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Peering into Putin’s Soul
January 7, 2008 |
Does Vladimir Putin have a soul? He doesn’t if you ask Hillary Clinton. In a campaign stump in New Hampshire, Clinton pondered the existence of Putin’s soul as a means to crack at George Bush’s foreign policy. She said:
“Bush really premised so much of our foreign policy on his personal relationships with leaders, and I just don’t think that’s the way a great country engages in diplomacy. . . . This is the president that looked in the soul of Putin, and I could have told him, he was a KGB agent. By definition he doesn’t have a soul. I mean, this is a waste of time, right? This is nonsense, but this is the world we’re living in right now.”
The comment drew laughs and applause from a Democratic crowd always eager to hear jabs at the Prez they love to hate. Forget for a moment that Clinton’s beating up on lame duck Bush only shows how desperate she is. She has nothing to offer but Bush-lite (though I’m positive that all Obama has to offer is Clinton-lite. That’s only two short degrees from Bush by my count.) But the inanity of American democracy is not the issue here.
The issue is Putin’s soul. For a genealogy of its nature we have to begin not with Bush, but with Putin himself. In October 1999, Putin speaking on Ukraine’s desire to become chummy with NATO made a collective assessment of not only his soul, but of the entire CIS. “Both Ukraine and Russia, as well as many other CIS countries, are in the process of soul-searching, seeking to clarify their positions in the world,” he told reporters. “To do so, one should not look only to the West or only to the East. Above all, one should look inside one’s own country to see what its people want and expect.” (BBC Summary of World Broadcasts, 10/10/99). Putin didn’t have a clue where to find his or Russia’s soul and decided that it would be best to look everywhere.
The Western media also seemed to think that Putin was missing a soul. More specifically he lacked the gregarious Russian soul that so personified Boris Yeltsin. In the Daily Mail on January 1, 2000, Owen Matthews wrote “Whatever his failings, Yeltsin is loaded with that indefinable Russian quality, dusham (soul) whereas Putin is as colourless as a winter evening in Moscow.” While Matthews thought Putin’s soul, if he indeed had one, to be colorless, Itar-Tass thought that its nature was best found in Putin’s love for animals. In a report titled “Putin Bares Soul on Animal Rights in Letter to Brigitte Bardot,” Putin was said to have told the French actress, “[Animals] live alongside with us on our planet, on our land and their fate depends on us to a large degree. That is why people must always behave in a humane way both towards other people and towards animals” (Itar-Tass, 1/5/2000). By February 2000, Putin’s soul went beyond a warmness for animals and began showing its political side. The Financial Times‘ John Thornhill declared that the approaching Presidential elections signaled that “the battle for Vladimir Putin’s political soul was intensifying” (FT, 2/8/2000). Putin won that battle but not without the help of some “dead souls” reported the Moscow Times (9/9/2000).
The exact nature of Putin’s soul came under more focus after his electoral victory. In an editorial in the Sunday Times, historian Robert Service appeared to have looked into Putin’s soul and found “the words “order” and “power” engraved on [it]” (Sunday Times, 10/22/2000). The London Times suggested that this true nature of Putin’s soul was being shrouded that the soft, sweet, but firm imagine of him emerging from his cult of personality. The “Putin cult” painted him as neither zoophiliac nor power imprinted figure but as a a dedicated “church goer and guardian of Russia’s soul” (2/10/2001).
The most talked about definition of Putin’s soul, however, came in June 2001 when George Bush peered into Putin’s soul at their first meeting at Brdo, Slovenia. In his now infamous statement on Putin’s soul, Bush said, “I looked the man in the eye. I found him to be very straightforward and trustworthy. We had a very good dialogue. I was able to get a sense of his soul; a man deeply committed to his country and the best interests of his country.” He then added, “I wouldn’t have invited him to my ranch if I didn’t trust him.”
