As I mentioned some days ago, I am now working on Volume III of my Memoirs of a Russianist: 2010 – 2026, Years in the Opposition.
The “Opposition’ of which I was and remain a member is to the Washington Narrative on behalf of U.S. global hegemony.
When covering my activities in 2021 in promotion of my newly published second volume of those Memoirs, I found the link to a review of my books which Natalie Baldwin kindly posted on her blog platform Natalie’s Place, and then reposted on other web platforms. Her review was all the more valuable, because she was well known for her own published books on her experience of traveling in Russia. See https://natyliesbaldwin.com/2021/03/review-memoirs-of-a-russianist-volumes-i-ii/
To my surprise and pleasure I now came across in her review an example of how minutia caught in the amber of my diary notes, being a primary source, can prove useful, indeed, quite thought provoking in unexpected ways years later, that is to say today.
Quote
While attending a dinner party to celebrate Victory Day with his in-laws in St. Petersburg in 1995, Doctorow relayed one relative’s experience serving in Chechnya as a pathologist for the military. His job was to examine and identify the war dead amid the utter devastation of the capital of Grozny. After completing his service, he and those he served with were all treated for “shell shock” before release. This young man told Doctorow and the other guests that the war seemed to have been needlessly prolonged for political reasons. [emphasis mine]
Unquote
I believe that this observation bears on our dilemma of explaining Putin’s dragging out the ongoing war with Ukraine. Is this awful situation that adds to the needless loss of hundreds of thousands of soldiers on both sides due to the defect of indecisiveness, or worse still, cowardice, in the personality of the president or is it due to his being controlled by oligarchs who profit from the war. In any case, the issue is not new.
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I close this brief essay with a comment on my whereabouts, which bears on the supposed conflict of ideologies today between the conservative, traditional values in Russia and a Collective West that supposedly has gone off the rails in its rejection of the family, of the biological distinction between male and female and adopted other nonsense promoted by present day Progressives from the offices they hold at the top of European states.
I write to you today from our rented apartment at Knokke, Belgium’s premier coastal resort. As I stroll down the paved walkway between the sand beach and the roadway, adjacent to what Russians call the ‘первая линия’ (literally ‘first line’) of 8-story gleaming new condominium residential buildings, I am struck by how the month of May must be mayhem at Belgium’s laying-in (birthing) hospitals. I say that because a very significant portion of strollers are carrying or pushing in carriages their ‘newly hatched’ offspring. Many others are with their toddlers, in families with two, three and more children. Since the preponderant share of the residents and vacationers here in Knokke are Flemish speakers, one can say at a minimum that Flemish Belgium has no demographic problem at all. Vladimir Putin would feel right at home here in Knokke, where, incidentally, his $100,000 or more Rolex watch would also not be so unusual among strolling males.
Yes, Knokke is a prosperous community, where the average per meter price of apartments is 10,000 Euros (about at Paris levels and twice the price of Brussels) and where an underground parking place will cost you 100,000 Euros. The latter fact explains or complements the fact that you will spot a fair number of Bentleys, Aston Martins and other very expensive autos which make the occasional Tesla on the street look like transportation for the poor folks.
At the same time the very Flemish joie de vivre, the feeling that the good times are rolling, makes Knokke a wonderful refuge from the dismal international news and war developments that preoccupy me when home in Brussels.
The interesting thing is that Knokke is not a gated community. It is open to day visitors of all kinds. And its ethnic composition is in flux. In the past, say up to Covid, on a weekend you could be sure to see on the digue (beachside walkway mentioned above, favored by strollers and cyclists) groups of Orthodox Jews, Hassidim based in Antwerp, going to or coming from their prayer services. Their distinctive dress, with men wearing oversized black fur hats even in the midst of summer, made them very easy to spot. Today, by contrast, the presence of Orthodox Jews has faded and in their place there is a growing and visible presence of Muslims. Clearly, well-to-do Muslims.
In general, Flanders is known to be anti-immigrant. The Belgian Minister of Defense, Theo Francken, gained national attention by his 2018 book Continent without borders, which denounced the uncontrolled entry of supposed refugees from Syria in 2015-2016. In his new position, Francken has co-authored measures to restrict access to Europe put in place by the EU authorities. And yet, it is precisely here that you can see the rising Muslim population ‘strut its stuff’ in the most prestigious resort of the country. In the same vein, I direct attention to the Flemish Opera which closed its spring season in June with a production of Carmen that had lead singers from everywhere, including South Korean tenor Kyungho Kim playing Don José. For that matter, one of Knokke’s leading art galleries is featuring some remarkable canvases and sculptures by South Korean artists which they exhibit next to well known French artists of long ago.
My point is that Vladimir Putin is only partly right when he speaks about the sources of conflict in the West. He says repeatedly that Russia’s problem is with European elites, not with the broad population. I agree overall but not in particulars. What he is saying follows the ideas of Nixon’s Vice President Spiro Agnew, who wanted government to rely on the right-thinking ‘silent majority,’ not on the loud-mouth elites.
Putin points to the dominant Progressives like Macron who have adopted false values and scorn the traditional social building blocks of family and religion. They are the disseminators of Russophobia. together with their cockeyed satanic values that we saw exhibited during the last Olympic Games in Paris. And yet, as I mention above, the elites are not a homogenous bloc. The proof is that elites in a vacation mood, at ease with their mug of beer and feet in the sand, can be quite tolerant folks and really don’t give a thought to Russia and its war.
©Gilbert Doctorow, 2026
Gilbert Doctorow 