Russia and Asia. Interview with Professor Michał Lubina

- In 1946, a book by the Polish scholar exploring Russian politics, Włodzimierz Bączkowski, was published in Jerusalem. In it, he described the nature of Russia – both Tsarist and Soviet, and methods there employed. He pointed out that the nature of her policies – diversionary and expansive – stemmed from the Asian origins of Russian statehood. Bączkowski’s theses were polemicised at the time by a former Second Republic intelligence officer, the Sovietologist Jerzy Niezbrzycki (writing under the pseudonym Ryszard Wraga). He argued that the Asianness of Russia’s origins was, at the very least, relative and could not be used to try to explain the policy she had pursued and was pursuing. Who do you think was right in this discussion?

This one is a very interesting, even fascinating discussion, and as such it has its place in the history of political thought. From a contemporary point of view, however, there are two fundamental problems with it. Firstly, what is meant by Asian? Asia is extremely diverse and in fact there is no single Asianness. Completely different are the countries of Central Asia, for example, and South-East Asia is completely different, what does Turkmenistan have in common with the Philippines?

Secondly, describing Russia’s Asianness in pejorative terms has perceptible tinge of orientalising, and this is unacceptable today. However, bracketing these remarks, I assume that Bączkowski, when writing about Russia’s Asianness, had in mind the Mongol legacy, the period of the so-called yoke, when the Mongol Empire conquered Rus, which in the long run benefited Moscow the most, as it emerged as the strongest political centre and forcibly conquered the remaining Ruthenian principalities, which led to the creation of the Russian Empire. In this sense, both polemicists were right – and I would take a compromise position here, assuming that Russia is a hybrid state, drawing its models both from local sources (Ruthenia), from Byzantium, from the Mongols and from the West. From Byzantium, for example, the model of the state-church relationship or the sacralisation of power; and from the Mongols, for example, the ruthlessness in the pursuit of political goals, justifying methods political goals, justifying the methods (Bączkowski’s “diversion” fits here). On the other hand, historically speaking, Russia’s Asian elements have been weaker, at least in the last three centuries, although perhaps events after 2022 will lead to the (re)Asianisation of Russia. We shall see. For the moment, I regard Russia as a hybrid, a fascinating eclectic mix of different influences.

Russia’s Asianisation – ideological and political considerations aside – works on the imagination when distances, those vast territories east of the Urals, and their remoteness from the centres of political Russia, Moscow and St Petersburg, are considered. You have travelled across Asian Russia. As an eyewitness to this geographical Asianness of Russia, do you see it in the everyday life of the towns and villages there? How does it manifest itself?

I saw many years ago on Yahoo, an American portal, a simplified map of the world in which Russia was marked as Russia and Asia began south of it. And although geographically absurd, culturally it was the right view. Russia is in Asia, but she is not Asia: she may be in Asia in the physical sense, most of her territory is there, but she doesn’t feel that way at all. Driving on the Trans-Siberian Railway, you pass similar European cities, like Irkutsk, Khabarovsk or Vladivostok, most of which are European and could be in any other part of Russia. They differ in detail, in local colour, but that’s about it. Siberia and the Russian Far East are culturally an extension of (Russian) Europe, Asianness is tenuous there. In 2006, I travelled to China for the first time, then by land, it took me a month through Russia, and I only experienced the culture shock when I crossed the Russian-Chinese border. When I travelled overland to India a year later, a completely different world had manifested itself already in Iran and then only intensified in Pakistan. Similar journeys, similar distance, and a huge difference. All because Russia, despite her thousands of kilometres, culturally is not so radically different.

Should we speak – still using this conventional formula – of Russia’s “Asianness”, or rather of its various “Asiannesses”? Is the “Asianness” of Omsk similar to that of Krasnoyarsk? How does Novosibirsk compare to Irkutsk or Vladivostok? In other words, are there “regionalisms” other than those resulting from different terrain or climate?

Regionalisms certainly do exist, and it is worth asking anthropologists or sociologists working in these regions for an in-depth view, such as Prof. Ewa Nowicka, who studies the Buryats, or Dr. Kinga Nędza-Sikoniowska, who studies the socio-urban fabric of Russian cities. They, and many others, will certainly tell you more than I can. On the other hand, these local dissimilarities seem to me to be just some local colouring, not some great fundamental, existential difference. The Tsarist and then Soviet uravnilovka effectively made the various Rus’ people into Russians and Russified the other peoples of Russia. While differences have survived, they do not seem fundamental to me in the Asian part of Russia, although I stress that I have not researched this in depth.