Bush’s playing soul doctor has been lambasted ever since. The NY Times’ Thomas Friedman called Bush and Putin “soul brothers” (6/29/2001). Contra Bush, the Washington Post argued that Putin’s service in the KGB “calls the quality-of-soul claim into some doubt” (6/27/2001). A few days latter, the WP again questioned the real nature Putin’s soul. “We’re still hoping to get that glimpse of Mr. Putin’s soul that President Bush talked about last month,” wrote the Post’s editors (7/5/2001). Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez however bucked the emerging conventional wisdom. In talks with Putin, Chavez expressed gratitude to the Russian President “for the generosity of his soul.” This is probably one of the only times Bush and Chavez would see eye to eye on something (Itar-Tass, 10/22/2001).
Bush’s assessment of Putin stuck and he continued to be excoriated for it in the press. It appeared that every time Putin did something the West didn’t like, the press reminded its readers of Bush “looking into his soul.” By 2004, if the Christian Science Monitor’s Daniel Schorr is to be believed, the day Bush blandished Putin’s soul was “a dim memory.” Now Putin was “an authoritarian ruler [who] sees his regime trembling on the brink of destabilization and is running scared” (9/17/2004). Was this the return of the repressed KGB soul? A new kinda running scared soul? Where is St. Peter when you need him?
For most commentators, Putin’s increasing grip on the Russian body politic made his soul merely a facsimile of a Soviet dictator. Since the Soviets were all godless communists, there is no way that Putin possessed a soul. At least not one worthy of divine appreciation. This of course is despite the fact that Putin considers himself a devout Orthodox Christian. Eastern perversion of Christianity doesn’t make the cut among America’s Protestants. Their soul has no middle ground. It’s nature is either of good or of evil. The soul of a chekist is always dyed black. It’s even in their eyes. As John McCain said, “I looked into his eyes and saw three letters: a K, a G and a B.”
With Clinton the search for Putin’s soul continues.
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Eastern perversion of Christianity doesn’t make the cut among America’s Protestants. Their soul has no middle ground. It’s nature is either of good or of evil.
I would suggest that this applies to only a small minority of America’s protestants, albeit a vocal minority.
Sean,
as always, a great historical perspective. A unique Russia blog in that regard. Great work! Keep it up!
I would suggest that this applies to only a small minority of America’s protestants, albeit a vocal minority.
Election totals for Mike Huckabee would suggest it is a bigger vocal minority than you believe. The Republican party under George W. Bush has increasingly become the party of the religious social conservative right, rather than the fiscal conservative right.
In conversations with friends and associates (when the topic arises) time and time again, the stereotype remains that Russians are not religious and certainly Putin is not religious.
I have a coworker here who is a Quaker and she happens to know my interest in Russia and such other details. Last week she told me about some Quaker friends of hers that are moving to Russia, to conduct some sort of missionary work there. On almost every flight that I’ve had to Russia over the last 5 years, I’ve encountered religious youth groups or missionary groups seeking to recruit or in their mind “help” the godless Russians.
So I believe there is a persistent image in minds of many Americans that Russia is godless after years of communism, and the Russian orthodox church is somewhat considered irrelevant or at least rather passive. I can say also that to Americans, you are not religious unless you attend church on a regular basis, which flies in the face of many orthodox Russians, who consider themselves religious without attending church regularly.
I believe if a poll could be conducted of Americans asking 1) Are Russians religious? and 2) Do you consider Vladimir Putin a religious man? a clear majority would answer “No” to both questions. If you followed up with asking Americans 3) Are Americans religious? and 4) Do you consider George Bush a religious man? I believe a majority of Americans would answer “Yes” to both questions.
I would suggest that this applies to only a small minority of America’s protestants, albeit a vocal minority.
The unstated issue behind my statement about Protestant’s concept soul being either good or evil comes from the fact that they don’t believe in a purgatory. Therefore when it comes to divine judgment, for Protestants you are either going to heaven or hell. There is no middle ground.
Though I have to say that Catholics seem to be adopting this binary understanding of the soul. My super catholic aunt has a tendency to sound more like a Fundy everyday.
