The Road to Unfreedom: Russia, Europe, America

“History as a discipline began as a confrontation with war propaganda. In the first history book, The Peloponnesian Wars, Thucydides was careful to make a distinction between leaders’ accounts of their actions and the real reasons for their decisions. In our time, as rising inequality elevates political fiction, investigative journalism becomes the more precious. Its renaissance began during the Russian invasion of Ukraine, as courageous reporters filed stories from dangerous locations. In Russia and Ukraine, journalistic initiatives clustered around the problems of kleptocracy and corruption, and then reporters trained in these subjects covered the war.”

In this quote, Snyder connects his work to that of the ancient historian Thucydides, appealing to tradition in order to give substance to his arguments. He highlights the origins of history as a discipline aimed at challenging and clarifying the often-misleading narratives presented by leaders. He also points to the contemporary relevance of this critical approach, emphasizing that in times of rising inequality and prevalent political fiction, investigative journalism gains immense value, serving as a vital counter to propaganda and misinformation.

“Eternity arises from inevitability like a ghost from a corpse. The capitalist version of the politics of inevitability, the market as a substitute for policy, generates economic inequality that undermines belief in progress. As social mobility halts, inevitability gives way to eternity, and democracy gives way to oligarchy. An oligarch spinning a tale of an innocent past, perhaps with the help of fascist ideas, offers fake protection to people with real pain. Faith that technology serves freedom opens the way to his spectacle. As distraction replaces concentration, the future dissolves in the frustrations of the present, and eternity becomes daily life. The oligarch crosses into real politics from a world of fiction, and governs by invoking myth and manufacturing crisis. In the 2010s, one such person, Vladimir Putin, escorted another, Donald Trump, from fiction to power.”

This quote in the first chapter discusses the transformation from the politics of inevitability to the politics of eternity, attributing this shift to the failures of capitalism to sustain social mobility, resulting in rising economic inequality and disillusionment with progress. Snyder links the figure of Vladimir Putin with that of Donald Trump as political leaders who, in their own way, manipulate historical narratives and public sentiment to consolidate power.

“By condemning God, Ilyin empowered philosophy, or at least one philosopher: himself. He preserved the vision of a divine ‘totality’ that existed before the creation of the world, but left it to himself to reveal how it might be regained. Having removed God from the scene, Ilyin himself could issue judgments about what is and what ought to be. There is a Godly world and it must be somehow redeemed, and this sacred work will fall to men who understand their predicament—thanks to Ilyin and his books.”

In this quote, Snyder highlights Ivan Ilyin’s manipulation of theological and philosophical ideas to elevate his (Ilyin’s) own ideological position, employing a strategic form of replacement, where Ilyin effectively substitutes God with his own philosophical judgment. In his own analysis, Snyder uses irony to describe Ilyin’s adoption of a quasi-divine role, dictating moral and existential directives that Ilyin claims will lead back to a lost divine totality.

“To men raised in the Soviet Union in the 1970s, Ilyin’s ideas were comfortable for a second reason. To the Russian kleptocrats of that generation, the men in power in the 2010s, his entire style of thinking was familiar. Although Ilyin opposed Soviet power, the shape of his argument was eerily similar to that of the Marxism, Leninism, and Stalinism in which all Soviet citizens were educated. Although Russian kleptocrats are by no means philosophers, the instruction of their youth led them surprisingly close to the justifications they would need in their maturity. Ilyin and the Marxism he opposed shared a philosophical origin and language: that of Hegelianism.”

Snyder’s analysis in this quote underscores how historical and ideological continuities shape contemporary Russian politics, with Snyder using juxtaposition to compare Ilyin’s ideas with Soviet ideologies. Despite Ilyin’s opposition to Soviet power, Snyder points to the similarity in Ilyin’s ideas and Soviet ideas, both rooted in Hegelian philosophy. Snyder argues that both Soviet Marxism and Ilyin’s philosophy adapt Hegelianism to justify their respective ideologies.

“Soviet communism was a politics of inevitability that yielded to a politics of eternity. Over the decades, the idea of Russia as a beacon for the world gave way to the image of Russia as a victim of mindless hostility. In the beginning Bolshevism was not a state but a revolution, the hope that others around the world would follow the Russian example. Then it was a state with a task: to build socialism by imitating capitalism and then overcoming it. Stalinism was a vision of the future that justified millions of deaths by starvation and another million or so by execution in the 1930s. The Second World War changed the story. Stalin and his supporters and successors all claimed after 1945 that the self-inflicted carnage of the 1930s had been necessary to defeat the Germans in the 1940s. If the 1930s were about the 1940s, then they were not about a distant future of socialism. The aftermath of the Second World War was the beginning of the end of the Soviet politics of inevitability, and thus the opening gesture towards a Russian politics of eternity.”

