By Matija Šerić
After numerous terrorist attacks by Chechen extremists, such as the Beslan school crisis in the fall of 2004, as well as the Orange Revolution in Ukraine at the end of the same year, the Russian Federation found itself in an uncomfortable position. Although the state had largely stabilized after the grim 1990s, threats came both from within and outside. Russian President Vladimir Putin, though generally successful in dealing with domestic and foreign policy challenges, had to devise a vision for modern Russia. Having a vision was important to keep this vast country united, but it was also necessary to have an agenda that would satisfy Russian nationalists. The president did not craft entirely original ideas; instead, he found inspiration in history for the future—specifically, for the 21st century.
Putin’s 2005 Speech
During his annual address to the Duma and the Federation Council in April 2005, Putin called for new national unity against those who would threaten the state, both inside and outside the homeland. He began the speech by emphasizing that the state must consider “the deeper meaning of values such as freedom and democracy, justice, and legality.” He then delivered his famous line that “the collapse of the USSR was the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the 20th century,” as tens of millions of Russian citizens were left outside the Russian state. Yet he also stated that “those who seek to restore the Soviet system have no brains.” Putin sought to revive something older, more valuable, and deeper: the idea of the Russian nation and the absolute power of the “Third Rome.” He charted a course that was 180 degrees opposite to the Western values imposed on Russians until then.
Ivan Ilyin – Symbol of Anti-Communist Russia
Putin noticed old Russian nationalist and patriotic ideas in historical books, which he personally preferred as a history enthusiast. He found the idea of Russia for the new millennium in the thoughts and writings of the political and religious philosopher Ivan Alexandrovich Ilyin (1883–1954). Ilyin’s ideas provided an intellectual foundation for Putin’s understanding of Russia’s position on the international stage and would become increasingly significant in subsequent political debates.
Ilyin was repeatedly arrested by the Bolsheviks and expelled from the country in 1922. As a member of the “White” anti-communist Russia in exile, Ilyin embraced the vision of a Orthodox Russian identity that the communists sought to suppress. In Ilyin’s writings, Putin found ample material supporting his intentions regarding the shape of the state he wanted to create, even the notion of “sovereign democracy.” Putin did not mourn the collapse of the Soviet system but lamented the fall of the historical Russian idea. In 2005, Putin cited Ilyin for the first time, whose works had only begun to circulate openly after Perestroika and Glasnost in the 1980s.
Russia – A Sovereign Nation
“Let us not allow ourselves to forget this. Russia is a state that has chosen democracy through the will of its own people. It has chosen this path by its own consent, and it will decide for itself how best to ensure that the principles of freedom and democracy are realized here, taking into account historical, geopolitical, and other peculiarities, and respecting all essential democratic norms. As a sovereign nation, Russia can and will determine for itself the timing and conditions for its progress along this path,” Putin said in his 2005 speech.
Putin’s reference to a philosopher little known outside and within Russia coincided with the return of Ilyin’s remains to his homeland, along with those of the anti-communist Tsarist general in the civil war, Anton Denikin. Ilyin had been buried in Switzerland, and Denikin in the USA, but Putin supported the initiative to bring them back to the Donskoy Monastery in Moscow. It is noted that the Russian leader personally funded Ilyin’s new tombstone and was seen laying flowers on it. All of this led to a renewed interest in his works. Besides Putin, Ilyin’s admirers in the Kremlin included then-chief Kremlin ideologist Vladislav Surkov and party leader Dmitry Medvedev, who became Putin’s right-hand man.
Ilyin – Aristocrat and Conservative
Ivan Ilyin was born in Moscow in 1883 into an aristocratic family. He attended the Imperial Moscow University, opposed the 1905 Russian Revolution, and did not actively participate in student uprisings. He initially favored radical political views such as anarchism, later liberalism, but gradually moved closer to right-center positions. This was not surprising, as his political mentor was Christian philosopher and political liberal Pavel Novgorodtsev. In 1906, he graduated in law, and by 1909 he began working as a political scientist. He traveled to Western Europe and studied Hegelian philosophy. Initially, he supported the February 1917 Revolution, but later described it as a “temporary disorder.” Although he became a staunch opponent of the democratic system, he condemned the October Revolution of the same year, calling it a “national catastrophe.” He did not participate in the Russian Civil War but worked as a law professor at Moscow University until 1922, when he was expelled into exile for opposing the Bolshevik regime.
Anti-Communist Ideologue
Between 1923 and 1934, Ilyin worked in Germany, specifically in Berlin, as a professor at the Russian Scientific Institute. As a journalist, he became the main ideologue of the Russian White movement in emigration and, between 1927 and 1930, was the publisher and editor of the émigré magazine Russkiy Kolokol (“Russian Bell”). During this period, he established himself as one of the most influential voices in the Russian emigration, whose ideas strongly resonated among anti-communist intellectual circles in Europe.
A Distinct Eurasianist
Like many in the diaspora, he was interested in the idea of Eurasianism and Pan-Slavism, which would be led by Russians. Ilyin advocated a specific form of Eurasianism (not the classical one) in which he saw Russia as a civilizational bridge between Europe and Asia, called to build its own authentic political and spiritual model independent of the West. He was not a formal Eurasianist like Nikolai Trubetskoy or Pyotr Savitsky and often distanced himself from them. He emphasized that Russia was neither 100% European nor Asian, but an independent spiritual civilization tasked with shaping its own political model.
In short, his writings aimed to promote the moral and spiritual renewal of the Russian people and the eradication of all forms of communism, which, in his view, destroyed the traditional (conservative) values cherished by the Russian nation.
Conflict with the Nazis
As a fervent anti-communist, Ilyin showed certain sympathies toward Mussolini’s fascism and Hitler’s Nazism but was critical of totalitarianism as a system, so he did not support the Nazi regime. A conflict arose between Ilyin and the Nazi authorities because he refused to propagate their ideology at the university. In 1934, the Nazis dismissed Ilyin and placed him under house arrest. After that, he lived in isolation, under security surveillance, and his works were restricted or banned. Despite the pressure from the Nazi regime, he continued to develop his vision of Russian nationalism, which remained separate from the ideological framework of the Third Reich.
Residence in Switzerland
In 1938, with the help of Russian pianist Sergei Rachmaninoff, he managed to pay for his release and then left Germany for Switzerland. There, he was allowed to reside but could not work or interfere in Swiss politics. He wrote for local newspapers and taught Russian literature in adult education schools, which was not considered paid employment. In 1943, he refused to cooperate with the Russian Liberation Army or Vlasov’s forces, composed of Russian prisoners of war under General Andrey Vlasov who had agreed to cooperate with the Germans against Stalin’s USSR. In 1949, Ilyin and his wife obtained Swiss citizenship. In his 1950 essay “What the Collapse of Russia Would Mean for the World,” Ilyin foresaw the future fall of the Soviet Union and outlined guidelines for preserving Russia from, as he claimed, the harmful influences of the West. He passed away near Zurich in December 1954.
