Putin's intelligence services are cleaned by people of citizenship than the Russian, a policy in total contradiction with the multi -ethnic history of agencies. It is a risky move that could one day bring serious consequences to the regime, shows an analysis of the Center for European Policies (CEPA).
The change takes place despite the continuous decline of the Russian ethnic population and, therefore, the increasing proportion of minorities. Although the past information services have always been dominated by the Russians, this has been intensified in recent years. According to the official census of 2021, only about 72% of the population is Russian – six million less than in 2010. The demographic crisis of the country is now so severe – and uncomfortable from a political point of view – that officials have stopped the public updates this year.
And yet, if someone analyzes the list of high -ranking officials – that is, the heads of the key departments of the FSB, the main security service of Russia – finds almost no Tatar or, say, Chechen, the second and third ethnic group in the Russian Federation.
Surprisingly, until recently, among the heads of Lubianka Square were some Ukrainian ethnic groups, including in the infamous 5th service, who obviously failed to provide precise information about the Ukraine's situation before the large-scale invasion of 2022. Now, all have been replaced by Ethnic Russians.
This Total Russification of FSB leadership makes it very different from Stalin's secret services
Despite the constant purges, Stalin's services have remained extremely capable and brutally efficient – largely due to their ethnic diversity. This was an inheritance of the early Soviet Secret Police, which had absorbed the most ruthless and efficient elements of the militant clandestine groups of the former Russian Empire.
These among them were the Jewish staff, who had spent decades perfecting conspiracy methods while opposing Tsarist pogroms – often through criminal networks and revolutionary parties; Armenians, who had built a truly international movement meant to avenge the authors of the Armenian genocide of 1915; Georgians and other ethnic groups in the Caucasus, with their experience in financing the revolutionary movement by any necessary means, including robberies-through these Stalin operations made a name for the first time; And the Latvians, whose legendary resistance in the ethnic regiments of the Russian army during the First World War has brought them a reputation of hardness (many supported the Bolshevik revolution and became Lenin's Pretor Guard).
These ethnic groups had their own leaders, networks and common interests – and Stalin made sustained efforts to suppress them, considering such clans a threat to his monopoly on power. His successors from Kremlin intensified these efforts by completing the ranks of security services with persons named by the Communist Party.
And yet, Soviet leaders were pragmatic enough to allow the so-called “national personal” to lead the KGB departments from the most sensitive Soviet republics.
Eduard Sevardnadze, Gorbachev's Foreign Minister and later President of Georgia, held the position of Minister of Public Order in Georgia between 1965 and 1968, and later as Minister of Interior of the Republic. Geidar Aliyev, the first president of Azerbaijan, had a long career in the KGB and became head of Azer KGB in 1967.
However, under Putin, the FSB adopted a more aggressive and xenophobic approach. A FSB colonel-a Tatar of ethnicity-told these authors, in the late 2000s, about his work experience in different regions until he reached Moscow to serve in the central apparatus. He to some extent supported the cause of state security-he volunteered in the Soviet KGB in his youth and had spent years monitoring the Islamist movements in Uzbekistan, where his (ie Muslim) origin had been useful to him. Finally, he was promoted to serve in the Department of Terrorism Combating in Moscow.
According to tradition, he organized a welcome party for his new colleagues. During the assembly-held in the Lubianka building-his boss, who was in a state of intoxication, brought him various accusations related to the Tataro-Mongolian invasion. He asked the colonel to apologize for what had happened in the 13th century. From that moment, the colonel took the precautionary measure to take a Russian name, not Tatar. And the FSB colonel was not the only one who faced such treatment.
A FSB general, Rașid Nurgaliev, became known because of Putin and his close, Nikolai Fortișev – they had served together in Karelia. Promoted by Putin, Nurgaliev has been Minister of Interior from 2004 to 2012 and since then he is a member of Putin's Security Council.
A FSB general promoted in Moscow will always try to bring with him reliable officers from the region in which he served.
And yet, Nurgaliev was Tatar and Muslim, as did the colonel. It was rumored that a FSB officer was entrusted with a delicate mission: to convince Nurgaliev to be baptized as an Orthodox Christian-a mission that, once fulfilled, brought to the officer the rank of general. It seems that the conversion was placed as a condition for the appointment of Nurgaliev as Minister of Interior.
FSB is an extended organization, with departments throughout Russia. In this environment – marked by total impunity and large -scale corruption – the clan system and personal patronage inevitably play a major role in the officers' careers. But these modern clans are no longer ethnic; they are regional.
A FSB general promoted in Moscow will always try to bring with him reliable officers from the region in which he served. Putin himself did the same thing when he brought people to Moscow he had served in the FSB in St. Petersburg.
FSB serves only one master today: Vladimir Putin. Its corporate culture reflects the fears and prejudices of that man. It embodies a paranoid, tribalist and almost medieval approach to the problem of loyalty – one that assumes that a man's behavior is predetermined by his ethnicity and religion, rather than his professional competence or education.
Putin's deep suspicion toward non-rums reflects the fear that regions like Tatarstan or Chechnya could one day break up
But such fear is so strong. Putin's deep suspicion towards non-Rui reflects his anxiety that regions of the country, such as Tatarstan and Chechnya (where the local departments of the FSB are led by Russians, as expected) could one day follow the path of former Soviet republics and detach. And yet, by Russianing the management of his security services, Putin could only weaken the most important control tool.
After all, how can its early warning system detect regional crises if it excludes even the most capable of recognizing signs?
Article written by Irina Borogan and Andrei Soldatov- Senior researchers at the Center for European Policies (CEPA). There are Russian and co -founding investigative journalists of Agentura.ru, a supervisory body for the activities of Russian secret services. Their book “Our dear friends in Moscow, the interior story of a destroyed generation” was published in June.
