Mikhail Zygar says the Soviet Union’s collapse was only a temporary win for democracy

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0:02 Hi there.

0:02 You're listening to NPR's Book of the Day.

0:04 I'm Alyssa Nadworny.

0:06 Exiled Russian journalist Mikhail Zygar now lives

0:09 in New York after fleeing Russia in 2022.

0:12 A court there sentenced him in absentia to eight and a half

0:15 years in prison after he spoke out about the war in Ukraine.

0:19 In his latest book, The Dark Side of the Earth,

0:21 he says the Soviet Union's collapse wasn't a victory for democracy

0:26 and that many unresolved issues led to the world order we have now.

0:30 He tells NPR's Nick Spicer how the history of Russia

0:33 helps explain the forces shaping moves by President Vladimir Putin today.

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1:43 In my book, I cover 30 years.

1:45 I start with the early '60s, the moment when the first man goes to space,

1:50 Yuri Gagarin, and that's the highest peak of the Soviet civilization.

1:54 And only in 30 years after that, Soviet Union collapses.

1:58 So, it takes 30 years for the country to disappear.

2:02 And I think what was really important,

2:04 Soviet Union started collapsing decades before 1991 because a lot

2:10 of people in the Soviet Union stopped believing in any possibility of [snorts]

2:15 any bright future for Soviet Union.

2:17 They stopped believing in communism.

2:19 And in late '80s, they saw different perspective.

2:23 They They started believing that democratic Russia was possible.

2:27 So, I think that psychological dimension was really important

2:33 and it's the the most important approach in my book.

2:36 So, sort of a crisis of faith, it sounds like.

2:38 Absolutely.

2:39 Um one of the big changes in the late '80s and '90s,

2:43 you describe that moment so well at the end

2:45 of the Cold War when everything seemed to be opening up,

2:47 reform, new freedoms, McDonald's, you know, near um uh Red Square.

2:51 I remember visiting that and a sense that history had turned,

2:54 but you argue that it had not.

2:56 Why not?

2:57 We see now that uh the world today looks like

3:01 not as if Democrats um had prevailed back in the '90s, uh but on the contrary.

3:08 And uh today's Russian President Vladimir Putin

3:11 shares the same rhetorics as the old the old hardcore conservatives used to have

3:17 in the late uh years of the Soviet Union.

3:20 So, indeed, Russia today looks like the country where the coup of 1991,

3:27 the coup attempt against Gorbachev had actually prevailed.

3:31 Um somehow the Western ideas, not the Western military forces,

3:36 but the ideas, democracy became so popular and so fashionable.

3:41 It was completely unacceptable to remain dictator

3:45 not only for uh old communist bosses, but for a lot of other former dictators.

3:51 And now we see that we are living through the opposite trend.

3:56 We see that liberal democracy seems to be like old and outdated

4:00 and naive ideology and a lot of people seem not to believe in it.

4:05 Why not?

4:05 And where?

4:06 Um I'm afraid there are a lot of people in the United States

4:10 who don't really believe and quite a lot of people uh in Europe.

4:16 I'm happy that we are talking to you a few days right after

4:20 the election in Hungary that shows us that it's still a complicated picture.

4:25 And tell me, how does that inform the decisions that Vladimir

4:29 Putin is taking in Russia and on the global stage?

4:33 The worst thing that that happened to Vladimir Putin

4:36 uh during the last years is that he realized

4:39 that he does not understand the new generations

4:42 of Russians because they don't share his Soviet cultural code.

4:48 They less and less seem to worship the great empire.

4:54 They are not that different from other people who were born and raised

4:59 with uh iPhones in their pockets in Europe or in the West.

5:02 So, Putin needs to re-educate all those people.

5:05 He needs to bring Soviet Union back.

5:08 He needs uh to bring Soviet values back.

5:11 He needed to relaunch that repressive apparatus

5:14 and the atmosphere of fear in the country.

5:17 So, I'm still convinced that this war in Ukraine is also the war for Russia,

5:23 not only for Ukraine.

5:24 It's the war to make young Russians obey the dictator.

5:28 So, you know, from having read your book, uh it's fascinating read,

5:31 fascinating look uh at um Soviet history as seen from Moscow

5:36 from different points of the Soviet empire at the time.

5:40 You've interviewed a lot of high-level people.

5:42 Um what is the sort of resonance for a Western reader now,

5:46 somebody who picks up your book in the United States?

5:49 Are there, you know, you're doing history, but it does have contemporary echoes.

5:53 What is the sort of takeaway for somebody living in the here and now today?

5:56 You know, I'm afraid to say that I see

5:59 some parallels because definitely an almighty empire that Soviet

6:03 Union used to be and uh almighty empire

6:07 of the United States of America have something in common.

6:10 And I think it will be really important

6:13 for some people in America to read this, to see

6:16 some obvious trends that were happening in the Soviet

6:20 Union and how that empire came to its end.

6:23 And one of the most important reasons, as I've already mentioned,

6:26 was the crisis of faith, crisis of confidence.

6:29 The fact that um for all Soviet people,

6:33 the communist ideology was completely outdated and no one believed in it.

6:37 So, basically, yes, I think liberal democracy as as it is

6:42 the the cornerstone ideology of uh the United States is crucial.

6:47 And cynicism, uh which is becoming more

6:50 and more influential in many countries of the world, is that kind of disease.

6:56 So, I think that's um to to find some some unexpected parallels between

7:03 historic figures because I think unexpectedly uh

7:07 when I was writing about Mikhail Gorbachev,

7:09 for example, I found that he historically

7:13 in a way looks like former President Barack Obama.

7:16 Or first Russian President Boris Yeltsin

7:19 in a way uh reminded me of Donald Trump.

7:23 And just to look forward for your country

7:25 and the Russians who may be looking back on their history,

7:29 imagining the future, do you feel hopeful for your country?

7:32 Is there going to be a moment where

7:34 uh freedom and democracy come to the country?

7:38 You know, first I do think that the end of the the Putin's empire is inevitable.

7:44 And I I think it's from historical point of view,

7:47 it's more or less obvious that the concept of Russia as an empire is doomed.

7:53 So, Russia won't be able to remain that aggressive

7:57 empire as is is it's trying to be.

8:00 So, I'm more or less confident that it will be

8:03 very different from what we we see now in 20 years.

8:07 It's harder to to predict um the future of democracy

8:11 because it depends on the rest of the world as well.

8:15 Uh yeah, I wish that democratic ideas

8:18 in Russia could prevail and I think it's possible.

8:21 It's really possible because unfortunately, tragically,

8:24 the leader of Russian opposition Alexei Navalny was

8:27 murdered in in Russian prison 2 years ago,

8:30 but still he is clearly going to be seen by future

8:36 generations of Russian Russians as some kind of Russian Messiah,

8:41 the heroic leader who gave his life for democratic values,

8:45 for the idea that Russia can be democracy.

8:48 And I think that's a very powerful message.

8:50 When a person sacrifices his life for his belief in democracy,

8:56 that's very impactful.

8:57 That can really change the way how

9:00 the future generations would see their own future.

9:03 A hero to remember then.

9:05 Yeah, absolutely.

9:06 Mikhail Zygar is the author of Dark Side [music] of the Earth.

9:08 Thanks so much.

9:09 Thank you, Nick.

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