There are plenty of aphorisms stating that history repeats
itself, or repeats itself as farce, or just rhymes. We have heard plenty of
warning how those who don’t draw lessons from history are doomed to repeat it –
even though there is never any consensus what lessons to draw and how to apply
them. Nevertheless, it’s hard to ignore the fact that history moves in certain
patterns, and that similar circumstances create similar results.
Take the history of the German people in 1918-1945 and that of
the Russian people over the past three and a half decades. Both suffered a
nasty defeat, which resulted in major economic hardships and impoverishment for
their people, but without a direct military occupation that would have brought
home the immediacy of the defeat. The Germans and the Russians saw their
empires crumble (two empires, in the case of the Germans). They lost
substantial historic territories populated by their co-nationals and new
upstart states emerged on their borders.
Both Germany and Russia then went through a period of febrile
mini-prosperity – or rather, an orgy of consumption by a small elite and
growing resentment of the rest of the population. Nationalist and revanchist
movements remained active, busily promulgating the idea of a “stab in the
back”, selloff by the elites and various other conspiracies, in which foreign
enemies were eagerly helped by the domestic fifth column.
During the 1990s, similarities between the Weimar Republic in
Germany and Russia were actively discussed. There have been fewer such
comparisons lately – maybe because there have been very stark differences, as
well – and yet Russia has been taking steps down the same road, both in its
foreign policy and in domestic attitudes.
The two nations’ leaders are very different, and comparisons
between Putin and Hitler are invariably strained. And yet, there are broadly
similar patterns in their rise to power, which hint at similar historical
circumstances pushing such figures to the top.
Hitler came from an obscure provincial background in Austria,
and his origins remain vague. A failed artist, he had turned into a kind of bum
in the years after World War I, before discovering his calling at the head of
the national socialist movement.
Putin, likewise, comes from Leningrad outskirts and his family
background is also uncertain. He had a thoroughly undistinguished career in the
Soviet KGB, and was stuck in a dead-end job in Dresden, the backwaters of
Soviet intelligence. After the collapse of the Soviet Union (the Russian
equivalent of the German and Austrian defeat in World War I) he returned to his
native city where he allegedly was forced to drive a gypsy cab at a low point
of his life.
What neither could have imagined at his 40th birthday party was
that by the age of 44 in the case of Hitler, and 47 in the case of Putin, he
would be the absolute ruler of his nation.
From that moment on, both were blessed by an extraordinary good
fortune. It was as though Fate, having raised them from complete obscurity to
global prominence, felt that she should go on lavishing on them her
never-ending favors. Hitler rose to power at the very moment the Great
Depression was coming to an end, and global economic growth recommenced. The
militarization of the German economy accelerated the recovery, but it probably
wouldn’t have happened had conditions worldwide not been improving.
On the global stage, Germany faced favorable conditions, too,
which allowed it to rearm and prevented a united front forming in the West.
Britain and France were still concerned about the Bolshevik threat and some
even considered Hitler’s Germany a bulwark against Stalin. The United States
had turned isolationist in the wake of its World War I intervention. Finally,
technology, especially tank warfare, gave a huge advantage to those who
mobilized and struck first. By the time the victim of aggression got its
bearings, Hitler’s panzer divisions were in its capital city.
The high point of the Fuehrer’s success was December 1941.
Europe was his and his armies were at the gates of Moscow. He was convinced
that Britain would collapse and he thought that Stalin’s manpower reserves were
at an end. Convinced that he’s on top of the world, Hitler declared war on the
United States after the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor.
December 1941 was also a turning point in his fortunes. That’s
what all of Greek mythology is about: the hubris of a man who thinks that he
can rule the world and suffers a cruel downfall at the very moment of his
supposed triumph. The Soviets, it turned out, hadn’t even begun to fight and
once they did, the Germans badly beaten at Moscow, Stalingrad and Kursk. Japan,
instead of attacking the Soviet Union from the east, drew the United States
into the war, making sure that America’s formidable economy shifted overnight
to military production.
Three and a half years later Hitler was dead – but not before
Fate had mocked and humiliated him, dealing him one severe blow after the next.
At the start of his rule, Putin has been equally fortunate. A
complete unknown becoming prime minister and then, promptly, president, he came
to power at the nadir of the Russian economic crisis. It was the moment when
oil prices reached a cyclical nadir and a huge speculative bubble in oil
markets began to inflate. Even more important, Yeltsin’s economic reforms of
the 1990s built a foundation for market forces to come to bear, sating pent up
domestic demand. The ruble, devalued sharply in 1998, allowed domestic
producers to replace imports in the Russian market. Foreign investors started
to take notice, too. Taken together, these factors brought Russia unprecedented
prosperity and economic muscle not seen since 1913.
Accordingly, the similarity of historical circumstances and
leaders’ biographies have created similar outcomes. The German “stab in the
back” myth surrounding its defeat in World War I has been revived in Russia,
with a widespread belief that Mikhail Gorbachev and Boris Yeltsin “sold” the Soviet
Union, dismantling it on orders from their American handlers.
Putin has also echoed Hitler in talking about Russia as “the
world’s largest divided nation,” while his grab of Crimea mirrored Germany’s
occupation of Sudetenland.
Putin’s extraordinary rise to power and the stunning oil wealth
that began to pour into Russia got to his head. He seems to have become
convinced that he can do no wrong and that Divine Providence has chosen him as
Russia’s savior. By the rules of Greek tragedy, it was a good time for his
misfortunes to start.
And so they have. Everything he has touched since the Ukrainian
Maidan has turned into a disaster. His buddy Yanukovych was driven out of Kyiv.
Crimea, so easily annexed, has become a nightmare – and Ukraine only now has started
to work toward getting it back. Instead of a land corridor to connect the
peninsula to Russia, Putin has on his hands the downed Boeing and a ruined,
impoverished and thoroughly criminalized Donbas. His attempt to extricate
himself by venturing into Syria seems to be drawing him deeper and deeper into
an unending conflict in the Muslim world.
Add to this Western sanctions, idiotic counter-sanctions which
are now going to extend to Turkey and, last but by no means least, a dramatic
drop in world energy prices and loss of international markets.
It would have been almost tragic – had it not been so richly
deserved. And, if historical patterns hold, there is no way out of this
situation. Whether or not Putin wants to get off this inexorably moving juggernaut
of history, he no longer has no choice: he’s doomed to repeat his predecessor’s
path to the end.