This quote explores the ideological evolution of Soviet communism, moving from a vision of global revolutionary leadership to a defensive posture rooted in victimhood. This transformation illustrates how a failed promise of inevitable progress can lead to a cyclical narrative of eternal threat and defense, laying the groundwork for the rise of a reactive, survival-oriented mindset that continues to influence Russian political ideology today.

“States that joined the EU had operative principles of succession. Russia did not. Surkov transformed this failure into a claim of superiority by speaking of ‘sovereign democracy.’ In so doing, he conjured away Russia’s problem—that without actual democracy, or at least some succession principle, there was no reason to expect that Russia would endure as a sovereign state. Surkov suggested that ‘sovereign democracy’ was a temporary measure that would allow Russia to find its own way to a certain kind of Western political society. Yet his term was celebrated by extreme nationalists, such as the fascist Alexander Dugin, who understood sovereign democracy as a permanent state of affairs, a politics of eternity. Any attempt to make of Russia an actual democracy could now be prevented, thought Dugin, by reference to sovereignty.”

This quote from the second chapter highlights the rhetorical strategy Vladislav Surkov employed to recast Russia’s lack of democratic succession as a unique form of governance termed ‘sovereign democracy.’ This term disguises the absence of a genuine democratic mechanism in Russia, thus reframing an institutional deficiency as a distinctive strength that purportedly aligns with national sovereignty. The phrase was appropriated by nationalists like Alexander Dugin, who interpreted it as justification for permanently rejecting Western democratic models, favoring a static, authoritarian regime under the guise of protecting national sovereignty.

“If Putin came to the office of president in 2000 as a mysterious hero from the realm of fiction, he returned in 2012 as the vengeful destroyer of the rule of law. Putin’s decision to steal the election under his own spotlight placed Russian statehood in limbo. His accession to the office of president in 2012 was therefore the beginning of a succession crisis. Since the man in power was also the man who had eliminated the future, the present had to be eternal.”

In this quote, Snyder illustrates how, by eliminating any viable means of succession and fostering a political environment where his power is unchallenged, Putin essentially halted the progression of time within the governance of Russia, creating a perpetual present where he remains in constant control, embodying the politics of eternity. This transition, over 12 years, is representative of Russia’s descent into an authoritarian regime.

“Leonid Brezhnev’s permanent enemy, the decadent West, had returned: but this time the decadence would be of a more explicitly sexual variety. Ilyin had described opposition to his views as ‘sexual perversion,’ by which he meant homosexuality. A century later, this was also the Kremlin’s first reaction to democratic opposition. Those who wished to have votes counted in 2011 and 2012 were not Russian citizens who wanted to see the law followed, their wishes respected, their state endure. They were mindless agents of global sexual decadence whose actions threatened the innocent national organism.”

This quote highlights the Kremlin’s use of moral and sexual rhetoric to delegitimize democratic opposition, reflecting a long-standing tactic of equating dissent with moral corruption, a method traced back to philosopher Ivan Ilyin. Leonid Brezhnev was a Soviet leader, ruling from 1964 until 1982, whose focus on portraying the West as decadent was key to his rhetoric. By labeling political dissenters as agents of “global sexual decadence,” the Russian government, under leaders like Putin, frames the desire for democratic processes and legal accountability as foreign and morally perverse intrusions. This strategy transforms political and civil rights issues into a culture war, diverting attention from legitimate grievances and undermining the opposition by associating it with societal taboos and fears.

“Yanukovych won the election of 2010 legitimately and began his term by offering Russia essentially everything that Ukraine could give, including basing rights for the Russian navy on Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula until the year 2042. This made it impossible for Ukraine to consider joining the NATO alliance for at least three decades, as Ukrainians, Russians, and Americans understood at the time. Russia announced that it would expand its presence on the Black Sea by adding warships, frigates, submarines, troop-landing ships, and new naval aircraft. A Russian expert pronounced that Russian forces would remain in their Black Sea ports ‘until doomsday.’”

This quote captures the strategic implications of Viktor Yanukovych’s decisions as president of Ukraine, specifically his agreement to extend Russian naval basing rights in Crimea, which significantly influenced Ukraine’s geopolitical position. The expansion of Russian military presence in the Black Sea exemplifies Russia’s long-term strategic intent to solidify its influence and control over the region, reflecting a broader imperial approach toward its neighbors.

