Proceedings from the International scientic conference

IDENTITY IN THE ERA OF GLOBALIZATION AND EUROPEANIZATION

3-4 November 2011, Skopje
Republic of Macedonia

Zoran Matevski

NATIONAL AND RELIGIOUS IDENTITY IN R. MACEDONIA

IN GLOBAL AGE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 323

Rubin Zemon

THE DEVELOPMENT OF IDENTITIES AMONG THE MUSLIM

POPULATION IN THE BALKANS IN AN ERA OF GLOBALIZATION
AND EUROPEANIZATION: CASES OF TORBESHI, GORANI AND
POMACI . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 329

Ali Pajaziti

ISLAM AS A GLOBAL PROVOCATION: INTEGRATION OF

EUROPEAN MUSLIMS FROM TARIQ RAMADANS PERSPECTIVE . . . 339

Dragan Todorovi

PROTESTANTISM AMONG ROMA IN SOUTH-EASTERN SERBIA:

STATE AND CONSEQUENCES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 349

Hristina Ignatovska

CONCEPTUALIZATION OF RELIGIOUS IDENTITY IN THE

EUROPEAN UNION AND THE REPUBLIC OF MACEDONIA . . . . . . . . . . 363

Milan Tasi

MULTICULTURALISM VS INTERCULTURALISM:
FROM AN INDIVIDUAL (SUBJECTIVE) VIEWPOINT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 371

Jean Firic

ROMANIAN IDENTITY REPRESENTATION IN EUROPE BY SPORT

AS A MODERN EXPRESSION OF CULTURE IN THE PROCESS OF
GLOBALIZATION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 381

Angela Costescu

THE IMPACT OF THE CONTROVERSY AROUND THE IDENTITY OF

THE RUDARI PEOPLE FROM A ROMANIAN VILLAGE UPON LOCAL
SOCIAL LIFE. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 387

Bashkim Arifi

THE DIVERSITY OF BALKAN COUNTRIES AND

THE GLOBALIZATION PROCESS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 395

Ana Aceska

IDENTITY AND PLACE: TOWARDS ONE DURABLE INTERPLAY IN

THE SOCIAL SCIENCES AND HUMANITIES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 409

Milo Jovanovi, Suzana Markovi-Krsti

IDENTITIES AS NECESSARY FICTIONS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 419

Emilija Simoska

CULTURAL AND ETHNIC IDENTITIES IN MACEDONIA . . . . . . . . . . . . . 431

Ivan Blaevski

INTERCULTURAL COMPETENCE AND IDENTITY NEGOTIATION . . . 441

Eleonora Serafimovska, Marijana Markovic

THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN PERSONAL AND SOCIAL

DETERMINANTS OF SELF AND ADHERENCE TO VARIOUS SOCIAL
CATEGORIES AMONG THE STUDENT POPULATION
IN REPUBLIC OF MACEDONIA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 451

Antoanela Petkovska

RE-THINKING THE IDENTITIES - THE MEDITERRANEAN . . . . . . . . . . 463

Maria-Antoaneta Neag

RESHAPING IDENTITIES: ROMANIA, BORDERLINE OF THE

EUROPEAN UNION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 469

Irina Postolache

IDENTITY CONSTRUCTIONS. THE CASE OF HUNGARIAN AND

ROMANIAN STUDENTS FROM BABE-BOLYAI UNIVERSITY,
ROMANIA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 479

Zoran Jovanovi

ANSWER OF THE SMALL CULTURES TO THE CHALLENGES OF

GLOBALIZATION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 487

Victoria Kafedjiska

THE GLOBALIZATION OF MEDIA TECHNOLOGIES AS AN

INTRODUCTION TO THE CULTURAL IMPERIALISM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 495

Marija Drakulovska Cukalevska

GLOBALIZATION AND THE LANGUAGE

- SPECIAL REVIEW ON THE REPUBLIC OF MACEDONIA - . . . . . . . . . . 505

Sase Gerasimoski, Vesna Trajkovska

THE DOMINANCE OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE IN THE

EUROPEAN MULTILINGUAL MOSAIC THROUGH THE PRISM OF
LINGUISTIC IDENTITY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 513

Vladan Pavlovi

THE ATTITUDE OF THE FAR-RIGHT ORGANIZATIONS IN SERBIA

TOWARDS THE RELATION BETWEEN LANGUAGE AND NATIONAL
IDENTITY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 521

Camelia Firic

UPON THE INVASION OF ANGLICISMS IN THE ROMANIAN

LANGUAGE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 529

Vsevolod Samokhvalov

THE HOLLY GRAIL AND THE ALTER EGO: BALKANS AS A SOURCE

OF THE RUSSIAN EXCEPTIONALITY IN THE LATE SOVIET AND
EARLY RUSSIAN DISCOURSE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 537

Gazmend Qorraj

EUROPEANIZATION EFFECTS:
THE ROLE OF DOMESTIC ACTORS IN WESTERN BALKANS . . . . . . . . 551

Irena Veljanova

EMBODIED ETHNICITY AND INFORMAL SANCTIONING

MECHANISMS: SANCTIONING OF EMBODIED MACEDONIANNESS
IN AUSTRALIA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 561

Manuel Cristian Firic

INTERNATIONAL JUDICIAL COOPERATION IN CRIMINAL

MATTERS. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 571

Jelena Ristik

THE FUTURE OF THE NATION-STATE IN THE ERA OF

GLOBALIZATION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 577

Vsevolod Samokhvalov, PhD

/UDC 327.8(470:497)

Doctoral Candidate, University of Cambridge

THE HOLLY GRAIL AND THE ALTER EGO: BALKANS AS A SOURCE

OF THE RUSSIAN EXCEPTIONALITY IN THE LATE SOVIET AND
EARLY RUSSIAN DISCOURSE
Abstract
The paper is based on the inter-disciplinary research project, which studies the process of relational
identity construction and the Russian foreign policy. Following the constructivist epistemology
and methodology of intertextuality, the paper will study main texts that defined the Russias Great
Power identity: school and university textbooks, major history works, most popular history novels
and media discourse. The author looks into the concept of identity as expressed by the term of
Russias Great Powerhood linked to the idea of Europe. The working hypothesis of the research
project is that Russias idea of Great Powerhood was always exercised/implemented in/through
Russias interaction with Europe.
The Balkans take special role in the role of the Russian identity construction. Departing from the
facts of certain historical borrowings the Balkans the discourse evolves to reconstruct the Balkans
as the source of the Russian Greatness. Embedded in the Soviet discourse through the textbooks and
fiction literature in the 1960s, the discourses penetrates numerous texts in the media discourse in the
late 1980s. The paper further analyzes evolution of the discourse in the Russian period. It identifies
certain deconstruction of the Holy Grail that take place, introduction of orientalist elements and
adjustment of the discourse to new realities.

