From Russia With Love

When writing my occasional world events blogs, I do not generally like to write about nations that are particularly large or important (since I figure there are already plenty of people who write about such events and are much better able to put them into a coherent picture than my anecdotal sort of style). However, I have been rather troubled by recent events in Russia, and this blog will deal the dark return of Soviet ways on Russia's brave defenders of truth and liberty. The following short comments will relate to some of the more threatening and ominous signs coming out of Russia that the bad old days are returning.

The Soviet Defenestration Returns

I once wrote a historical essay called "The Defenestrations of Prague," and found three important ones in history. The third was the assassination of Jan Masaryk. It is interesting because the Soviets threw him out of the window of his own house and then claimed it was a suicide. The same thing happened on Friday, March 2nd, when Ivan Safronov, a 51 year old Russian journalist who was critical of the military establishment was found dead after a fall from his fifth-floor apartment. He apparently made some enemies after embarassing Russia's military establishment by publishing articles demonstrating the failure of Russia's experimental Bulava intercontinental missle.

Till Death Do Us Part

A mother and daughter set of Russian immigrants who came over the United States in 1989, Marina (age 48) and Yana (age 25) Kovalenskaya, flew to Moscow last month from their home in Los Angeles to attend a family wedding. There, they apparently met up with enemies, because they ended up sick with Thallium poisoning. They were transferred from their hotel room to the American embassy hospital, and from there to the Sklifosovsky clinic, Moscow's top emergency hospital (according to Guardian Unlimited). Thallium poisoning was apparently favored during Soviet times as a poison, but it is unclear how these two women became targets for assassination. Perhaps it hardly matters.

Welcome To Russia

You'd think that with all of the assassination attempts going on that Soviet-type thugs would be too busy to harass young artists, but you would be wrong. Ivan Ushkov, age 33, is part of Russia's "lost generation," the generation that dealt with the fallout from the fall of the Soviet Union while other generations got rich and found positions of power in the new regime. He is a photographer and artist, who takes (and draws) pictures that demonstrate the dark truth behind Russia's rather phony and glamorous facade. He's a man after my own dark heart, but apparently that sort of dark truthtelling is a bit dangerous in St. Petersburg, Russia, these days. His first Moscow showing was cancelled and he has dealt with bogus police investigations of his art studios because he portrays an image of Russia that threatens the interests of the powerful. Of course, I will let this fine gentleman have the last word about the false positive picture Russia's leaders try to promote, "They are smoking their own dope, basically." Indeed. Another comment of his is also insightful: "But if you don't watch television or interest yourself in politics then very soon politics could get interested in you." Very true also.

Lest We Forget

Since Dateline did such a lovely and thorough job on researching the strange assassination of Russian journalist and Kremlin critic Alexander Litvineko, I will not write about it here (as it is too well known for my blog). That said, it is worth mentioning that dark truthtelling is becoming a rather dangerous occupation on Russia. Russia killed more journalists last year than any other nation besides Iraq and Algeria. Worse, many of these appear to be the work of those closely allied to the Russian government, a very ominous trend. Those of us in the West, and in the United States in particular, should not forget that we have our own rather brutal Cold Warriors here as well. We should not be naive to think that if the world's attitude towards truthtelling darkens that we will not be affected by it at all. If the perceived need for security ever trumps our concern for freedom (especially to tell the truth, often an unpleasant thing), then we will suffer greatly, especially those of us with quick pens and big mouths.