Limonov vs. Putin

by Edward Limonov

  One could possibly brush aside these facts and find a certain explanation to every scandalous bloc of information about the President’s ties and actions. But there is so much of these ties and actions that a rational person even he does not want to, must believe in some evil aura of suspicious actions that surrounds V. V. Putin. Of course he is the president now, people pay more attention to him. But still. Even if only half of what he is suspected of is true, then we have a person whose place is not at the head of a State.

  Yeltsin’s choice of a successor looks all the more incomprehensible if we remember that in August 1999 began the invasion of Dagestan by two thousand Chechen fighters headed by Basayev. The invasion was a complete surprise for the RF leaders. Because the Federal Security Service headed by Putin has slept over the invasion. And that person that has failed on the post of FSB director is appointed a premier and successor. A mystery? Not. Yeltsin needed to secure his impunity after his retiring.

  Putin spent eight months on the post of prime minister. In essence he was doing his pre-electoral campaign on this post. Two pre-electoral goals stood before him: pacify Chechnya (militants have invaded Dagestan), create a base for the victory of Putin’s Kremlin on the December 1999 elections and also get popular in the political sense.

  On September 4th 1999 a car loaded with explosives caused the explosion of a residential building in Dagestan’s city of Buynaxk. On September 9th 1999 a house was blown up on Guryanov Street in Moscow. On September 13th a house was blown up in Volgodonsk. All of these events have caused Putin’s harsh reaction. The successful military operations in Dagestan and Chechnya that have followed these bombings have rapidly increased Putin’s rating. Later, since the finding of explosives and detonators in the basement of a Ryazan house looked extremely suspicious (The FSB claimed it was a “training operation”), part of our society started to suspect that the bombings of September 1999 were organized by the FSB in order to raise the ratings of the presidency candidate V. V. Putin. There was no independent investigation on this case and therefore it is impossible at the present time to prove or to refute such frightening accusations. Maybe we will learn the truth when we will have another president. Maybe we will never learn it. Minimally the Ryazan’s story is extremely suspicious.

  A quite banal economic program was written for Prime Minister Putin. Also very harsh tax conditions were created in order to fill up the State’s budget. As a proof of his efficiency on his prime minister post on October 31st 1999 on Sergey Dorenko’s talk show Putin gave the growth rate of industrial production: 7%. On December 31 1999 Yeltsin spoke on television too, he said he is resigning before term and Putin became president interim.

  What was Edward Limonov doing these months? On august 24th 1999, on Ukraine’s Independence Day members of the National-Bolshevik Party peacefully occupied the tower of the Sailors Club in Sevastopol. On a 36 meters altitude they hung out NBP flags and the banner “Sevastopol is a Russian city!” They spread leaflets with the text: “Kuchma, you will choke on Sevastopol!” After a few hours of siege the tower’s doors were forced. Sixteen National-Bolsheviks were arrested and spent six months in Ukrainian prisons. On January 29th 2000 I took the boys from a prison in Moscow where they arrived from Ukraine. A different political climate was in the country then and the prison commandant even shook my hand, thanking me for the courage of my party members. In Ukraine, especially in Crimea this action created an unseen arising among the millions of Russian-speaking as well as Ukrainian citizens who consider Sevastopol the holy city of Russian national glory. Never did any Russian political organization hold such a striking and big action during Ukraine’s eight-years history.

  On February 23rd 2000 the National-Bolshevik Party formed a column on Pushkin Square. In the front we were carrying two black 20 meters-long banners. One read: “Down with autocracy and throne succession!” and the other: “Putin, we didn’t call for you, leave!” Columns of other opposition parties angrily looked at our slogans and us. They did not agree with us then. Today they do.

  SECOND BLOCK

  Accusations

  Against Putin

  On December 14th 2004 39 activists of the National-Bolshevik Party entered the public reception room of the President’s Administration and after occupying one of the offices they demanded to meet president Putin. The protesters were spreading leaflets of the following content:

  *

  Appeal to the RF President V. V. Putin

  WE DON’T NEED SUCH A PRESIDENT!

