Literally the previous day representatives of the president were saying Rutskoy and Khasbulatov had taken hundreds of blameless citizens hostage to further their criminal plans. In the White House, with the exception of a handful of opportunists, there were numerous members of the service staff, administrative staff, journalists, deluded ‘defenders’ and, finally, deputies sincerely standing by their constitutional principles, And these people, cooped up in there, are who the troops began ruthlessly murdering. The actual gunmen and instigators of the rioting, as it turned out, got off most lightly. That is what I was warning against during the day on Sunday 3 October.
By the way, as we now know, Rutskoy and Khasbulatov were trying to continue negotiations through Interfax and Defence Minister Pavel Grachev. They were prepared to surrender. That offer should have been accepted.
In my opinion, what happened at the White House was completely unjustified retribution. Several days have passed and the bodies of the dead have still not been released from the building, supposedly because they are being examined by investigators. That is sacrilege! The impression is that the authorities are trying to conceal the fact that hundreds of people have been killed in the White House. In broad daylight! In front of an enormous crowd! We have descended into the first stages of lunacy. Our army has been forced to shed blood. It is unforgivable. This tragedy has been brought about by the leaders of the Supreme Soviet, the presidency, the executive branch – and it has totally discredited them. Today, none of them have any right to remain in power.
Q: Well, at least the Kremlin is not trumpeting its victory.
A: I am glad they have toned down the triumphalism and war cries like ‘Crush the nest of vipers!’
The press is already using the kind of language and tone and expressing the kind of concern that we should be hearing at this terrible time. Many people are aware that, after what has happened, we cannot continue to behave as we have been.
Finally, even the president in his address said this was a tragedy, not a victory. He has declared a period of mourning and spoken the kind of words that are appropriate on a day like this. But for the rest… One has the impression Yeltsin’s aim is to intimidate Russia, to intimidate people even more. And then what? I heard nothing constructive. Nothing more than, in effect, do away with the soviets!
Q: Mikhail Sergeyevich, you keep criticizing the president, but actually some people see a logical chain of development: Gorbachev spawned Yeltsin, Yeltsin spawned Rutskoy and Khasbulatov.
A: That is a very superficial analysis. New movements and personalities have appeared as society is developing. It is historically conditioned.
Q: I am just remembering that in the last years of your presidency there was also talk of declaring a state of emergency.
A: Indeed there was, and when I was president I often heard people demanding I should declare a state of emergency and introduce presidential rule.
Otherwise, they would say, step down! I was under constant siege! But I did not fall for it. For me, the option of shedding blood was unacceptable, dividing society into Reds and Whites, wanting to devastate the opposition. That does not mean things always turned out as I might have wished, but I was guided by deep moral convictions. I tried to hold back those on both sides, move democratic processes forward to the point where they would become irreversible. But now look at the state we are in!
Look! Again we are seeing basic political, economic, social and constitutional rights of citizens violated; again we are seeing Glasnost, transparency, openness throttled. What use are all these manifestos and concepts if, ultimately, we are dragged into a bloodbath?
Q: Do you not think we have to look for the origins of the tragedy not in how Yeltsin behaved, or Khasbulatov or the army…
A: I do not believe it was possible to implement reform without consulting the people, by just treating them like building bricks for constructing a democratic country. The new government of Russia embarked on a cavalry charge that has brought the state to its knees. Instead of reform we have had ‘Mighty Breakthroughs’, ‘Chairman Mao’s Great Leap Forward’. That is neo-Bolshevism.
Where do we find the roots of today’s bloody tragedy? They date from the moment when the wrong policies were adopted. Where were Yeltsin, Rutskoy, Khasbulatov and their supporters then? They were all in the same boat. Then Yeltsin and Gaidar started pushing through their shock therapy, their high-speed method of reforming the economy to show Gorbachev and his supporters the proper way to effect social change. But before they could do that, the policy had to be approved by the parliament and congress! Who gave the president the right to issue statutory decrees? The Supreme Soviet and all the deputies in congress assembled!
Do you know when all this free-for-all started? When they saw the results of their joint endeavours! The Commonwealth of Independent States did not work, the country was torn apart, the economy collapsed, centuries-old human ties were ruptured. Seventy per cent of citizens found themselves on the poverty threshold. That was when the president and the Congress started noticing alarm signals. The deputies were more sensitive because most of them live in the provinces and see everything with their own eyes. That is when they started arguing over who was more to blame. They are all to blame: the Supreme Soviet, the Congress of People’s Deputies and the president. Instead of recognizing that, they started feuding with each other and have reduced Russia to a state where we are all covered in blood. And to cap it all, the belligerents all see themselves as saviours of the Fatherland.
Q: You are insisting all the current leaders should go, but what if the people do not turn out to vote in new elections? That would be tricky.
A: No, the people are just waiting for new elections and will turn out for them. They will reject these would-be rulers who for the past nine months have been wrestling on the mat of Russian politics and have now started shelling each other. What we need above all else is consensus, to move reform forward in order to promote peace in society and stability. We can achieve that through simultaneous democratic elections of the parliament and the president.
I remain optimistic that Russia will enjoy a rebirth. I have absolutely no doubt of it. I can see how people have changed. More than 60 per cent of managers and business owners now want no return to the old top-down command system. A new breed of entrepreneurs has appeared, not just spivs, but people who really know how to run a business.
We can see that society is eager for normal, healthy, serious reforms within a framework of democracy and firmly established freedom. That is why I believe we will get out of this mess, although it may take years, or decades. We can get out of the crisis sooner than that, especially the current predicament. It will depend on the policies the government pursues. That is why I want the people, the citizens, to make their voices heard in free, simultaneous, independent elections of all the branches of government and local institutions. Then we will get authorities in the provinces and in the Centre with a mandate from the people and they will be able to promote reform successfully. That would safeguard society from a major historical zigzag, a rift and civil conflict.