Introduction

he Balkans have drawn the attention of international community as troubled European periphery. European identity was reproduced and sustained in dealing with the
problems coming from the Balkans. Post-modernity and European values were reproduced in the juxtaposition with pre-modernity, embodied in underdevelopment, traditionalism and hatreds persistent in the region. As much as Europe used the region to construct
its own identity Russia has long used the Balkans and the Black Sea region to sustain its
own specific identity. The present paper sets out to look at the question what role was
attributed to the both regions in the Russian identity, how it was constructed and how it
was related to Europe. The paper employs the methodology of discourse analysis in the
study of the main texts, which define Russias self-perception as an international actor.
The paper will particularly look into the question what role is attributed in this discourse
to the Black Sea region and the Balkans.
In order to identify the pool of ideas on which the Russian people drew their understanding about the international affairs, this chapter focuses on the intellectual trajectory,

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Vsevolod Samokhvalov

which an average Russian citizen and elite member would go through. The reconstruction
of these ideas will be done through the inter-textual analysis of school and university text
books on Russian and Soviet foreign policy and world history, and historical novels that
were highly popular in the USSR in the period of the 1980s. The specific time periods is
selected because it was in this period when, in the aftermath of Brezhnevs stagnation on
the peak of Gorvachevs perestroika, Russian literature and history undertook an attempt
to reconsider its past and new books on the history of Russia and the Soviet Union were
written.
The chapter analyses two strands of textbooks those with indicative title The History of the USSR1 and those titled World History for the concluding 7th-10th grades of
schools. The textbooks on the History of the USSR were now prepared by two groups
led by M. Nechnkina and Y. Kukushkin, senior academicians from Moscow University
and various institutes of Soviet Academy of Sciences2. State publishing houses translated
his books into a number of foreign languages, including English, French and Spanish.
The groups of Professors I. M. Krivoguz and V. K. Furaev prepared textbooks on Modern period of the World History3 and Contemporary World History4. They also produced
university textbooks. These textbooks represented a new generation of textbooks which,
despite certain liberalisation of education in the 1980s, were charged with ideological
interpretations. The key historical actors are ideological systems rather than states, classes rather than personalities. Although these textbooks are overburdened with quotations
from Marx and Lenin, the concepts of Great Powerhood protrude through the thick ideological smokescreen.
In 1980s, another authoritative source of information about Russia became a republished edition by one of the founders of Russian historiography Nikolay Karamzin. His
standard voluminous work History of the Russian State written in the early 19th century
and reprinted in the mid-late 1980s became an alternative source of information in the
late Soviet period. The chapter will also use Karamzin in order to identify to what extend this alternative source with considerable authority could generate an anti-hegemonic
discourse. In the present chapter I will refer to the electronic version of this fundamental
work widely available and frequently quoted among the Russian reading audience.
Another important source of information became new popular novels by Valentin
Pikul, who was at the peak of his popularity and authority in the late 1980s. Over the
period 1979-1989, Pikul wrote at least 10 major non-fiction history5 novels, which were
all published and widely-read in the Soviet audience. One can judge his impact on the
Soviet elite by the fact that Pikul was decorated with two important Soviet orders and
was also awarded a special prize. Even several military vessels of the Baltic and the
Black Sea Fleet of Russia were named after him. No other writer has received such an
honour. In addition, several civilian ships, streets, libraries and even a planet bear Valentin Pikuls name. Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev stressed that he was a passionate
reader of Pikul and quoted some excerpts from him. On 17 May 1987 the Central Soviet
Communist newspaper Pravda ran an interview with Pikul with the eloquent title I like
strong personalities6. Some researchers, acknowledging his controversial character, had
to admit Pikul was the most popular novelist in the USSR7.

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539

In 1989 Pikul published his novel I have the honour.(Pikul, 1989). The novel,
which claims to be based on real events and memoirs of an intelligence officer of the
Russian and Soviet General Staff, describes the life of a True Russian hero, Oladiev8, who
is an offspring of intercultural marriage between a Russian man and a Serb woman. The
chapter analyzes Oladievs Balkan odyssey and the career which constitutes an important
site of identity construction.
Last, but not the least, the present chapter will analyze the late Soviet media discourse as it was articulated in the most popular and less ideologized Soviet newspaper
Izvestia, which became an outlet for free public debate in the USSR in the late 1980s. This
chapter will analyse how these discourses are reproduced in the rhetoric of politicians,
diplomats and policy-makers in the media. The media discourse is supposed to be the
output of those inputs which they received in the early 1960s.

Balkans as a Holy Grail

In the late 1980s any Russian would be first introduced to the Balkans as early as
primary school. In the history textbooks, any description of creation of the Russian culture and history would inevitably state that the Balkans and the Mediterranean were the
gate of Russia to the European history. World history comes to the Black Sea from the
Balkans which is described in individual chapters9. The culture and civilization comes to
medieval Scythians from the Greek colonies in ancient times; writing and nobility titles
arrive to Eastern Slav from Byzantine and Southern Slavs.
Karamzins work comes to add special mystical essentialism to this discourse. The
Balkans is constructed now as a kind of Holy Grail for Russia. They are not merely the
source of cultural borrowings, but a spring of intellectual enrichment, inspiration and
spiritual growth. This attribute occurs in numerous descriptions of conversion to Eastern
Christianity, important dynastic marriages and cultural borrowings. (Karamzin, Vol.6:
16, 19-22). Even the Varangians before coming to the Slavic principalities had benefited
from the knowledge of Greece and Rome. (Karamzin, Vol.1: 37). Pikuls novel Chest
Imeyu takes this discourse even further. For example, when describing shady gardens of
Dubrovnik, General Oladiev describes it as cradle of Russian greatness:
Here the learned Serb Marko Martinovich was teaching the birds of Peters nest10 to sail and fight in the seas; the Serbs of Dubrovnik, being excellent
sailors and extraordinary navigators, fought many times under the banner of the
Russian fleet. Small Dubrovnik (Ragusa) was a republic once upon a time and
Catherine the Great sent them friendly letters. Local residents were also sending
their Ambassadors to Saint PetersburgI have spent many hours delving into the
stacks of books of a local bibliopole and came across The Life of Peter the Great
in Serb, works by Lomonosov, odes by Derzhavin, poems of Pushkin and even The
History [of the Russian State] by Karamzin...(Pikul V. p. 41)

