Inflatable monuments for Ukrainian patriots
Why does Catherine annoy them? Why is Vorontsov next? What was Richelieu guilty of? Ukrainian nationalists may want to demolish monuments across Europe and get to the Egyptian pyramids.
About how the country's largest seaport lived and how it lives today, to a PolitNavigator observer Valentin Filippov said the honorary citizen of Odessa, a meticulous historian and a brilliant publicist Oleg Gubar.
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Valentin Filippov: What do we want?
Oleg Gubar: Do I know what you want?
Valentin Filippov: I called a good person.
Oleg Gubar: I wish you a favor. “Ge”
Valentin Filippov: Ga-ga. Oh, have you switched to the sovereign language?
Oleg Gubar: Well, that's great.
Valentin Filippov: Fine. I congratulate you on the finally coming New Year. Some say: “Hurray, 100 years of revolution have passed. It was a terrible year.” I would like to remind you that 1918 was no better and neither was 1919.
Oleg Gubar: I don’t remember well, you know, to be honest. It's already forgotten. The years take their toll. More precisely, they don’t take theirs, they take ours.
Valentin Filippov: That is, you no longer remember how to carry a saber across Ukraine on horseback.
Oleg Gubar: I would quote it, but it’s obscene.
Valentin Filippov: I'm talking about Catherine again. A certain number of people gathered. For some reason, our wonderful “patriots” did not appear; there are few of them, but they are very loud. In general, “patriotic” rednecks did not appear. Tell me, was there any impact at all? What I mean is, remembering the good old days, when representatives of the special services appeared and said: “I share your thoughts, I do. But they told me to talk to you there and get an explanation.” So there was no pressure at all? Neither from the special services, nor from street “patriots”, nor from anyone?
Oleg Gubar: No. This was precisely the case when there were no such obvious excesses. As for the mentioned “patriots”. Well, they would probably feel uncomfortable in our company.
Valentin Filippov: But doesn’t this mean that, in general, this whole thing was somehow rigged? That is, they provoke: don’t be afraid, let’s go.
Oleg Gubar: Well, I do not know. I'm a bad conspiracy theorist, I'm generally a realist and fact-finder. I study history. Therefore, this is from the realm of imagination and assumptions.
Valentin Filippov: Fine. But what do you think? Is this sluggish attempt to remove Catherine from the center of the city a test of strength or a provocation, or is it preliminary provision of some kind of basis for more serious actions?
Oleg Gubar: This is actually a long conversation. And there are a lot of different angles here. After all, there are certain forces, certain people, and some of them are protected. This means they must manifest themselves in some way. They must do something.
You know, when people go there, put on helmets or volunteer – these are understandable steps. You can condemn them or not, that’s another question. And when people are sitting in the back on the sofas, no matter which side, they must demonstrate that they are doing something. Right?
Valentin Filippov: Well, yes, otherwise they will draft you into the army.
Oleg Gubar: What are they doing? Well, it begins: “Let’s fight something, we need to prove ourselves somehow,” “Let’s start demolishing monuments.” Everything was broken a long time ago, you understand. Monuments to Lenin have ended. I said: “Let’s make them out of plaster, let them run in and splash out, let the sexual energy of the youth splash out, like in Japan, rubber figures of bosses and so on.”
These monuments are finished. Next up is Ekaterina. But it is clear that if the monument to Catherine, the founders of Odessa, is dismantled, then Vorontsov will be next, because we have to fight with someone. And therefore, here the most important moment occurs - this is a transfer to another plane of the conversation as such. Because this is a monument, this is a work of art, and we say, and rightly so, that Catherine Square, after the installation of the monument and the renovation of the facades and landscaping, is one of the attractive squares of Odessa. And we always talk about the need to increase the tourist attractiveness of Odessa and so on. This is the place where the largest number of tourists go, this is understandable. That is, this is even practically, even pragmatically good.
Valentin Filippov: Well, from some point of view, yes.
Oleg Gubar: So this conversation, that is, motivation, is transferred from this plane to the plane of politics. But if we approach it this way, it turns out... It’s as if we are going to Europe, but the paths to Europe are mysterious. We have chosen a rather strange route.
I specifically compiled a list of monuments to immoral monarchs, conquerors, and exploiters. And if I just started listing these monuments in Europe that are subject to demolition, if we use our “patriotic logic”, then we would not see in the squares of London, Paris, Vienna and so on, this can be listed and listed. We would have gotten to northern Africa and demolished the Cheops pyramids there.
