News X World (India): Zelenskiy Hosts European Leaders in Kyiv Amid Russia Tensions
Russia related news has proliferated these past two days and I have been repeatedly asked for commentary by News X.
Given that I am presently in Russia, where for reasons unknown youtube access is suspended, I am unable to enter the links which the broadcaster has kindly forwarded to me. These often are temporary and later are removed, which apparently happened to yesterday’s link to an interesting discussion I had with News X regarding the Victory Day parade in Moscow and what it means for reshuffling international relations. If I can recover the viable link when I am back in Brussels in a couple of days, I will post that one then.
As we now know, this gang of four are pressing Donald Trump to join them in imposing new and drastic sanctions on Russia if the Kremlin does not agree to the 30 day unconditional cease fire called for by Zelensky. We also know from their statements that the end game they expect to result from this exercise is a peace agreement that amounts to Russian capitulation. It is hard to see how Trump will play their game. It is 100% certain that Vladimir Putin will not.
Today’s military parade in Moscow marking the 80th anniversary of Victory in Europe Day was a splendid success. The air temperature was chilly and most everyone on the tribune including President Putin wore topcoats. But it was sunny and the celebrated fly-over of air force jets provided a perfect finale to the events on Red Square. The Russian president and honored guests then walked over to the the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in the nearby Alexander Gardens to observe a moment of silence and lay wreaths.
In the afternoon there is still to be the March of the Immortal Regiment which is the public counterpart to the official military parade in which Russians from all walks of life come to hold aloft photos of their forebears who fought in the Great Patriotic War as WWII is known in Russia or who worked in the home front at military manufactures. We may assume that this will also pass without incident.
In summation, the drone attacks which Kiev had threatened to sabotage the Russian Victory Day parades did not happen. We can all be calmer now that some sharp escalation in the war is for the time being unlikely.
But the entire exercise of the celebrations in Moscow was important for much more than what did not go wrong and I address attention to that in what follows.
First, all the big states of Indochina or Southeast Asia, if you will, were present: Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Myanmar. And there is good reason for this. Today they joined in celebrations of Victory in Europe. In July (date still uncertain) they will again come together, this time in Beijing, to celebrate Victory in the Pacific, i.e. the surrender of Japan, which had invaded them all during the war. And President Putin has said that he will also be attending this event in China. Given these facts, which only now became crystal clear, I better understand Putin’s decision to name Xi as the most important guest at today’s events, though it surely cost him the attendance of the Indian prime minister, who could not under any circumstances be seen as second to Xi.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un was not present in Moscow but his soldiers were and took part in the parade. Moreover just after the parade President Putin took the time to shake the hands of the senior officers in their contingent and to express gratitude for their unforgettable contribution to the liberation of Kursk oblast.
Looking at those statesmen who were on the reviewing stand, we must call out the leader of Serbia, Vucic, and the leader of Slovakia, Fico. Both had been threatened by the EU Commission’s vice president responsible for foreign affairs, Kaja Kallas, with dire consequences if they went to Putin’s party. Serbia would lose its chances for admission to the EU, she said. And under encouragement from Brussels, the Baltic States closed their air space to the Slovak leader’s jet with intention to make it impossible for him to travel to Moscow. But travel there he did.
We can be sure that this vicious bullying by Brussels will not be forgotten when Fico’s vote is needed to pass further EU decisions extending sanctions on Russia or granting aid to Kiev. In a word, by overplaying her hand the dictator running the Commission, Ursula von der Leyen has done more than former German Chancellor Merkel achieved by her wrong-headed policy of open doors to all illegal immigrants in 2015. That Dummheit cost the EU British membership. This latest Stupidity by the EU Commission may promote the break-up of the EU itself.
It is also worth mentioning, as Russian television commentators remarked, that this trip to Moscow brought together Vucic and Fico as never before and they found fellowship in each other.
Die Militärparade zum Tag des Sieges in Moskau, 9. Mai 2025
Die heutige Militärparade in Moskau zum 80. Jahrestag des Sieges in Europa war ein voller Erfolg. Die Lufttemperatur war kühl, und fast alle auf der Tribüne, einschließlich Präsident Putin, trugen Mäntel. Aber es war sonnig, und der gefeierte Überflug der Luftwaffenjets bildete einen perfekten Abschluss der Veranstaltungen auf dem Roten Platz. Der russische Präsident und die Ehrengäste begaben sich anschließend zum Grabmal des Unbekannten Soldaten im nahe gelegenen Alexandergarten, um dort eine Schweigeminute einzulegen und Kränze niederzulegen.
Am Nachmittag findet noch der Marsch des Unsterblichen Regiments statt, der das öffentliche Pendant zur offiziellen Militärparade ist und bei dem Russen aus allen Gesellschaftsschichten Fotos ihrer Vorfahren hochhalten, die im Großen Vaterländischen Krieg, wie der Zweite Weltkrieg in Russland genannt wird, gekämpft haben oder an der Heimatfront in der Rüstungsindustrie gearbeitet haben. Wir können davon ausgehen, dass auch dies ohne Zwischenfälle verlaufen wird.
Zusammenfassend lässt sich sagen, dass die Drohnenangriffe, mit denen Kiew die Sabotage der russischen Siegesparaden angedroht hatte, nicht stattfanden. Wir können nun alle etwas ruhiger sein, da eine scharfe Eskalation des Krieges vorerst unwahrscheinlich ist.
Aber die gesamten Feierlichkeiten in Moskau waren für viel mehr wichtig als nur dafür, dass nichts schiefgelaufen ist, und darauf möchte ich im Folgenden eingehen.
Zunächst einmal waren alle großen Staaten Indochinas oder Südostasiens, wenn man so will, vertreten: Vietnam, Laos, Kambodscha, Myanmar. Und dafür gibt es gute Gründe. Heute haben sie gemeinsam den Sieg in Europa gefeiert. Im Juli (das genaue Datum steht noch nicht fest) werden sie erneut zusammenkommen, diesmal in Peking, um den Sieg im Pazifik zu feiern, d.h. die Kapitulation Japans, das sie alle während des Krieges überfallen hatte. Und Präsident Putin hat angekündigt, dass er ebenfalls an dieser Veranstaltung in China teilnehmen wird. Angesichts dieser Tatsachen, die erst jetzt klar geworden sind, verstehe ich Putins Entscheidung besser, Xi zum wichtigsten Gast der heutigen Feierlichkeiten zu ernennen, auch wenn ihm dies sicherlich die Teilnahme des indischen Premierministers gekostet hat, der unter keinen Umständen als Xi untergeordnet erscheinen durfte.
Der nordkoreanische Staatschef Kim Jong Un war nicht in Moskau anwesend, aber seine Soldaten waren da und nahmen an der Parade teil. Darüber hinaus nahm sich Präsident Putin unmittelbar nach der Parade die Zeit, den hochrangigen Offizieren seines Kontingents die Hand zu schütteln und ihnen für ihren unvergesslichen Beitrag zur Befreiung der Region Kursk zu danken.
Wenn wir uns die Staatsmänner auf der Tribüne ansehen, müssen wir den serbischen Staatschef Vučić und den slowakischen Staatschef Fico besonders erwähnen. Beide waren von der für Außenpolitik zuständigen Vizepräsidentin der EU-Kommission, Kaja Kallas, mit schwerwiegenden Konsequenzen bedroht worden, sollten sie an Putins Feier teilnehmen. Serbien würde seine Chancen auf einen EU-Beitritt verlieren, sagte sie. Und auf Betreiben Brüssels sperrten die baltischen Staaten ihren Luftraum für das Flugzeug des slowakischen Staatschefs, um ihm die Reise nach Moskau unmöglich zu machen. Aber er reiste trotzdem dorthin.
Wir können sicher sein, dass diese bösartige Schikane aus Brüssel nicht vergessen wird, wenn Ficos Stimme benötigt wird, um weitere EU-Beschlüsse zur Verlängerung der Sanktionen gegen Russland oder zur Gewährung von Hilfen für Kiew zu verabschieden. Mit einem Wort: Durch ihr Überziehen hat die Diktatorin an der Spitze der Kommission, Ursula von der Leyen, mehr erreicht als die ehemalige deutsche Bundeskanzlerin Merkel mit ihrer fehlgeleiteten Politik der offenen Türen für alle illegalen Einwanderer im Jahr 2015. Diese Dummheit hat die EU die britische Mitgliedschaft gekostet. Die jüngste Dummheit der EU-Kommission könnte den Zerfall der EU selbst vorantreiben.
Erwähnenswert ist auch, wie russische Fernsehkommentatoren bemerkten, dass diese Reise nach Moskau Vucic und Fico wie nie zuvor zusammengebracht hat und sie sich gegenseitig als Verbündete gefunden haben.
Napolitano: 0:33 Hi, everyone. Judge Andrew Napolitano here for “Judging Freedom”. Today is Wednesday, May 7th, 2025. Professor Gilbert Doctorow joins us today from St. Petersburg, Russia. Professor Doctorow, a pleasure. I have a lot of questions to ask you about the current state of negotiations between the United States and Russia, and how President Trump’s statements have been perceived in the Kremlin.
But before we do, you have been sending me some very interesting observations about life in Russia today, particularly the time you spent in Moscow. As you may recall, I was in Moscow as a guest of the Russian Foreign Ministry just two months ago, but I’m interested in hearing your observations. The influence of the American and Western sanctions on everyday life in Moscow, food, clothing, travel, electronics, your thoughts?
Gilbert Doctorow, PhD: 1:40 Well, the influence of the sanctions has been to change the sourcing for the things that Russians buy in their supermarkets every day. That’s to say the product assortment is the same, quality is different, frankly often superior to what it was before they changed the sourcing. But the price levels are generally substantially below what we have in Europe, although some product categories have been creeping up in price where they rival the prices that I see in Belgium or even exceed them in some cases, but rather rarely.
Nonetheless, the Russian consumer has everything you could possibly want, including some rather exotic things you might mention for the personal tastes of one visitor to Western Europe having the reminiscences of wine, to enjoy the comforts of Baileys or of Campari or things of that nature, not just the ordinary French red wines. There’s no problem finding anything in a supermarket that you would find in the best West European supermarkets. And they also have graded price levels of supermarkets similar to ours, starting with an economy level and going up to super premium.
3:01 So then in the realm of food and how you fill your shopping basket, no problem. In the realm of consumer electronics and things that most people in the audience take for granted as part of their daily lives, I mean smartphones, notebook computers and so forth, there’s been a dramatic change in what is on offer in the mass-market stores, big retailers. They require regular deliveries, predictable deliveries to satisfy their network of stores across the country.
And so they have had to resort to new sourcing, Chinese sourcing, but not the major brands of China, which are shy of American secondary sanctions and have left the Russian market. So there are the lesser, or less well-known Chinese producers who do not sell to the American market, but are now taking up the whole of the, or nearly the whole of the Russian market, except for what I found in the country’s biggest retailer that has gone into marketing its own branded notebooks that are assembled in Russia and in Belarus [and] are priced dramatically cheaply using Intel chips.
So in that respect, the sourcing has changed, perhaps a lower quality for the mass market. For the premium market, for people for whom money means nothing, they can buy anything they want from the American and global producers of advanced computers in specialty shops that buy fixed lots of imports from the parallel market. So for a premium or an additional commission, shall we say, to intermediaries, they can get anything they want.
Napolitano: 5:01 All right, so let’s take one or two examples, and then we’ll get to the Special Military Operation in Ukraine. How does California wine get from the Napa Valley in California to a wine shop in Moscow?
Doctorow: Honestly, the California wines are not doing too well in Russia.
Napolitano: All right. I can understand that. But can you find California wines? Is there some circuitous route around the sanctions? And if you don’t want to choose wine, choose anything else that’s uniquely American, Dell computers.
Doctorow: 5:39 No, I haven’t seen any Dell computers, but I haven’t seen them for a very long time. I don’t think it was a conscious decision of the retailers. They just didn’t have advantageous offers. They had Hewlett-Packard in great quantities.
Napolitano: How does Hewlett-Packard get from Dallas, Texas to Moscow, Russia?
Doctorow: Probably by way of Kazakhstan or China or some other third country where there are eager-beaver merchants who buy up these products and resell them. They import them into their country where there are no sanctions prohibiting the import, and then they pass them along to Russian retailers in specialty shops, as I say, appealing to consumers who are insensitive to price.
Now look, the Chinese have taken more than half of the new car sales in Russia. But I was surprised on this visit to see new Chevrolets on the highways. And this is particularly surprising because Chevrolets were on sale, General Motors was promoting their product, but the economy level, the compact level, that is what you had here on the roads before the Special Military Operation. Now I see full sedans, with Chevrolet logos on them. So that is of course coming in from third countries, parallel trading, possibly or more likely from the Middle East.
Napolitano: 7:14 Fascinating, fascinating. You have spent time with journalists, fellow academics, even former government officials. Can you put your finger on the pulse, the collective pulse of these people? Is there a yearning for an end to the Special Military Operation, or is there an understanding of President Putin’s patience, or do you have some other analysis that you draw from your conversations with these folks?
