My friend Lara, kind, liberal ex-BBC employee who is half-Finnish by blood and all Finnish by choice, told me a long while ago the Finnish proverb 'A Russian's still a Russian even if you fry them in butter'. Yesterday she posted on LiberFaciorum that what she felt mostly was 'hatred ... I recoil whenever I hear Russian being spoken on the Tube or in a shop ... I am lucky, I left Russia forever before I became an adult because my Finnish mother dreamt of leaving that wretched country all her life ... For now I can only hate, and donate a bit of money, and feel heartbroken'. Talk to my other Finn friend, anarcho-syndicalo-eco-activist Lady MetalMoomin, about the Russians and she becomes a Scandi-nationalist ready to pull the pin from a hand-grenade with her teeth. It's no surprise: they have been bad neighbours.
Back when I was at college my mum's cousin worked for Oxford City Council and he and his wife regularly hosted foreign students, a good number of whom were decorative Russian girls called Olga and Natasha and so on who I quite enjoyed being invited to dinner with. There's a significant chance that some of them may now have grown-up sons of their own who are in Ukraine right now, trying to kill and not be killed. It amazes me that I can still speak on the phone to yet another friend, Peta, who teaches English in Moscow with her husband. They are South Africans so they're pretty safe there at the moment, though they'd quite like to go somewhere else. 'Please pray for the young men of Russia', she asked me the last time we spoke.
As well as the physical dangers in this as in all wars, there are spiritual dangers too. War arises from delusion and falsehood, and is powered by pride and often despair: it unleashes hatred even where it did not exist before (at least Lara names it, rather than pretend). The ancient Russian conviction that they are eternal victims now combines with a terrifying nihilistic despair to take the country to a dark place indeed: it's only fascists who go on about how great death is. The Ukrainians, meanwhile, occupy the ground of hope and humanism, but they face the temptation any combatant confronts: to chase victory by turning, in subtle ways, into your enemy. Prayers for them must include a desire to preserve them from such a fate. War does all of this; it is hateful, even when it's necessary.
It is natural – and politically popular – to fear and distrust Russia. And the invasion of Ukraine was obviously unjustified under international law. But assuming neither side achieves a military victory, maybe both sides reach exhaustion, what should be the final resolution? I rather agree with the Blessed Justin, reported on the anniversary of the invasion, that we must pray for a "just peace". Russia should not be humiliated as Germany was after the First World War. Equally Ukraine should not be pressurised into a vindictive settlement. I do not have further details of his position because these are hidden behind a paywall in the Daily Telegraph, for which he wrote the article, and I refuse on principle to pay to read online news reporting, and I don't read the Daily Telegraph anyway, and his remarks are not to be found on the official A of C website, no doubt because that would breach newspaper copyright. But I would expect a just peace to recognise the sovereign integrity of Ukrainian territory as it was before the invasion. And also not to impose punishment on Russia – that would simply deepen the sense of isolation and victimhood. We do need to find ways of preventing such an invasion happening again. But I would hope this could be achieved through a global acceptance of what the invasion has done to the status, reputation, and economy of Russia. That would not mean Russia getting away with it. Also we should remember that the real Russian victims are not its leadership, but the ordinary men, with human hopes and dreams just like the rest of us, who had to take part in an armed conflict which in all probability they did not want, and who died for their country.
ReplyDeleteI think complete victory for anyone is quite unlikely - it's rare in wars. And yes, peace is not the absence of war, and needs positively to be constructed and planned for, taking into account the fact that many, many Russians clearly buy into the narrative their leadership paints with varying degrees of enthusiasm. It is starting to be mentioned that the greatest threat to the current Russian regime is from groups to the nationalist right of it, who are not people you want in charge of a nuclear arsenal. That may be worth thinking about, too.
ReplyDeleteSo you prefer Putin to Wagner. Better the devil you know?
ReplyDeleteOh, even Mr Prigozhin might be less of a nutcase than some of the souls on the horizon ...
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