The Balkans as the Holy Grail plays a crucial role in the personal formation and
transformation of Oladiev. Drinking from the Holy Grail of the Balkans, represented
by his mother, Oladiev learns only extreme human emotions: he mourns the fallen Serb
heroes together with his mother when she commemorates Saint Vitus day of Kosovo

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Vsevolod Samokhvalov

battle on 28 June 1389. It is through the Balkans that little Oladiev first learns to love
the freedom-loving revolutionary pro-Russian and nationalist royal families of Karageorgevich of Serbia11; and to hate murderers from the corrupt pro-Austrian dynasty of
Obrenovic12. Years later, after the separation of parents, the Balkans transform Oladievs
quiet life. Looking through a newspaper, he finds the name of his mother in the lists of
the Serbs arrested for protests against King Obrenovic. Oladiev rushes to Belgrade where
he immediately joins the nationalist leader Dragutin Dimitrievich Apis and participates
in the coup against Obrenvic. This journey establishes one more link between the True
Russian hero and the Balkans. Upon his return to Russia he joins the intelligence service
of the Russian army, not because he likes risks13, but because he wanted to fulfil the tasks
that would benefit the people and which except for him could not be carried out by even
the bravest soldiers restore the Great Russia (Pikul, 1989: 137). In the years to come,
Oladiev will regularly visit the Balkans at the crucial junctures of their history. On one
of these visits, on the 27 June 1914, Oladiev finds his mother. Next day, after the assassination of Austrian Archduke Franz-Ferdinand, his mother saves him from the Austrian
counter-intelligence which is chasing Oladiev in Bosnia and Austria. His newly found
mother again grants Oladiev chance to live whilst sacrificing her own life (Pikul, 1989:
81, 137). This episode establishes the bonds of personal indebtedness between Oladiev
and the Serb woman, which he will later pay off.

Alter Ego and Even More: Self-Sacrifice, Ethics and Competence

Another important modification of late Soviet discourse, which was directly linked
to the Balkans, is the fact in the late Soviet texts Serbia is constructed as an Alter Ego of
Russia, and Yugoslavia as an Alter Ego of the Soviet Union. The True Serb - Alter Ego
shares a lot of similar features with genuine, self-sacrificing Russia, but it also bears an
element of difference. The difference is constructed through when Serbia and Yugoslavia
are described as sometimes inferior and sometimes even superior to the Soviet Union.
Serbia is superior to Russia in terms of self-sacrifice because all the texts stress the heroic
fight of the Balkan nations against the Ottoman and Austro-Hungarian empires over half
a millennium. General Oladiev eventually has to explicitly admit this Serb superiority
several times (Pikul, 1989: 123-124, 127-128). Although it would be natural to expect
that the Russian victory should place Russians higher than Serbs, in reality the greatness
(magnitude) of Serb suffering makes their fight more heroic. In the early 20th century Russia has to face the emergent threat of False Europe (Germany under Prussian militarism)
whereas Serbia fights against a much stronger, more corrupt and monstrous Sinful Europe
(Austro-Hungarian Empire) (Pikul, 1989: 28, 65). In this combat Russia provides valuable assistance to Serbia, but the Serbs are constructed as implicitly superior to Russians as
they have been through much worse torture and were still able to win their independence.
The greater the suffering and self-sacrifice, the greater is the eventual triumph of
Serbia in the 20th century. The half a millennium of slavery becomes a dark background
to be contrasted against the glory of Serb victories in the 20th century. This quality of
Yugoslavia to rise like a Phoenix from the ashes ranks it even higher than the Soviet

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541

Union which had been defeated just once by Tartars. Yugoslavias cycle of self-sacrifice
and supernatural abilities stretches through the centuries and this is why in some regard it
is even more unique than Russia. When describing WWII, all the late Soviet texts stress
that the Serbs did not merely organize their anti-Fascist resistance, but fought the entire
war for their liberation and, eventually, became the only South-East European nation that
made a significant contribution to the victory over Nazism (Furaev, 1989: 23, 28; Pikul,
1989: 136). They were even strong enough to firmly stand up in the conflict against Stalin
(Furaev, 1989: 51). This discourse reaches its apogee during Gorbachevs visit to Yugoslavia when Gorbachev constructs the Serb people as Great True Russia in comparison
to Europe:
When many European states were devastated by the Nazi military machine, a guerrilla fight was unfolding in the mountains of Yugoslavia against the
conquerors, which grew into a real peoples war. The defenders of our Motherland were inspired by the thought that they were not alone, that here in the South
of Europe, thousand kilometres away from the Soviet-German front, our Yugoslav
brethren were giving their fight14.