Doctorow: Well, I’m glad that you gave a list of contacts or possible contacts that I would have at the outset of a question. Because this is where my inputs to the program are different from that of my peers. The former government officials or present government officials with whom my peers meet or some correspondents, that is clear.
8:20 What I am offering is the insights coming from conversations with the intellectual and creative community, which by and large, my peers in these programs of interviews have no contact with, because this is something that would go back years and they are not available, accessible to occasional visitors. And what I would say in answer, direct answer to your question that proves– I spent seven hours at table talk with a partly retired journalist expert, a man who rose high to positions of administration in the Ministry of the Press going back to the 1980s, then became an editor-in-chief of the Union of Journalists magazine, and teaches part-time as a professor of journalism in one of the journalism schools in Moscow.
9:18 So what he had to say was not just anecdotal or I just happened to know him. No, he’s a person of considerable authority and experience. And I took with seriousness his remarks in answer to your question. It gives a certain, more nuance or greater depth to the question of who thinks what about the war. It may amaze your audience, it surprised me in fact, that there are actually some pacifists in Russia.
They always were here well hidden and they still exist. And he is, this acquaintance, friend of mine, is in that category. But he, as I said, he has occupied important positions in the official bureaucracy. He’s not happy with the war, not at all happy with the war, though he’s fully aware of the reasons for the war. He’s fully aware of the incompetence, the terrible degradation of quality of leadership in Western Europe.
10:20 That he’s perfectly aware of. He’s perfectly aware of the neo-Nazis and the neo-fascism in Germany and in Western Europe. Nonetheless, he is not happy with the war, and he would like very much for it to end as quickly as possible. And I think there are many people, not just of his age and experience, but among the creative classes in Moscow, particularly, because that’s where, that’s the biggest market for people in all kinds of arts and in social media. There are a lot of people in that stratum who are not fifth column, they are not anti-Putin or anti-Russian, but they’re not happy with the way things are going. And certainly they’re not happy with the censorship that has come into force and has been strengthened during the period of the war, censorship that takes the form of denunciation as of one or another journalist or publication as being foreign agents.
Napolitano: 11:26 Fascinating, fascinating observations. Is there a willingness to give him, President Putin, a long leash, or is there an underlying grumbling of loss of political support?
Doctorow: These people are not oppositional in an active sense. They’re not going to go out in the streets. They’re not going to support the more notorious anti-Putin politicians such as still exist in the Russian Federation. But privately among themselves, they are not at all happy, and they really wish that Putin would stop this as soon as possible. That’s as much as I can say. They’re not politically active, but they do things that show where they stand.
I’ll tell you what, they subscribe to and buy the magazines that are now being published by people who are chased out of a publication like Mr. Moratov, the Nobel Prize winner, was running when he received the prize for defending press freedom in Russia. His publication was shut down. There were very many competent, as my friend says, some of the best Journalists in Russia who were out in the street as a result and some of them have formed new glossy magazines with very good material in them. And he will buy that up just to give them support. That’s an example.
Napolitano: 13:06 Understood. Does the Kremlin take, as far as you can tell, does the Kremlin take Steve Witkoff seriously?
Doctorow; Well, I’m
sure they do. They take him probably more seriously than they take Donald Trump. Donald Trump is in front of a microphone saying some outrageous things every day and flip-flopping. Steve Witkoff is not doing that. He’s quite consistent in his positions with respect to Russia, which are generally friendly and hopeful for a detente with Russia. And he doesn’t say these peculiar things like Putin has to come to terms because the price of oil has gone down. So in that sense, they take Witkoff much more seriously than they do Trump.
Napolitano: 14:00 Here’s President Trump on “Meet the Press” on Sunday with a rather startling statement. I wonder what your opinion is of the Kremlin’s opinion of this. Chris, cut number 10. —————-
Interviewer: 14:15 Ukraine: there’s been discussions they will have to give up some of the land.
Trump: Russia will … all of Ukraine, because that’s what they want.
Interviewer: All of Ukraine, meaning they wouldn’t keep any of the land that they’ve claimed?
Trump: Russia would have to give up all of Ukraine because what Russia wants is all of Ukraine. And if I didn’t get involved, they would be fighting right now for all of Ukraine. Russia doesn’t want the strip that they have now. Russia wants all of Ukraine. And if it weren’t me, they would keep going. —————-
Napolitano: 14:45 I don’t think there’s a scintilla of evidence that Russia wants all of Ukraine, but please, please weigh in. What does Vladimir Putin think when he sees that?
Doctorow: Well, I think he knows what Trump is doing. He’s certainly perspicacious enough and certainly penetrating enough to see that Trump is setting up his listeners for the eventual ceding to Russia of all the territory that it’s taken. And then he will claim that thanks to his intervention, they haven’t taken all of Ukraine. This is just a ploy. I don’t think that some–
Napolitano: American people will believe that. There’s not a scintilla of evidence that Putin wants all of Ukraine. In fact, he said he doesn’t. The last thing he would want is to rule a country amidst guerrilla warfare.
Doctorow: 15:36 Yeah, but the American public has been listening to Biden and company for the past four years, who are saying that Putin wants to take Poland and the Baltic[s] as well. So I think that if Trump is saying what he wants is all of Ukraine, it sounds rather modest.
Napolitano: So you don’t think that statements like this seep their way into the Putin-Witkoff negotiations?
Doctorow: I don’t believe at all, that’s going on. I still think that Witkoff is discussing with Putin many other things that are on the agenda, should a genuine rapprochement with Russia take effect. And I bet, I mean what’s going on in the Middle East and in other parts of the world, including the conflict, potential conflict between Pakistan and India, in which both America and Russia have stakes and would like to see it cooling off.
So there are many things for them to discuss, and which Witkoff, some of them are in Witkoff’s portfolio of responsibility.
Napolitano: 16:42 I wonder if President Putin is speaking to President Modi and to Modi’s counterpart– name escaping me, I guess it would be the head of the army– in Pakistan since Russia’s close to both countries. The last thing Russia wants is an India-Pakistani war, particularly one over behavior of some private individuals. It wasn’t even anything either of the governments did.
Doctorow: Well, I think that Putin is much closer to Modi than is appreciated in the West in general, in the United States in particular. And I say that– I was just going over my materials. I’m doing an editing of the galley proofs of my about-to-be-published book, war diaries 2022, 2023. And I just was reading over the remarks I made back in ’22 on how important Modi was for Putin’s decision to unleash the Special Military Operation.
All of our attention, all of my peers are talking about the essential contribution of Xi when he and Putin met [at] the Olympics just before, a week before the Operation was unleashed. Yes, of course, that was very important. But three weeks before that, Putin had met with Modi. And the position of India was of great importance in the first weeks after the start of this operation, when the General Assembly of the United Nations had a vote condemning Russia, but in which two countries, India and China, both abstained. That was of decisive importance to Russia, because it showed that more than half, four billion out of seven billion of the world’s population did not support the resolution. Therefore India from the beginning up to today has been a much closer discussion partner with Mr. Putin than I think most of our journalists give them credit for.
18:51 Do you have a feeling for how much longer the war or the Special Military Operation in Ukraine will last, Professor Doctorow? In other words, how much longer can the Ukrainians hold out?
Doctorow: 19:06 As I was saying before, I collect information that indicates how important the drone aspect of this war has become. The Russian television was saying that the Ukrainians themselves are producing one drone every 30 seconds. They are following closely the developments of Ukraine itself produced in underground master house shops. These are not big factories; they are small units, but collectively they’re producing a lot of drones. And that is of decisive importance in the pace of Russian move westward. It means that Russian troops are broken up into small units and not into a massive front that is advancing at once.
20:02 It’s a different warfare. And so for this reason, it’s extremely difficult to predict the pace of the Russian advance and to say “this will be the final date”. I still hold that it’ll be before the end of this year, but not because of the capabilities of the Russian military, rather because the Ukrainian political elite will crack.
Napolitano: Here’s something of interest to you. This audience for this show is very, very pro-peace, as you know, and we’ve been posting some polls. This morning, we asked the following question, “Will Trump finalize a peace deal between Russia and Ukraine?” About a thousand people responded during the conversation that you and I have been having. It’s a fraction of those that have been watching. And the response is 87% no, 13% yes. How would you have voted on that?
Doctorow: 21:03 I would have voted “no”, because I believe that the parties are too distant one from the other, and the Ukrainians under Zelensky do not accept a peace under any other terms than essentially a Russian capitulation, which given the circumstances of the battlefield is utter nonsense. The only way that Ukraine will come to terms under realistic conditions will be when this government is overthrown or physically eliminated. Look, if the Ukrainians fire on the parade in Moscow as they have threatened, I think Kiev’s leadership will be wiped out the next day.
Napolitano: I would think you’re right. Just before you go, are there parades elsewhere? Will there be celebrating tomorrow in Russia, as like the 4th of July in the United States, maybe even grander because it’s a big round number? It’s the 80th anniversary of the Russian defeat of the German forces in World War II. Will there be celebrations in St. Petersburg and elsewhere besides the grand one, which we all hoped President Trump would attend– but that’s apparently not going to happen– in Moscow?
Doctorow: 22:20 The whole country will have — in every 1 million plus city and maybe in smaller cities, too — they all will have their own parades. The major cities will have state-run military parades, followed by parades that are organized by the people at large, this Immortal Regiment parade. The government is doing its most possible to ensure the security there.
Here in Petersburg. I will not go to it. I won’t go, because they’ve made registration to participate in it very difficult. You have to register online. Some days ago it was a deadline. You have to send pictures of who your relatives who fought in the war were, what kind of placards you’re going to hold up. It’s really a pain, and I think they intentionally wanted to keep the numbers down for safety reasons. But for those of the audience who want to see it in the original, let me just mention that there is a Russian internet channel. It is https://www.ontvtime.ru/live/russia1-tv.html which you can find on any browser. And when you come to their homepage, It has the symbols of various of the major Russian TV channels, including Russia1.
And you click on that, and you can watch the live broadcast from Moscow. So you don’t have to wait for whatever NBC gives you in minutes of time. You can watch the whole thing if you want to wake up very early.
Napolitano: 23:49 Got it, got it. Professor, Doctorow, thank you. Fascinating conversation. Safe travels. Enjoy your time there and I hope we’ll see you again next week.
Doctorow: Thanks so much.
Napolitano: Of course. Coming up– fascinating, fascinating observations about life in Russia today, the American people should know about. The sanctions have not diminished economic prosperity at all. In many cases, they’ve enhanced it–
11 o’clock, Professor Jeffrey Sachs; at 1 o’clock, the former British diplomat in Moscow, Ian Proud coming to us from London; at 2 o’clock, Aaron Mate; at 3 o’clock, Phil Giraldi.
In today’s conversation with Judge Napolitano, we discussed a number of the observation from my ongoing visit to Petersburg and Moscow that have been the subject of my Travel Notes these past several days. We also talked about why the Kremlin is likely to take what Steve Witkoff says more seriously than what Donald Trump says, given that the President flip-flops every day in his efforts to tame the domestic opposition to his Russia policies. I am particularly proud of having explained why Putin’s relations with Narendra Modi were as important in his decision to launch the Special Military Operation as were his ‘higher than an alliance’ relations with Chinese President Xi.
I use this opportunity to provide the link that takes you to Russian state television stations which I mentioned at the close of the interview: https://www.ontvtime.ru/live/russia1-tv.html This is for those among the Community who may wish to watch the Victory Day parade in Moscow live on the 9th.
In this installment I turn attention to what was always a mainstay of my reports on visits to Russia since the onset of the Special Military Operation: the household shopping basket and, more broadly, how the consumer is faring in a country subject to the world’s most severe sanctions and in the midst of a war that has placed military production at the center of economic planning while disrupting traditional supply chains.
Food
Put simply, most any food item you would find in any given niche (economy, upper middle class or elite) of the supermarkets in Belgium is available in the counterpart category retailer here in Russia, though sourcing is usually very different.
The difference in provenance is most apparent in fruits and vegetables. High quality leaf lettuce, pre-packed mixtures of baby spinach and other young shoots, cucumbers and cherry tomatoes are grown locally in greenhouses year round. Green celery comes from Iran. Persimmons, summer quality watermelons and other fruits arrive these days from Azerbaijan. The quality of these imports is premium.
In addition there are chains of small food shops spread out across the urban residential communities selling specialty items that are specific to Russian consumer taste like fresh, non-sterilized salmon caviar in the Fish and Caviar network or fragrant giant strawberries delivered from Greece to your corner green grocer. Parenthetically I note that such strawberry sourcing does not work within the EU, where Spain seems to have a monopoly for its less glamorous fruit.
In dairy products, the departure of Danone from the Russian market has had very little impact on what is on your breakfast table. In virtually the same plastic containers and with very similar labeling you can find your Activia equivalent. Despite all the political posturing against Russia, the Finnish cheese maker Valio maintains a respectable presence in the dairy fridges. Otherwise, if you put branded cheeses aside, the product assortment in this category is as good or better than it ever was.