  Mr. President, we have a long list of pretensions to you. On your conscience you have:

  1. The manipulation of elections – both for State Duma and for president.

  2. The deprivation of the citizens of Russia of their electoral rights: passage from the election to the appointment of governors. These are State coups, the destruction of the federative state.

  3. The robbing of the people through the “monetization of benefits”. Only naive people believe in the fairy tale about the villains Zurabov and Gref gone out of hands. We know: nothing in the State of the Russian Federation is done without your approval. It was possible not to abolish, but to double and to triple the benefits with the present prices on oil.

  4. The appearance of American military bases in Central Asia. You let them there after the events of September 11th 2001. You ingratiate yourself with the USA.

  5. The transfer of Russian territories to China. 35 years ago border guards have conquered the islands on the Far East in bloody battles. Judging by your saying, you intend to do the same with the Kurils – give them to Japan. And Kaliningrad to comrade Gerhard?

  6. The friendship with the monstrous regime of Turkmenbashi, who banished Russians from Turkmenia.

  7. The closing down of independent TV channels. Thanks to you the television ceased to show the truth and is daily lying to the people.

  8. The witless interference in the elections in Abkhazia and Ukraine. However difficult it was to spoil the relations with the friendly Abkhaz people, but you succeeded in this. And Ukraine, by your efforts, stands on the threshold of disintegration and civil war.

  9. The victims of Nord-Ost and Beslan. There is no “international terrorism” whatsoever, there is a war in Chechnya. Which you could not win and which now you do not have the courage to end. Confess that this war is conducted not for national interests, but for your personal rating, for your “tough guy” reputation.

  10. The renewal of political repressions in Russia. The National-Bolsheviks Gromov, Tishin, Globa-Mikhaylenko, Bespalov, Korshunsky, Yezhov, Klenov, who stood up against the robbing of the people are political prisoners. The victims of political arbitrariness are such people as the physicist Danilov and the lawyer Trepashkin, punished altogether only for their independent behavior.

  These are not all the claims to you, but these are already sufficient. It seems that you imagined yourself a Tsar, and not a President, elected by the people and responsible before the people. You forgot the words of oath, which you gave at your inauguration: “I swear… to respect and to guard human and civil rights and freedoms, to respect and to protect the constitution of the Russian Federation, to protect the sovereignty and independence, safety and integrity of the State, to serve the people loyally”. Possibly, you don’t act by evil will; simply you do not have political talent. All the more, find courage in yourself and retire. The more rapidly you do this, the better it will be for Russia.

  The National-Bolsheviks.

  INDIFFERENCE AND LIES

  (THE HISTORY OF THE “KURSK” SUBMARINE’S LOSS)

  One of the first tragic scandals that have given the RF citizens their first view of the person, who has climbed up the Kremlin throne with Yeltsin’s help, was the history of the loss and the investigation of the loss of the “Kursk” submarine.

  Let us go through the pages of recent history. The nuclear submarine K-141, a project Antaeus, whose construction began in 1990 on the Northern machine-building works in Severodvinsk, was put o
ut to sea on August 10th 2000. 118 crewmembers and the captain G. P. Lyachin were aboard on August 12th 2000 when at 11:28AM supposedly an underwater explosion was registered in the Barents Sea; two minutes later – another one. As it turned out later, the explosions occurred four hours earlier at about 7:30AM. At 5:30PM the Kursk did not respond and was declared wrecking at 11:30PM. On August 13th at 4:46AM hydro acoustics first discovered the submarine lying on the ground. At 7:30PM the submarine was discovered visually.

  It was that day, August 12th 2000 that president Putin went to Sochi on vacation and did not interrupt it in relation to the catastrophe of the Kursk submarine, stayed there during the entire period of the rescue operation. Tanned, in a polo shirt he appeared in the news on television without any sign of grief on his face. Only on August 16th the commandment of the Navy received the president’s sanction for accepting foreign aid to save the Kursk crew, since it turned out that Russia’s Navy does not possess the necessary rescue means. But it was too late. On August 21st 2000 the Navy commandment officially declared the death of the Kursk crew. On August 22nd president Putin finally visited the Navy base in Vedyaevo and met the relatives of the dead sailors.