The newspaper campaign during Gorbachevs visit to Yugoslavia was more intense
than coverage of Gorbachevs meetings with the US presidents15. And the reporters did
not miss the opportunity to stress the side-by-side fight of Yugoslav and Soviet warriors16;
to refer to the fact that Belgrade and Moscow have the same long history filled with heroic
fight17. The Dalmatian sea resort city of Dubrovnik has the same long democratic tradition
as the early medieval democratic republics in the Russian city of Novgorod; the harbours
of Split and Dubrovnik on the Adriatic coast established twin relations with the Black Sea
ports and resorts of Odessa and Yalta18.
Although a close ally, Yugoslavia is constructed as a separate actor from the Socialist
camp. Not only because it launched its own Non-Alignment movement, but also because
it preceded the USSR in conducting the correct foreign policy aimed at diffusing tensions in international affairs19, launching regional cooperation and starting a dialogue on
turning the Balkans into a nuclear-free zone of peace and collaboration. The late Soviet
discourse acknowledges Yugoslavia as a friendly, competent, but again a separate and
independent country that had gained wide international respect and authority20. All these
resulted in mutual and equal recognition of the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia. Also both
countries received simultaneous invitations to join the Council of Europe21. The tough
and swift reforms of Ante Markovich to curb high inflation made the Serbs even superior
to Russians because they were ready to pay an even higher price to achieve their goals.
And again no other foreign leader or his policies received so much attention in Izvestia as
the successful reforms of Ante Markovich22.
If judged along temporal and intellectual assessment axes, Serbs again are presented
as superior to Russia in terms of progressivity and competence. Pikul constructs this superiority from the first pages when his hero Oladiev meets Apis and his associates. Unlike
Oladiev, who is from a poor but aristocratic family, Apis and his associates are described
as self-made and professional people:

542

Vsevolod Samokhvalov

Former ploughmen who after their tough rural work grew into officers,
stocky and tanned, they were wearing uniforms very similar to the Russian. They
smell of cheap sheep cheese, strong tobacco and sweat. They were very much like
Russians, but they were different. Their guttural and gurgling speech, as that of the
high-flying eagles, was brief and up to the point(Pikul, p.14)

This superiority of Serbs should not be reduced to authentic barbarity of the Balkans
as they were perceived from Europe. Pikul states that centuries of their heroic fight and
self-sacrifice against the Ottoman Empire, made the Serbs even nobler and more Truly
European than the Austro-Hungarian Empire and even Russia. Oladiev contrasts patrols
and document checks in Vienna with the liberal, atmosphere of Belgrade where 150
streets were policed by only 150 policemen, where nobody would get drunk, cause scandals or fights, nobody locks their house or shop and where there were no paupers (Pikul:
41). Izvestia reinforced the perception of the Serbs as closer to Europe when it described
the ability to provide more freedom and more consumer goods as an important point for
comparison because in this the failure of the Soviet Union was more or less obvious. The
rush of the Soviet shuttle-traders into Yugoslavia reinforced this perception23.
Pikul stresses that nobody would gape at European celebrities or even the ageing
King of Serbia Peter Karageorgievich when he was strolling around the city and having a
pint of beer without personal guards, and compares it to the situation in Russia where the
Tsar would not be able to make a single step in the Russian capital without being gaped
at (Pikul: 41). Belgrade students knew Russian democratic pro-European writers much
better than their Russian colleagues24. The discourse was reinforced in Izvestia by reports
about the painful but successful reforms of Yugoslav Premier Ante Markovich and his
successful trips to European capitals and to Washington25, about the Soviet debt to Yugoslavia as well as about the wave of Soviet shuttle traders coming to Belgrade. Yugoslavia
is superior to Russia because it succeeds in conducting an independent socialist revolution, carries out economic reforms26 and even provides considerable financial credit to
the Soviet Union27.
The construction of Alter Ego takes shape in the description of parallel reforms in
the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia. Unlike Poland and Hungary, where the Communist
regimes were overthrown, or China, where the Communist Party suppressed any change,
Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union were constructed as two countries and people united
by the fact that both Communist Parties go through the process of renewal and try to
modernize their countries28, trying to reform their communism and taking brave steps
to liberalise religious and political life29, making some mistakes but also correcting them;
fighting against corrupt and conservative bureaucracies in Moscow30 and Belgrade31
which resisted reforms in both countries.32
But even in these descriptions of parallel reforms an superiority of Yugoslavia is
constructed when Izvestia editorial stresses Self-management, as the history proved33, is
a notion of the same type as perestroika and glasnost34. The inflow of the Soviet shuttletraders who rushed into Yugoslavia reinforced this perception35. The last point stressed
that Yugoslavia, although being a Soviet Alter Ego, was closer to Europe than the Soviet
Union. The ability to provide more freedom and more consumer goods was an important

THE HOLLY GRAIL AND THE ALTER EGO: BALKANS AS A SOURCE OF THE RUSSIAN EXCEPTIONALITY IN THE LATE...

543

point for comparison because the failure of the Soviet Union in this regard was fairly
obvious.
To balance against the full superiority of Serbs over the Russians some elements
of inferiority are introduced. The inferiority of Yugoslavia is asserted when the Soviet
Union/Russia are depicted as saviours of the Balkan nations from being exterminated by
Western powers either in the 19th or in the 20th century (Furaev, 1989: 236-237.), and is
amplified through the description of the Soviet diplomatic and financial support to help
Yugoslavias socialist modernisation, which helped to strengthen its international standing in the first post-war years (V. K. Furaev, 1989: 36-82.)36. Pikul demonstrates that the
Serbs excessive self-sacrifice can lead to a lack of understanding of deep societal processes, especially of such a complex issue as national liberation. In June 1914, General
Oladiev tries to dissuade his hot-blooded friend Colonel Apis from individual terrorist
acts against Austro-Hungarian Archduke Franz Ferdinand. Failing to convince his friend,
Oladiev concludes that although the time of the Habsburgs on the Austrian throne has almost run out, Apis still shouldnt push them forward, because history does not like violent
pushing and one bullet can turn into a small stone which provokes an entire avalanche in
the mountains (Pikul, 1989: 75).
So sometimes the hot-headedness of Serbs serves them badly because they lack sufficient humbleness to accept the inevitability of historical processes. The textbooks reproduce this hot-headedness when they describe mistakes of leadership in national policies
(V. K. Furaev, 1989: 46, 48, 54, 62, 79-80). Eventually, the national question (national
liberation, multinational state-building and inter-ethnic peace) becomes the site where
the Russian-Soviet Self is linked to Serbia-Yugoslavia. The relations of equivalence are
established when the earlier inter-ethnic peace started to deteriorate in both countries.37
During his 1988 visit to Belgrade, Gorbachev drew a parallel between the national
questions in the two countries when commenting on the events in Caucasus and Kosovo. Although Gorbachev refused to consider them as a threat to Communism or to the
territorial integrity of the state38, this thesis and the link between the two countries was
further fixed in subsequent reports of the analogues phenomena in similar republics of the
Soviet Union and Yugoslavia. Rich Northern republics with a strong Western European
historical background such as Slovenia39 and Croatia, and their analogues in the Soviet
Union Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania40 simultaneously introduced amendments to the
constitution of the SFRY and USSR respectively, and raised the issue of a reconfiguration
of the Yugoslav/Soviet federation into a confederation with some hints of further possible
independence.
The national question also becomes the site where the web of the Balkan identities achieves the peak of its antagonism. Pikul demonstrates the extreme character of
the Balkans in the lives of his two heroes. Oladiev as a representative of True Russia is
dreaming about something achievable the restoration of True Russias Greatness after
the defeat in the Russia-Japan war. In his turn, Apis fights for a greater mission similar
to the one that Russia achieved centuries ago, the unification of South Slavic lands in
a new Yugoslavia a union of nations for which Apis is ready to walk over piles of
corpses (Pikul, 1989: 124, 128). His main opponent is False Serbia represented by the