I do not believe the majority of Americans have ever heard of the Russian Orthodox Church.
I do not believe the majority of Americans have ever heard of the Russian Orthodox Church.
It is quite possible that they/we are that stupid, even though throughout the Midwest they are a prevalent church, and their services and such are essentially the same as the Greek Orthodox Church.
I think there is only 1 Russian Orthodox church that I am aware of in my little hick state of New Hampshire (that one is in Manchester and my eye doctor of Karpathian origin attends).
Lending weight to your point, as I recall the eye doctor’s receptionist happened to glimpse my cross and recognized it as something similar to what the good doctor wore, but she had no idea what it was or why. To her it probably seemed as if we both belonged to some goofy cult that wore strange crosses.
FWIW, there is an OCA (Orthodox Church of America, which basically got started by Russian emigres) in Claremont, New Hampshire. The rector of that church is Russian born Fr. Andrei Tregubov. Berlin, NH, also has an OCA church.
*Rolling eyes* (But I won’t say at who!)
Those damn christianists! What depths of stupidity will they stoop to next!?!
Seriously, some of you need to get out more. Some of the characterizations of Christians in America here are laughable. It will probably come as no surprise to most here that I consider myself a Christian of the more protestant, non-denominational strain of thought. Have many friends and family who fit into the same category as well. The only ones who support Huckbee are those that are not aware of his positions on policy. Huckabee may very well be a Christian but he is not a conservative (in the modern definition of such), he is just another Jimmy Carter, only this time with a “R” after is name instead of a “D”, and he would be just as disastrous for American domestic and foreign policy as was Carter.
Chris is probably right that many Americans do not know what Orthodox Christianity is or entails. Those that are aware of it, don’t know much more about it other than that its followers seem to have a fondness for pictures of Jesus, Mary, or the saints with bling. It can most likely be explained by the fact that historical immigration to the US from countries where Orthodox Christianity is practiced has been relatively low.
As for the fact of Clinton dogging on Putin, its just more evidence that all humans require someone that they can look down on and point to as inferior. For many, Bush fulfills this role and gives their lives meaning, for others as indicated in the comments, its Christians.
A couple weeks back Putin was compared to Reagan here. I think the comparison is valid. Putin has done much to improve the moral of his country. Putin and Bush are also probably more alike than many would imagine, and is why they hit it off so well together. They are both very proud of their respective countries, though, which is probably where the friction ends up coming into play.
They’re not stupid, just poorly informed, like the many Russians who think the US is a Catholic country. Lots of people just don’t have much formal education. My sister had never heard of Stalingrad until last month.
Yeah Kolya, my roommate in grad school converted to Orthodoxy. I know this stuff.
Seriously, some of you need to get out more. Some of the characterizations of Christians in America here are laughable.
I can’t say I disagree. Given some on here spend half their time (rightly) complaining about lazy, ill-informed sweeping stereotypes about Russians made in various media outlets, their is an awful lot of the same thing going on here about Americans and the West.
“their” should be “there”. Groan.
Pardon for the misspell?
It can most likely be explained by the fact that historical immigration to the US from countries where Orthodox Christianity is practiced has been relatively low.
Depends on what you consider to be low. As I mentioned earlier, many regions in the Midwest have deep Orthodox Slavic roots. Cleveland, Pittsburgh, and the Steel/Rust belt, Chicago, and Minnesota all have long Slavic histories. About 22% of the immigrants that came from Europe in the years 1899 to 1910 (when detailed records were first kept) were Slavic, which is roughly 2.2 million people. Only about 60% of those were Orthodox, of course (Poles and others being Catholic). Still you’re talking about approximately 10% of the immigrant population a century ago. For comparison, Italian immigration peaked around the same time, and was roughly 1.8 million during the same time frame. (Both Slavic and Italian immigration figures are from NewAdvent.org Catholic Encyclopedia discussion of immigration to the US).