In beverages, Russians who cannot live without Evian or San Pellegrino water can buy their fill in upper middle class supermarkets. Many leading Scotch whiskeys are here at prices comparable to Belgium even if the shelves give much more space to no-name whiskeys at a fraction of the cost. And even niche items like Campari liqueur or Baileys are on sale, though the Baileys is selling at a 30 per cent premium to the Belgian retail price.
The selection of imported canned or bottled beers can be astonishing. To be sure, the overall volume of beer imports is down substantially from before the war, but those who must have their Belgian or German white beer or triple strength monastery brews are still spoiled for choice in our neighborhood.
As for wines, the Italian, French, Chilean, South African and even Australian producers remain well represented. The big ongoing change is the presentation on store shelves of high quality Crimean ‘estate bottled’ red wines in the 8 to 10 euro range, though those in search of prestige bottles will find Russian wines also in the 20 or 30 euro price category in ordinary supermarkets, not only at specialized wine merchants where prices can be multiples of the aforementioned. For lovers of dessert wines, the port varieties on offer from the Crimean producer Massandra present in every supermarket are a must: for 5 euros you get a product that would cost 5 times that if it were labeled Portuguese and sold in Brussels.
As for nonfood items in supermarkets,most brands familiar to US and European consumers remain stocked on the shelves. Tide detergent is here. Regarding many other products, if the producer has left the Russian market his production lines remain active in the hands of the Russian acquirers, selling the same goods under a new name.
Having said all that and only mentioned price a couple of times above, I can now address the question of price inflation: whereas in past reports I said that prices were fairly stable, on this trip it became clear that prices have risen appreciably. Just how much depends on the given product and given producer’s market leverage.
The inflation since my visit 5 months ago is uneven across product categories, reaching perhaps 30% on some items like Russian farmed lake trout or salmon from the Karelia region, which have risen to above Belgian levels. This is noteworthy when wild fish like flounder caught off Murmansk are selling at prices three times lower than in Europe. Yet, in fairness, it must be said that prices on most products that I examined have risen only in the single digits. Still, overall the price rises will be felt in family budgets.
Electronics
We cannot live without our electronic gadgets and this is as true of Russia as anywhere else. Accordingly, I spent some time at the DNS shop closest to my home. DNS is the country’s largest electronics retailer. It was formed several years ago following a market consolidation. I not only looked but also purchased there a new smart phone and new notebook computer.
There can be no question that their product assortment has changed dramatically from what it was before the start of the Special Military Operation, when many of the world’s major manufacturers were represented here. Even on my last visit there were some Western notebook computers from old stock still available for purchase. Not now. Nearly all their computers, telephones and related paraphernalia are produced in China. The leading Chinese international brands like Huawei left this market under threat of U.S. secondary sanctions. So DNS is selling goods supplied by less known companies that are virtually unknown in the West. Are they good? No doubt, otherwise DNS would not offer a money-back one year guarantee. But it is unlikely they are as good as the Hewlett Packard or Alcatel products they replace.
As regards computers, I said above ‘nearly all’ are Chinese. The DNS store had two notebooks on offer priced at half the cheapest Chinese entries and looking very good. These, the salesman told me are made to DNS order on assembly lines in Russia and Belarus and are sold under the DEXP brand name. They run on Intel Celeron chips, have the Microsoft Operating System installed at the factory and are loaded with the Microsoft 365 version Word and Excel software. The all-in price was 220 euros and they come with the aforementioned one year money-back guarantee which can be extended to two years for a modest fee.
I will not bore readers with the hard disk Gigabyte capacity and the like. Suffice it to say that the performance characteristics of this entry level product is sufficient for the needs of your average journalist, myself included.
For those among you who will look for high performance Western computers, Russia today has an answer to your needs but not in the mass market retailers like DNS which must have high volume and regular product deliveries to keep all their shops across the country well stocked. This niche is satisfied by stand-alone computer and electronics shops that buy their products via parallel trading in one-off import lots. A mark-up, of course, is added for this service, but the customers are price-proof and get what they want.
As I said, I also purchased a medium performance Chinese smart phone sold under the HONOR brand name. We are now using it and are very satisfied with our 110 euro outlay.
DNS stores also stock home appliances like dishwashers, refrigerators, washing machines, stoves and the like. Here the Western manufacturers remain present though Chinese and Russian brands are predominant. Here again, any consumer who is ready to pay the equivalent of the purchase price of a small car to get a prestige stove or refrigerator to impress fellow oligarchs can find what he or she needs in stores offering imports from parallel trading.
CARS
Not a great deal has changed in the car market since my visit 5 months ago. Chinese market penetration of new car sales had already reached and passed the 50% mark then. At that time, when more and more Chinese manufacturers entered the market and were setting up distribution, their ability to supply spare parts in a timely way was under question.
Accordingly, on this visit I asked one taxi driver about his Geely, and he said he had no problems with the car or with servicing and spare parts.
There are, of course, a lot of cars on the road in Petersburg that were bought before the imposition of Western sanctions. When I asked the owner of the Peugeot taxi which was taking us downtown how he was faring with spare parts, he said he had no problems. To his knowledge all spares for his car were being sourced in China which is not only reseller but also for some items is an original manufacturer of Peugeot parts. If he is right then the Chinese have stepped into the void left by Western carmakers for maintaining their own vehicles.
In diesem Teil widme ich mich einem Thema, das seit Beginn der Sondermilitäroperation immer ein Schwerpunkt meiner Berichte über meine Besuche in Russland war: dem Warenkorb der Haushalte und, allgemeiner gesagt, der Lage der Verbraucher in einem Land, das den strengsten Sanktionen der Welt unterliegt und sich mitten in einem Krieg befindet, der die Rüstungsproduktion in den Mittelpunkt der Wirtschaftsplanung gerückt und die traditionellen Lieferketten unterbrochen hat.
Lebensmittel
Einfach ausgedrückt: Fast alle Lebensmittel, die man in Belgien in Supermärkten jeder Preisklasse (billig, gehobene Mittelklasse oder Elite) findet, sind auch hier in Russland in entsprechenden Geschäften erhältlich, wenn auch meist aus ganz anderen Quellen.
Der Unterschied in der Herkunft ist am deutlichsten bei Obst und Gemüse zu erkennen. Hochwertiger Blattsalat, vorverpackte Mischungen aus Babyspinat und anderen jungen Sprossen, Gurken und Kirschtomaten werden das ganze Jahr über lokal in Gewächshäusern angebaut. Grüner Sellerie kommt aus dem Iran. Kaki, Sommer-Wassermelonen und andere Früchte werden derzeit aus Aserbaidschan importiert. Die Qualität dieser Importe ist erstklassig.
Darüber hinaus gibt es Ketten kleiner Lebensmittelgeschäfte, die über die städtischen Wohngebiete verteilt sind und Spezialitäten verkaufen, die dem russischen Geschmack entsprechen, wie frischen, nicht sterilisierten Lachskaviar im Fish and Caviar-Netzwerk oder duftende Riesenerdbeeren, die aus Griechenland zu Ihrem Gemüsehändler um die Ecke geliefert werden. Nebenbei bemerkt funktioniert eine solche Erdbeerlieferung innerhalb der EU nicht, wo Spanien offenbar ein Monopol für diese weniger glamouröse Frucht hat.
Bei Milchprodukten hat der Rückzug von Danone aus dem russischen Markt kaum Auswirkungen auf Ihren Frühstückstisch. In fast identischen Plastikbehältern und mit sehr ähnlicher Beschriftung finden Sie Ihr Activia-Äquivalent. Trotz aller politischen Gesten gegen Russland ist der finnische Käsehersteller Valio weiterhin gut in den Kühlregalen vertreten. Abgesehen von Markenprodukten ist das Sortiment in dieser Kategorie genauso gut oder sogar besser als zuvor.
Bei den Getränken können Russen, die ohne Evian- oder San Pellegrino-Wasser nicht leben können, in Supermärkten der oberen Mittelklasse nach Herzenslust einkaufen. Viele führende Scotch Whiskys sind hier zu Preisen erhältlich, die mit denen in Belgien vergleichbar sind, auch wenn die Regale viel mehr Platz für No-Name-Whiskys zu einem Bruchteil des Preises bieten. Und selbst Nischenprodukte wie Campari-Likör oder Baileys sind im Angebot, wobei Baileys allerdings 30 Prozent mehr kostet als im belgischen Einzelhandel.
Die Auswahl an importierten Dosen- und Flaschenbieren ist erstaunlich. Zwar ist das Gesamtvolumen der Bierimporte gegenüber der Zeit vor dem Krieg deutlich zurückgegangen, aber wer unbedingt sein belgisches oder deutsches Weißbier oder dreifach starkes Klosterbier haben muss, hat in unserer Nachbarschaft immer noch die Qual der Wahl.
Was Weine angeht, sind italienische, französische, chilenische, südafrikanische und sogar australische Produzenten weiterhin gut vertreten. Die große Veränderung ist derzeit die Präsentation hochwertiger „Weingut-Abfüllungen“ aus der Krim im Preisbereich von 8 bis 10 Euro in den Regalen der Geschäfte. Wer jedoch nach prestigeträchtigen Flaschen sucht, findet russische Weine auch in der Preisklasse von 20 oder 30 Euro in normalen Supermärkten und nicht nur in Fachgeschäften, wo die Preise ein Vielfaches davon betragen können. Für Liebhaber von Dessertweinen sind die Portweine des Krim-Produzenten Massandra, die in jedem Supermarkt angeboten werden, ein Muss: Für 5 Euro erhält man ein Produkt, das fünfmal so viel kosten würde, wenn es als portugiesischer Wein in Brüssel verkauft würde.
Was Non-Food-Artikel in Supermärkten angeht, so sind die meisten Marken, die US-amerikanischen und europäischen Verbrauchern bekannt sind, weiterhin in den Regalen zu finden. Das Waschmittel Tide gibt es hier. Bei vielen anderen Produkten gilt: Wenn der Hersteller den russischen Markt verlassen hat, bleiben seine Produktionslinien in den Händen der russischen Käufer aktiv, die die gleichen Waren unter einem neuen Namen verkaufen.
Nachdem ich all dies gesagt und oben nur ein paar Mal den Preis erwähnt habe, kann ich nun auf die Frage der Preisinflation eingehen: Während ich in früheren Berichten sagte, dass die Preise relativ stabil seien, wurde mir auf dieser Reise klar, dass die Preise deutlich gestiegen sind. Wie stark, hängt vom jeweiligen Produkt und der Marktmacht des jeweiligen Herstellers ab.
Die Inflation seit meinem Besuch vor fünf Monaten ist je nach Produktkategorie unterschiedlich stark ausgeprägt und erreicht bei einigen Artikeln wie russischer Zuchtforelle oder Lachs aus der Region Karelien, deren Preise über das belgische Niveau gestiegen sind, möglicherweise 30 %. Dies ist bemerkenswert, wenn man bedenkt, dass Wildfische wie vor Murmansk gefangene Flundern zu Preisen verkauft werden, die dreimal niedriger sind als in Europa. Fairerweise muss jedoch gesagt werden, dass die Preise für die meisten Produkte, die ich untersucht habe, nur im einstelligen Bereich gestiegen sind. Dennoch werden die Preissteigerungen insgesamt in den Familienbudgets zu spüren sein.
Elektronik
Wir können ohne unsere elektronischen Geräte nicht leben, und das gilt für Russland genauso wie für alle anderen Länder. Deshalb habe ich einige Zeit in dem DNS-Geschäft in der Nähe meines Wohnortes verbracht. DNS ist der größte Elektronikhändler des Landes. Das Unternehmen entstand vor einigen Jahren im Zuge einer Marktkonsolidierung. Ich habe mich dort nicht nur umgesehen, sondern auch ein neues Smartphone und einen neuen Laptop gekauft.
Es steht außer Frage, dass sich das Sortiment seit Beginn der Sondermilitäroperation, als viele der weltweit größten Hersteller hier vertreten waren, drastisch verändert hat. Bei meinem letzten Besuch gab es noch einige westliche Notebooks aus alten Beständen zu kaufen. Jetzt nicht mehr. Fast alle Computer, Telefone und das dazugehörige Zubehör werden in China hergestellt. Die führenden chinesischen internationalen Marken wie Huawei haben diesen Markt unter Androhung von US-Sekundärsanktionen verlassen. Daher verkauft DNS Waren von weniger bekannten Unternehmen, die im Westen praktisch unbekannt sind. Sind sie gut? Zweifellos, sonst würde DNS keine einjährige Geld-zurück-Garantie anbieten. Aber es ist unwahrscheinlich, dass sie so gut sind wie die Produkte von Hewlett Packard oder Alcatel, die sie ersetzen.
Was Computer angeht, habe ich oben gesagt, dass „fast alle“ aus China stammen. Der DNS-Laden hatte zwei Notebooks im Angebot, die halb so teuer waren wie die billigsten chinesischen Modelle und sehr gut aussahen. Der Verkäufer sagte mir, dass diese auf Bestellung von DNS in Russland und Weißrussland hergestellt und unter dem Markennamen DEXP verkauft werden. Sie laufen mit Intel Celeron-Chips, haben das Microsoft-Betriebssystem werkseitig installiert und sind mit der Microsoft 365-Version der Software Word und Excel ausgestattet. Der Gesamtpreis betrug 220 Euro und sie kommen mit der oben genannten einjährigen Geld-zurück-Garantie, die gegen eine geringe Gebühr auf zwei Jahre verlängert werden kann.