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Vsevolod Samokhvalov

reactionary-unethical-nationalist prince regent Alexander Karageorgievich, who dreams

about conservative Great Royal Serbia and who hates Apis as only a weak person can
hate a man strong in body and spirit. (Pikul, 1989: 128) The extreme character of the
mission defines the difference in the destiny of the heroes. Oladievs antagonism to False
megalomaniac and incompetent Russia causes him some career problems coming from
the Tsars senior officers (Pikul, 1989: 21) or, at most, one arrest during the toughest time
of Stalins repressions when Oladiev is openly criticizing the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact
and the incompetence and servility of the top Soviet commanders ((Pikul, 1989: 70).
Apis antagonism to False Serbia ends with open fight and death and disgrace for him and
his associates. It is only later on that Tito (True hero of Yugoslav brotherhood) demands
that Apis is reinstalled as hero (Pikul, 1989: 133, 136).
Both True Russia and True Serbia fall victims of Sinful and Civilizing Europe which
mistreats them when it does not want to give them independence in the 19th century
(Krivoguz, 1989: 117.); or manipulates the two countries to enter into WWI and does not
share equally the hardship of WWI at the Eastern front (Pikul, 1989: 76, 94, 122, 126,
128-130, 136). Both True Russia and True Serbia become victims of False Europe (England, France) which uses the Ottoman Empire and Sinful Europe in order to check Russia
in the Black Sea and does not allow Serbia to become an independent state. Both True
Russia and True Serbia suffer from similar manipulations when Sinful Europe (AustroHungary, Italy) manipulate the militant nationalism of Croats and Bosnians in the 19th
and late 20th century that could not win Russia and Serbia in an honest encounter (Pikul,
1989: 40). Both fall prey to militant nationalism (Western Non-Europe) and Civilizing
incompetent Europe when the European Economic Community and the US Congress
adopted several resolutions about human rights violations in Yugoslavia. Construction
of nationalism as something alien and non-European, and opposing European development of Yugoslavia, took place when Izvestia stressed that the riots in the republic were
allegedly provoked during the official visit of the delegation of the European Parliament
to the republic41. Almost simultaneously, the paper also reported an analogous resolution
adopted by the US Senate in relation to the conflict between Armenia, Azerbaijan and
the Baltic states42. Eventually, a link was established when Ruslan Khasbulatov, speaker
of the Supreme Soviet of the Russian Federation, spoke about the centrifugal tendencies
in Russia and accused some regional leaders of trying to balkanize Russia and destroy
the state with a thousand-year glorious history and its unprecedented culture in world
civilization?43.

Conclusions
Obviously, the two countries saw the storm looming over them. What was to be
done? The answer was given in the conclusion of Pikuls novel. The ageing Major General Oladiev of the Soviet intelligence, who had benefitted from the unique spiritual guidance and help of the Balkans which transformed him from False Russia into True Russia, had benefited from the self-sacrifice of his mother who had saved his life, could do

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545

nothing better than sacrifice his life in order to repay the Balkans for those unique gifts,
services and experiences that the Peninsula granted him over these several decades. As
happened to many of Pikuls heroes, the Balkans became Oladievs last mission. In 1944,
he is dispatched to Bosnia to train Titos guerrilla forces. In May 1944, together with his
Yugoslav comrades, he is encircled by SS-forces during their raid on Drvar that aimed to
destroy their headquarters and to capture their commander Marshal Tito.
Once more Pikul constructs the Alter Ego through lengthy descriptions of the Red
Army sending armours, medicines and clothes to their Slav brethren; descriptions of
Soviet doctors and officers working in the mountains of Montenegro and Macedonia;
stories about overloaded airplanes landing in impossible conditions on tiny plots of the
Bosnian plateau to drop their loads and then taking off over deep gorges to evacuate the
wounded guerrillas. In order to claim the additional authority of objective historic knowledge, Pikul, as always, resorts to describing individual cases from the point of view of
an eye-witness whereas the account of the last fight of Oladiev is narrated to him by his
daughter :
The pilot of the last Soviet airplane was tasked to evacuate my father. Fighting was taking place almost next to the plane and boarding was taking place under
intense fire. The pilot called my fathers name many times and asked him to board.
But he never answered back. Instead he took the machine gun and joined the ranks
of the last of the fighters, yielding his place in the airplane to a young Serb womanpartisan with her newly-born child. (Pikul, 1989, pp. 154-155 ).

Having given his place to a Serb mother, Oladiev found his place in the ranks of Yugoslav guerillas, and they all ended up in a common grave. At the end of his narration he
once more fixes the link between True Soviet Great Russia and True Serb Yugoslav Alter
Ego. When describing the photo of the battlefield of Kupresko Polje where most of the
warriors fell covering the retreat of the main troops of the Yugoslav army, Pikul writes:
Here is that grave! Yugoslavia has kept its ancient Serb traditions. Every
day in the twilight a black-dressed elderly woman comes to this place. She is the
embodiment of our common Slav mother. Every evening, already stooping of her
age, she adds some oil to the icon-lamp and places fresh fragrant roses over the
grave. Lakonochi44 she wishes to all deceased ones. Looking at this picture I suddenly thought that this old Serb woman is that very Serb mother to whom my hero
yielded his place on the plane. I wanted to cry this is the end of my novel. I have
said all I knew. I have the honor (Pikul, 1989, pp. 154-155 ).