“European integration lasted long enough that Europeans could take it for granted, and forget the resonance and power of other political models. Yet history never ends, and alternatives always emerge. In 2013, the Russian Federation proposed an alternative to integration under the name ‘Eurasia’: empire for Russia, nation-states for everyone else. One problem with this proposal was that the nation-state had proven itself to be untenable in Europe. In the history of Europe’s great powers, imperialism blended into integration, with the nation-state hardly appearing. The major European powers had never been nation-states: before the Second World War they had been empires, where citizens and subjects were unequal; afterwards, as they lost their empires, they had joined a process of European integration in which sovereignty was shared.”

This quote highlights the historical shifts in political organization within Europe, contrasting the long-standing model of European integration with Russia’s alternative vision of a Eurasian empire. In his original understanding, Snyder notes that statehood in Europe was not fully established, as major European powers transitioned from empires, where inequality was rampant between citizens and subjects, to members of a cooperative integration process where sovereignty is pooled rather than absolute.

“The explicit Russian rejection of a European future was something new. Russia was the first European post-imperial power not to see the EU as a safe landing for itself, as well as the first to attack integration in order to deny the possibility of sovereignty, prosperity, and democracy to others. When the Russian assault began, Europe’s vulnerabilities were exposed, its populists thrived, and its future darkened. The great question of European history was again open, because certain possibilities in Russia had been closed.”

This quote emphasizes the stark departure of Russia from the path followed by other European post-imperial nations, which generally viewed the EU as a stabilizing force. Unlike its European counterparts who embraced EU integration as a pathway to shared sovereignty, prosperity, and democracy, Russia positioned itself as an adversary to this integration, using its power to undermine the EU’s influence and block the democratic aspirations of its neighbors.

“Beginning in 2013, the principles of Eurasia guided the foreign policy of the Russian Federation. The official Foreign Policy Concept for that year, published on February 18 under the signature of Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov with the special endorsement of President Vladimir Putin, included, amidst the boilerplate that remained unaltered from year to year, a series of changes corresponding to the ideas of Ilyin, the Eurasianists, and their fascist traditions. […] The Concept made clear that the process of supplanting the EU with Eurasia was to begin immediately, in 2013, at a time when Ukraine was in negotiations with the EU over the terms of an association agreement. According to the Concept, if Ukraine wished to negotiate with the EU, it should accept Moscow as its intermediary. In Eurasia, Russian dominance was the order of things. In the long term, Eurasia would overcome the EU, leading to ‘the creation of a unified humanitarian space from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean.’ Lavrov later repeated this aspiration, citing Ilyin as its source.”

This quote in Chapter 3 highlights a significant shift in Russian foreign policy in 2013, as the concept of Eurasia became a guiding principle, influenced by ideologies such as those of Ivan Ilyin and Eurasianist thinkers who harbored fascist traditions. The insistence on Moscow acting as an intermediary for Ukraine’s negotiations with the EU underlines Russia’s strategic objective to extend its influence across Europe to the Pacific, redefining regional dynamics and reshaping international alliances by promoting a unified, Russian-dominated space.

“Because they failed to understand the stakes of the conflict in Ukraine, Europeans proved to be more vulnerable to Russian attack than Ukrainians. Because Ukrainians were aware that their own state was fragile, many had no trouble seeing the EU as a precondition for a future with law and prosperity. They saw Russia’s intervention as cause for a patriotic revolution, since they understood EU membership as a stage in the construction of a Ukrainian state. Other Europeans had forgotten this connection, and so experienced the political problem posed by Russia’s war in Ukraine as cultural difference. Europeans proved vulnerable to soporific Russian propaganda suggesting that Ukraine’s problems showed its distance from the European mainstream.”

In this quote, Snyder criticizes European perceptions of the conflict in Ukraine. Ukrainians, aware of their nation’s fragility and viewing EU membership as essential for legal and economic stability, responded to Russian interventions with a surge of patriotic fervor, seeing it as an opportunity to solidify their statehood. In contrast, many Europeans, disconnected from the immediate threats facing Ukraine, misconceived the conflict as merely a cultural difference, rendering them vulnerable to Russian propaganda.

“Nations are new things that refer to old things. It matters how they do so. It is possible, as Russian leaders have done, to issue ritual incantations designed to reinforce the status quo at home and justify empire abroad. To say that ‘Rus’ is ‘Russia,’ or that Volodymyr/Valdemar of Rus in the 980s is Vladimir Putin of the Russian Federation in the 2010s, is to remove the centuries of interpretable material that permits historical thought and political judgment.”

Snyder highlights the manipulative potential of historical narratives when national leaders, particularly in Russia, retrofit ancient histories to serve contemporary political agendas. This strategic simplification eliminates the critical interpretive space necessary for genuine historical thought and informed political judgment, instead reinforcing a static national identity that legitimizes imperial ambitions.

