Yeltsin: A Man Of Many Lives

 By: Leroy A. Binns Ph.D.

Upon passing on April 23 Western leaders exalted Boris Yeltsin for his tenacity and wisdom. Bill Clinton said “history will be kind to him,” George H. W. Bush concurred in reference of him as “a historic figure” and Margaret Thatcher claimed the former Russian president deserved to be honored as “a patriot and liberator.” In identical fashion past and present leaders from Central and Eastern Europe too acknowledged a debt of gratitude to a man they deemed a forerunner of democracy in the region.

Boris Yeltsin nonetheless was the architect of varying dimensions, a demagogue who adopted erratic behavior to an ever fluid climate and landscape. In the wake of his death The Guardian in an article entitled “A Destroyer not a Builder” purports the following, “The truth is that Mr Yeltsin’s legacy proved to be a bitter pill… Even before Mr Yeltsin sent an unmarked column of tanks to Grozny to crush the separatists and start a decade of brutal war in Chechnya, liberal democracy was being crushed by the president’s fatal embrace… Many of the seeds of Russia’s authoritarianism were planted in that era.” Continents away The Australian conveys comparable perceptions in its commentary, “The Man who took on Totalitarianism,” “Words like complex and contradictory do not do justice to a man who went from being hailed a hero to being dismissed as an incompetent embarrassment in the space of a few years. For every positive legacy of the Yeltsin era there is an equally negative one.”

Born Boris Nikolayevich Yeltsin to Nikolai and Klavdia Yeltsin in 1931 in the village of Butkain in the Sverdlovsk region he marries Naina Iosifovna Girina in 1956 and the union gives birth to daughters Yelena in 1957 and Tatyana in 1959. A foray into politics ensued in 1976 with the appointment to first secretary of the Sverdlovsk District Central Committee. Months later his enthusiasm and productivity caught the attention of the general secretary of the communist party Mikhail Gorbachev who initiated a transfer to Moscow as secretary of the Central Committee for Construction.

The ambitious Yeltsin in 1985 was once again elevated on this occasion to the post of first secretary of Moscow City Party Committee a position that automatically bestows membership to the politburo otherwise known as the Soviet Union’s de facto ruling body with circumstance to reshape Soviet politics. Taking advantage of said privilege the ill-advised newcomer on October 21, 1987 proceeds to publicly denounce Gorbachev’s perestroika for its pace and results and is punished by an angered committee with banishment to Sverdlovsk where he is demoted to serve as supervisor of construction.

As economic turbulence exposed polarity and ill gotten gains his campaign against corruption among the political elite resounded with his candidacy and afforded him a seat in the spring of 1989 within the Soviet parliament and in less than two years he won the Russian Federation’s first popular presidential election. Yeltsin was now at the pinnacle of his political career and poised to inflict damage to a regime weakened domestically by stalled reform and fragmentation and internationally by the loss of the Eastern Bloc.

In August 1991 an attempted coup that sidelines Gorbachev while vacationing at his dasha near the Black Sea presents Yeltsin with a platform for action. For many his defiance atop an armored personnel carrier challenging regression is his crowning moment as a beacon for democracy. Further his ability to dismantle the experimental Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) with the assistance of counterparts from the Ukraine and Belarus engraved his place in history.

With Gorbachev’s resignation from the short term head of state ceremonial duties Yeltsin ascended to the coveted position of president of the Russian republic and proceeded to build alliances. The first order of business was aimed at forging ties with eclectic advisors across party lines that allowed for maneuvering in decision making processes as was equally the appointment of the 35 year old economist Yegor Gaidar as prime minister. The outcome notwithstanding, exemplified unfamiliarity with the application of capitalism in a society void of market reform. Decisions in early 1992 to introduce shock therapy by removing price controls resulted in hyper-inflation and plunged millions of Russians into poverty. Moreover in the absence of a progressive tax code as much as 40% of the Russian economy sought safe haven underground. An apparatus with high interest rates was crippled by sparse investments and a budget deficit approximately 7% of GDP.

In spite of a reshuffle at the behest of the Supreme Soviet that substituted an incompetent Gaidar with Viktor Chernomyrdin Yeltsin’s resoluteness by 1993 became apparent in light of resistance to surmounting fiscal crisis. As the Duma sought to impeach the president he rebuffed by dissolving parliament. The stalemate climaxed and the brazen leader with minimal party allegiance found refuge in the army and its ranks that in the end claimed 140 lives and achieved the objective of dislodging lawmakers from the White House with a flurry of bullets. A Yeltsin victory against archrivals vice president Aleksandr Rutskoi and assembly speaker Ruslan Khasbulatov was also accompanied with a date for new parliamentary elections and although unprecedented and illicit a referendum on a new constitution.