The only ones who support Huckbee (sic) are those that are not aware of his positions on policy.
Apparently, that is quite a large number of people, given his winning Iowa caucuses during a record turn-out.
Regardless of Huckabee’s final showing in the Republican primaries, the fact remains that his presence steers political candidates towards the right on discussions of religion.
For the record, statistics show that the US is the largest church-going nation among the Western nations. 2005 Barna Research poll indicated that 47% of Americans claimed to “attend church in a given weekend, not including a special event such as a wedding or a funeral.” Gallup Research Polls indicate that roughly 40% of Americans answer positive to the question “did you attend church or synagogue in the last seven days, or not?”
For various reasons, research shows that Americans likely overstate their claims regarding church attendance. However, the figures still show that Americans consider church attendance a significant part of their religious devotion.
FWIW, there is an OCA (Orthodox Church of America, which basically got started by Russian emigres) in Claremont, New Hampshire.
Claremont is over there near Vermont, about 2 or 2-1/2 hours away, so I didn’t actually know about that church. Berlin, NH might as well be Canada, that’s about 3+ hours from here.
The church in Manchester that I mentioned is St. Peter and Paul OC. As I just happened to look, I see there is also St. John the Russian OC in Ipwsich, Massachusetts, not far from my work. Various others in northern Massachusetts are closer than the other two cited in NH, but thanks Kolya.
“As I mentioned earlier, many regions in the Midwest have deep Orthodox Slavic roots. Cleveland, Pittsburgh, and the Steel/Rust belt, Chicago, and Minnesota all have long Slavic histories.”
And the majority of Americans live somewhere along the two coasts…
Wally, I can’t disagree with you on Huckabee’s showing in Iowa other than to state that no matter which side of the political aisle, Iowans are just weird. I can’t say that they are crazy, or stupid, or really anything derogatory like that, it’s just that they are not quite right in some way. That said, I might be suffering from some myopia myself. Being a policy wonkish sort, it drives me nuts to think someone would vote for a presidential candidate based purely on identity politics. It happens I suppose, but I would like to think that went it comes to pulling the lever, each voter has done his or her research. Pretty polly-annish of me I guess, but it lets me sleep at night.
In my town of some 300k out here in western portion of the Midwest, there are I believe couple or more orthodox churches, both Russian and Greek. I know one was operating out of this tiny house, which looked fairly ordinary from the outside save the fact that someone had built a small cupola on the roof. It was cute, but I don’t know how they were able to fit more than 5 people in that house at any one time. They also show an orthodox service on the public access channel, but probably most see it and think “oh, ‘culture’…next” and flip the channel. It wouldn’t surprise me if most of the audience for the orthodox churches here are Bosnian refugees oddly enough. We have bunch of them here and I don’t think many of them, if any, are Muslim.
I think there are a lot of missionary trips to Russia, because it sounds like fun to the kids going, and yeah everyone thinks Russians are still godless, commie bastards. There are also a ton of missionary trips to Mexico and South America and everyone knows that they are catholic. But those pesky Protestants believe Catholics need saving too, just like the heathens.
This is quite tangential to the subject at hand, but I did my graduate work at a Catholic university in the mid- to late-90s, and a lot of the Catholic intellectuals there were quite enamoured with Orthodoxy. I think it was quite trendy.
I’m inclined to agree with CM here that most Americans have no idea about (1) the Russian Orthodox Church or (2) Putin.
What’s more striking to me with all the flak over Bush’s comment, Hillary’s comment on the comment and McCain’s KGB rejoinder is that none of them are really a critique of the Bush regime’s foreign policy, which is not too dissimilar from Clinton foreign policy (past, or presumably future). So all Hillary is left with is a critique of Bush’s reasoning (or lack thereof), since extending beyond that puts her on dangerous ground. Making fun of Bush’s verbal follies is easy pickings, but ultimately distracting, I think, from a reasoned examination of the tragedy of American foreign policy.
