Moscow, October 1993

What were you doing in early October 1993? I was less than a month away from having a baby.

That's my excuse for not really remembering the details of what hindsight now shows was the turning point in modern Russian history, leading from the hope of the end of the Soviet Union to the present-day kleptocracy and authoritarian regime of Vladimir Putin.

I had a vague recollection that Boris Yeltsin started out as part of the solution until he surprisingly wasn't, but I didn't remember how it happened. This story from the Associated Press, which was printed in the St. Paul Pioneer Press yesterday, was a good refresher on the facts.

Yeltsin was president in 1993. He was in a standoff with members of Parliament, some of whom were Russian nationalists or Communists. Instead of working it out through other means, he brought in the military: their tanks blasted the Parliament building, setting it on fire. Hundreds of people were killed.

I don't remember any of that, which amazes me. (I blame the last month of pregnancy.)

After putting out the mutiny, Yeltsin initiated the adoption of a new constitution that gave broad powers to the presidency, leaving parliament with little authority.

Russia’s politics remained turbulent throughout the 1990s, with Yeltsin’s foes continually challenging his power. After Putin became president in 2000, he has used the legal framework created under his predecessor to methodically tighten control of the country and eventually unleash a relentless crackdown on dissent....

I hate to admit it, but the details of the 1993 moment were news to me:

The violent clashes in October 1993 between government forces and supporters of the rebellious parliament followed a long showdown between Yeltsin and hard-line lawmakers who opposed his chaotic and painful free-market reforms. Yeltsin’s vice president, Alexander Rutskoi, sided with the rebel lawmakers.

As tensions soared, Yeltsin ordered the parliament disbanded, a move that Russia’s Constitutional Court declared illegal. Attempts to negotiate a settlement failed, and the crisis erupted into violence on Oct. 3, when demonstrators supporting the parliament clashed with police, stormed the mayor’s office and made an abortive attempt to seize the state TV broadcasting center.

Viktor Alksnis, a retired military officer who supported the rebellion, said in a recent podcast that “power was lying on the ground” on that day, and the parliament’s supporters could have won if their leaders showed a stronger will and determination.

The next day, Yeltsin ordered the military to intervene and it used tanks to pummel the parliament building, setting it ablaze in an attack that played out on live television worldwide. The authorities said 123 people were killed in the clashes, while unofficial estimates put the death toll in the hundreds.

I don't know how a better solution could have been achieved, given the economic tidal waves happening in the country, Russia's lack of civil society institutions, and probable distrust of Western organizations that could have helped. 

But imagine a world where they worked it out instead, and where Russia became something other than what it is today.