Yeltsin’s mishaps were conspicuous in his accommodation of the aristocracy. The privatization of state property under the purview of the deputy prime minister Anatoly Chubais at bargain prices established a clique of oligarchs the likes of Boris Berezovsky, Mikhail Khodorkovsky, Vladimir Gusinsky and Leonid Nevzlin with an insatiable craving for assets, governmental privileges and political supremacy. According to American journalist the late Paul Klebnikov, “Using his access to the highest officials of the Russian government and his reputation as a close friend of the Yeltsin family, Berezovsky hammered away at the privatization projects that would place key state industries in his grasp.” The editor of Antiwar.Com Justin Raimondo who equates Yeltsin’s new family with the Sopranos contends, “The rule of the commissars had been succeeded by the reign of gangsters, criminal elements who seized control of the national economy and engineered a complete takeover of the state machinery not for any ideological motive or ostensibly patriotic purpose but simply to enrich themselves.” Besides shortsightedness in favor of asymmetrical relationships punctuated a death rate from murders, suicides, heart attacks and accidents that stigmatized Russia with the resemblance of a state at war.

Crystallizing autonomy in both the private and public sectors the unassuming president was unwilling to entertain challenges to his authority. Chechnya’s undertaking to form an independent entity was foiled by his haphazard conduct – military intervention. Unheeding an international chorus for diplomatic engagement his impulsion to annihilate the rebellious faction restricted a change in course and prolonged an acute dilemma. The crusade a duration of over two years bore liability for the lives of thousands of Russian citizens.

The deficiency of a democratic tradition in conjunction with indistinct institutions of social reform, public discontent with inadequacies and a process ran amuck are all components of a bankrupt presidency. However such realities, personal shortcomings and ill health did not preclude this enduring figure from a re-election bid.

With opinion polls recording his approval rating at 8% in January 1996 he mustered reinforcements – Russian tycoons, American political/media consultants and government resources in a display of might to a moderate ticket and surprisingly garnered 35% of the votes to guarantee a run off against rival and second place winner communist party boss Gennady Zyuganov.

The 1996 Presidential Elections (first round)

Candidates                                          Results  

Boris Yeltsin                                       35%

Gennady Zyuganov                             32%
Aleksandr Lebed                                 14%

By playing the political chess game of ejecting defense minister Pravel Gravel his loyal torch bearer during the 1993 aborted ouster and a Lebed detractor he was enabled the leverage necessary to court the third place former general who he appointed to the Security Council. The gamble yielded good fortune – cooptation of the Lebed camp and ultimate re-election with 53% of the votes.

True to form Yeltsin continued to restack the deck with Lebed being the first cast off board. Chronic sickness magnified by lengthy leaves of absence also facilitated musical chairs with competing figures such as returning Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin administering or pilfering the state.

The year was 1998 and fiscal mismanagement multiplied with the offering of superficial solutions. The entire cabinet was abruptly dismissed and the steward Chernomyrdin was replaced by former energy minister Sergei Kiriyenko. To revive a collapsing economy, sales of hard currency was indefinitely suspended paralyzing bank activity and thus commerce with rippling effects of escalating street rates of the dollar beyond 10 rubles (the official value was 7.86 rubles to the dollar or 12.7 cents per ruble). Consequently spiraling anxiety surrounding inflation which stood at 84.4% by years end was attributed to Kiriyenko’s early discharge.

Russian Inflation Rates 1992 – 1998

(annual % change in consumer prices)

Year                            Rate                             Year                            Rate

1992                            2,508.8                        1996                            21.8

1993                            839.9                           1997                            11.0
1994                            215.1                           1998                            84.4
1995                            175.0

Source: Goskomstat, Russian Economic Trends

Additional measures embodied a debate with proposals inclusive of a return to a Soviet regime of fixed currency exchange rates, controlled prices and nationalization of major industries.

In the months ahead former KGB official Yevgeny Primakov credited for advancing a rapport with the legislature and former interior minister Sergei Stepashin exit the prime minister’s office and the director of the Federal Security Service Vladimar Putin is assigned the vacancy and declared Yeltsin’s successor. Putin was again rewarded in the closing hours of the 20^th century as the baton finally changed hands with the president’s abrupt televised resignation.

Boris Yeltsin’s legacy was one of consummation with survival for which he sacrificed the interest of the state. In the words of liberal parliamentary leader Gregory Yavlinsky, “The government that was formed was without any clear ideology. It was neither red, nor white nor green. It was based solely on personal greed. You got a system that was corporatist, oligarchic and based on monopolized property rights and semi-criminal relationships.” Such deportment contrived pandemonium illustrated by an alarming number of unexplained deaths ranging from five to six million between 1992 and 2000 and an expansion of indigence during the same timeframe.

Russian Annual Rate of Poverty

(% of population)

Year                            Rate                             Year                            Rate

1992                            33.5                             1997                            21.2
1993                            31.5                             1998                            24.6
1994                            22.4                             1999                            39.1
1995                            26.2                             2000                            33.7
1996                            21.4

Source: Goskomstat, Russian Economic Trends

Yeltsin’s unpredictability and chaotic mannerisms are derivatives of a communist background. However his fixation with personal loyalty was an obstacle to evolution and a catalyst for a diminished empire transformed by insolvency and destitution.