Much like peering into Putin’s soul is substituted for a reasoned examination of the complex nature of Russian society and politics.
Making fun of Bush’s verbal follies is easy pickings, but ultimately distracting, I think, from a reasoned examination of the tragedy of American foreign policy.
I’m of the belief they choose this path because a reasoned examination of American foreign policy would not paint a picture of tragedy to anywhere near the extent that is commonly believed. The last thing a Clinton would want to do is to get into specifics about what to do and what not to do as regards foreign policy over a two-term presidency.
“a reasoned examination of German foreign policy would not paint a picture of tragedy to anywhere near the extent that is commonly believed.”
Didn’t they say something like this after the Battle of Stalingrad?
Does Hillary Clinton have clitoris? No she doesn’t if you ask Monica.
This is nonsense, but this is the world we’re living in right now. :))
(c) 2008 some unknown Russian aka papasha_mueller
I think there are a lot of missionary trips to Russia, because it sounds like fun to the kids going, and yeah everyone thinks Russians are still godless, commie bastards.
For readers taking this totally at face value, I want to report on one trip taken by an evangelical Quaker youth group to Russia last summer. Yes, they expected a fun time, and they had one–thanks to good leadership, to hospitable families for the home-stay portion of the trip, and not least, thanks to the good brains that these kids brought along. I don’t believe they ever thought Russians were a bunch of godless commies, but they came home with a wealth of new impressions that will surely ripple out among their families and friends.
I cringe when I think of affluent American kids treating the world as their playground, but for them never to leave home, never to risk being foolish, never to encounter overseas realities (however poorly they might interpret them) would be far worse.
And to every American who has had the good fortune to travel or live overseas in academic or professional capacities, and who then wants to hoard such opportunities for themselves and other “old hands” and save the world from their unwashed fellow Americans, I have to wonder whether you went directly from infancy to the witty sophisticate you now think you are, without going through the usual awkward adolescent “gee-whiz” phase. This isn’t aimed at anyone here–I’m just on a tangent from Jason’s original comment. Thanks for hearing me out.
(PS: And a lot of us Protestants are not quite that casual about assuming we know who is and isn’t going to be saved!)
Didn’t they say something like this after the Battle of Stalingrad?
No.
Actually, they did.
“Anweisung für antibolshewistische Propaganda-Aktion,” 20 February 1943. The document is the work of the Main Office (Hauptamt) for Propaganda. The original is at the Bundesarchiv Berlin (signature NSD 12/74).
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Directive for the Anti-Bolshevist Propaganda Action
—————–
The ultimate conclusion of this propaganda action must be the absolute affirmation of the whole people to the Führer. The Führer alone led the NSDAP to power ten years ago, and thus built a protective wall against the Bolshevist danger that year by year grew more dangerous for Germany and for Europe. The Führer alone had the genius to see the imminent threat of a Bolshevist attack and prevented it through his heroic decision, thus sparing our people from infinite misery, sorrow, and horror. The Führer created the German military, the sword that alone is able to defeat Bolshevism.
“We will win because Adolf Hitler leads us!”
This slogan must be the logical conclusion of this action.
The thanks that we owe the Führer for saving our people is so great that we can never repay him. The least that he can demand of us is a faith in him that can be shaken by nothing, regardless of what happens, a faith that will flow like a river of power through our people and lead to victory. We owe him absolute allegiance. More than ever, everyone’s slogan must be:
“Führer command, we will obey!”
http://www.calvin.edu/academic/cas/gpa/bolshevist.htm
Actually, they did.
If by “they” you mean those who ran Hitler’s propaganda machine and a select few of Hitler’s inner circle, then you are right.
But to most Germans, including most of the German army, the defeat at Stalingrad was nothing less than a tragedy, and acknowledged as such in letters home, diaries, memoirs, and contemporary reports.