“Yanukovych’s career demonstrates the difference between Ukrainian oligarchical pluralism and Russian kleptocratic centralism. He had run for president for the first time in 2004. The final count had been manipulated in his favor by his patron, the outgoing president Leonid Kuchma. Russian foreign policy was also to support his candidacy and declare his victory. After three weeks of protests on Kyiv’s Independence Square (known as the Maidan), a ruling of the Ukrainian supreme court, and new elections, Yanukovych accepted defeat. This was an important moment in Ukrainian history; it confirmed democracy as a succession principle. So long as the rule of law functioned at the heights of politics, there was always hope that it might one day extend to everyday life.”

This quote discusses the political journey of Viktor Yanukovych, contrasting the dynamics of power in Ukraine with those in Russia. It highlights a significant episode in Ukrainian politics—the 2004 presidential election—where Yanukovych initially benefited from electoral manipulation supported by Russian interests and his predecessor. However, widespread protests (known as the Orange Revolution) reversed the election outcome and underscored the resilience of democratic mechanisms in Ukraine.

“For those who took part in the Maidan, their protest was about defending what was still thought to be possible: a decent future for their own country. The violence mattered to them as a marker of the intolerable. It came in bursts of a few moments or a few hours. But people came to the Maidan not for moments or hours but for days, weeks, and months, their own fortitude suggesting a new sense of time, and new forms of politics. Those who remained on the Maidan could do so only because they found new ways to organize themselves.”

This quote, regarding the 2014 Maidan protests in Ukraine, emphasizes that the protesters’ participation was driven by a belief in the possibility of a better future for Ukraine, not merely a reaction against immediate grievances or the violence they faced. The sustained presence of protesters, staying for extended periods despite risks, illustrates a transformative experience for them, creating a new sense of time and fostering innovative forms of political organization and expression.

“In a grand ceremony in Moscow, Putin accepted what he called the ‘wishes’ of the Crimean people and extended the boundaries of the Russian Federation. This violated basic consensual principles of international law, the United Nations Charter, every treaty signed between independent Ukraine and independent Russia, as well as a number of assurances that Russia had offered Ukraine about the protection of its frontiers. One of these was the Budapest Memorandum of 1994, in which the Russian Federation (along with the United Kingdom and the United States) had guaranteed Ukrainian borders when Ukraine agreed to give up all nuclear weapons. In what was perhaps the greatest act of nuclear disarmament in history, Ukraine handed over some 1,300 intercontinental ballistic missiles. By invading a country that had engaged in complete nuclear disarmament, Russia offered the world the lesson that nuclear arms should be pursued.”

This quote juxtaposes between Russia’s commitments under international law and its actions during the annexation of Crimea. Snyder uses the term “grand ceremony” sarcastically to describe Putin’s “acceptance” of Crimea into the Russian Federation, contrasting the celebratory connotation of the phrase with the illegal nature of the act under international law. The quote ends with a criticism of the situation, pointing out that, by invading a disarmed Ukraine, Russia inadvertently taught the world a cynical lesson about the necessity of nuclear deterrence, thus undermining global non-proliferation efforts.

“Putin was not trying to convince anyone in that post-Soviet world that Russia had not invaded Ukraine. Indeed, he took for granted that Ukrainian leaders would not believe his lie. The provisional Ukrainian government understood that Ukraine was under Russian attack, which is why it pled for an international response rather than reacting with military force. Had leaders in Kyiv believed Putin, they certainly would have ordered resistance. Putin’s aim was not to fool Ukrainians but to create a bond of willing ignorance with Russians, who were meant to understand that Putin was lying but to believe him anyway. As the reporter Charles Clover put it in his study of Lev Gumilev: ‘Putin has correctly surmised that lies unite rather than divide Russia’s political class. The greater and the more obvious the lie, the more his subjects demonstrate their loyalty by accepting it, and the more they participate in the great sacral mystery of Kremlin power.’”

Snyder highlights Putin’s strategy of misinformation, emphasizing his understanding that the effectiveness of a lie depends not on its believability but on the complicity of those who choose to accept it despite its clear falsehood. Putin’s tactics involved creating an atmosphere where Russians are encouraged to accept and defend his narratives as a demonstration of loyalty, rather than critically evaluate their truthfulness. The reference to Charles Clover’s study on Lev Gumilev underscores the notion that overt lies turn the act of believing into a ritual of allegiance and participation.

