This is an archive of the former website of the Maoist Internationalist Movement, which was run by the now defunct Maoist Internationalist Party - Amerika. The MIM now consists of many independent cells, many of which have their own indendendent organs both online and off. MIM(Prisons) serves these documents as a service to and reference for the anti-imperialist movement worldwide.
Maoist Internationalist Movement

A week in the life of Russian imperialism

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    July 13 2007

    On July 7 the New York Times Mao-baited Russian President Putin.(1) The same day the Los Angeles Times called for "A new revolution" in Russia.(2) The New York Times followed up with the usual old news stories resuscitated about murdered journalists in Russia.

    On July 8 Russia arrested a spy for Britain in Russia.(3) The BBC argues that events prove that the ex-KGB faction of the government has become dominant under Putin.(4) This is actually how the imperialists get cute with each other before striking a deal.

    On July 9, news appeared that Russian colossus Gazprom was in talks about a $20 to $30 billion deal with a Norwegian, French or U.$. oil company for the Shtokman gas field.(5) On July 10 appeared Australian speculation on why Gazprom is one-quarter the market value it would be if it were Exxon-Mobil.(6)

    In such circumstances, Conoco-Phillips can be counted on to have pressured Bush for the Gazprom deal. However, Bush may use both the carrot and the stick with Russia. Of course, Russia may end up playing the stick back.

    Also on June 9, Royal Dutch Shell announced plans to explore business opportunities with Russia's Rosneft.(7) Shell is a joint English-Dutch corporation. Finally, we learned on July 12 that France's multinational oil corporation won the battle for the Gazprom deal for Shtokman. The French company Total took a 25% stake under a newly signed deal.(8)

    Next we heard that it had been President Sarkozy of France that had proposed "delaying" Kosovo's independence.(9) Russia opposes the independence of Kosovo (Kosova); even though it has a majority of Albanians that finds itself stuck with Serbia. The other major powers favor Albanian independence in Kosova, a card Hitler also played in World War II.

    The Kosova case ("Kosova" is the pro-Albanian spelling) is one where the right to self-determination is on the side of the Western imperialists. The history of geo-politics connecting Russia to Serbia is on the other side. The Kosovan people like others of eastern Europe are suffering because of geo-political rivalries, the biggest of which are generated by imperialism, as we have seen since World War I. Until geopolitical tensions between NATO and the Russian imperialists ease, we can expect Russia to have a different view of Kosovo than the West.

    Now Conoco-Phillips will have to wonder if it lost on the Shtokman gas field because of Bush's partisan missile shield idea and France's somewhat moderated stance on Kosovo. Apparently Putin was not much threatened by the New York Times and Los Angeles Times.

    The pace of news concerning Russia was very fast in a week's time, almost worth knocking Paris Hilton out of first place.

    The New York Times story was another boiler-plate story about "Nashi," Putin's youth group.(1) There was nothing new in it except that the New York Times pointed out that the Nashi book insignia are red. The last sentence of the article said that instability coming would make Mao's Cultural Revolution seem like nothing. It was a threat from the New York Times to stage a revolution in Russia.

    MIM would say the New York Times "news" boasts are idle threats, because the demographics and economics are not there. The West has no super-profits to offer to distribute to Russians and the Russians have no youth bulge capable of bringing off a big new revolution--thanks in large part to the Western privatization schemes that killed off a large fraction of Russians with the collapse of the Soviet Union.

    The truth about Maoism in Russia is that there is some flirtation going on. The fascist side of the spectrum occupied by Limonov sounds very close to the MIM line, because Limonov is an ex-pseudo-Maoist. Limonov is a fan of Lin Biao, but he and Zhirinovsky fill the role of ultra-nationalists in opposition, Zhirinovsky as loyal opposition and Limonov as disloyal, which leads them to fascism. In fact, Limonov even plays a negative role in the united $tates by exciting a new variety of white nationalism. A Russian nationalist revolution targeting Moscow and Leningrad with the United $tates in the background might have progressive economic content. If it could be led by proletarian internationalists, such a revolution could get somewhere; although, again, the demographics are not there.