But it’s interesting that you equate those who believe the presidency of Bush Jr. has not been an unmitigated disaster with those Germans who believed the Battle of Stalingrad was nothing more than a hiccup in the fortunes of the Third Reich. I remember laughing at those who first wrote that Baghdad would be defended like Stalingrad, and later those who thought the Iraq War was like the Battle of Stalingrad. I guess some things just are prone to be hammered to fit metaphors.
“But to most Germans, including most of the German army, the defeat at Stalingrad was nothing less than a tragedy, and acknowledged as such in letters home, diaries, memoirs, and contemporary reports.”
As Iraq is to most Americans today. You seem to think most Americans approve of Bush’s foreign policy and people who disapprove are just a few nay-sayers. They don’t. It is highly unpopular.
As Iraq is to most Americans today. You seem to think most Americans approve of Bush’s foreign policy and people who disapprove are just a few nay-sayers. They don’t. It is highly unpopular.
I’m saying no such thing. My point was that a reasoned examination of American foreign policy would not paint a picture of tragedy to anywhere near the extent that is commonly believed. You then said the Germans thought the same thing as regards their foreign policy after the battle of Stalingrad. They did not.
I meant _some_ Germans.
Знакомое лицо…, где-то я его видел ))
If you do a google search for “Putin” and “soul”, you get 339,000 hits, and they all refer to Bush’s comment!!
If you do a google search for “Putin” and “soul”, you get 339,000 hits, and they all refer to Bush’s comment!!
That’s why I thank god that my university affiliation gives me access to Lexis-Nexis. Without it, I would have never known that Putin’s soul was a topic that went beyond Bush’s comment.
i would take exception to this characterization of putin as devoid of a soul, although i’m a ginormous hillary pusher when it comes to american politics. the only argument for his not having a soul that i could discern is his service record with the kgb. but this is preposterous. if that is so, then anybody who has ever worked for, or at, the cia is equally soulless, which means bush the daddy is soulless, and which by extension means bush the sonny is without a soul too simply because of heredity, for a father and a mother without a soul (nobody has ever accused good ole barbs of having something as human as soul, it shriveled away long ago in her lineage as an atavistic appendage) could ever produce soul-having offspring. after all, an organization that practices torture in the form of water-boarding and god knows what else as wantonly and systematically as the cia, an organization that puts together glob-trotting rendition squads all but condemning the unfortunates thus rendered to years of torture and a high probability of death, cannot be spoken of as having a clear conscience and unblemished soul. so if the kgb is bad, then so is the cia. if the kgb makes its alumni soulless, then so does the cia and other intelligence community agencies. after all, what is good for the goose is good for the gander.
moreover, what the west cannot seem to wrap their heads around is that kgb provenance is no telltale sign of political nefariousness. the kgb was en elite organization in the ussr, much more so than the cia under dulles or the fbi under hoover could ever aspire to be. it cherry picked the best and the brightest and infused them with a sense of duty and obligation to the nation (motherland in communist-inspired parlance). naturally, when the communist party and the rest of the soviet authority pillars, including the army and the ministry of the interior, collapsed that left the kgb as the only source of intelligent, educated, multilingual people to staff important government positions, people who, while not entirely neglecting their own bank accounts, can and do prioritize government interests as paramount. just because the west disagrees with how they define those interests, it does not mean the kgb people in positions of power r incarnations of evil. sure, kgb legacy politicians have their shortcomings stemming from their spy agency associations. luck of trust, conspiracy mentality, defining public interest as always prevalent over the individual who can be run over roughshod if needs be, all of that r clearly handicaps. russia needs a new generation of leaders who will combine the duty-bound mentality of the present kgb people with the open-mindedness and forward-thinking russia will have to have to transform itself into an economic powerhouse that could deal on equal terms with europe, america, india, and china. medvedev, might, and i repeat, MIGHT be such a leader. but for the time being, the kgb alumni r all there is to be had. they r the best russia has for the lack of something better, at least for the time being.
The West’s image of the KGB is based on the KGB as depicted in Hollywood movies, not the actual KGB.