The Principle of Collective Responsibility
Protection Against Social Revolution

A week ago, the UNIAN telegraph channel reported on the defection of sixty Russian soldiers. It would seem that this act should have aroused sympathy and respect for the Ukrainian observer, at least in words, because the more Russian soldiers follow the example of these, the better for the people of Ukraine. But the news about the desertion was accompanied by a contemptuous comment: “That’s right, Russian soldier, go back to your mother’s house to make bread, you have no business on Ukrainian soil”. There may be nothing for Russian soldiers to do on Ukrainian soil, but such a tone will hardly encourage them to leave it. Why, instead of telling the enemy soldier: “You’re a human being, not a schmuck, don’t let them send you to the slaughter like a sheep!” they tell him: “You’re a schmuck and behave like a schmuck — run away!” Well, isn’t that silly? Alas, not stupidity, but normal logic for a statesman.

If one says openly today that the goal of the Russian soldier does not coincide with that of the Russian command, tomorrow someone may decide that the goal of the Ukrainian soldier does not necessarily coincide with that of his commander either. Sowing social discord in Russia can also be reaped in Ukraine. Bad examples are contagious. Today a Russian soldier decides that it is normal and not shameful to leave a war he does not want, and tomorrow a Ukrainian soldier will do the same.

Yes, today a Ukrainian will not decide this, because today for him to leave the front means to let the enemy into his home. But tomorrow everything can change. And a soldier must obey his commander regardless of whether he is defending his land, conquering someone else’s or suppressing a rebellion. By the way, the Ukrainians are different because they have never been shy about sending their authority to the right place. Hence the Maidan. But for the authorities themselves it is a sharp knife.

That is why no turning of the national war into civil war and no seeking of allies according to the social principle rather than citizenship is acceptable to the Ukrainian authorities. As for any other. That sixty enemy soldiers came out of the war is good, but that they can set an example for their own, even if not now, but in some completely different situation, is bad. So they must not look like heroes, but cowards. Though sometimes it takes more courage to defect than to fight.

Hence the principle of collective responsibility. If we assume that not all Russians are for Putin, then we can assume that not all Ukrainians are against him either. That not everything is determined by a passport. That the people and the party are not necessarily one, as they used to say in the USSR. Or people and power, translated into modern language.

But if everything is defined by a passport, no social discord is possible. What kind of revolution can there be if the entire country is united? Nothing. Anyone who opposes the government is a traitor. The nation must be united. And no help from fellow classmates if they have a different nationality. They are the enemy. If the division into natives and outsiders is based on nationality, then for a worker the boss “employer” is a natives if he has the same nationality. And a policeman is one’s own, while a worker with a different citizenship is a stranger. What kind of revolution is this?

So anyone who claims that all Russians, all Chinese or all citizens of Papua New Guinea are to blame for something, this (or that) someone is a contra. Of course, one can assert all sorts of abominations not out of malice, but out of stupidity. But this only means that one can also become a counter-revolutionary (or counter-revolutionary) through stupidity. But why a person became a control, this is the next question.