    On the plus side of the recent furor, the Los Angeles Times story for revolution admitted that Kasparov's support in Russia is 6%.(2)

    The Litvinenko case is turning out to be not as straightforward as the Western imperialists would have hoped. There is video evidence that Litvinenko was an admitted spy with a fear of a contract on himself long before the polonium affair. At the same time, Berezovsky is on trial in absentia in Russia according to Voice of America July 3rd.(10) The Litvinenko debate hinges partly on his ties to Berezovsky.

    Now the Russians have arrested a Russian that reportedly admitted to spying for Britain. Britain seems to be at the cutting edge of the whole anti-Western sentiment, first getting caught with the fancy rock spy devices, then the Lugovoi charges that British secret services were behind the Litvinenko killing. The charge of spying against Vyachaslav Zharko on July 8 seems to tie together some loose ends.

    The provincial white nationalists never seem to learn that one cannot go to a country like Russia, Iran, China or northern Korea and spout ignorant Amerika-centered politics, such as the Mao-baiting article by the New York Times. In other countries, people are more used to comparing politics internationally. They actually read more than the AP version of news.

    Iran for example has a vastly lower imprisonment rate than the united $tates. Rhetoric about Amerikan freedom will not go far there despite Western bribery of its friends.

    One does not create space for Liberals in other countries by spying and engaging in war and repression. It took Amerikkkans all of a few seconds to pitch the "Bill of Rights" for the "Patriot Act," when 9/11 hit. Other countries have faced much more serious wars. We find it unlikely that there would be any space for demonstrations in the United $tates, had the United $tates been in a civil war as serious as the one with the Chechens. Just seeing how Amerikans reacted to 9/11, we can only guess what they would have done had the equivalent of a Chechen war been on U.$. territory recently.

    Had the united $tates really wanted to bolster "freedom," it would have cut its imprisonment rate 90%; it would have pardoned Libby, because revealing a CIA agent's identity is freedom of speech, not because Libby was a monarchist crony; it would have stopped with wars on Iran's borders; it would have hanged Bush and Cheney for monarchism for spying on the Amerikan people; it would have made it a crime to recruit for U.S. government spy jobs among journalists or academia and it would have lined up and shot as traitors those who proposed the "Military Commissions Act."

    Instead, the united $tates spies on MIM; whips up various death threats against us and comes up with bizarre justifications for secret court orders. Even northern Korea knows what the "Patriot Act" is, so Amerikans are not fooling anyone. Amerikans should just change their motto to, "we're a rich country with an easy life," and cut the nonsense about freedom.

    Conversely, we can expect that when the united $tates shows signs of freedom, other countries follow suit. Director Hayden released a few documents on the CIA's history and a few days later we learned that Soviet era archives on Stalin opened up to relatives of those executed by Stalin.(11)

    It is difficult to take the Britain versus Russia row entirely seriously when one knows that there is a stiffening business competition in Europe between British and Russian energy companies. The Cheney declassification scandals are made-to-order for Russia to up the ante. The scandals show that Amerikans are every bit as arbitrary about spying as the Russians they accuse. Bush's commutation of Libby's sentence also proves that questions of spying serve politics of the monarch first. After that, Putin is only showing that he is a bird-of-a-feather. May the best multinational corporation win.

    Notes:
    1. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/08/world/europe/08moscow.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin
    2. "A new revolution urged in Russia Opposition groups are hoping to defeat Putin's pick in next year's presidential election. Authorities seem edgy,"
    http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/asection/la-fg-opposition7jul07,1,960512.story?page=1&coll=la-news-a_section
    3. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6280494.stm
    4. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6756357.stm
    5. http://www.ft.com/cms/s/fba6f532-2df2-11dc-821c-0000779fd2ac.html
    6. http://www.dailyreckoning.com.au/gazprom/2007/07/10/
    7. http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/07/09/business/gaz.php
    8. http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/07/13/business/EU-FIN-Russia-Gazprom-Shtokman.php
    9. "EU seeks aid for Sarkozy on Kosovo," http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/07/12/news/france.php
    10. http://voanews.com/english/2007-07-03-voa49.cfm
    11. http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,,-6766078,00.html