Originally Posted by Оля
I understand that the text is very long, but maybe someone could find time to correct some of my mistakes, or maybe to correct the text in parts. Please.
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I've read George Kennan's utterance which says that Russia's neighbours are either vassals or enemies, and I was rolling this maxim around in my mind again and again. What is it about this utterance that makes me indignant and why do I want so much to say something against that? At first sight everything is correct, however offensive it is, but correct. You look at the map, and you see that it's how it is. Although we border also on China which is neither our enemy nor our vassal. Although India is not that far from us, too. But the rest of our neighbours... So why do I revolt and why do I not agree with the Mr. Kennan's utterance? And I know why. Because who says that? Who is Kennan, remind me please? He's an American!
To talk about neighbours, is easy to Americans. They, somehow, almost don't have neighbours. But if for Russia all the neighbours are either enemies or vassals, for America only continuous stretch of neighbours exists in the world. And if some country and its inhabitants don't count themselves neither enemies nor vassals in respect of America, America count every country either one or the other. It's only that America doesn't go into details neither of national nor religious nor cultural peculiarities. America and Americans somehow distinctly don't want to know anything about anyone except themselves. And they can't even imagine that completely different consciousness and opinion could exist. What is Mr. Kennan's sentence about? About something what he sees in the mirror. He only thinks it's not his own reflection in it.
But allow me to say what I think about us and our neighbours. I'll say that not from the State of Russia's position, but from my own, purely private one. I was born and grew up in Russia. Or, I should rather say, in the Soviet Union. And now, I live in the Russia which Mr. Kennan is talking about. I was born in the Soviet Union, and all those, now neighbouring, countries enter into my geographical conception of Homeland. And that means all this is a territory of love. And the majority of people who live in Russia feel the same. Russian people, unlike Mr. Kennan, know geography, they know different national cultures, they have friends, relatives and colleagues in the neighbouring countries. Unlike Mr. Kennan, they take to heart every conflict situation which happens between Russia and its neighbours. There are many of such situations, and everything is very complicated.
If we go deep into Mr. Kennan's sentence, Russia only has enemies. Because any vassal is always a potencial enemy. Vassals don't love their master, it's impossible. From this point of view America is in a much worse condition. Who loves America? Tell me!
I was in Tbilisi two weeks before the South-Ossetian conflict began. I stayed at "Sheraton" hotel. In Tbilisi, it's one of the best and most expensive. The hotel was not full. Only few tourists and very, very many Amercian military specialist lived in it. Judging by their stripes, they were airmen and missile specialists. These American soldiers evidently enjoyed staying at a good inn. They obviously were not used to such good conditions and to chic hotels. But at that, they always wore the field dress, without finding it necessary to put on the full one. They were wrinkled, unbuttoned, free-and-easy. They were indifferent about the beautiful, ancient city Tbilisi. They didn't care that people came to the hotel restaurant worn in accordance with the evening time and the restaurant's level. They were speaking loudly, laughing boisterously and even didn't suppose that someone could understand what they were talking about. They regarded all the people who surrounded them as absent in their life. They, obviously, didn't care about Georgia. They conduct themselves in the same way at any US military base. You think Georgians treated those soldiers with sympathy? No! But me, and my friends, Georgians were very glad to see. The purpose of my visit was discussing our mutual theatrical plans, and also the outlook for opening of Russian Book's Shop in Tbilisi. We went to the restoring Georgian Penmen's House where was and will be a literary museum. In this building, Griboyedov and Pushkin formerly were reading their works. We agreed then that I will come again and read my new stories there and present my manuscripts to the museum.
We have talked a lot those days, were remembering and quoting our favourite Georgian and Russian films which people in our countries know by heart. I make many trips in Ukraine, in the Baltic states, Kazakhstan, Belarus, Georgia, Armenia, with my performances. I go not to enemies and not to vassals.
How easy to say that about Russia! How easy, in general, to say such things about others! And how easy to draw borders! I recall, once in Switzerland, a journalist at the press conference asked me if I count myself an European. I replied, "There is no sense to answer this question since one who asks me doesn't count me an European." I know, what I'm writing now, will read people in Germany. I'd like to ask a question, a rhetorical one: perhaps in Europe all have good-neighbour relations with each other? What, Frenchs love Germans, and vice versa? What, all adore Britons? What, Belgians dote upon the Dutch? Even life in one house, if there are several flats in it, is always not simple. Completely unclouded and untroubled relations between neighbours are impossible. The best and most comfortable thing is living without neighbours. In many respects, that's how America tends to live.
I spent so much time speaking on the phone on the most hot days of the Georgian-South Ossetian conflict. My Georgian friends and I, we were talking so much, and if we were even not be able to come to an agreement, we were assuring each other of love and friendship. In the same way I was talking with my Ukrainian friends who were terribly agitated by the Caucasian developments. We talked much and we keep talking. That's not how it could be between enemies or vassals.
I was watching eagerly the newscasts. At one moment I was watching our mass media, at another CNN, at another BBC. The pictures were alike both here and there. The comments were diametrically different. Nobody touched on the truth which always is in the middle. It's us who's in the middle. We are who now lives in this world. We always are in the middle.
Do you know what makes me glad about the manner in which Russian television channels presented information? And it differs very much from the way how they showed the Chechen campaign or reports about terrorist acts. In the reports from the South Ossetia were few or almost were not shown Georgian soldiers – neither captive, nor killed nor fighting. At that, European and American channels showed many of Russian soldiers. In Russia, a decision must have been made - not to create a scary, enemy image of a Georgian. It's a very good sign. And I have never been Putin's worshipper, have never been a worshipper of his politic style, but what he said in his interview to CNN, that he takes the military operations between the Russian and the Georgian armies as a civil war - this is very important. That's not what people usually say about enemies or vassals.
To Americans, who mix up the name 'Grusia' with the name of their state Georgia, it never occurred how much hard people in Russia took this conflict. And how much hard Georgians take it. In july, I was talking to a very famous Georgian writer, his name doesn't matter. He's old and wise. He was talking about Saakashvili then, evidently trying to apologize for the president of his country. He said, "You see, Zhenya, Saakashvili is a very ill-mannered man. But you should understand Georgians. We are small and proud. And we want people to talk about us, to know about us. Saakashvili made things in such a way that everyone is talking about us. Even if in a bad manner, but every day." And these words explain much. But explain only to the people who knows Georgia and loves it, in other words to us who lives in Russia. But those who don't know and don't understand this marvellous country's peculiarities are indifferent about that. I will never believe in sincerity of Americans' care about Georgia. I won't believe in sincerity of their slogans and appeals for defence of democracy, I won't believe that Americans don't see and don't understand Mikhail Saakashvili's essence. And I won't believe that Americans count him and Georgia a friend. For them, Georgia is not an enemy or a vassal, but just a card or a chip in their game. A chip in which you don't feel living people, history, long-standing human relations.
So virtually, Mr. Kennan said a thing which is hard to dispute. Especially if watch CNN. I can repeat his words, but addressing America. It's only that I won't be quoted. That’s the whole difference.
Yevgeni Grishkovetz, a Russian writer.
