Defeat is Freedom
The Russian poet Gorodnitsky has a confusing stanza in his song about the Decembrists (who tried to overthrow the Tzar in 1825):
Пусть запомнят потомки на все времена,
Добывая победу в сраженье:
Не всегда для свободы победа нужна,
Ей нужнее порой — пораженье.
(Let our descendants always remember
As they struggle for victory in battle
That freedom doesn’t always need victory
Sometimes defeat is freedom.)
The Decembrists tried to win their freedom from the Tzar. Instead they were sent to Siberia… How was that freedom? But all my life I’ve returned to these words. Especially now.
Putin charmed Russia. He had the scent of victory on him: a young martial artist, a KGB agent from Germany (like a popular TV show hero, Shtirlitz, a sort of soviet Bond). What a contrast with the obese, drunk Yeltsin! Russia was going to be great again.
Under Yeltsin, Russians suffered humiliating defeats in Chechnya and Yugoslavia, to say nothing of Afghanistan. Now, wait a minute — why do Russians feel bad about defeats in other countries? Why were Russians even trying to keep Chechnya?
Because we were addicted to Empire, to land, to a notion of greatness. The USSR fell when I was eleven; I remember not feeling sorry for the communists (my family had suffered under them I learned) but I did feel sorry that Russia was no longer the largest country. Isn’t that ridiculous? Childish?
Not letting Chechnya go when they refused to join the Russian Federation in ’91 was childish as well. It led to immense suffering. Desiring Crimea is childish. So what if Khruschev gave it to Ukraine? He gave it, didn’t he? What’s done is done. It was not some sort of promised land for Russia. It was actually taken by force. Childish.
Childish, childish… defeat is freedom. Defeat teaches children that actions have consequences. That what we desire with the whole of our little egos may be harmful, hurtful, wrong.
For the Decembrists defeat meant literal freedom. Gorodnitsky loved Siberian country. It was far from authorities, he could breathe freely, and he thought the Decembrists could, too. “The further from Moscow, the freer the air”. That’s why he wrote what he did.
For Russia, defeat will be spiritual freedom. Freedom from the need to control and conquer. Freedom to let people go and to leave them alone. Freedom to look at ourselves and ask, “Now what?” and find ordinary, human answers: family, friends, love, work, freedom.