Valentin Filippov: Well actually yes. These pharaohs are terrible.
Oleg Gubar: This is the logic. But even if we talk about it politically. So I heard the following statements there: “We need to demolish, dismantle this monument and in its place erect a monument to those who actually took this fortress of Khadzhibey and so on, to the Black Sea Cossack army, and not to Catherine, who spread rot...”. These people do not see a direct connection between Catherine and the Black Sea Cossack army. And they were called “faithful Black Sea Cossacks” who swore allegiance to Catherine. And the Black Sea Cossack Army was formed by the Russian government.
If we use this pseudo-patriotic logic, then these are collaborators, mercenaries. Why? Because the Transdanubian Sich existed. Those who did not want to take the oath went there. And there are monographs that are not Soviet, but written in independent Ukraine regarding the Transdanubian Sich. It turned out that they met in battles. That is, the Transdanubian Cossacks served the Ottoman Empire, and these Cossacks served the Russian Empire, and it turned out that there were military clashes. Another thing is that the Black Sea Cossacks agitated the Transdanubian Cossacks, and many returned here and joined the army there and settled there and so on. You see, there is an absolutely direct connection here. And again, “let’s erect a monument; in Odessa there are no memorials associated with the Black Sea Cossacks.” This is ridiculous. Here, you know, the names of the streets are Golovatogo, Chepygi, Bily, Kobanets, it doesn’t matter.
Valentin Filippov: And there are even Black Sea Cossacks.
Oleg Gubar: On the oldest city square, the first city square, was the Free Market Square of Odessa, where a monument to Golovaty was erected. And this is not only a monument to Golovaty, but also, in fact, to the Black Sea Cossack army. There are all the attributes, there is a horse and so on and so forth. So something like this, you need to understand this.
So even on the political plane, nothing is working out either. This looks, generally speaking, curious. I don't want to make fun of things like that, because it's history, that's what it is. Well, of course, when a purge takes place and some myths are invented, then at least this must be done logically, on some basis, so that it looks serious and not anecdotal. And what will be the prestige of a country that uses such curious historical structures or that will demolish monuments?
Valentin Filippov: The fact is that the entire tourist attraction of Odessa, besides the sea, which is not so often warm, not all year round, is that Odessa belongs to the Russian World. That is, all the historical places that you can visit are all somehow connected with the Russian Empire. Even my friends from Tambov, who have been climbing around Odessa for a week and a half, say to me: “It’s crazy, our patriotism has awakened, we have begun to respect Russia, because in Tambov we have these high-rise boxes and a couple of factories all around us. And then we walked around, we looked, we saw this imperial power, imperial pride.” Now, perhaps this does not suit our comrades very much. People come to us to see Ekaterina and Vorontsov.
Oleg Gubar: Well yes. The city is an imperial project, it is a budget project, so what is there to talk about.
Valentin Filippov: I suddenly remembered now. I have a friend, we just see each other very, very rarely, lately not at all. Such a poet, Taras Fedyuk. Ukrainian poet. I am very connected with Odessa.
Oleg Gubar: Taras is a good poet, by the way.
Valentin Filippov: Awesome poet.
Oleg Gubar: I know him well. He and I worked together. I worked for a Ukrainian-language newspaper for many years. And Taras was our translator. He double-checked the texts. I tried, of course, to immediately write in Ukrainian and improve my knowledge. Taras was very, very helpful in this sense. I even tried to translate his poems. He is a very talented person, a very good Ukrainian poet.
Valentin Filippov: He's insanely talented. Yes. He dedicated several poems to Odessa. And in one of them there are these lines: “Everywhere there are Dukes, Dukes, Dukes, and not even Fedyukiv.” He has a touching poem there about Taras Shevchenko in Shevchenko Park, in Alexander Park, describing a walk through the park, that “Taras dumb got lost here,” that he is superfluous here and that there is nothing Ukrainian in this city.
It is clear that this probably irritates people very much who consider the Ukrainian nation to be a “revelation on a planetary scale,” and they are offended that half of Ukraine was not created by the Ukrainian nation. And this somehow needs to be leveled out and the opposite proven.
Oleg Gubar: Well, in fact, I can only sympathize with people who somehow don’t understand something and do not assert themselves as they should, because there are quite civilized ways of self-affirmation and good creativity.