“On July 5, facing defeat by the Ukrainian army, Girkin made the move that Putin had recommended: he turned the local population into human shields. He withdrew his men to Donetsk, and other GRU commanders did the same. This guaranteed, as Girkin noted, that civilians would become the main victims of the war. The Ukrainian side fought Russians and their local allies by shelling cities, while the Russians did the same. In the terminology of partisan war, this was the shift from ‘positive’ to ‘negative’ mobilization: if no one wants to fight for the partisan cause as such (positive motivation), then a partisan commander creates conditions in which the enemy kills civilians (negative motivation). This was Girkin’s chosen tactic, as he himself said. One of his Russian interviewers correctly described Girkin as a man who would willingly sacrifice the lives of women and children to advance a military goal. Destroying cities to win recruits was indeed Girkin’s signal achievement.”

In this quote, Snyder discusses Igor Girkin’s tactical shift during the conflict in Ukraine. By withdrawing to Donetsk and positioning civilians as buffers against Ukrainian military advances, Girkin ensured that civilian casualties would increase, a tactic he acknowledged as shifting from positive to negative mobilization. This maneuver exposes the ruthlessness of Girkin’s strategies and points to a broader ethical dilemma in modern warfare, where the distinction between combatants and non-combatants blurs.

“This Russian victory led to a truce at Minsk on September 5. It specified only that ‘foreign forces’ withdraw. Since Moscow denied that Russian troops were in Ukraine, it interpreted this provision as requiring no action. Russian soldiers remained in Ukraine after the Minsk agreement, and new ones were deployed. Some units that had seen combat during the August invasion were rotated out to the camps at the Russian-Ukrainian border or to their bases, only to return to the war in Ukraine a few months later.”

This quote discusses the controversial September 5 Minsk agreement, which was seeking to end the Donbass conflict. This agreement was repeatedly broken by Russia over the following years, leading to the full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. Snyder points to the phrase “foreign forces” as language manipulation, as Russia claimed it had no troops in Ukraine, thereby asserting that the clause did not apply to them, which allowed Russian soldiers to remain stationed in Ukraine with impunity.

“Russia’s war against Ukraine was called a ‘hybrid war.’ The problem with phrasings in which the noun ‘war’ is qualified by an adjective such as ‘hybrid’ is that they sound like ‘war minus’ when what they really mean is ‘war plus.’ The Russian invasion of Ukraine was a regular war, as well as a partisan campaign to induce Ukrainian citizens to fight against the Ukrainian army. In addition to that, the Russian campaign against Ukraine was also the broadest cyber offensive in history.”

Snyder discusses the rhetorical strategy included in the term “hybrid war,” which fails to fully capture the breadth of Russia’s aggressive strategies, which include both conventional military actions and cyber warfare. Snyder emphasizes the unprecedented scale and impact of Russia’s cyber operations, stressing both their scope and the modern evolution of warfare tactics beyond physical battlegrounds.

“By invading Ukraine, annexing Crimea, and shooting down MH17, Russia forced the EU and the United States to respond. The EU and U.S. sanctions were a rather mild response to Russia’s announced intention to remake ‘the world order,’ as Lavrov put it; but they did isolate Russia from its major partners and deepen Russia’s economic crisis. Putin pretended that China was an alternative; Beijing exposed Russia’s weakness by paying less for Russian hydrocarbons. Russia’s power rests upon its ability to balance between the West and the East; the invasion of Ukraine made Russia dependent on China without forcing the Chinese to do anything in return.”

This quote describes the geopolitical consequences of Russia’s aggressive actions in Ukraine and Crimea on its international relations and internal economic situation. It highlights the reactions of the EU and the US, which imposed economic sanctions. The analysis then shifts to Russia’s strategic pivot toward China, depicting Russia’s weakened bargaining position as it became overly reliant on China.

“The Soviet secret police—known over time as the Cheka, the GPU, the NKVD, the KGB, and then in Russia as the FSB—excelled in a special sort of operation known as ‘active measures.’ Intelligence is about seeing and understanding. Counterintelligence is about making that difficult for others. Active measures, such as the operation on behalf of the fictional character ‘Donald Trump, successful businessman,’ are about inducing the enemy to direct his own strengths against his own weaknesses. America was crushed by Russia in the cyberwar of 2016 because the relationship between technology and life had changed in a way that gave an advantage to the Russian practitioners of active measures.”

This quote emphasizes the historical expertise of Soviet and Russian secret services in executing covert operations that manipulate perceptions and behaviors, known as “active measures.” Snyder suggests that these techniques were effectively applied to undermine American strengths by exploiting vulnerabilities, particularly in the digital and information arenas during the 2016 US election. The success of these operations is attributed to a significant shift in the relationship between technology and everyday life, which disproportionately benefited Russian intelligence capabilities.