The skilful narrator Pikul laid the foundation for how Russian society would see the
role of Moscow in the Balkans. It was waiting to come and save the Serbs, if possible aspiring to eternal glory through self-sacrifice. The Serbs deserved it. They were the equals
of Russians, but also more authentic, more ancient and sometimes even superior to them.
A new emerging Russia was dreaming about saving internationalist Serbs and Yugoslavs,
or share their fate. As it happens, the subsequent events provided plenty of opportunities
for repeating this discourse.

546

Vsevolod Samokhvalov

The importance of the Balkans for Russias Great Power identity has been reproduced in numerous textbooks, popular literature and fiction. Given the fact that in the Soviet system of production of knowledge there was little space for competing discourses,
which could challenge the hegemonic discourse of heroic self-sacrificing Russia and the
Balkans, the discourse of Holy Grail had developed into Alter Ego. The quality of the
Balkans as that of the ancient source of spiritual and intellectual enrichment, integrity
and courage has been extrapolated to the present time. These qualities were reproduced
and taken further in media and public speeches. They have created the context in which
anything which would happen to Yugoslavia were considered as preliminary scenario of
Russia.

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547

Notes
1 These textbooks focus on the history of Russia, in particular all its states which existed in this territory over
the last three millennia.
2 Nechkina M.V. and Leibengrub P.S. (1984), Istoria SSSR: Uchebnik dlia 7-ogo klassa, (History of the
USSR: Textbook for the 7th grade), Moscow: Prosveshchenie; Nechkina M.V., Fadeev A.V. and Leibengrub
P.S. (1968), Istoria SSSR: Uchebnoe posobie dlia 8-ogo klassa, (History of the USSR: Textbook for the
7th grade), Moscow: Prosveshchenie; Kukushkin Y.S. (1986), Istoria SSSR: Uchebnik dlia 9-ogo klassa,
(History of the USSR: Textbook for the 9th grade), Moscow: Prosveshchenie; Kukushkin Y.S. (1988) , Istoria
SSSR: Uchebnik dlia 10-ogo klassa srednei shkoly (History of the USSR: Textbook for the 10th grade of
secondary school), 3rd edition, Moscow::Prosveshchenie
3 Krivoguz I.M. (1989), Novaya Istoria: 1871-1918: Uchebnik dlia 10-ogo klassa srednei shkoly (Modern
History: 1871-1918: Textbook for the 10th grade of secondary school), 2nd edition, Moscow: Prosveshchenie
4 In fact these textbooks were written by less senior academics Manusevich A.Y., Orlov V.A. and Stetskevich
S.M., but it was the name of Furaev V.K. that featured on the first page of the textbook. V. K. Furaev (1989),
Noveyshaia Istoria (Contemporary History), 1917-1939: Textbook for the 9th grade of the secondary school,
Moscow: Prosveshchenie, 1987; V.K. Furaev (ed), Noveyshaia Istoria (Contemporary History), 1939-1988:
Textbook for the 11th grade of the secondary school, Moscow: Prosveshchenie,.
5 It should be noted that Pikul was an extremely skilful manipulator in claiming authority of objectivity and
historical accuracy. In writing his books he heavily relied on, and provided quotes from, archival materials,
contemporaneous media reports, memoirs of significant personalities of the times described, etc. This more
or less accurate historical information was interwoven with numerous instances of the authors creative
fantasy, e.g. dialogues between the main characters and/or descriptions of the doubts and thoughts of the
main heroes, which could hardly have been recorded and documented. In conclusion, Pikul frequently took
the role of prophet and describes the events to come, a rhetorical device which allowed him to claim the
status of longitudinal observer. He was simultaneously eye witness of all events and an unbiased researcher
who observed history from a distance and from above. The composition of his books and specific style
of narration allowed Pikul to present his books as credible historical accounts and, with the background
of scarcity of really popular history works and heavily-ideologized, extremely boring official history
textbooks, made his novels important identity-shaping texts, in particular with regard to the Balkans and
the Black Sea region. For example, in his novel I have the honour (Chest Imeyu), speaking from the name
of his hero, he openly claims this right because for authority because his hero is not writing memoirs as
commander in the war and he does need to demonstrate that his decisions were correct. He is not a historian,
who is usually preoccupied with big processes and abstract figures, he has first-hand experience from the
trenches and still his vision is not limited to that of the soldier, because he was an intelligence officer with
sharp analytic skills and great outlook. Pikul V., Chest Imeyu, p.93-94, 109.
6 Quoted in Yuri Afanasiev, We are only beginners, Sovietskaya Kultura, 21 March 1987, [interviews Yuri
Afanasyev, Rector of the Moscow State Historical Archive Institute].
7 Olcatt A., Glasnost and Soviet Culture in Maurice F. and Heyward I. () (eds), Soviet society under
Gorbachev: current trends and the prospects for reform, New York: Sharpe, 1987 p.109; Walter Laqueur,
Soviet realities: culture and politics from Stalin to Gorbachev, New Brunswick: Transaction Publishers,
1990, p.41. It should be noted that some of the Russian critics, e.g. Nikolai Gublinsky stressed that some
authors, like Pikul, deal with historical themes, in order to substantiate their own ideas, ideas which have
nothing whatsoever to do with history or, for that matter, with literature, quoted in William Korey, Russian
antisemitism, Pamyat, and the demonology of Zionism, Chur: Harwood Academic Publishers p. 154.
8 Although Pikul narrates the story from the name of his hero using the first person, stressing that the memoirs
of the hero are anonymous because he is an intelligence officer of the Russian/Soviet General Staff, other
sources claim that the name of the officer is Oladiev (Aladin) and he is an offspring of an old Russian
aristocratic house. Some other sources claim that the author of the memoirs was Russian/Soviet officer
Alexandr Samoilo. There is no clarity about the heros personality. Most likely it is a collective hero. For the
purpose of brevity we will use the name Oladiev.
9 Krivoguzs Modern History textbook focuses on the history of Europe. The non-European history constitutes
less than a sixth of the book. The bulk of the book analyses developments in major European states. In
general, the structure of the book demonstrates that Modern History consists of the history of the Marxist
movement, Western European states, South-East and Central Europe, WWI and imperialist rivalry. It is
still noteworthy that the Liberation Fight of the people of the South-East and Central Europe is described
in a short but separate chapter. Thus the Balkans retain their important role of link between Russian and
European history. Krivoguz I. M. 1989, p. 116-131.
10 The birds of Peters nest close associates of the Russian Tsar Peter the Great who were assigned to
recruit, nodernize and command his new army.
11 It is remarkable how the concept of True Serbia becomes prototype for the formation of a True Russia.
All the positive features (according to temporal, ethical, power, self-sacrificing criteria) are fused in the
personalities of the pro-Russian Serb Kings Karageorgievich whereas pro-Austrian dynasty of Obrenovich

548

Vsevolod Samokhvalov

is represented as the epicentre of negative features.

