Of Paratroopers and Cognitive Dissonance

Ever since the opposition rallied on Bolotnaya Square and marched down Prospekt Sakharova, RuNet has been ablaze with intellectual (and, sometimes, hardly) discourse on the upcoming presidential elections and the country’s future.

Ever since the opposition rallied on Bolotnaya Square and marched down Prospekt Sakharova, RuNet has been ablaze with intellectual (and, sometimes, hardly) discourse on the upcoming presidential elections and the country’s future. The dissenters are rallying troops for the opposition march on February 4, the commentariat churns out opinion pieces like a conveyor belt, and even some of those long seen as the regime’s loyal supporters are switching camps. Sifting through everything that is being said on the matter can take days, if not weeks. But one recent demarche stands out from the routine: some paratroopers, that is veterans of the famous Russian airborne forces (“voenno-desantniye voyska” or VDV in Russian), have come out with a music video called “Nobody but Us,” in which they poetically lambast Vladimir Putin.

In Russia, VDV are some of the most (if not the most) feared soldiers. They are generally perceived as the most brutal and tough guys out there: images of them smashing heads through bricks and breaking logs with bare hands are plentiful. They are the ultimate antithesis to bohemians and are often frowned upon by intellectuals; the epitome of belligerence and brute force. When they celebrate their professional holiday, the day of the VDV, by dipping into city fountains bottles and girlfriends in hand, most civilized citizens prefer to stay home. They shock, and they awe. But most importantly, one would expect them to be true patriots and most loyal to the former and future commander in chief. At least I did.

Just a day after the video went up on YouTube, it garnered 127,000 views and almost 6,000 comments (that’s discounting all the “likes,” “shares” and comments on Facebook and LiveJournal). Sporting trademark striped undershirts and blue berets, they introduce themselves as the “Committee of VDV veterans of the Akademichesky District in southern Moscow:” a couple of battle-seasoned men with a couple of guitars, a Spartan affair. Here is a rough translation of some of the lyrics, just to give you a general idea:

You’re just like me, a man, not a God
I am just like you, a man, not a fool
We won’t let you lie and steal anymore
We’re free paratroopers, the Motherland is with us.
You’re just a bureaucrat, not a Czar or a God
To you a human being is a dumb banderlog,
The color of the freedom ribbon is good for everyone
And you’re the only one who sees it as a condom.

I look at you, at your portraits
You keep on lying to us, just like your “bears”
We’re tired of watching the whole country’s shame
Next to destitute villages, we have your castles.
You ruined the defense complex, you gave up the army
You didn’t care about the soldiers, you told off the officers
We won’t forgive all of your “achievements”
We are asking peacefully: tyrant, you better go...

Many critical songs have been sung and videos uploaded ever since the “middle class awoke” after the fraudulent parliamentary elections past fall, take “Our Nuthouse Votes for Putin,” for example. All of it, though, has come from the so-called “creative class,” or the “Internet hamsters” – a new term that’s been coined for the tech-savvy, well-off Russians who are chummy with the Internet. But a similar move by people from a completely different social stratum is truly unexpected, if not mind-blowing.

“Hm, if these guys sing this way, things are worse than I thought,” comments user Vadim Soloveitchik on Facebook. Many rushed to thank the “real men:” “Thank you guys for taking a civil stand. You are our defenders,” writes user Maria Falstyan. “Haha, VDV is with us! If I were Putin, I would cancel the next VDV holiday, they could go storm the Kremlin after they dip in the fountains,” user Alexander Manilov jokes.

Joke or not, the critics also have a point: “The fact that the VDV has not been disbanded is Putin’s direct achievement,” says used AndreyKalinin1 on YouTube. “Where do you see VDV being against Putin?” asks user kasherniy on LiveJournal. “The video shows two guys in uniforms singing an anti-Putin song. We have more than two people in VDV, it seems...”

The veterans have already become a cause célèbre: they’ve been invited to perform at the next opposition rally and the Dozhd TV channel has interviewed them on air. “We are people too, and we don’t want to live in such a country, with theft and lies...There is no modernization of the army taking place, that’s all a lie,” the veterans told the channel. They’ve already complained that pressure is being put on them by the veterans’ union to keep their heads down.

I don’t know about you, but my neat and comfy vision of the current protest movement in Russia has just been shattered: it’s not that simple, after all. Sure, there have been public cries of desperation by police officers and other state employees before, but for rank-and-file soldiers to come out and openly criticize Vladimir Putin in the harshest of terms – that’s a first. Let’s take this a step further: if the opposition starts sensing widespread support among the armed forces and those in power get the sense that come revolution day, their orders may not necessarily be followed, the entire establishment becomes precariously unstable. I am not sure if that’s a good thing.