  Then the situation developed in the following way: after committing a criminal negligence the president decided to pay off the relatives of the dead sailors with honors. On August 26th the Kursk captain Gennady Lyachin was posthumously granted the title of Russia’s Hero and the 117 crewmembers were posthumously rewarded with the order of courage. The Kursk would have remained under water it wasn’t for the media, still half-free then, who started to spread information that the Kursk sunk after he collided with an American submarine spying after Russian Navy training. The media had reasons to claim so. Back in August 15th (the next day after the whole world learned about the tragedy) the radio station Echo of Moscow has declared, citing an anonymous source in the American administration: “During the incident with the Kursk submarine, two US Navy submarines were staying near it and their acoustics have registered the sound of the explosion Saturday”. In the evening of the same day the Navy’s Commander-in-Chief, the admiral Vladimir Kuroedov has said that there was a possible collision between the Kursk and an American submarine. On August 16th the Defense Minister Igor Sergeev appeared on television and directly said that the Kursk was rammed. So, on September 19th 2000 president Putin gave the order to start the operations for bringing the rest of the crew and the submarine itself to the surface. However, it was not for elucidating the mystery of its loss. He knew the mystery. He needed to hide the truth.

  On October 20th 2000 an expedition of Russian and Norwegian divers arrived to the place where the Kursk sunk.

  On November 7th the operation was completed; fifteen bodies were brought out of the deformed compartment. On March 24th 2001 the order about salvaging the Kursk was signed and on May 18th a contract to lift the submarine was signed with the Dutch firm Mammoet. On July 6th the expedition goes out into the Barents Sea.

  Notice that the first thing that the expedition did was to separate the first compartment, which was the one to be hit, on July 16th. (The fact that it was, was declared by the chairman of the government commission Ilya Klebanov back on November 8th 2000: “After the operations undertaken by the deep-water Mir machines and the exploration of the submarine by the divers, the collision version received a serious video-proof: an interior dent was discovered in the first compartment.”)

  On October 7th 2001 the salvage operation begins. The first compartment is cut and left on the seabed. The Dutch were not trusted for lifting it. On October 21st 2001 the Kursk’s body without the first compartment was put in the dock of a ship-repair factory in Roslyakovo. On October 23rd investigators stepped up on the deck of the submarine. Ustinov and his comrades were working hard, examining the submarine without its first compartment, where it was hit by an “object”. On February 2002 the investigators finished their work. On March 20th 2002 the identification of the Kursk sailors was finished. On April 26th 2002 the Kursk was scrapped. Without its first compartment.

  Only on May 31st 2002 the salvaging of the first compartment of the Kursk submarine was begun. It was a long process and it ended only on June 21st 2002. Apparently they were gathering the tiniest fragments from the seabed. In case the neighboring Norwegians might lift some. And there might be evidence of a collision with the Americans.

  And in June 29th 2002 on the concluding meeting of the investigative commission the official reason was finally named – the explosion of a torpedo. And it was a deliberate lie. A huge lie. A monstrous lie!

  I remember the pseudo-investigation commission and the daily television appearances of a freezing Ilya Klebanov, almost from the deck of the ship, which was doing the salvage operation. This lie, the longest in the RF history lasted almost a year. At that time I was detained in Lefortovo prison and observed with disgust the national daily operation: Russian citizens were lied to on the president’s order.