12 The author gives a detailed account of the debauchery, filth, and decay at the royal court of Obrenovic in the
late 19th-early 20th century. V. Pikul, Chest Imeyu, p.6-8
13 The element of humbleness is always present in the description of the Russian hero. He is not a superman,
but a simple person who is not looking for glory, but due to chain of events has to face numerous challenges
and having met them becomes a hero.
14 Na osnove polnogo ravnopraviya, samostoiatelsnosti i vzaimnogo uvazheniya: Vystuplenie, M.S.
Gorbacheva, Izvestia, 18 March 1988.
15 The reports about Yugoslavia described the same troubles that the Soviet leadership was trying to tackle
in its own country, e.g. obsolete equipment and inefficient enterprises, unfavourable weather conditions
for farmers, increase of import, export-dominated economy, heavy dependency on the external market,
inflation, disintegration of economic life of the country, and excessive consumption. On its front pages
Izvestia covered the preparation for and the course of Gorbachevs visit to Yugoslavia. See e.g. Nakanune
vizita, Izvestia, 5 March, 1988; N. Ermolovich, L. Kolosov, Yugoslavia: Vremiya Resheniy, Izvestia, 12
March 1988; Pribytie M. S. Gorbacheva v Belgrad, Izvestia, 15 March 1988, N. Ermolovich, L. Kolosov,
Yugoslavia Vstrechaet Vysokogo Gostiya, Izvestia, 15 March 1988.
16 Na osnove polnogo ravnopraviya, samostoiatelsnosti i vzaimnogo uvazheniya: Vystuplenie M. S.
Gorbacheva, Izvestia, 18 March 1988; The correspondents accompanying the Soviet leader stressed that
there were more than 30 military units staffed by Soviet people who fought in the ranks of the Yugoslav
National Liberation army. One of the most outstanding fighters in the Yugoslav Army was the commander of
the reconnaissance group Mekhti Ganifa Ogly Gusein Zade, a Soviet citizen of Azeri origin; N. Ermolovich,
L. Kolosov, Buduschemu Mirnoe Nebo, Izvestia 19 March 1988.
17 N. Ermolovich, L. Kolosov, Yugoslavia Vstrechaet Vysokogo Gostiya, Izvestia, 15 March 1988.
18 Obogoshchat sotrdunichestvo vo vsekh sferakh, Izvesta, 19 March 1988.
19 Sotrudnichestvo: Novye Podkhody, Izvestia, 28 January 1989, p.4
20 V. K. Furaev, (1989), p. 81; See e.g. Dan start venskim peregovoram: Vystuplenie E. A. Shevardnadze,
Izvestia, 7 March 1989; Sovetsko-Yugoslavskie Peregovory, Izvestia, 15 March 1988; Rech tovarishcha
Gorbacheva M. S., Izvestia, 17 March 1988; My navsegda zapomnim eti vstrechi, Izvestia, 18 March 1988;
Na osnove polnogo ravnopravia, samostoiatelsnosti i vzaimnogo uvazhenia: Vystuplenie M.S.Gorbacheva,
Izvestia, 18 March 1988; E. Vostrukhov, S. Skosyrev, Konferentsiya zakonchila svoyu rabotu, Izvestia, 8
September 1989.
21 N. Ermolovich, L. Kolosov, Yugoslavia: Vremia Resheniy, Izvestia, 12 March 1988; At the same time the
Yugoslav side demonstrated its interest in the visit. Gorbachev Perestroika and New Thinking for our
country and the entire world and collection of his articles were translated into Serb-Croat and published
ahead of his visit to Belgrade, See e.g. Izdany v Yugoslavii, Izvestia, 13 March 1988; N. Ermolovich, L.
Kolosov, Buduschemu Mirnoe Nebo, Izvestia 19 March 1988; There was also a series of follow-up reports
by Izvestia, see e.g. Otkrytyi dialog: Yugoslavskie Rukovoditeli o visite M. S. Gorbacheva v SFRYu, Izvestia,
20 March 1988; SSSR-SFRYu: Novye Rubezhy, Izvestia, 22 March 1988; Vysokaya otsenka, Izvestia, 25
March 1988; See also V. Volodin, Balkany vybirayut sotrudnichestvo, 12 June 1989; Yu. Kovalenko, Mosty
na Vostochniy Bereg, Izvestia, 21 June 1989.
22 L. Kolosov, Yugoslavia Ishchet Premiera, Izvestia, 12 January 1989; L. Kolosov, Trudnye Dni Yugoslavii,
Izvestia, 27 January 1989; E. Vostrukhov, Yugoslavia, Kabinet proiavliaet kharakter, Izvestia, 28 July 1989;
E. Vostrukhov, Strasti vokrug inflatsii, Izvesia, 25 August 1989; E. Vostrukhov, Po komande k novoi valiute,
Izvestia, 2 January; A. Pushkov, V gordom odinochestve, Izvestia, 25 April 1990; See also a long series of
articles by Izvestia correspondent in Belgrade E. Vostrukhov, Kak dinar stal konvertiruemym, Izvestia, 7-11
August 1990; E. Vostrukhov, Smozhet li Soyuz Pomoch Yugoslavskim Reformam, Izvestia, 3 November
1990.
23 Barier bezdenezhia ili meshochniki v centre Belgrada, Izvestia, 16 April 1990.
24 More numerous scenes about the self-sacrifice of Serbs, their knowledge of the V. Pikul, Chest Imeyu, p.
60, 75.
25 E. Vostrukhov, SFRY: Milliard dlia reform, Izvestia, 20 October 1989.
26 N. Ermolovich, L. Kolosov, Yugoslavia: Vremia Resheniy, Izvestia, 12 March 1988; See also Speech
by Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze delivered on the occasion of the visit of his Yugoslav
homologue V. Lonchar. Shevarnadze also stressed that the USSR and SFRY follow similar directions in
reforming socialism and expressed Soviet gratitude to Yugoslavia for their support of Soviet initiatives in
the international arena: SSSR-Yugoslavia: Dinamizm Otnosheniy, Izvestia, 1 November 1989.
27 For example, Prime Minister Aleksandr Vlasov of the Russian Federative Socialist Republic paid a five-day
trip to the Yugoslav Republics of Serbia and Montenegro. He proposed ways to eliminate the Soviet debt
to Yugoslavia which amounted to some 2 billion dollars. In Serbia Vlasov proposed Soviet participation in
the construction of new and the re-building of old pipelines. In Montenegro, he discussed the possibility
of joint ventures in construction, the aluminium industry and ship-building. Whereas relations between
USSR and Bulgaria or USSR and Hungary were characterised by numerous episodes of Soviet development
assistance or by mutually beneficial trade, the Soviet indebtedness to Yugoslavia raised her status in the

