In Putin’s Russia there are two completely absurd state holidays, the celebration of which takes place against the background of the complete destruction of their meaning. The first of these holidays is Constitution Day, celebrated on December 12, because anyone who reads the first two chapters of this document, which describes the foundations of the constitutional system, and compares their content with the current reality will understand that they have nothing in common.
The second holiday celebrated today is Russia’s Day. Actually, why today? Not many people who celebrate this holiday out of laziness know or even ask why it falls on this day. Perhaps many of them believe that on this day an important battle took place or a prince or tsar who played an important role in the formation of the Russian state was crowned.
Unlike them, those who consider today a day of mourning know exactly what happened 29 years ago. The Congress of People’s Deputies of the RSFSR adopted the Declaration of State Sovereignty of this republic of the USSR, and pushed for the collapse of the second USSR and the transformation of the first into an independent state. That is why during the rule of Yeltsin, under whom this happened, this holiday was called Independence Day — Russia from the USSR.
However, for the staunch imperialists, revanchists and great power chauvinists, who are now called «vatniks», such a formulation of the question is absurd and criminal. For them, Russia is the territory of the entire former USSR or, earlier, the Russian Empire, while the territory of the RSFSR or the Russian Federation is a «remnant» that had its «historical Russian lands» cut off by the «borders drawn by the Bolsheviks.
So which ideology is closer to Russia’s rulers today? To the ideology of a state within the borders that were formed taking into account the acquisition of independence by the republics and peoples of the former Soviet Union and the Russian Empire, recognized by the international community? Or to the ideology of revanchism, which considers all these states as a mistake and aims to revive the empire around the «Orthodox Russian world»?
Putin himself has repeatedly given unequivocal answers to this question: «…the collapse of the Soviet Union was the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the century (2005)… You know, I’m going to share this with you: I came back from abroad and looked at what was happening in the country with surprise. A lot of things were unexpected for me. I’ve mentioned it somewhere in public: the wheel was flat, I came to change the wheel. People asked me: ‘Are you for the Union or for Russia? I was stunned, I said: ‘Isn’t there a difference? It’s called something else, it’s Russia, Great Russia (2013)… What was I talking about? I was talking about the debate between Stalin and Lenin about how to build a new state — the Soviet Union. Stalin formulated the idea of autonomy for the future Soviet Union. Lenin criticized Stalin’s position and said that it was an untimely and wrong idea. Moreover, he put forward the idea that all the future subjects of this state, the emerging Soviet Union… at that time there were four subjects — Russia, Ukraine, Belarus and, by the way, the south of Russia (Transcaucasian Federation). So Lenin argued that the state, the Soviet Union, should be formed on the basis of… full equality with the right to withdraw from the Soviet Union. And this is the time bomb under the building of our statehood (2016)… After the collapse of the USSR, Russia, which was then called the Soviet Union abroad, Soviet Russia — if we talk about our national borders — lost 23.8% of its territory, 48.5% of its population (2018)… In the history of our country there were many heroic deeds, but the victory over fascism, the revenge on the Nazis for all their atrocities, for considering themselves a superior race and unleashing a terrible war, is of special importance. This brazen power conquered many countries, and impunity blinded the Nazis. They thought that in a few weeks they could subjugate the Soviet Union as well — the millennia-old historical Russia (2019)».
Thus, there is no doubt that Putin considers the independent states that emerged with the collapse of the USSR, including Russia, which declared its sovereignty on that day, as well as its constitution, as a fiction. Equally important is the fact that the current government’s policy denies both the values and the principles on which the creation of the sovereign state of the RSFSR was proclaimed on June 12, 1990.
Here are just a few of the provisions of that declaration, the glaring contradiction of which with the policies of the present regime is obvious:
«The First Congress of People’s Deputies of the RSFSR, aware of the historical responsibility for the destiny of Russia, respecting the sovereign rights of all the peoples belonging to the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, expressing the will of the peoples of the RSFSR, solemnly proclaims the state sovereignty of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic on its entire territory and declares its determination to create a democratic legal state as part of the renewed USSR… The state sovereignty of the RSFSR is proclaimed in the name of the highest purposes — ensuring the inalienable right of every individual to a decent life, free development and use of his native language, and the right of every nation to self-determination in the national-state and national-cultural forms chosen by it… The Congress of People’s Deputies of the RSFSR affirms the need for a significant expansion of the rights of the autonomous republics, autonomous regions, autonomous districts, as well as territories and regions of the RSFSR… The RSFSR guarantees all citizens, political parties, public organizations, mass movements and religious organizations operating within the framework of the Constitution of the RSFSR equal legal opportunities to participate in the management of state and public affairs… The RSFSR declares its commitment to the universally recognized principles of international law and its readiness to live in peace and harmony with all countries and peoples, to take all measures to prevent confrontation in international, inter-republican, and inter-ethnic relations, and to defend the interests of the peoples of Russia.»
In this case, what the citizens of Russia are celebrating today is a rather rhetorical question. It is much more important to understand the answers to the questions of what the current system of hypocrisy and lies represents, how to get out of it, and where to go after that.