Ich werde die Leser nicht mit Angaben zur Festplattenkapazität in Gigabyte und Ähnlichem langweilen. Es genügt zu sagen, dass die Leistungsmerkmale dieses Einstiegsprodukts für die Bedürfnisse eines durchschnittlichen Journalisten, mich eingeschlossen, ausreichend sind.
Für diejenigen unter Ihnen, die nach leistungsstarken westlichen Computern suchen, hat Russland heute eine Antwort auf Ihre Bedürfnisse, allerdings nicht in Massenmarkt-Einzelhändlern wie DNS, die hohe Stückzahlen und regelmäßige Produktlieferungen benötigen, um alle ihre Filialen im ganzen Land gut zu versorgen. Diese Nische wird von eigenständigen Computer- und Elektronikgeschäften bedient, die ihre Produkte über Parallelhandel in einmaligen Importchargen einkaufen. Für diesen Service wird natürlich ein Aufschlag berechnet, aber die Kunden sind preisbewusst und bekommen, was sie wollen.
Wie bereits erwähnt, habe ich auch ein chinesisches Smartphone der mittleren Leistungsklasse der Marke HONOR gekauft. Wir nutzen es nun und sind mit unserer Investition von 110 Euro sehr zufrieden.
DNS-Geschäfte führen auch Haushaltsgeräte wie Geschirrspüler, Kühlschränke, Waschmaschinen, Herde und Ähnliches. Hier sind westliche Hersteller weiterhin präsent, obwohl chinesische und russische Marken dominieren. Auch hier findet jeder Verbraucher, der bereit ist, den Gegenwert eines Kleinwagens für einen prestigeträchtigen Herd oder Kühlschrank auszugeben, um seine Oligarchen-Kollegen zu beeindrucken, in Geschäften, die Importe aus dem Parallelhandel anbieten, das, was er sucht.
AUTOS
Seit meinem Besuch vor fünf Monaten hat sich auf dem Automobilmarkt nicht viel verändert. Der Marktanteil chinesischer Neuwagen hatte damals bereits die 50-Prozent-Marke erreicht und überschritten. Zu dieser Zeit, als immer mehr chinesische Hersteller auf den Markt drängten und Vertriebsnetze aufbauten, wurde ihre Fähigkeit, Ersatzteile rechtzeitig zu liefern, in Frage gestellt.
Bei meinem aktuellen Besuch habe ich einen Taxifahrer nach seinem Geely gefragt, und er sagte, er habe keine Probleme mit dem Auto, dem Service oder Ersatzteilen.
Natürlich sind in Petersburg viele Autos unterwegs, die vor Verhängung der westlichen Sanktionen gekauft wurden. Als ich den Besitzer des Peugeot-Taxis, das uns in die Innenstadt fuhr, fragte, wie es ihm mit Ersatzteilen gehe, sagte er, er habe keine Probleme. Seiner Kenntnis nach würden alle Ersatzteile für sein Auto aus China bezogen, das nicht nur Wiederverkäufer, sondern für einige Teile auch Originalhersteller von Peugeot-Teilen sei. Wenn er Recht hat, dann sind die Chinesen in die Lücke gesprungen, die westliche Autohersteller bei der Wartung ihrer Fahrzeuge hinterlassen haben.
NewsX: 0:00 We now move on once again and stay in the region. Tensions are once again escalating in the Russia-Ukraine border. Ukraine says its forces are still engaged in combat inside Russia’s Kursk region, pushing back against claims from Moscow that the incursion has been repelled. The governor of the Kursk said that Ukrainian drones targeted civilians near the border, killing three and injuring seven others. Ukrainian drones also targeted Moscow for the second night in a row.
Russian air defences said that they intercepted nearly 19 drones approaching the capital from multiple directions. All four of Moscow’s airports were temporarily shut down during the strikes, with operations resuming only after the threat passed. Russia attacked Kharkiv after Ukrainian drones caused the temporary closure of Moscow’s airports. Four people are said to have been injured in this strike. Russia also struck Ukrainian cities of Odessa and of Sumy, which killed four people in total.
1:06 The Russian military also said that it shot down more than 105 drones across the country. Meanwhile, Ukraine reportedly attacked a power substation in Russia’s Kursk region, knocking out electricity in a town and injuring two teenagers. These moves come just ahead of a planned Russian ceasefire to mark the anniversary of the Russian Victory Day. Meanwhile, US President Donald Trump, responding to Vladimir Putin’s ceasefire declaration, said that while it doesn’t sound like much, it’s a lot compared to previous efforts. Additionally, Trump remarked that Moscow and Kiev wanted to settle the war and that Putin was more inclined towards peace after recent fall in oil prices. Let’s listen in to Trump’s comments.
Trump: 1:57 Putin just announced a three-day ceasefire, which doesn’t sound like much, but it’s a lot if you knew where we started.
I think Russia with the price of oil right now, oil’s gone down, I think we’re in a good position to settle. They want to settle. Ukraine wants to settle.
NewsX: We are now joined by Gilbert Doctorow, Russian affairs expert located in Brussels, Belgium, to discuss this in further detail. Gilbert, thank you very much for joining us. I want to get your immediate response and hope and see what you think of the proposed ceasefire by Vladimir Putin, obviously to celebrate Russia’s anniversary of their Victory Day. Do you think that It will go a bit better than the one that occurred at Easter, where there was violations on both sides of the spectrum and on that declared ceasefire. How do you think this one is going to go?
Gilbert Doctorow, PhD: 2:58 Well, it may go in the same manner as the preceding’s one-day ceasefire. There certainly will be violations. But I think we have to put this in the perspective of the overall situation. The overall situation is: the Russians do not anticipate that the Ukrainians will honor the ceasefire. This was a unilateral ceasefire. There were no conditions made on Ukrainian participation. The Russians have prepared for the Ukrainians not to expect it at all, in which case they have prepared to respond to any egregious violations which threaten their security.
At the same time, they’re also talking about proactive strikes against areas that they believe have caches of drones and other attack weapons which they might be using for the period of the Russian-ordered ceasefire. That is to say the Russians hope to wipe out drones that the Ukrainians have prepared to use during the ceasefire. The biggest issue, though, is whether Ukrainians will carry out the threats that they have been making for the last week or more, that they would like to interrupt the parade in Moscow or in some other Russian cities by firing drones or missiles at these places.
4:25 If that were to happen, then the war would escalate in a completely different nature from what we have seen for the last three years. The Russians are prepared to use devastating force against Kiev, including remarks by military leaders that they have a squadron of their Oreshnik hypersonic missiles ready to hit Kiev and, I say, destroy Kiev, if the Ukrainians are mad enough, are crazy enough to try to interrupt the parade in Moscow, which will have 25 or more foreign guests on the reviewing stand.
But just keep in mind that the Ukrainians are under great pressure. The Trump administration is pressing them hard to accept concessions of territory for a settlement with the Russians. The regime in Kiev is unable to do that, as Mr. Zelensky can do that only at the risk of his own life, because he is threatened by the neo-Nazi gangs who have been in control of Kiev since the change in government in 2014. So you have a situation of real panic among leaders in Kiev. They cannot agree to the peace terms that Mr. Trump is proposing, and yet they cannot publicly denounce them. So what they can do is try to attack Russia in a way that will be deeply embarrassing to Mr. Putin’s government, as I said, attacking the parade in Moscow.
NewsX: 6:04 I just want to get your outlook on some of the developments that have been going on on the battlefield. Obviously you’ve mentioned briefly about the drone strikes that attacked the Russian capital today, which included the temporary closure of all four major airports in the Russian capital. There’s also a Ukrainian offensive in the Kursk region, that region that has been so hotly contested during this conflict, where Ukrainian forces have initiated a new offensive in the region. Reportedly, some reports saying that they’re capturing up to 500 square miles and displacing 130, 000 residents. Can I get your views on those battlefield developments, Gilbert?
Doctorow: 6:55 These are battlefield developments, public-relations developments. The practical value of these repeated incursions into either Belgorod or Kursk border regions of Russia is to get the attention of news agencies like your own and to remind the world that the Ukrainian forces are still active and haven’t been completely demolished by the Russian army. The reality is that this is a partly drone war now, and all the news that you have broadcast is about the drone war. At the same time, it remains a war of attrition and an artillery war in which the Russians continue to make advances of several hundred meters and several kilometers on various parts of the Donbas front every day.
7:39 They have not taken critically important logistics hubs, which have been under attack for months in the Donbas by the Russians. They haven’t succeeded yet, but they’re very cautious, because they try to avoid casualties. The attacking side always has greater casualties than the defending side, and the Russians are going slowly and carefully in their Donbass movements. As regards the border regions that you have mentioned, this is for publicity reasons. You are doing exactly what they expect the world global press to do, calling attention to their remaining attacks.
8:18 And let’s make it clear: the Russians have declared officially that Kursk region is freed of the Ukrainian forces. The Ukrainians suffered 75,000 or 76,000 casualties, meaning both deaths and their soldiers who were removed from from the army because they are maimed and and are incapable of continuing soldierly life. This is the fact. The public relations side of it is to get the attention of the world and to hope to get more aid. On the ground, the Ukrainians are only losers.
NewsX: 8:57 Gilbert Doctorow, thank you very much for joining us. We now move on to the Indo-Pacif–
In the Travel Notes, Installment Three which I published earlier today, I presented a critique of Russian press censorship coming from the liberal wing of the profession. Here I offer readers an excellent example of how bureaucracy can run amok with unforeseeable consequences that do nothing for national defense while irritating a great many people needlessly.
At noon today Moscow time I gave an interview to the Indian global broadcaster News X regarding the skirmishes now ongoing at the Russian-Ukrainian border in the Kursk region, on the exchange of drone attacks. I broadened the discussion to the Russians’ expectation that their unilateral 3 day cease-fire bracketing the 80th anniversary of Victory in Europe Day (9 May) will not be respected by Kiev; and I went on to mention that should Zelensky & Co. do something really stupid on the 9th and attack one or another of the parades in Russian cities, not to mention attack THE PARADE in Moscow, we can expect all hell to break loose in the Russian counter-attack.
I am unable to verify the link which NewsX kindly sent me because THE RUSSIAN AUTHORITIES HAVE SHUT DOWN youtube:com
Over the past year there have been localized go-slow days on youtube services in Russia but this looks like a definitive ban. Meanwhile, LinkedIn, which was shut down for well more than a year, has suddenly come back to life on the Russian internet.
As I see it, there is not much sense in terminating youtube if your objective is to enhance Russian state security. Youtube itself is a neutral platform that is used by those promoting every imaginable political and social position. But there is sense in keeping LinkedIn out of the country because it carries the pesonal data of all kinds of Russian state officials which can be very useful to the intelligence agencies of ‘hostile countries.’ Hence my conclusion above that censorship can be very clumsy if the censors are not kept on a very short leash.
As I noted previously, my reason for traveling to Moscow this past weekend was to visit with Russian friends whom we have known for years but barely seen since the Covid pandemic put social relations on hold and the interruption of travel to Russia due to war sanctions post-February 2022 reduced the frequency of our visits to the country from every second month to just two or three times a year.
In today’s travel notes I will dwell a bit on the personal side to the trip because it turned up material about the state of journalism today in Russia which I am keen to share with the community.
This friend, whom we shall call ‘R,’ had a successful career in the Soviet, later in the Russian Ministry of the Press and within the Union of Journalists. He was always a calm soul, not the person to rock the boat, but that is not to say that he was indifferent to abuse of power, to bureaucratic stupidities and other negative manifestations of Russia’s ‘managed democracy.’ He saw a lot of both during his job-related travels across the length and breadth of the Russian Federation and had a good basis for comparison with world standards during private travels abroad that took in most of the European continent.
In what can be described as semi-retirement, he has cut back his work week to one day in the office. However that work is as a professor in a school of journalism and he also holds a position as senior editor in a journal published by the Union which deals with current issues in the profession. Accordingly I give appropriate weight to what he says about the loss of talent to emigration as a result of the tightening of censorship since the onset of the Special Military Operation. He particularly calls attention to the shutdown of the liberal newspaper Novaya Gazeta, whose editor Dmitry Muratov received the Nobel Peace Prize in 2021 in honor of his championing a free press in Russia.
According to R, Novaya Gazeta was home to some of the country’s most talented journalists and following its closure many of them moved abroad. We may assume that they will find hard times in the West now that Donald Trump had shut down funding for Radio Free Europe and similar democracy promotion agencies.
These Fifth Column crusaders do not deserve better, you may say. However, I understand my friend’s concern for the idealistic and naive souls among them who may be caught in the crossfire of right-minded patriots in East and West.