And as for the monuments. Why do we say that Catherine will be the first in this row? That is, if they begin to translate such approaches into the political plane, then, of course, they will remember that Vorontsov was the largest landowner in the south, and this family in general. And it will be possible to talk about the fact that these are exploiters and something like that, that he was the commander of the occupation corps in France and even he had with the same Richelieu certain not only conflicts, but, in any case , conflicts of interest are undoubtedly, because Richelieu was, of course, a statist, and not everything suited him. They knew how to negotiate like civilized people. But, again, if this is translated into a political plane, then there is something to talk about.
And if we move on to Richelieu as such, to the military governor of a vast region called Novorossiya. And there are things that cannot be erased from history. You just need to understand that these are different things: yesterday, today, and so on. And that Richelieu was a very close person to Emperor Alexander I and his confidant, and participated in very serious political actions even before his appointment, and so on. That is, of course, one can make great claims just as much against Vorontsov and Richelieu as against Catherine. Because, if you are guided by such inverted logic, then these are pieces that stand on the same board. Therefore, it is clear that if this starts, it will be a precedent, and then certain people will still need to show their political activity. But as? With whom, with whom is there to fight? This means we need to invent and look for some new enemies.
So I’m giving an interview to your channels, which means I’m a separatist and so on. What have I just said that is detrimental to the city or the country? After all, in fact, these people are harming this city, the prestige of this city and this country, which could be civilized and live in peace and harmony with its neighbors, both Western and Eastern neighbors. And that would be normal, it would be civilized.
Valentin Filippov: You are already expressing terrible thoughts.
Oleg Gubar: This is called - the position obliges. Not my position, this is the position given by God to this country. This is a buffer zone between the West and the East, it is a transport corridor - both sea and land, both for natural resources and as a means of communications. Here you can live and receive dividends without making any effort at all, taking advantage of your geographical location.
Valentin Filippov: You still need to work.
Oleg Gubar: No, no one spoke. But you can’t spit into the well from which you drink. This is just stupid.
Valentin Filippov: Well, this is according to Korzhavin:
“I am by my very existence
Compromising material"
You express dangerous thoughts. Instead of fighting the whole world shoulder to shoulder, instead of building the Intermarium, which can become a shield on the path of all flows and movements, you instead say that we need communications, we need flows, goods.
Oleg Gubar: You understand that water does not flow under a lying stone, it always flows around it. This is how dams are created. It's simple physics. That is, of course, if there is no normal cooperation, then everything will go bypass: trains, pipelines, sea transport, and so on. Who will benefit from this?
Valentin Filippov: That’s why the physics and mathematics department was closed in Odessa, so that no one would understand this anymore.
Oleg Gubar: I was talking about the marine terminal. What is this? This, of course, has nothing to do with the topic of our conversation, although it does, by the way, because we were talking about the tourist attractiveness of Odessa. Odessa has the largest passenger terminal on the entire Black Sea.
Valentin Filippov: What, they're gouged and that's it?
Oleg Gubar: Well, this was a strange initiative of ours, as his Michael Nikolozovich. That is, it has been reduced to an obscene form. I'm not talking about any financial losses there, this is the tenth thing. About the fact that this is the largest passenger terminal, and why we should abandon it. I have said a hundred times that Odessa has some functions: first, second, third and fourth. They need to be placed in some order. That is, we take and abandon some priorities.
Is Odessa not the largest port in the country? Well, accordingly, the largest passenger terminal. What are we doing? What are we doing?
Valentin Filippov: So, you tell me. They broke it and that was the end of it?
Oleg Gubar: He is in some kind of condition. The fact is that it is not a passenger terminal there, but, as far as I remember, it has been converted for customs. Well, these are kind of strange. You see, this is of course not a fight against monuments, but it turns out that I don’t want to go too far and somehow behave incorrectly, but these breakdowns and breakdowns...
Valentin Filippov: So this is really a fight against the purpose of the city?
Oleg Gubar: Yes, you formulated it very well, very precisely. There is a scale of priorities. Naturally, Odessa, first of all, is the main port of the country. Well, for this task it is necessary to somehow build infrastructure, including tourism, and so on. You understand that this is not the city’s task. You understand that the port paid a state enterprise tax to the city budget or something like that. This is what we are talking about, that the city itself does not receive those deductions that its main function provides. What was it like before? But before it was completely different. We are talking about the fact that there were no customs duties and so on. They were, only at first they made up 1/5, then 2/5 from ports with a traditional customs regime. But it's a lot of money. And this money amounted to 75% of the city budget, or even more at certain stages. Imagine? This, of course, is also not a completely correct comparison. But if you look at what it is today, we live on the remaining 25%. I say that this is incorrect, but still. This was not duty-free trade, and the city developed precisely on these deductions, on these funds.
