The most outstanding achievement we have today (other than military achievements) is the unity of society. Yes, we have united around an arduous task – to repel the aggressor, to repel the enemy. But still, we have united. As far as I know the results of research, not only of the present, there has never been such a long unification. But despite this, today, we already see a division in society. I'm not talking about a split. I don't see a split yet.
I see the division into four groups. The first is the military, and this is not the Ministry of Defense, for example, or even the General Staff. These are specific soldiers who are fighting. It can be the Defense Ministry, it can be the Armed Forces, it doesn't matter. These people are treated with great respect by absolutely everyone. The second group is those who have never traveled anywhere, who are always in Kharkiv, always in Odesa, always in Dnipro. I don't want to talk about Kyiv, because the situation there is a little bit special. The third group is those who evacuated, but evacuated within Ukraine. After the war, the time of this evacuation – when and to what extent – will also matter. The fourth group is those who went abroad.
I do not want to condemn, explain, or acclaim anyone. I am simply noting that society is divided along these lines. I'm terribly afraid that the authorities may cause a split along these lines with their not-entirely reasonable decisions. It doesn't take much for this to happen. For example, there was a proposal that those currently abroad should be economically incentivized to return. Honestly, I have never heard a more stupid proposal in my life. Even in Soviet times. It is so ridiculous. It's just a provocation that is hard to even comment on. We managed to overcome this, to convey that this cannot be done. We should understand that this should not be done and is dangerous.
I know of only one empire so far that has managed to squeeze imperialism out of its thinking
Will we be able to maintain this unity of society after the war? We will not be able to. It is unrealistic. This is because the consequences of the war, the results of the war, and our victory will not satisfy everyone. Someone will need a parade on Red Square, someone will need to return our people from Tyumen, and someone else will need something else. This will not happen. This must be understood.
It is apparent that Russia is not going anywhere. I know of only one empire so far that has managed to squeeze imperialism out of its thinking. This empire is called Great Britain. But the elite there has been working to squeeze this out for a hundred years. As the writer Anton Chekhov said, one must squeeze out a slave drop by drop, and they squeezed out imperialism. In Russia, it's the exact opposite. It is cultivated. This is how imperialism develops. You have probably heard the speech by the head of the Russian Security Council, Nikolai Patrushev, right? There were a lot of very unpleasant things for us. We will live next to an aggressive, strong, vengeful neighbor, and we must be prepared for this.
I am not a politician. I have a poor understanding of what the government should be like and how it should be run. But I understand what society should do. Society has to make it clear to everyone, both those in power and those not in power, that we don't have only one office where all decisions are made. We have and should have multi-subjective governance, with civil society governance, local government governance, and the unification of these local authorities to solve certain problems. There are business associations. There is the unification of business and government. The government is involved in business affairs, particularly in promoting our export economy. There is nothing wrong with that.
One more thing. We are very often angry with our partners that the aid is so slow. We would like everything to be done tomorrow, or better yet, the day before yesterday. This is the result of the fact that these are democratic societies. There is no such thing as fast in democratic societies. Fast is only when a dictator says: “it will be so.” That's fast. We have to prepare for this, among other things. Because when the community makes local government decisions, not the head of the village council, this procedure will require time, explanations, conversations, and persuasion. My point is that democracy is better than dictatorship, and humanity has not invented anything better. But it has its drawbacks.