Respected official that he always was, R tells me that the press as a whole was opposition-minded going back to the 1980s and earlier still. They were kept in line by a vigilant and active contingent of censors who were in regular contact with journalists to review their writings and enforce textual revisions. That was pre-publication coercion. What has developed in the past few years is post publication coercion through enforcement of the so-called ‘foreign agent’ law. Nobel Prize or no, even Dmitry Muratov was finally brought down when in September 2023 he was officially declared to be a ‘foreign agent.’
Censorship is not the only malaise in the profession. According to R, professional standards have been declining. A recent survey of competences of new graduates from Russian schools of journalism indicate very poor levels of performance. Less than 30% of degree holders can write grammatically correct and readable texts while less than 20% know a foreign language. Nonetheless, even with weak skills the graduates do find employment, many of them in the burgeoning social media organizations.
Yes, R is a through and through Liberal, a fine representative of the intelligentsia with all of its positive as well as negative facets. The bookcase lined walls of his apartment attest to his vast readings. He is not blind to the failings of the West and especially to the rise of ill-educated incompetents to the leading government positions in most European countries. He is not blind to neo-fascism in Europe.
However, R is quietly ill-disposed to the ongoing war in Ukraine which he knows far better than most Muscovites because his ‘little homeland,’ as they say here, is in the southwest of this country. That is where he grew up and it is where today he maintains an apartment in a city just 100 km from the Ukrainian border. They have been subjected to frequent drone attacks. Yet, he says, despite the attacks there is a residual sympathy in the native population of Kursk for their Ukrainian neighbors.
I must add that R is a life-long pacifist, which is and always was a rare philosophical position to hold in this country.
We discussed all of the foregoing issues at the dinner table from our arrival at R’s apartment at 2 o’clock in the afternoon till our departure after 10 pm with just a couple of brief breaks when we retired to the couch and armchairs. That is the Russian way, or at least it was the Russian tradition among the intelligentsia. You are offered a succession of courses eaten leisurely and downed with an assortment of alcoholic beverages.
We spent a good long time on the appetizers. Appetizers were always the most prized part of any Russian meal. You find that truth in the early pages of Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina when you read about Stiva Oblonsky’s visit to his social club for lunch. Main courses were an after thought. And desserts could be ignored.
At the start of our meal, home cured salmon, thin slices of an elite pork sausage, summer quality green cucumbers and sliced pepper, a variety of potato salad – all begged for a shot of vodka, which we obliged. Then came the wild mushroom soup that is also de rigueur, followed by baked duck legs served with roasted new season potatoes. Next we sampled an assortment of hard cheeses, all Russia-sourced and fairly impressive considering that during the 70 years of Communist rule cheeses came down to a local variant on processed American cheese. The meal ended with a home baked sponge cake accompanied by our hostess’s apricot and almond jam served with strong oriental coffee.
There was a sequence of alcoholic beverages including aged Armenian brandy, a major brand of Scotch, a bottle of French sparkling wine and the 10 year old ‘estate bottled’ Crimean red wine that we brought as the mandatory contribution of guests to any party. All drinks were served in moderation as prompts to toasts, in the Russian manner. They spur on rather than stifle conversation.
Younger Russian readers of these lines will object and say that the times are a-changing, that such social habits have fallen out of vogue. Like journalism, cooking is on the decline and with it the tradition of lengthy table conversations.
A very relevant trend was highlighted in a feature report on Business FM, the radio station that I listen to over breakfast while my wife is still fast asleep and the radio keeps me company. Their real estate experts noted the trend now in Moscow apartment sales NOT to install kitchens. The reason given by prospective buyers is that they don’t know how to cook and they just order their meals from restaurants and fast food providers for delivery to their apartments. Of course, the greater consideration may be to bring down the up-front cost of the apartment by eliminating the fridge, dish washer and related installations.
Wie ich bereits erwähnt habe, war der Grund für meine Reise nach Moskau am vergangenen Wochenende ein Besuch bei russischen Freunden, die wir seit Jahren kennen, aber seit Beginn der Covid-Pandemie kaum noch gesehen haben. Durch die Unterbrechung der sozialen Kontakte und die Reisebeschränkungen nach dem Krieg im Februar 2022 sind unsere Besuche in Russland von alle zwei Monate auf nur noch zwei- bis dreimal im Jahr zurückgegangen.
In dem heutigen Reisebericht werde ich mich ein wenig mit der persönlichen Seite der Reise befassen, da sich dabei Material über den aktuellen Zustand des Journalismus in Russland ergeben hat, das ich gerne mit der Community teilen möchte.
Dieser Freund, den wir „R“ nennen wollen, hatte eine erfolgreiche Karriere in der Sowjetunion, später im russischen Presseministerium und in der Journalistengewerkschaft. Er war immer ein ruhiger Mensch, keiner, der für Unruhe sorgte, aber das heißt nicht, dass ihm Machtmissbrauch, bürokratische Dummheiten und andere negative Erscheinungsformen der „gelenkten Demokratie“ in Russland gleichgültig waren. Er hat während seiner beruflichen Reisen durch die gesamte Russische Föderation viel davon gesehen und hatte durch private Auslandsreisen, die ihn durch den größten Teil Europas führten, einen guten Vergleich zu internationalen Standards.
In einer Art Teilruhestand hat er seine Arbeitswoche auf einen Tag im Büro reduziert. Allerdings arbeitet er als Professor an einer Journalistenschule und ist außerdem leitender Redakteur einer von der Gewerkschaft herausgegebenen Zeitschrift, die sich mit aktuellen Themen des Berufsstands befasst. Dementsprechend messe ich seinen Aussagen über den Verlust von Talenten durch Auswanderung infolge der verschärften Zensur seit Beginn der Sondermilitäroperation großes Gewicht bei. Er weist insbesondere auf die Schließung der liberalen Zeitung Novaya Gazeta hin, deren Herausgeber Dmitry Muratov 2021 für seinen Einsatz für die Pressefreiheit in Russland den Friedensnobelpreis erhielt.
Laut R waren bei Novaya Gazeta einige der talentiertesten Journalisten des Landes beschäftigt, von denen viele nach der Schließung ins Ausland gezogen sind. Es ist zu vermuten, dass sie es im Westen schwer haben werden, nachdem Donald Trump die Finanzierung von Radio Free Europe und ähnlichen Einrichtungen zur Förderung der Demokratie eingestellt hat.
Man könnte sagen, dass diese Kreuzritter der Fünften Kolonne nichts Besseres verdienen. Ich verstehe jedoch die Sorge meines Freundes um die idealistischen und naiven Seelen unter ihnen, die zwischen die Fronten der rechtschaffenen Patrioten im Osten und Westen geraten könnten.
Als angesehener Beamter, der er immer war, erzählt mir R, dass die Presse insgesamt schon seit den 1980er Jahren und sogar noch früher oppositionell eingestellt war. Sie wurde durch eine wachsame und aktive Zensurbehörde in Schach gehalten, die in regelmäßigem Kontakt mit Journalisten stand, um deren Artikel zu überprüfen und Textänderungen durchzusetzen. Das war Zwang vor der Veröffentlichung. In den letzten Jahren hat sich eine Zensur nach der Veröffentlichung durch die Durchsetzung des sogenannten „Auslandsagenten“-Gesetzes entwickelt. Selbst Dmitry Muratov wurde schließlich zu Fall gebracht, als er im September 2023 offiziell zum „Auslandsagenten“ erklärt wurde, trotz seines Nobelpreises.
Die Zensur ist nicht das einzige Übel in diesem Beruf. Laut R sind die beruflichen Standards gesunken. Eine aktuelle Umfrage zu den Kompetenzen von Absolventen russischer Journalistenschulen zeigt ein sehr schlechtes Leistungsniveau. Weniger als 30 % der Absolventen können grammatikalisch korrekte und lesbare Texte schreiben, während weniger als 20 % eine Fremdsprache beherrschen. Trotz ihrer geringen Qualifikationen finden die Absolventen jedoch eine Anstellung, viele von ihnen in den boomenden Social-Media-Unternehmen.
Ja, R ist durch und durch liberal, ein hervorragender Vertreter der Intelligenzija mit all ihren positiven und negativen Facetten. Die mit Bücherregalen gesäumten Wände seiner Wohnung zeugen von seiner umfangreichen Lektüre. Er ist nicht blind für die Schwächen des Westens und insbesondere für den Aufstieg schlecht ausgebildeter Inkompetenter in führende Regierungspositionen in den meisten europäischen Ländern. Er ist nicht blind für den Neofaschismus in Europa.
Allerdings steht R dem andauernden Krieg in der Ukraine, den er weitaus besser kennt als die meisten Moskauer, da seine „kleine Heimat“, wie man hier sagt, im Südwesten dieses Landes liegt, stillschweigend ablehnend gegenüber. Dort ist er aufgewachsen und dort hat er heute eine Wohnung in einer Stadt, die nur 100 km von der ukrainischen Grenze entfernt liegt. Sie sind häufigen Drohnenangriffen ausgesetzt. Dennoch, so sagt er, gebe es trotz der Angriffe in der einheimischen Bevölkerung von Kursk nach wie vor Sympathien für die ukrainischen Nachbarn.
Ich muss hinzufügen, dass R ein lebenslanger Pazifist ist, was in diesem Land eine seltene philosophische Haltung ist und immer war.
Wir diskutierten alle oben genannten Themen am Esstisch, von unserer Ankunft in R‘s Wohnung um 14 Uhr bis zu unserer Abreise nach 22 Uhr, mit nur wenigen kurzen Pausen, in denen wir uns auf das Sofa und in die Sessel zurückzogen. Das ist die russische Art, oder zumindest war es die russische Tradition unter den Intellektuellen. Man bekommt eine Reihe von Gängen serviert, die man gemächlich verspeist und mit verschiedenen alkoholischen Getränken hinunterspült.
Wir verbrachten viel Zeit mit den Vorspeisen. Vorspeisen waren immer der wertvollste Teil einer russischen Mahlzeit. Das findet man auch in den ersten Seiten von Tolstois „Anna Karenina“, wenn man über Stiva Oblonskys Besuch in seinem Club zum Mittagessen liest. Die Hauptgerichte waren Nebensache. Und Desserts konnten ignoriert werden.
Zu Beginn unseres Essens gab es hausgebeizten Lachs, dünne Scheiben einer edlen Schweinswurst, sommerlich-frische Gurken und geschnittene Paprika sowie verschiedene Kartoffelsalate – allesamt Gerichte, die nach einem Schuss Wodka verlangten, dem wir gerne nachkamen. Dann kam die Wildpilzsuppe, die ebenfalls de rigueur ist, gefolgt von gebackenen Entenkeulen mit gerösteten neuen Kartoffeln. Als nächstes probierten wir eine Auswahl an Hartkäse, alle aus Russland und ziemlich beeindruckend, wenn man bedenkt, dass Käse während der 70 Jahre kommunistischer Herrschaft auf eine lokale Variante von amerikanischem Schmelzkäse reduziert war. Das Essen endete mit einem hausgemachten Biskuitkuchen, begleitet von Aprikosen-Mandel-Marmelade unserer Gastgeberin und starkem orientalischem Kaffee.
Es gab eine Reihe alkoholischer Getränke, darunter gereifter armenischer Brandy, eine bekannte Scotch-Marke, eine Flasche französischen Sekt und den 10 Jahre alten „Estate Bottled“ Krim-Rotwein, den wir als obligatorischen Beitrag der Gäste zu jeder Party mitgebracht hatten. Alle Getränke wurden in Maßen serviert und dienten, ganz nach russischer Art, als Anlass für Trinksprüche. Sie regen die Unterhaltung eher an, als dass sie sie hemmen.
Jüngere russische Leser dieser Zeilen werden einwenden, dass sich die Zeiten ändern und solche sozialen Gewohnheiten aus der Mode gekommen sind. Wie der Journalismus ist auch das Kochen auf dem Rückzug und mit ihm die Tradition ausführlicher Tischgespräche.
Ein sehr relevanter Trend wurde in einem Feature-Bericht auf Business FM hervorgehoben, dem Radiosender, den ich zum Frühstück höre, während meine Frau noch schläft und das Radio mir Gesellschaft leistet. Die Immobilienexperten dort stellten fest, dass es in Moskau derzeit Trend ist, in Wohnungen keine Küchen einzubauen. Als Grund gaben die potenziellen Käufer an, dass sie nicht kochen können und sich ihre Mahlzeiten einfach in Restaurants oder bei Fast-Food-Anbietern bestellen und in ihre Wohnungen liefern lassen. Der wichtigere Grund dürfte natürlich sein, dass man durch den Verzicht auf Kühlschrank, Geschirrspüler und ähnliche Einbauten die Anschaffungskosten für die Wohnung senken kann.
Legitimate Targets: 0:00 Welcome back to “Legitimate Targets”, everybody. I hope you’re all having a great day. There are some big shakeups ongoing with these US-Russia peace talks over the NATO proxy war in Ukraine. And I’m really not that surprised. I, well, we’ll get into everything and what’s going on. But things are not going as swimmingly as President Trump initially assumed they would in his plan for a 24-hour peace deal.