There is much talk of Chinese colonisation of Siberia. Is this actually an ongoing process? If so, how is it taking place and what is the result?

The Chinese colonisation of Siberia is a whooping great lie, a myth and fake news, an absurdity that was popular in Russia in the 1990s. (and earlier in the early 20th century) and which is already slowly dying out in Russia itself. Unlike in Poland, where the popular folklore “geopolitics of the old highlander” (“and as the old highlander used to say, Poland will be all the way to the Urals, beyond the Urals will be China, and you won’t exist sons of…”) still prevails, assuming that China could be our ally pushing towards the border in the Urals, which would even be funny if it were not pathetic, as well as dangerous to the interests of the Republic of Poland (because she sees a partner of sorts in the now clearly pro-Russian China).

The myth, the fake news of Chinese colonisation, came from specific circumstances of the time and the place, the weakness of Yeltsin’s Russia in the 1990s, the necessity to give China some of the islands in the Amur, the local fears of Far Eastern Russians and the exploitation of this by the media and politicians. All of this produced a toxic mix that caused the 200-400,000-strong Chinese presence in Siberia to grow to several million in the public imaginary. This was never the case; there were never even a million Chinese in Russia (the whole of her!); the largest estimate two decades ago was 750,000 Chinese spread more or less equally across three parts: Moscow, Eastern Siberia including the Russian Far East and the rest of the country. Since then, by the way, the Chinese population has declined because China is a richer country, additionally she is facing demographic problems, so there is not only lack of interest in emigrating to Russia, but also the people’s government is blocking such ideas so as not to irritate Moscow, etc., etc… I could still go on in great length, I have described it in three books, but firstly, who reads academics, and secondly, the popular folk wisdom of the “old highlander” is much stronger than hard data and all other facts anyway.

The complicated nature of Russia’s relations with China is discussed on various occasions, but most often when there are acute international crises, and both sides particularly need something from each other. In recent years, there has generally been a strong emphasis on China’s superiority over Russia – the dragon can do more than the bear, it is simply stronger. Do you agree with this? Isn’t this another oversimplification, linked this time to an overestimation of Beijing’s authority and political consistency? What are these relationships really like? What benefits do both the sides gain of them, and what in the partner/rival policy harms them?

China is clearly stronger than Russia, and has been since at least 2008, a fact that both sides are well aware of and deliberately conceal, creating the appearance of an equal relationship. Great credit for this goes to China, which, vis-à-vis Russia, shows an impressive virtue of moderation. They could have imposed much tougher conditions on Russia, as they did, for example, on Sri Lanka or Turkmenistan, but they did not, because China has learned Russia’s lesson. They know that it is a proud state, even having, as one researcher put it, “a pathological need for respect”, and that when offended it can act irrationally. This is why China has built a relationship with Russia on what I call an asymmetric win-win; both sides gain, China more, but Russia gains something too, it’s not like it loses out. The relationship with China was an “insurance policy” for Russia in case relations with the West collapsed, and an opportunity for the chinovniks to make money. The insurance policy worked after 2022, China helped and still helps Moscow to survive and continue the war. And as for the earnings of the chinovniks, Beijing has already taken a “turn toward Putin’s cronies” some decade ago, as one Russian researcher commented. Because national interests are an abstraction whereas money in Cayman accounts is a tangible concrete. That is why when one Russian journalist asked Igor Sechin, the ruler of Rosneft, if he had learned at least one word in Chinese, he replied “yuan”. And when, a few years later, the same journalist repeated the question, Sechin, laughing, replied without embarrassment “mnogo yuani”, many yuan.

Today, a confluence of three key factors makes Russian-Chinese relations strong and likely to remain so in the near future. The first is the “backing” – the two countries are each other’s strategic backings, which allows both to focus on more important areas. Figuratively speaking, Khabarov regiments would not be able to carry out massacres in Irpin and Bucha if they had to guard the Amur from the Chinese. And since nothing threatens them from there, these and other Far Eastern troops could be redeployed in Ukraine. China, similarly, can think of conquering Taiwan and subjugating the entire South China Sea because it has peace from the north. The second factor is anti-Americanism, Russia and China have a common enemy, and they have a great deal in common. The third is complementary economic cooperation, serving both countries and their appropriate individuals, such as the aforementioned Sechin.