  Here are additional facts on the Kursk tragedy, so that the RF citizens do not have any doubts. On December 6th 2000 the RIA-Novosti reported: “On August 17th Russian military planes chased a foreign submarine in Barents Sea”. Here is the text: “Russian military planes chased a foreign submarine in Barents Sea in the training area of the Northern Fleet. This was confirmed by the Defense minister Igor Sergeev. A day earlier, the recently retired Norwegian admiral Einar Skorgen reported this fact. He did not exclude the possibility of a collision between the Russian Kursk with an American submarine. The admiral also confirmed that in late August the USA submarine Memphis entered a Norwegian harbor. Commenting the Norwegian admiral, the marshal Sergeev said that a special commission finished its work and should make its conclusions. According to the Russian minister Skorgen’s declaration will be added to the commission documents and submitted to a ‘deep analysis’. Meanwhile the USA continues to refute the possible involvement of an American submarine in the loss of the Kursk submarine in Barents Sea. As RIA-Novosti learned from sources in the Russian military delegation in Brussels, the Pentagon chief William Cohen declared to the defense minister Igor Sergeev that an American submarine could not have been involved in a possible collision with the Kursk.”

  The site http://www.br.com was also bringing new information under the title “Loss of the Kursk submarine”: “In Brussels the defense minister Igor Sergeev declared that the priority version of the Kursk loss still remains a collision with a foreign submarine and also confirmed that six military anti-submarine destroyers of the Northern Fleet did climb in the air. Meanwhile the USA defense minister William Cohen continues to affirm that American submarines have nothing to do with the catastrophe. However the Norwegian admiral Einar Skorgen confirmed the facts, explaining that he has sent a couple of his planes to intercept Russian machines. According to information from Norway the American Toledo submarine left the place of the catastrophe after the collision with Kursk. The submarine was damaged in the front, seven sailors died; the screw propeller and the steering gear were partly destroyed. In two days the crew managed to neutralize the effects of the collision and on August 15th it led the submarine into the deep under the cover of two NATO’s Orions. When on August 18th the Memphis submarine called at a Norwegian harbor for repairs, it was only a part of the operation on rescuing the Toledo. Just as the information about all the British submarines returning to their bases, supposedly because of dysfunctions discovered in the reactor of one of them. Some circumstances became known after the dismissal of Skorgen, who differed in opinion with the NATO leadership, more precisely with the USA Navy commandment and allowed himself to point out the Americans’ involvement in the catastrophe.” There is information confirming that the admiral Vyacheslav Popov did give the order to destroy a foreign submarine in the area where the Kursk was lost. It is for this reason that anti-submarine destroyers were called to fly over the Norwegian coast. But then Popov suddenly cancelled his order after talks with the admiral Skorgen and the planes were returned to the base
. It is these circumstances that the Deputy Prime Minister Klebanov was supposed to make public on November 21st like some secret. But he did not because something unforeseen happened: the American democracy started to skid; it did not need another scandal on the background of the presidential elections. About at the same time the Northern Fleet held bombing exercises as a late show of determination to sink spy submarines discovered near the Kursk…

  Back in September 16th 200, a month after the catastrophe, the site Korrespondent.net published information taken from the Stringer newspaper, called “Kursk collided with an American submarine!” with the subtitle “The last ram attack”. I abridge the text below: “Russia’s president has put 118 lives on the victory altar of Albert Gore on the presidential elections in the US. The editorial staff got documents proving that the reason of the Kursk loss was a collision with the American Sea wolf-class Jimmy Carter (SSN-23) submarine.” Then the Stringer editorial board starts to justify president Putin: “We perfectly understand the frightening choice that stood before Putin right after the Kursk tragedy… Either to stay silent and get a deal, with his conscience in the first place, but to receive a real benefit for Russia in result. We do not condemn Putin’s choice. Maybe on his place anyone would have done the same thing. We are not going to read notations to the president…” But let us go to the text through the justification: “Three explosions. Everything happened suddenly, during 10-20 seconds. The nuclear submarine Kursk was raising to the surface with a speed of 20 knots (about 40 km/hour). The periscope and the antennas were already raised. … Suddenly metal screeching was heard in the front compartment. A container with compressed air exploded from a collision with an unidentified object. The head of the submarine was thrown down. 145 seconds later the cruiser crashes at full speed into the bottom of Barents Sea. The blow of a machine weighting 18 thousand tons against the ground was terrifying. … The blow caused the torpedoes to fall from their fastenings and to detonate. …