, there were some protests by the helpless pensioners. But they were few in number and definitely no threat to the authorities. In fact, no one supported them except a small group of maverick 'National Bolsheviks', who protested against the government actions last year. They were also absolutely isolated.
Bunch of slaves
Still, the authorities immediately sent them to prison to languish for many years. One contributor to the Chechen website 'Kavkaz' - one of the very few who recall the 1905 Revolution - proclaimed that the Russians had changed irrevocably over the past 100 years and had became a bunch of slaves with whom the authorities could do whatever they wanted.
One might state that after 100 years of turmoil, the revolution is finally over. Indeed, this is the wish of Moscow. Mr Putin has often repeated Tsarist minister Piotr Stolypin's statement that Russia needed order to be a great state.
But the Russian revolution may not be over, and the present tranquility may be deceptive, as it was a century ago on the eve of the upheaval. Indeed, in 1905, Russia had not experienced revolutionary violence since the great peasant revolt led by Emelian Pugachev at the end of the 18th century. This was in sharp contrast with events during that time in the West, especially in France.
And it was not accidental that a score of Russian intellectual luminaries - from conservative to radical - professed that Europe would be engulfed by revolutionary violence. They either scorned or praised the docility of the Russians but, regardless of their political views, they did not believe that the streets of Russian cities would be similar to Paris in 1789 to 1794, 1830, 1848 and 1871. And they proved to be wrong.
The same might be said about the stability of post-Soviet Russia, and revolutionary violence might erupt unexpectedly as it did a century ago. And if this happens, future generations may look at the 1905 Revolution as the event that opened a new era in Russian and global history, the era of revolutions that never end.