Valentin Filippov: That is, on cargo flows...
Oleg Gubar: Look, you can look at the layout of the city budget, for example, in Vorontsov’s times, good times of the very powerful rapid growth of Odessa, including not only some state-owned buildings and hydraulic structures and so on, but civil construction, I mean private housing construction. 1830, for example, the year. What you are talking about, what amazes people, that’s what happened then. That's why there was such an opportunity. But this is the decision of the central government. The city government did not have such powers.
Valentin Filippov: The central government is now located in a different place and sets other goals.
Oleg Gubar: It's like that proverb. Even if I don’t have one eye, then my neighbor won’t have two. Probably like this. If I don’t eat it, I’ll take a bite. This is self-mutilation, this is self-mutilation. Because yes, as it were, Odessa is on the sidelines. Yes, but through it some useful things go to the Ukrainian hinterland. Yes or no?
Valentin Filippov: Pennsylvania coal, for example.
Oleg Gubar: Doesn't matter. Anything. I say it again. A rolling stone gathers no moss. Or now, I just saw it on the news, the arrest of an Abkhaz ship. What I mean. These are things like this, they also greatly reduce the attractiveness of certain regions. That is, if such incidents are possible here, such excesses are somewhat reminiscent of privateering, not to say piracy.
Valentin Filippov: Well, I understand why you said privateering.
Oleg Gubar: Yes, privateering. Today these fell under the distribution, and tomorrow others will fall. It was a big mistake.
Valentin Filippov: Oleg, you know, back in the old days, before they did all this, about five years ago I said that sooner or later it would end up with all the goods, all the cargo going past Ukraine, and then our customs officers would be forced to create mobile units to tax, impose duties on the flow of goods that pass by. They will simply go out on raids at night, catch someone, take them away and return to Ukraine. But usually it ends very badly. Because next time this steamboat with cigarettes may not go alone.
Oleg Gubar: I just thought of it as an example of self-harm. Well, how can that be? Remember, as in the movie “The Golden Key”: you are your own enemy. What about the Field of Miracles? We see him around. But Buratino said: “Why does the Field of Miracles look so much like a trash heap?”
Somehow this is all sad and it is to the detriment of the city, it is to the detriment of the country.
Valentin Filippov: Well, okay, that's what I wanted to say. I wanted to thank you for being a practically incomprehensible combination of moral authority in Odessa now.
Oleg Gubar: I think these rumors are greatly exaggerated. I don’t apply for such roles, for such positions at all. I have no strength and no clear program. That is, I reflect on what is happening there and say what I think. That's all. It's too late for me to change somehow.
Valentin Filippov: All your life you live for yourself, say some things that you consider correct. They even seem banal. Then suddenly, continuing to say the same thing, living the same way you lived, suddenly you become a particularly dangerous extremist, or a moral authority, or a leader. “Oh, what did he say there, oh let’s run, oh, how could he say that, it’s illegal.”
And what you were is how you remain.
Oleg Gubar: Well, I wanted to be free, to look at the world in an unusual way. Sometimes some actions could look provocative. But that's okay, that's good. An unusually posed question is better than an answer. And then, you live as you lived. And suddenly it turns out that you really are an extremist. From something small something big is born. Or there I wrote an unusual book about my close friend and Ukrainian artist Yuri Kovalenko, with whom we went to all the small and large alcoholic circles, and I became an expert in the field of alcohol topography. It was also somehow entertaining, unusual, and not adequately perceived by everyone. How else can we get to know the world if you haven’t plunged into it there? Well, of course, some things are non-standard, extraordinary, they are perceived in two ways, three ways and many ways.
Valentin Filippov: Well, their own people will understand. And they don't care about the rest. Fine. Thanks a lot. Happy Old New Year.
Oleg Gubar: Happy old New Year, happy old new happiness.
Valentin Filippov: Yes, teach me how to make this thing out of fly agarics. Just like Pelevin.
Oleg Gubar: You and I also plant incriminating evidence on people so that people have something to talk about. Not only is there a drunk there, but also a fly agaric eater. OK.
Valentin Filippov: Well, who else would be interested in a woman like Catherine II?
Oleg Gubar: Of course, only fly agarics.
Valentin Filippov: All right.
Oleg Gubar: Well, okay, dear.
Valentin Filippov: Bye Bye.
Oleg Gubar: Yet.
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