So joining me today to break this all down is a very accomplished Russian expert, Gilbert Doctorow. He’s an independent political analyst based in Brussels. He’s got a PhD in history, I believe Russian history in specific from Columbia University and a 25-year career business focus on Russia and Eastern Europe. You can find his books on Amazon, you can find his substack online, which includes a lot of his transcribed conversations and interviews.
And also I’ve seen him on many of our good friends’ shows like the Duran and many other geopolitical shows online. So without further ado, Gilbert Doctorow, thank you so much for joining me today. How are you?
Gilbert Doctorow, PhD: 1:19 I’m very well, thanks. And thanks so much for the invitation.
LT: Of course, it’s great honor to have you here. My first question for you is … we just got news that Trump is planning to roll out the official final proposal for the Ukraine peace deal, as the media is calling it. Who knows if that’s true. But he is only in this peace deal, supposedly rumored to be suggesting a de jure Russian annexation or claim over Crimea, nothing about the Donbass. So what do you think about this deal?
Doctorow: 1:59 I think that Trump has already understood that there will be no deal. And he wants to extricate himself from this. He has, in his statements of the past week, he said and reiterated this was Biden’s war, not his war. His objective was to stop the war.
But I think it’s fairly clear that he hasn’t had much success in bringing the parties together. And even his latest comments a day or two ago, that this week would be definitive and the two sides will agree. This is just a smokescreen. The reality that I see is that Trump is going to walk away from this, which is probably the smartest thing he can do, because there’s no way that the irreconcilable positions can be reconciled. And he is taking up time and energy of his top people on a hopeless mission.
2:57 He doesn’t say that, of course; it’s obvious. But I think the fact that Rubio has cancelled his participation in the meeting of the Brits and I think the Germans and the Kiev representatives in London today is indicative that this is coming to closure and will be acknowledged as unworkable. Why do I say that and why isn’t Rubio coming? Because Zelensky has issued a statement that he, under no circumstances, will recognize Crimea as Russian. This comes against the context of a change situation, particularly called out by yesterday’s “Financial Times”.
They were the most insistent on reporting that Vladimir Putin has dropped his maximum demands and has agreed to stop the Russian advance in Ukraine, to freeze it at the present line of confrontation, and not to pursue what is in the Russian constitution now, the full acquisition of the four oblasts of Eastern Ukraine that Russia has made part of the Russian Federation following referenda there. This refusal by Zelensky to make any compromise, any step back at the very moment when Putin has made a very significant step back and which have moved, which proves the sincerity of Russia’s comments, that they’re not looking for territory. They’re looking for a security arrangement that will … bring them in from the cold.
4:59 That is the end of NATO expansion and the demilitarization, the defanging of the Kiev regime. These are their objectives, above all, not adding one more village or another village to the territory of the Russian Federation.
LT: I will say right before we went live, I saw that Peskov came out and said that that report in the “Financial Times” was fake news, which begs the question then, if the media for the past three years has been telling us that Russia is about to go all the way to London, they’re about to invade all the way across Europe, what does it mean now that the media is putting out news to try and get the sides to come together and stop the bloodshed and stop the losses for Ukraine.
Doctorow: 5:54 I’m not sure that the “Financial Times” front page article was favorable to Russia as such. They were– and I’m not sure that Peskov is telling the truth. I think I rather doubt it. But why should he? These– if such a move, such a compromise were being entertained by the Russians, it certainly was behind closed doors.
How it leaked out and “Financial Times” got it is a separate question. But that Peskov denied it, well, why not? It isn’t an official position. It hasn’t been officially announced. Therefore, they can say it’s fake news. But I don’t believe it was fake news.
LT: 6:31 Well, at this point, I think it would go to show that, like you said, they’re willing to do anything to try and bring common sense back to the table. And even still, Zelensky is not willing to allow for even Crimea to be, quote unquote, liberated or officially recognized [as] Russia. But I do have to ask you, you know, you were talking about how Trump’s going to essentially wash his hands of this, which I think is good.
I think that’s the correct move. But if the US is still supplying intelligence and maybe other things to Ukraine, who knows? I mean, iha this become Trump’s war now, or do you think there’s going to be a complete cessation of US support?
Doctorow: 7:16 I think Trump is feeling his way, because he’s walking through a minefield. He has got the hawks on Capitol Hill, which includes most of his own party at least, and the whole of the Democratic Party, who want to see the war continue, who are not enthusiastic about his rapprochement or détente with Russia.
That is not one of their priorities. Nonetheless, he is intent on pursuing a détente with Russia, for reasons that came out quite evidently in the last two weeks with respect to Iran. I was invited yesterday on Press TV Iran to comment on the final ratification of the 20-year long-term comprehensive cooperation between the two countries, because for Iran it was very important, very significant. For me, the importance of this, looking at it as a Russian observer, is that it showed to Washington how useful the Russians and Mr. Putin in particular can be in guiding their very difficult negotiations with Tehran, difficult, partly made difficult because of Trump himself and his extravagant claims of what he hoped to achieve in talks with Tehran.
8:40 But here you have a situation a bit like 2013 when Putin pulled the chestnuts out of the fire for Obama over the Syrian weapons, chemical weapons, and their eventual destruction on an American naval vessel. Obama didn’t have the depth of thinking or the political maneuver room to make use of that very big assistance he received from Putin in sparing him the need to attack Syria.
In this case with Donald Trump, Steve Witkoff has obviously appreciated fully the value of advice from the Russians in dealing with the Iranians. How to find a solution that will shut up all of the warlocks on Capitol Hill and in Tel Aviv, and yet will not encroach on the sovereignty and the dignity of Iran, which is an essential precondition for their reaching any agreement with the United States. I think also it’s conceivable the Russians will be active in the process of verification that whatever restrictions are made on the Iranian nuclear program will be carried out faithfully.
10:10 My point though is not about Iran as such. It is the usefulness of Russia in a very delicate and important diplomatic challenge that Trump has partly made for himself. This is a good signal why Russia can be of great value if the relations with the United States are somehow normalized and are removed from the context of the Ukraine-Russia war. This is where I think Trump is headed.
Now to answer your question, well, nobody has an answer to this question. I’ve asked myself this as well. What is Trump going to do about the, not just about the materiel, war materiel, still in the pipeline and being delivered to Ukraine, but what is he going to do about the intelligence, which the United States, critical intelligence, which the United States has been providing to Ukraine for its battlefield operations. As you say, if he were to continue this, then it becomes Trump’s war. There’s no way he can evade that. He and the United States will remain co-belligerents.
11:21 The question of what a co-belligerent means has been raised by the very irresponsible comments to the press, to his own Bundestag by the incoming chancellor in Germany, Merz. His idea [is] doing what the Americans have been doing and that the British and the French have been doing, supplying long-range missiles to Ukraine, doing the targeting for them. But the Germans have a weapon which is probably more dangerous for the Russians because they have no experience encountering it. So at least for an initial period, it could be a valuable asset to Ukraine. And Merz is proceeding on this, or says he will proceed on this.
12:19 And the Russians object vehemently and leave us to believe that they would strike against military assets within Germany, NATO membership or no NATO membership. So the situation around the war remains dangerous for all of us, not just for the combatants. The possibility of escalation into a general European war has not been totally removed, even if Mr. Trump’s hints that the United States will not provide Article 5 coverage to Europe have been repeatedly made.
LT: 13:08 Well, I mean, that was what I was thinking this morning, the thorn in the side that is Europe and the UK. I saw a report the Russians are claiming that the EU and the UK want to establish a naval blockade around Russia, which to that I say you and what navy. But really, how much of a thorn in the side is the EU in establishing a lasting peace, bringing an end to this? And do you think that without the United States, the EU and the UK can provide any sort of a filling of the void for Ukraine in their in their proxy conflict against Russia?
Doctorow: 13:50 Well, I’ve seen various military estimates of how long the Ukrainians can maintain the battlefield lines if the United States stops providing assistance, both intelligence and material assistance.
These vary; it could be several months, it could be a year, or it could be a week. Nobody knows for sure. There’s a big debate among experts and I don’t claim to be a military expert, But I do watch closely what they’re saying. And I see a lot of contradictions. Nobody knows for sure.
14:21 One thing is clear, that [in] reporting that you see in many of the YouTube interview programs by some credible people, they have tended to exaggerate the weakness of the Ukrainians and to overestimate the readiness of the Russians to make an all-out assault and to end the war quickly. Mr. Putin is not for that. He does not want to increase greatly the level of casualties, which has a very political sensitivity within Russia. As for Ukraine, I’ve seen reports from bloggers in Russia, or even statements from Russian soldiers in the field being interviewed by state television, indicating that the Ukrainians, despite all the discussion on how futile their recruitment efforts are, are adding young and well-trained soldiers to their battle formations.
15:32 They have not folded, they have not run away from the battlefield, they have taken enormous losses. As for example, those remaining straggling soldiers that are just across the border inside Russian Federation in Kursk and have refused to surrender. They’re being battered. And the Ukrainian losses in the Kursk adventure exceeds 75,000 dead and mutilated soldiers, which is unbelievable considering that these were among the best-trained and best-equipped units in the Ukrainian army.
16:14 Nonetheless, there is no collapse of the front lines. The Russians are advancing, it’s true, but incrementally. We heard a long time ago that Pekrovsk was under, was to be taken. Pekrovsk, or Krasnoyarsk, as the Russians call it, is an important logistics hub, which is said to be a key supplier of all the military materiel to the Ukrainian forces on the line. But it hasn’t been taken yet. The Russians are moving, as I’ve said, with great caution. The reporting that you see again on all these wonderful, often very, I say almost lurid in their, the titles they give the interviews that are appearing on YouTube, they suggest that the Ukrainians are a dollar short of ammunition; they don’t have enough artillery shells, it’s true.
17:15 But the war has evolved. The main threat the Russian forces face in Donbas is not artillery xxx counter fire. It is drones. For drones you don’t need hundreds of thousands of troops. You need a few hundred of well-trained computer programmers, gamers.
These people with latent talent are abundant in Ukraine, just as they are in Russia. And the Ukrainians have been very effectively fielding various reconnaissance and kamikaze drones, which make the Russians very cautious about massing their troops and staging anything resembling an all-out assault on the Ukrainian front.
LT: 18:05 Well, everything that you’re saying is, I think, a hundred percent correct. There’s no other reason why the pace has been as, you know, compared to the start of the conflict, it’s been as slow as it is now. Because I think both sides have been able to really improve their capabilities of drone warfare and other new sorts of warfare. And it’s, you know, you see the maps, they are only extending just several hundred meters. And that’s a huge victory for Russia at this point. It takes a lot of work to get that nowadays.
But moving aside from the front lines, if in fact the front lines were to materialize and there’d be a peace deal like what Peskov may or may not have hinted at today along the current front lines, or if the conflict drags on and the US is not party to it, do you think that there could be a dropping of US sanctions on Russia? Do you think we could see businesses coming back to Russia? I mean, some of these sanctions from the US have been here since 2014, at the start of the Maidan event. So do you think that’s something Trump would flirt with?
Doctorow: 19:31 Actually, the sanctions go back even earlier. Some go back to 2008, but mostly it was a severe package of sanctions imposed in the Magnitsky Act of 2012, about this supposed suppression of human rights and violations of the Russian prison system and so forth.
That was a very heavy set of sanctions. 2014 also was quite serious, as you say. It was serious enough, I looked at my notes recently, my notes from visiting Russia in 2014 in the autumn after the sanctions were imposed. And I can tell you right now, there was severe impact on the Russian economy in 2014, resulting from those sanctions. Indeed, it took eight years for Russia to build up a resilience to survive America’s eventual “sanctions from hell” that Victoria Nuland’s team put together, which they did successfully, but it didn’t happen at once.
20:36 Where do we go? What was the outcome? What can be the outcome if the American attempts at negotiated settlement fail? And incidentally, why would President Putin even entertain the idea of giving up the territory that is legally within the frameworks of the four oblasts that were incorporated into Russia, even if they actually weren’t held completely?
The logic is that Russia would prefer a legally agreed settlement. That will put an end to any discussion of violence, of terrorist attacks coming out of Ukraine. It would put an end to the European sanctions as well as American sanctions. And so for Russia, there is a lot to be gained by a piece of paper with signatures on it, even if I know so many … observers, so many people who may be watching this program have their doubts. “Oh, why should the Russians sign a paper when the United States does not have a commitment to anything for more than a single presidential term?”
21:57 These are all true, but there is a world out there, and the Russians will certainly build into any agreement provisions that protect them from violation. By that I mean the Russians will not accept any West European troops on Ukrainian territory or military infrastructure on Ukrainian territory. Under those circumstances, they have a long lead time before any kind of threat could emerge on the territory of rump Ukraine towards the Russian Federation. So whether Mr. Trump’s word is worth anything, the Russians can secure their own protection by the wording of the agreement and imposing what’s essentially a capitulation on Ukraine, doing that legally.
