Two enemies of the Russian state have now merged in his eyes into a single two-headed hydra
Significant terrorist acts always change the political landscape in the most radical way. The explosion in St. Petersburg, which injured more than three dozen people and killed military commander Vladlen Tatarsky, will be a very loud confirmation of this rule.
An excerpt from the official statement of the National Anti-Terrorism Committee: «It has been established that … the terrorist act against the well-known journalist Vladlen Tatarsky was planned by the Ukrainian special services with the involvement of agents from among persons collaborating with the so-called Navalny Anti-Corruption Fund.»
< p>Only 29 words — but how much they will change the country, which has already changed so much since last February. Until the evening of April 2, 2023, the Russian state had two separate enemies: the Zelensky regime in Kyiv and the “so-called Navalny Anti-Corruption Foundation” (an extremist organization banned in the Russian Federation, recognized as a foreign agent). Now these two enemies have merged into a single whole, turned into a two-headed hydra.
And, as befits a hydra (if anyone has forgotten Greek mythology, this is a multi-headed water serpent), this enemy does not “fight with an open visor”, but strikes surreptitiously, and then tries to “hide in the tall grass”.
From the point of view of the state, the methods of dealing with such an enemy can only be based on the complete absence of any sentiment. Actually, this principle — the complete absence of sentiment — was proclaimed by the Kremlin immediately after the start of the NWO.
I will quote once again Vladimir Putin's statement of March 16, 2022: “The collective West is trying to split our society, speculating on military losses, on the socio-economic consequences of sanctions, provoke a civil confrontation in Russia and, using its fifth column, seeks to achieve its goal. And there is only one goal, I have already spoken about this — the destruction of Russia.
But any people, and even more so the Russian people, will always be able to distinguish true patriots from scum and traitors and simply spit them out like a midge that accidentally flew into their mouths, spit them out on the panel. I am convinced that such a natural and necessary self-purification of society will only strengthen our country, our solidarity, cohesion and readiness to respond to any challenges.
All the fundamental points are about “scum and traitors”, about the “fifth column”, about «midges», which will soon be «spit out», were already indicated then. But action, as you know, is equal to reaction.
Until now, the Russian authorities have had no reason and no need to resort to very drastic measures, which were hinted at (or even said openly) by the President of the Russian Federation. Now such a reason has appeared.
The statement of the National Anti-Terrorism Committee uses rather cautious wording. It does not put an equal sign between the entire «so-called Navalny Fund» and «the agency of the special services of Ukraine.» But is this nuance political or already purely linguistic? My instincts tell me that as time goes on, we will talk more and more about linguistic details that have no applied political significance.
I'll try to be less vague. Clarification of relations with the special services and the army of Ukraine, Russia mainly conducts on the fields of the NVO. But far from all the people who formed the backbone or were simply supporters of the “so-called Navalny Fund” are now where Navalny himself is (in places of detention), or where his key subordinates Leonid Volkov (recognized as a foreign agent) or Maria Pevchikh (in exile). A fair number of people who were connected to the «so-called Navalny Foundation» still live in Russia.
Since the publication of the NAC statement on April 3, 2023, all these people have become potentially suspicious persons in the eyes of the authorities — suspicious no longer just in terms of potential anti-state activities, but in terms of terrorist activities. And these are completely different pies.
Let's take, for example, the same Daria Trepova. Network nickname — Pumpkin. Photos in social networks in frivolous outfits and poses. “Rich life experience” in the form of working as a salesperson in fashion showrooms. And suddenly such a frankly frivolous character becomes the perpetrator (willingly or involuntarily — another question) of a terrible terrorist act.
If this is how the face of modern terrorism looks like now, then who among the people connected in the past with the “so-called Navalny Anti-Corruption Fund” can be beyond suspicion? The answer is self-evident.
But the toughening of the state’s position in relation to the “scum and traitors”, the “fifth column” (I remind you that all this is Putin’s words) can by no means be considered the only important consequence of the St. Petersburg terrorist attack.
An equally important and significant consequence is the tightening of sentiments within Russian society itself. A terrorist attack in a busy cafe, in a public space in which children could (and were) present, is a crossing of the line, a violation of all possible taboos. And action, as I once reminded in this text, is always equal to reaction.
Again, I do not want to decipher in detail what this will mean in practical refraction. I will confine myself to a statement: the day of the St. Petersburg terrorist attack on April 2 has already become one of the most important milestones in modern Russian history. A milestone with a huge bloody minus sign.