One Wild Hunt for Loneliness

One Wild Hunt for Loneliness

Nikita Mironov: In your opinion, what be will the future of Ukaine, after the referendum in Crimea ?

Alexander Dugin: Maidan will fall apart. Internal wars will start in the junta presently in power. They have no real leader. All this will create confusion and hesitation. In Ukraine there is a legally elected president – Viktor Ianoukovitch – and there is Russian Crimea, a fact that Ianoukovitch has admitted to as an accomplished fact.

Some experts say that Americans could intervene in the situation…

They have already intervened, they are the ones who have organised Maidan. They needed Russia to quarrel with Germany and with the other countries of the EU.

But why?

First of all, they need to reanimate the image of the enemy to justify their aggressive foreign policy. Secondly, they have to take control of Ukraine – economically weak but geopolitically important – in order to deploy their military bases. America is always at war against us : when we are nice with it, it’s methods are soft, but when we resist, the methods harden. Today, Russia replies to every American attack, that is why they have decided to deal seriously with us.

In what sense? We are not at war.

You are wrong. War is here. On the territory of our sister, Ukraine : they act against our interests. Russia is under pressure everywhere : North Caucasus, Maidan, the fifth column inside Russia. America would like to organize Maidan in Moscow itself. Because Putin does not submit to the United-States. He is on an equal level with them. By insisting on his notion of a multipolar world, he is trying to reinstall the role of Russia on the world scene. America does not need such a Putin, it would like to sweep him away, and bring us back to the 1990’s when the country was falling apart and was completely under American control. If Russia had ignored the events in Ukraine, these same kind of things would have happened to her.

What will America do after the referendum in Crimea?

In any case, it will try to install its military bases on Ukrainian territory. Countries who have not sorted out territorial issues cannot integrate into NATO, but that doesn’t prevent it from installing military bases on the territory of these countries – as in Kosovo or in Georgia. As well as the antimissile defence systems. And I am sure the Americans will do it.

So the strategic position of Russia is going to deteriorate?

On one side it will deteriorate, on the other, it will improve. We recover Crimea – that is an enormous advantage. Russia thus obtains new territory as well as the strategic control of the northern part of the Black Sea. And millions of Russians returning to Russia will heighten the national spirit! The return of Crimea to the fatherland will bring about a Russian spiritual revolution, no more, no less. I hope that after that we will take care of the oligarchs, who have benefited of a total impunity, and cleanse this liberal filth which has proliferated these last twenty years. Unfortunately the situation has its inconveniences : the deterioration of the relationship with Europe, hard conflict with the United States, millions of Russians taken hostage in Kiev… But I will say it again: we are not the ones who started this.

Some analysts say that the acts of Russia in Crimea will make Kazakhstan turn away from Moscow, because it’s northern part is primarily inhabited by Russians.

I know Kazakhstan very well and I can say with certainty that there never was and never will be any conflict between our two countries. President Noursoultan Nazarbaïev foresaw the situation in which Georgia and Ukraine finally found themselves. He was the first to understand the essential law of the post-soviet space : the territorial integrity of every State on the territory of the ex-USSR depends on its relationship with Russia. If the relationship is acceptable, integrity is guaranteed. No post soviet country has been blackmailed with the “Russian factor” in order to annex territories where ethnic Russians live. Not one time. And no Russian politician has ever contested the right of Kazakhstan to be sovereign. It is Nazarbaïev himself who has engaged the process of integration within the Eurasian space. He said: “I am for integration if my interests are respected.” Belarus President Loukachenko has adopted a similar stance.

So there will be no territorial disagreement with Belarus and Kazakhstan?

No. Russia has three types of dialogue: with friends, with enemies and with neutral countries. We help our friends, cooperate with the neutral, like Moldavia, but if you are an enemy – like the old Georgian Predisent Saakachvili or the Kiev junta, we will treat you as such. And we cannot assure the integrity of your territory. It is the law of geopolitics. The United States and every other big State adopts the same behavior.

In your opinion, why has NATO maintained itself while the Warsaw Pact disintegrated?

Because the United States want world hegemony : they are trying to control the world. In this context, what is left for us is to build our own military block – maybe with China, Iran, India or the countries of Latin America, to balance the power struggle. It is a question of life or death. And we need an independent Europe, independent from the United States. When Putin speaks of the united Europe, from Lisbon to Vladivostok, he is not a hypocrite. He really has the desire to see a big Europe, strong and independent.

What consequences for Russia would the hypothetical breaking apart of Ukraine have?

Why hypothetical ? Ukraine has already fallen apart, that is a fact. Ianoukovitch admits it. I think for Russia it will not be easy. It is possible that Russia will incorporate the eastern part of Ukraine and will receive western refugees. On the other hand, even if that sounds cynical, it is to our advantage to have in western Ukraine a State of maniacs. Otherwise these people with their madness will contaminate people of sound mind. If these guys isolate themselves, it will be horrible. Western Ukraine has almost no resources. It is a poor region, with many armed madmen who are soon going to start killing each other, I think.

Translated by Venator for Open Revolt

Alexander Dugin (b. 1962) is one of the best-known writers and political commentators in post-Soviet Russia. In addition to the many books he has authored on political, philosophical and spiritual topics, he currently serves on the staff of Moscow State University, and is the intellectual leader of the Eurasia Movement. For more than a decade, he has also been an adviser to Vladimir Putin and others in the Kremlin on geopolitical matters.