22:52 If they cannot succeed, if the Europeans continue to prop up Mr. Zelensky, and to motivate him to resist the settlements that the United States is proposing, then, of course, the Russians have their own decision to make: when they will walk away from this conflict, how much of Ukraine do they have to capture to be confident that the whole effort was worth it? I imagine the Dnieper River as a dividing line tells us where they will stop, where they don’t see any further gain for themselves by proceeding. And of course, the threats that they can make to the West European warmongers that any presence of personnel or equipment in Ukraine will be instantly destroyed by Russian bombs, missiles, and so forth. I think the Europeans, even Macron or Starmer, they understand who’s who and who has the power over that territory. So I don’t believe that they will violate the Russian prohibition on entering Ukraine.
LT: 24:19 My last question for you, Mr. Doctorow. A few weeks ago we had Zelensky come out and say, “Oh, you know, I want to do this 30 days ceasefire and hopefully we can get negotiations out of this. We can get some sort of a more lasting peace.” If these reports are true, about halting the front lines as they currently are, who do you think is in Zelensky’s ear pressuring him right now? I mean, is it Starmer? Is it the EU? Is it– who is pressuring him to continue on when this is literally what he asked for just a few weeks ago, maybe two weeks ago. And what do you think their end game is here? Because I don’t see how this could end well for them.
25:09 Well, the question of violations of the ceasefire, which is what Mr. Putin used the 30-hour ceasefire, Easter ceasefire, to exhibit, to explain the violations, the 4,000 or however many violations that they say the Ukrainians committed during this period. That was one side of the issue. But frankly speaking, it’s a lesser side. The Russians are more concerned about something else.
If they were to allow a 30-day unrestricted ceasefire, it would be used by the Western powers supporting Ukraine to move in vast amounts of personnel and equipment to prop up the regime. And they will also have a chance to rotate their military units, which the Russian constant artillery bombardment has made virtually impossible.
So the Russian advance, the Russian advantage on the battlefield, will be given away for nothing. And that is the issue, not whether the Ukrainians are going to lob some more artillery at Donetsk oblast residential areas. That’s the least of it. That’s the easiest to demonstrate.
26:42 The re-equipment of the Ukrainian army will not be easily demonstrable. It’ll all be done at night, in hiding, under forests. But the results will be to change the battlefield position, which is now very favorable to the Russians, to one which will be more balanced or perhaps favorable to the Ukrainians. That would be a very foolish thing. It sounds good, 30 days as a down payment on a peace, but you can be sure that Mr. Zelensky had no intentions of making a peace that resembles compromises or resembles an acknowledgement of who has won the war. And that is what– this refusal to accept the loss of Crimea is the perfect example. There is no flexibility. This regime remains radical, Russia-hating and unreal.
27:36 And the backers, Starmer– you asked who’s behind this. Unquestionably, Starmer is the lead, because the Brits from the very beginning, going back to 2014, have been the most anti-Russian, the most vicious in supporting a regime that they knew would fight to the death against the Russians. And that remains the case. Mr. Macron is in the game only because he as this vain man, superficial, empty chameleon, has seized this as his opportunity to move ahead of Germany as the defender of Europe. In the past, going back to the twin locomotives of the EU, Germany and France, the French had the diplomacy, foreign affairs portfolio, and the Germans had the economic portfolio.
28:35 Now the Germans are vying for the foreign affairs-military leadership of Europe. And Mr. Macron is very keen not to let the Germans run away with that as well.
LT: Well, hopefully, next time we meet and speak, it’ll be under better circumstances and there will be a peace. But given how things are going, I don’t think that’s going to be anytime soon. So Gilbert Doctorow, thank you so much for joining me today. Where should people follow along with your work and stay up to date with everything that you are publishing?
Doctorow: 29:13 Well, I’m very hopeful that they will go to my Substack platform, because that is my primary platform. I am delighted to be on a couple of rather well-viewed weekly interview programs. I’m still more delighted that those, that this one in particular is, four hours after transmission in the States, finds itself in a perfect Russian translation voiceover on the RuTube.ru internet site.
29:46 So the Russians are also watching this, but my primary audience, of course, not Russia. It is the world at large. And I find a great satisfaction that there are so many people out there who are following, looking for information and views in the alternative media, which the mainstream generally does not provide. I don’t want to say never provides, it does. Even the “Financial Times”, Russia-hating as they are in their editorial positions, does occasionally provide some useful and true information about the Russian situation. But the alternative media is of course a better source.
LT: Well thank you so much for joining me, and I really appreciate your work. So hopefully we can speak again soon.
I open this installment of my travel notes with remarks on my experience in arranging and enjoying the past three days in Moscow. What I have to say is not intended to give tips to the Community which might be useful on any future travel to and in Russia that you may be considering. All the cutting edge services I mention are accessible only if you have a Russian bank account and credit cards, from which follows the possibility to put bank Apps on your telephone and enjoy the conveniences I outline here.
My purpose is rather to share my observations on how ordinary Russians live – which, to put it succinctly, is very well indeed. For those who occupy management positions in business or even are just employees with skills in demand, their salaries support the good life I describe here. For pensioners, whose monthly allowance is very meager, there are non-monetary allotments from the government, like a couple of train trips cross country for free each year or greatly reduced airline ticket prices that make it possible to enjoy the good life even on a very small nominal budget.
I must explain here that a few very large Russian corporations see you through many different sides of consumer life. One of them now is Sber, formerly Sberbank, which has its finger in all kinds of pies and offers their Russian customers many services quite remote from banking such as shopping for and home delivery of groceries. But the single biggest helper in the travelers’ needs is Yandex, Russia’s equivalent to Google.
Yandex began life as THE search engine of Russia and then used its skills and proprietary software to take over the lives of its countrymen as a benevolent monopolist. Occasionally you encounter the downsides of its lacking competition in management failures. But nearly all the time Yandex subsidiaries do a commendable job.
Had I so desired, I could have bought our train tickets to Moscow online from Yandex Travel (Puteshestvie) but we have an old fashioned instinct and wanted to consult with a railways sales person about our choice of train and the discount that suited us best, so we made the purchase at the main railway station in Petersburg.
What it was like on the Sapsan high speed train connecting the two capitals and covering the 700 km route in exactly 4 hours I will explain below. There were several pleasant surprises for us at the level of on board service even in the Economy railway car that I will share below.
As regards reserving a hotel in Moscow, I used Yandex Travel, which served as a very efficient substitute for booking.com. I quickly waded through their list of 4 and 5 star hotels in the city center, deciding finally on a Movenpick which is managed by the French hospitality services giant Accor, and is managed very well as our stay there proved.
For those who follow the money, I inform you that since I dithered in placing our booking in what is a peak travel period, the Standard rooms were sold out and we necessarily moved up to a Superior room for the ruble equivalent of 120 euros per night without breakfast. If that sounds like a lot, bear in mind that a 22 meter very well appointed room such as we received would cost the double in any European capital and probably the triple in New York. No breakfast, but if you use your wits and order breakfast from the menu, you can nicely get by for 10 euros per person, enjoying a royal omelet and a double espresso worthy of Milano. If you are indifferent to prices, a buffet breakfast with shampanskoye is on offer for 30 euros per person. When you come after 10 am on weekends, you are treated to live piano music over breakfast. But the little secret which reception does not share with everyone, is that at level -2 the hotel has a splendid swimming pool, sauna and well-equipped workout gym available for free to guests.
Who, you may wonder, are the guests? With the exception of myself, the hotel guests this weekend were 100% Russians, nearly all couples, many with young children. I would estimate the age band of the adults as running from 25 to 35.
The Movenpick is situated 200 meters from the Taganka Theater, a landmark in Russian cultural and social history going back to the 1970s when it was directed by the free spirit Yuri Lubimov who gained special renown for staging Hamlet with the bard Vladimir Vysotsky in the title role (which I saw together with my future wife seated on stairs leading to the balcony since all seats were sold out).
In the early 1980s, Lyubimov fell afoul of the authorities due to caustic productions including Brecht’s Threepenny Opera and Good Person of Szechwan. He was compelled to emigrate, first to Israel as a refuge of convenience. He then traveled around Europe and the USA directing operas, which was an entirely new domain. Finally in the 1990s he returned home to Moscow. His theater was returned to him and he became a celebrity among Russia’s freedom fighters and a close friend of Alexander Solzhenitsyn, whose 80th birthday was feted in the theater in the presence of notables including foreign ambassadors and the mayor of Moscow, Yuri Luzhkov. I know. I was there, and strolling around this quiet corner of Moscow brought back these recollections. Moreover; Solzhenitsyn’s Museum of the Russian Emigration Abroad is just across the street from the theater, while a monument to Vladimir Vysotsky is around the corner.
It is now typical of Moscow that such small oases of culture and desirable residential buildings are to be found on one side or another of the 8 lane ‘boulevards’ like Zemlyanoi Val on which the hotel is situated that run through the center of Moscow and set this city apart from all other European capitals. Called boulevards, they are in fact highways and the only way to get across them as a pedestrian is via underground passages.
Returning to the subject of Yandex, I note that their taxis swarm the streets of Moscow and wherever in the city you may be, when you order a taxi on your telephone App, you are likely to be picked up within 5 minutes or so. The operator finds you by geolocation software and their system remembers where they delivered you recently so that when you type in the first letters of your destination they identify a driver and show you the price for various categories of car, from Economy on up.
Yandex Go, as the taxi service is called, covers the entire Russian Federation. When we arrived in Pskov on 29 April having crossed over from Estonia, my Yandex App instantly found me a driver ready to take us to our home in Petersburg 290 km to the north.
Yandex also provided us with our entertainment for Friday evening in Moscow. Their search engine listed the very few concerts being presented on this first day of a long holiday weekend when most theaters are closed. We chose the Zaryad’ya Concert Hall where Mariinsky and Bolshoi theater chief conductor Valery Gergiev was putting on Bruckner’s Eighth Symphony. Then we bought our tickets via the Yandex theater ticketing system.
Bruckner is not a favorite composer of ours, but we were keen to discover the concert hall which dates from 2018 and is where Gergiev holds his Easter Festival each year.
The concert itself was less than enjoyable. The symphony seemed disconnected and going nowhere, though there were some glorious moments of rich polyphonic sound. Saying that, I think of the comment by Hungarian conductor Ivan Fischer to those of us who came to the final rehearsal of Dvorak’s Rusalka in the Brussels opera house some years ago: ‘This opera is magnificent and if you don’t enjoy the show you have me to blame for a poor presentation of the score.’
It could well be that Gergiev gave a poor reading of the score. Boring or not, over its two hours of uninterrupted music, his rendition of the Eighth Symphony left no one snoozing. Gergiev loves FULL volume and his combined double orchestra from the two opera theaters blasted us a good deal. On the positive side, we learned that the acoustics of the Zaryad’ya concert hall are wonderful.
The Zaryad’ya seats 1,600 and it is notable for the seating configuration which wraps around the orchestra from all sides. I know of nothing similar in our part of Europe.
Another unusual aspect of the Zaryad’ya is security. When buying tickets online you are obliged to enter your passport number, issuing country, etc. And when you come to the hall, you must produce your passport together with your ticket to gain entry. I have not seen such tight control anywhere in Petersburg venues.
*****
I close these Travel Notes with some observations on the Siemens-built Sapsan trains that operate on the Moscow-St Petersburg route.
They are in perfect condition, withdrawal of the manufacturer from the Russian market notwithstanding. Punctuality is remarkable, as are cleanliness and high quality service even in Economy Class. Security is uppermost: your passport is entered into the system with your ticket; and you are allowed to board the train only after the attendant standing at the door to each wagon checks your passport against the data shown on the electronic gadget in her hands. Inside the train, it is clear that there are not only attendants to serve you but also guards to maintain order.
Our train mostly cruised at 200 km per hour. For much of the route, there was little sway or vibration, but in places there were both phenomena. The reason is that the Sapsan is running on normal Russian railway track, which is all welded to eliminate the clack-clack but is not of such precision as the French TGV rail beds, that are segregated from ordinary train tracks.
Though every seat was taken in our rail wagon, there was dead silence. Nearly all passengers were looking only at their mobile phones but no one was conversing. The reason? The train offers a broad selection of movies in all imaginable genres that you can choose to watch via their wifi channels on board. All films are Russian: there is not a single foreign film. And the majority of films are about war. There were only a couple of romances or situation comedies and a few cartoons for the kids, including the ever present Masha and the Bear. When watching, you are obliged to use earphones so that you do not disturb others.
The wifi also offers a direct connection with the bistro car so that you can order sandwiches or beverages that an attendant will bring to your seat.
As for price, in Economy it was about 50 euros per person for a round trip ticket.
Ich beginne diesen Teil meiner Reiseberichte mit einigen Anmerkungen zu meinen Erfahrungen bei der Organisation und dem Genuss der letzten drei Tage in Moskau. Was ich zu sagen habe, soll keine Tipps für die Community sein, die Ihnen bei einer möglichen zukünftigen Reise nach Russland nützlich sein könnten. Alle von mir erwähnten hochmodernen Dienstleistungen sind nur zugänglich, wenn Sie über ein russisches Bankkonto und Kreditkarten verfügen, wodurch Sie Bank-Apps auf Ihrem Telefon installieren und die hier beschriebenen Annehmlichkeiten nutzen können.
