Trotsky’s Shadow

Is Russia’s government simply unable to handle critics? In the Western tradition, freedom of speech has been widely advocated since Voltaire, and forbidding government from outlawing speech critical of the government has been a founding concept of modern states for centuries.

As Alexander Litvinenko lay dying from an apparent poisoning of Thalium days ago, he had this message for Putin shortly before he died:

You may succeed in silencing me, but that silence comes at a price. You have shown yourself to be as barbaric and ruthless as your most hostile critics have claimed. You have shown yourself to have no respect for life, liberty or any civilised value. You have shown yourself to be unworthy of your office, to be unworthy of the trust of civilised men and women.

Deathbed accusations shouldn’t be taken at face value, but Litvinenko’s horrible poisoning, probably designed to 1.) make him suffer a painful death, and 2.) terrify other potential critics into silence, conjure up images of Trotsky’s assassination during World War II. The Stalinist dissident survived several attempts on his life before he was finally killed with an ice pick in Mexico City (Stalin was so delighted at the method that he gave all agents involved medals.)

And Litvinenko isn’t alone. Recall the recent attempts on the lives of Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko and journalist Anna Politkovskaya, the former being barely unsuccessful and the later being gruesomely successful. While it might seem absurd to murder these individuals because it has made their causes known far and wide, it undoubtedly has a chilling effect on other potential agents who are scared silent by the the consequences of turning their back on Mother Russia. And that should terrify all of us.