May 21, 2021 - 10:35am
It doesn’t seem all that long ago that we were reading about the protests in central Minsk after the Belarusian president Alexander Lukashenko won reelection for the umpteenth time under dubious circumstances. For a week, maybe even a little more, the press carried images of crowds demanding the resignation of the strongman with a combover, and then…. well, the situation in “Europe’s last dictatorship” fell off the radar somewhat.
What happened? Well, the bad guys won. All the stern op-eds in the world mean little when you can pass laws allowing police to shoot protestors. But what other lessons does Lukashenko’s survival have for fellow strongmen looking to extend their reigns in the face of mass unrest?
1. Never acknowledge your opponents have even the tiniest atom of a point. A weaker leader confronted with large crowds demanding change might be tempted to waver, acknowledge their frustrations, and offer to listen. Not Lukashenko, who, along with his next-door neighbour Vladimir Putin, comes from the Millwall F.C. school of leadership, that is to say they are guided by the principle of “no-one likes us we don’t care.” Of course, one might assume that even the most hardcore of Millwall supporters back in the day liked each other at least a little bit, but the crucial thing was that they did not care about what outsiders thought of them. Thus, Lukashenko makes no concessions to the claims of liberals, democrats or foreign governments; in fact, it serves his interests that they all read from the same message sheet as he can accuse the opposition of being in cahoots with external forces, and thus not representative of Belarusian society.
2. Make sure you have the local heavy in your corner. Up yours attitude notwithstanding, even the likes of Lukashenko might struggle to sustain so uncompromising a stance if he did not have backing from some serious hard men both at home and abroad. Fortunately for him, he can rely not only on his own security forces, but also on his frenemy Putin to virulently oppose any attempt by the EU or US to impose their values on or exercise influence over Russia’s “near abroad”. That said, it’s not much fun being a little bully backed by a big bully, and not just from the lack of self-respect it induces. Putin’s help doesn’t come for free, and he immediately pushed for the otherwise friendless Lukashenko to submit to closer ties with the far larger Russian state.
3. Always remember that the West is highly unlikely to go beyond a few symbolic gestures. Russian and Belarusian elites are accustomed to being insulted, sanctioned and placed on various blacklists and no doubt this is a bit annoying, but they are also pretty good at getting around the rules. In addition, Lukashenko is obviously aware that he presides over a land of farms and forests, 25% of which was heavily contaminated by the Chernobyl disaster, so he has nothing anybody really wants (except perhaps Putin). Cosmic indifference on the part of the US et al provides further insurance against the threat of regime change. And so he carries on dictating.
Daniel Kalder is an author based in Texas. Previously, he spent ten years living in the former Soviet bloc. His latest book, Dictator Literature, is published by Oneworld. He also writes on Substack: Thus Spake Daniel Kalder.
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SubscribeGreat article and a sad true. Khan and so many other zealots are standing for the very same people that slaughtered the natives and plundering their riches. They stand for the same ideology that served to justify the rape of over 200,000 women in Bangladesh in 1971. Not to mention the roughly 1,000 honour killings reported every year.
Hypocrisy is one of the greatest evils.
How strange. My comment has been downvoted. Does that mean someone thinks hypocrisy is not a great evil?
“Hindu-supremacist regime of Narendra Modi”
“Modi— another exponent of religious nationalism who wants to turn India into a Hindu facsimile of Pakistan”
Reading unadulterated BS like this makes me wish Indian Hindus genuinely did treat muslims the way they treat minorities in Islamic nations.
In Pakistan (which means land of the “pure”, incidentally), Islam is the state religion by law, no non muslim can be president, blasphemy laws, raping and forcefully converting Hindu minor girls is legal and frequent.
Point out where Modi, other BJP leaders or BJP voters have suggested replicating the same?
What Modi’s India did have since 2014 is special religious laws for muslims, frequent stabbings or beheadings because someone insulted their prophet, regular instances of Hindu girls being tricked or forcibly converted / murdered.
And to highlight just how ridiculous it is – the muslims in current India voted en masse for the muslim league and partition. They voted for Pakistan and the butchering of the “impure”. But the ones remaining in India were stuck in states where muslims were a minority. And today they demand special treatment for themselves.
What a fine bunch of specimens of humanity.
I only agree to the extent that India is nowhere near as bad as Pakistan. But minorities there, including Muslims, often ARE viciously mistreated and find state officials and the police uninterested or hostile. And you must be wilfully naive at best if you ignore Modi’s role in the 2002 anti Muslim pogroms in Gujarat
So, an Indian hates the leader of Pakistan. Well I never.
I think you will find most Indians really like the leaders of Pakistan. Whether it was launching a stupid war in 65, losing the entire eastern half by trying to violently suppress them, sending Balochistan and the Afghan borders down the same path, or generally fu**ing up the country by encouraging Islamisation and blind hatred of India rather than developing the economy…..
And Imran Bhai has continued that noble tradition. Indians love what he has done in just a few years!
If an Indian hadn’t written this, would you have engaged with the substance of the article? Also, the Indian left loves Imran Khan far more than Modi. They operate on the same simplistic level as you.
The link “to three million Bengalis — a people denigrated by Pakistani officials as “black monkeys” — in 1971.” seems not to work.
I take it that the author is not a fan? (I hope Unherd will publish a rebuttal This is an extremely one sided piece)
Agree. It’s dire – a travesty. And let’s see the rebuttal from a Pakistani, not another Indian.
Why, specifically, is it a travesty?
On Unherd, I have read biased pieces (from both sides of issues) and neutral pieces. There are all sorts here.