Mein Ziel ist es vielmehr, meine Beobachtungen über das Leben der einfachen Russen zu teilen – das, kurz gesagt, sehr gut ist. Für diejenigen, die Führungspositionen in Unternehmen bekleiden oder auch nur Angestellte mit gefragten Fähigkeiten sind, reichen ihre Gehälter für das gute Leben, das ich hier beschreibe. Für Rentner, deren monatliche Rente sehr gering ist, gibt es nicht-monetäre Zuwendungen von der Regierung, wie zum Beispiel ein paar kostenlose Zugfahrten pro Jahr quer durch das Land oder stark ermäßigte Flugtickets, die es ihnen ermöglichen, auch mit einem sehr geringen nominalen Budget ein gutes Leben zu führen.
Ich muss hier erklären, dass einige sehr große russische Unternehmen viele verschiedene Aspekte des Verbraucherlebens abdecken. Eines davon ist Sber, ehemals Sberbank, das seine Finger in vielen Bereichen im Spiel hat und seinen russischen Kunden zahlreiche Dienstleistungen anbietet, die nichts mit Bankgeschäften zu tun haben, wie beispielsweise den Einkauf und die Lieferung von Lebensmitteln nach Hause. Der größte Helfer für Reisende ist jedoch Yandex, das russische Pendant zu Google.
Yandex begann als DIE Suchmaschine Russlands und nutzte dann seine Fähigkeiten und seine proprietäre Software, um als wohlwollender Monopolist das Leben seiner Landsleute zu übernehmen. Gelegentlich stößt man auf die Nachteile des mangelnden Wettbewerbs in Form von Managementfehlern. Aber fast immer leisten die Tochtergesellschaften von Yandex hervorragende Arbeit.
Hätte ich gewollt, hätte ich unsere Zugtickets nach Moskau online bei Yandex Travel (Puteshestvie) kaufen können, aber wir sind altmodisch und wollten uns lieber bei einem Bahnmitarbeiter über die Zugverbindung und den für uns günstigsten Rabatt beraten lassen, also kauften wir die Tickets am Hauptbahnhof in Petersburg.
Wie es in dem Hochgeschwindigkeitszug Sapsan war, der die beiden Hauptstädte verbindet und die 700 km lange Strecke in genau 4 Stunden zurücklegt, werde ich im Folgenden erläutern. Selbst in der Economy-Klasse gab es für uns einige angenehme Überraschungen beim Service an Bord, über die ich im Folgenden berichten werde.
Für die Hotelreservierung in Moskau habe ich Yandex Travel genutzt, das sich als sehr effizienter Ersatz für booking.com erwiesen hat. Ich habe mich schnell durch die Liste der 4- und 5-Sterne-Hotels im Stadtzentrum gewühlt und mich schließlich für ein Mövenpick entschieden, das vom französischen Hotelriesen Accor geführt wird und, wie unser Aufenthalt dort gezeigt hat, sehr gut geführt ist.
Für diejenigen, die auf den Preis achten: Da ich mit der Buchung in der Hochsaison gezögert habe, waren die Standardzimmer ausgebucht und wir mussten für den Gegenwert von 120 Euro pro Nacht ohne Frühstück in ein Superior-Zimmer umziehen. Das klingt vielleicht viel, aber bedenken Sie, dass ein 22 Quadratmeter großes, sehr gut ausgestattetes Zimmer wie das unsere in jeder europäischen Hauptstadt doppelt so viel und in New York wahrscheinlich dreimal so viel kosten würde. Es gibt kein Frühstück, aber wenn man sich etwas einfallen lässt und vom Menü bestellt, kommt man für 10 Euro pro Person gut zurecht und genießt ein königliches Omelett und einen doppelten Espresso, der Milano würdig ist. Wenn Ihnen die Preise egal sind, gibt es ein Frühstücksbuffet mit Shampanskoye für 30 Euro pro Person. Wenn Sie am Wochenende nach 10 Uhr kommen, werden Sie beim Frühstück mit Live-Klaviermusik verwöhnt. Das kleine Geheimnis, das die Rezeption nicht jedem verrät, ist, dass das Hotel in der zweiten Untergeschossetage über einen herrlichen Swimmingpool, eine Sauna und einen gut ausgestatteten Fitnessraum verfügt, die den Gästen kostenlos zur Verfügung stehen.
Sie fragen sich vielleicht, wer die Gäste waren? Mit Ausnahme von mir waren alle Hotelgäste an diesem Wochenende zu 100 % Russen, fast ausschließlich Paare, viele davon mit kleinen Kindern. Ich würde das Alter der Erwachsenen auf 25 bis 35 Jahre schätzen.
Das Mövenpick liegt 200 Meter vom Taganka-Theater entfernt, einem Wahrzeichen der russischen Kultur- und Sozialgeschichte, das bis in die 1970er Jahre zurückreicht, als es von dem Freigeist Juri Lubimow geleitet wurde, der sich durch die Inszenierung von Hamlet mit dem Dichter Vladimir Vysotsky in der Titelrolle einen Namen machte (die ich damals zusammen mit meiner zukünftigen Frau auf den Treppen zum Balkon sah, da alle Plätze ausverkauft waren).
Anfang der 1980er Jahre geriet Lubimow aufgrund seiner bissigen Inszenierungen, darunter Brechts „Die Dreigroschenoper“ und „Der gute Mensch von Sezuan“, in Konflikt mit den Behörden. Er war gezwungen, zunächst nach Israel als Zufluchtsort zu emigrieren. Anschließend reiste er durch Europa und die USA und inszenierte Opern, was für ihn ein völlig neues Gebiet war. In den 1990er Jahren kehrte er schließlich nach Moskau zurück. Sein Theater wurde ihm zurückgegeben, und er wurde zu einer Berühmtheit unter den russischen Freiheitskämpfern und ein enger Freund von Alexander Solschenizyn, dessen 80. Geburtstag im Theater in Anwesenheit von Persönlichkeiten wie ausländischen Botschaftern und dem Moskauer Bürgermeister Juri Luschkow gefeiert wurde. Ich weiß das, weil ich dabei war, und ein Spaziergang durch diese ruhige Ecke Moskaus hat diese Erinnerungen wieder wachgerufen. Außerdem befindet sich Solschenizyns Museum der russischen Emigration im Ausland direkt gegenüber dem Theater, und um die Ecke steht ein Denkmal für Wladimir Wyssozki.
Es ist mittlerweile typisch für Moskau, dass solche kleinen Oasen der Kultur und begehrten Wohngebäude an der einen oder anderen Seite der achtstreifigen „Boulevards“ wie dem Zemlyanoi Val zu finden sind, die durch das Zentrum Moskaus verlaufen und diese Stadt von allen anderen europäischen Hauptstädten unterscheiden. Obwohl sie Boulevards genannt werden, handelt es sich tatsächlich um Schnellstraßen, die als Fußgänger nur über Unterführungen überquert werden können.
Um auf Yandex zurückzukommen: Die Taxis dieses Unternehmens schwärmen in den Straßen Moskaus, und egal, wo man sich in der Stadt befindet, wenn man über die App ein Taxi bestellt, wird man in der Regel innerhalb von etwa fünf Minuten abgeholt. Der Betreiber findet Sie mithilfe einer Geolokalisierungssoftware, und das System merkt sich, wo Sie zuletzt abgeholt wurden, sodass bei Eingabe der ersten Buchstaben Ihres Zielortes ein Fahrer ermittelt und Ihnen der Preis für verschiedene Fahrzeugkategorien, von Economy aufwärts, angezeigt wird.
Yandex Go, so heißt der Taxidienst, deckt die gesamte Russische Föderation ab. Als wir am 29. April aus Estland kommend in Pskow ankamen, fand meine Yandex-App sofort einen Fahrer, der bereit war, uns zu unserem 290 km nördlich gelegenen Zuhause in Petersburg zu bringen.
Yandex sorgte auch für unser Unterhaltungsprogramm am Freitagabend in Moskau. Die Suchmaschine listete die wenigen Konzerte auf, die an diesem ersten Tag eines langen Feiertagswochenendes, an dem die meisten Theater geschlossen sind, stattfanden. Wir entschieden uns für die Zaryad’ya-Konzerthalle, wo Valery Gergiev, Chefdirigent des Mariinsky- und Bolschoi-Theaters, Bruckners Achte Symphonie aufführte. Dann kauften wir unsere Tickets über das Theater-Ticketingsystem von Yandex.
Bruckner gehört zwar nicht zu unseren Lieblingskomponisten, aber wir wollten unbedingt die Konzerthalle aus dem Jahr 2018 entdecken, in der Gergiev jedes Jahr sein Osterfestival veranstaltet.
Das Konzert selbst war nicht besonders unterhaltsam. Die Symphonie wirkte unzusammenhängend und ziellos, obwohl es einige glorreiche Momente mit reichhaltigem polyphonem Klang gab. Dabei fällt mir der Kommentar des ungarischen Dirigenten Ivan Fischer ein, den er vor einigen Jahren zu uns sagte, die wir zur Generalprobe von Dvoraks „Rusalka“ in der Brüsseler Oper gekommen waren: „Diese Oper ist großartig, und wenn Ihnen die Aufführung nicht gefällt, bin ich schuld, weil ich die Partitur schlecht präsentiert habe.“
Es könnte durchaus sein, dass Gergiev die Partitur schlecht gelesen hat. Langweilig oder nicht, während der zwei Stunden ununterbrochener Musik ließ seine Interpretation der Achten Symphonie niemanden einschlafen. Gergiev liebt volle Lautstärke, und sein kombiniertes Doppelorchester aus den beiden Opernhäusern hat uns ordentlich beschallt. Positiv zu vermerken ist, dass wir gelernt haben, dass die Akustik des Zaryad’ya-Konzertsaals wunderbar ist.
Das Zaryad’ya bietet Platz für 1.600 Zuschauer und zeichnet sich durch seine Sitzanordnung aus, die das Orchester von allen Seiten umgibt. Ich kenne nichts Vergleichbares in unserem Teil Europas.
Ein weiterer ungewöhnlicher Aspekt des Zaryad’ya ist die Sicherheit. Beim Online-Kauf der Tickets muss man seine Passnummer, das Ausstellungsland usw. angeben. Und wenn man in den Saal kommt, muss man seinen Pass zusammen mit dem Ticket vorzeigen, um Zutritt zu erhalten. Eine so strenge Kontrolle habe ich in Petersburg noch nirgendwo erlebt.
*****
Ich schließe diesen Reisebericht mit einigen Beobachtungen zu den von Siemens gebauten Sapsan-Zügen, die auf der Strecke Moskau-St. Petersburg verkehren.
Sie sind in einwandfreiem Zustand, trotz des Rückzugs des Herstellers aus dem russischen Markt. Die Pünktlichkeit ist bemerkenswert, ebenso wie die Sauberkeit und der hochwertige Service, selbst in der Economy Class. Sicherheit wird großgeschrieben: Ihr Reisepass wird zusammen mit Ihrer Fahrkarte in das System eingegeben, und Sie dürfen erst in den Zug einsteigen, nachdem das Zugpersonal an der Tür jedes Waggons Ihren Reisepass mit den Daten auf dem elektronischen Gerät in der Hand verglichen hat. Im Zug ist deutlich zu erkennen, dass es nicht nur Zugbegleiter gibt, die Ihnen zur Verfügung stehen, sondern auch Sicherheitspersonal, das für Ordnung sorgt.
Unser Zug fuhr meist mit einer Geschwindigkeit von 200 km/h. Auf einem Großteil der Strecke gab es kaum Schwankungen oder Vibrationen, aber an einigen Stellen traten beide Phänomene auf. Der Grund dafür ist, dass der Sapsan auf normalen russischen Gleisen fährt, die zwar alle verschweißt sind, um das Klackern zu vermeiden, aber nicht so präzise sind wie die Gleise des französischen TGV, die von den normalen Zuggleisen getrennt sind.
Obwohl unser Zugabteil bis auf den letzten Platz besetzt war, herrschte absolute Stille. Fast alle Passagiere starrten auf ihre Handys, aber niemand unterhielt sich. Der Grund? Der Zug bietet eine große Auswahl an Filmen aller erdenklichen Genres, die man über das WLAN an Bord auswählen und ansehen kann. Alle Filme sind russisch, es gibt keinen einzigen ausländischen Film. Und die meisten Filme handeln vom Krieg. Es gab nur ein paar Liebesfilme oder Situationskomödien und ein paar Zeichentrickfilme für Kinder, darunter die allgegenwärtige „Mascha und der Bär“. Beim Anschauen muss man Kopfhörer benutzen, um andere nicht zu stören.
Das WLAN bietet auch eine direkte Verbindung zum Bistro-Wagen, sodass man Sandwiches oder Getränke bestellen kann, die einem dann an den Platz gebracht werden.
Was den Preis angeht, so kostete die Hin- und Rückfahrt in der Economy-Klasse etwa 50 Euro pro Person.
Gilbert Doctorow 