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29

30
31
32

33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42

43

44

549

Soviet international perception. The Soviet Union paid off the debt through joint and heavy infrastructural
projects that balanced the debt-based inferiority of the Soviet Union vis--vis Yugoslavia; L. Kolosov, Dolg,
Izvestia, 7 April 1989; Na Zemle Yugoslavii, Izvestia, 28 September 1989; Vizit v Yugoslaviu, Izvestia, 30
September 1989; also Reported by Radio Moscow-1, 30 September 1989 quoted in V. Tolz (ed.), The USSR
in 1989: A Record of Events, Westview Press: Boulder, San Francisco& Oxford, 1990, p. 524. See ibd. p.
125.
SSSR-SFRY: Krepnet Doverie, Izvestia, 30 January 1989; See also proceedings of the round-table between
Soviet and Yugoslav economists held in Moscow under the aegis of the Soviet Council of Ministers; Tolko
ne polumery: Sovietskie i Yugoslavskie uchenye o putiakh obnovlenia ekonomiki, Izvestia, 23 July 1990
L. Kolosov, Kto ostanovit inflatsiyu, Izvestia, 11 January 1989; Otkryt put k demokratizatsii, Izvestia, 16
April 1989. About the same time Izvestia published reports about Gorbachevs visits to the Ukraine and
Milosevics visit to Kosovo. There was also a detailed and lengthy piece on the alternative military service
introduced in Yugoslavia which echoed the debate in Soviet society, E. Vostrukhov, Bez oruzhia, no vdvoe
bolshe, Izvestia, 30 April 1989; E. Vostrukhov, Voznesenie raschital computer, Izvestia, 27 June 1989.
Izvestia, 1 January 1989.
S. Kolosov, Yugoslavia bez Pravitelstva, Izvestia, 3 January 1989.
Unter v lampasah, Izvestia, 2 January 1989; S. Kolosov, Yugoslavia bez Pravitelstva, Izvestia, 3 January
1989, No. 2 (22540); Nam po silam pobedit burokratiu!, Izvestia, 2 February 1989; Ob usilenii borby s
organizovannoi presupnostiyu, Izvestia, 23 December 1989; Vtoroi siezd narodnykh deputatov, Izvestia, 25
December 1989; V Press-Tsentre MVD, Izvestia, 6 May 1990; V. Romaniuk, Na shto natknulsia shprits: kak
riadovoi burokrat otmenil reshenie prezidenta SSSR, Izvestia, 5 July 1990.
Frequent use of expression as history proved is one more indicator that the Russian analysts perceived the
reality in terms of inevitable judgemental processes.
S. Kolosov, Yugoslavia bez Pravitelstva, Izvestia, 3 January 1989; See also L. Kolosov, Yugoslavia: Plenum
TsK: SKYu zavershyl svoiu rabotu, Izvestia, 17 February 1989.
Barier bezdenezhia ili meshochniki v centre Belgrada, Izvestia, 16 April 1990.
References to the Balkans become scarce now because the authors want to stress the Soviet-led modernisation
and distance the USSR from other Balkan signifiers Great Power, imperialism, interethnic conflicts, etc.
K sobytiam v Nagornom Karabakhe, Izvestia, 14 July 1989, Chitateli Izvestiy o mezhnatsionalnykh
otnosheniakh, Izvestia, 15 July 1989.
Vstrechi M. S. Gorbacheva na Yugoslavskoi Zemle, Izvestia 17 March 1988.
See e.g. E. Vostrukhov, Federatsiya ili konfederatsiya, Izvestia, 22 September 1989; E. Vostrukhov, Ugroza
navisshaya nad federatsiey: Nochnoi plenum TsK SKYu, Izvestia, 27 September 1989.
See e.g. Obraschenie Prezidenta Verkhovnogo Soveta SSSR k narodu Litovskoi SSSR, Izvestia, 1 January
1990 and subsequent issues.
E. Vostrukhov, Snova vystrely v Kosovo, Izvestia, 2 June 1989, E. Vostrukhov, Otmeneny osobye mery,
Izvestia, 3 September 1989.
V MID SSSR, Izvestia, 21 November 1989; In subsequent material the Soviet MFA also criticized Bush
for supporting those who try to destabilize the situation in Latvia and other Baltic states. O. Alexandrov,
Nelovko, no govorit pridetsiya, Izvestia, 24 November 1989; O zaiavlenii chlenov kongressa SShA,
Izvestia, 6 January 1990.
The term balkanization was also used in the 1960s in the Soviet press. But in that period it mostly referred
to the imperial powers trying to split anti-imperialist movements, whereas this was the first time that
Khasbulatov applied it to Russia. See e.g. V. Maevskiy, Posledniaya stavka: pismo iz Afriki, Pravda, 25
August 1960; Ruslan Khasbulatov, Pod flagom edinstva mozhet i dolzhno prohodit vozrozhdenie Rossii,
Izvestia, 24 September 1990.
Lakonochi (Serb) - Good night.