Additional Thoughts on Storming the Winter Palace

Galina Alexandrovna Zubchenko, Storming of the Winter Palace

As we've been hearing lately, Tripoli has fallen to the Libyan rebels, suddenly, unexpectedly, and joyous throngs filled Green -- now to be renamed "Martyr's" -- Square in the center of the city. The surviving sons of The Devil Gadhafi have been 'detained' as they say and the hunt for the Old Devil is on. Has he escaped the country? Did he commit suicide? Has he been captured by one of the rebel factions? Where is he?

Of course the stories and the scenes remind us all of the astonishing events across North Africa and in the Middle East and Arabian Peninsula. During the past year, one Arab dictator after another has been toppled by some force of People's Will that no one can quite fathom, but inspiration has been reverberating around the world.

Even the most bone stupid of Our Overlords seem to realize that not only is there something happening here, but it's spreading, and more and more it's becoming apparent that this global liberationist movement is driven by rebellion against the Haves Who Demand and Take More from those who have little. Or nothing.

Yes, of course it is a classic class struggle, involving what passes for the bourgeoisie demanding respect and justice from and for their Betters. The Aristos are being beaten back everywhere by their own retainers in many cases. And what of the struggling masses? They join in struggle against the High and the Mighty, but wisely, they take nothing for granted. A rebellion may succeed, but has a Revolution really taken place? We await developments.

And of course all of this tumult evokes the extraordinary events of November 7-8, 1917, in Petrograd, Russia. The Tsar's regime had already fallen in February, but the replacement Republic and later Provisional government was little more than an empty shell, a Potemkin government, if you will. Worse, it continued Russia's bloody and destructive involvement in WWI, fighting the Germans on the West.

During the days leading up to the October Revolution (November, by the Western calendar), the Bolsheviks had taken control of most of the ministries and communications in Petrograd which left what remained of the Provisional Government, headed by Alexander Kerensky, holed up in the Winter Palace trying to figure out what to do now.

The Winter Palace was the symbol of Russian rule, and whoever held it was by definition the Ruling Party of the Russian Empire, or Republic, or... soon to be Soviet Union.

The Bolsheviks, along with rest of the Congress of Soviets were meeting at the Smolny Institute a few miles away from the Winter Palace down the Neva River. Through strategy and oratory, they gained the upper hand over the Provisionals in a more or less democratic process and declared the Provisional Government defunct. This is a copy of the very famous proclamation issued October 25 (November 7) by the Bolsheviks:





The Storming of the Winter Palace would occur shortly, just as soon as a fleet of vehicles could rush from the Smolny to the Winter Palace Square, the vast open space in front of the Palace entered through the Red Arch and centered on the Alexander Column.



[The red building in the background is the Winter Palace (aka The Hermitage). It was painted a dusky red at the time of the Revolution. Now it is painted green and white with gold accents. Pretty!]

On the third anniversary of the Storming of the Winter Palace (November 7, 1920), there was a grand pageant, a historical re-enactment and an allegory of the Birth of the Soviet Union in Palace Square, the sight of the Storming, involving some 8,000 performers (far more than actually took part in the original struggle), some of whom had been there when the Storming took place. The pageant that went on for hours, was witnessed by some 100,000 comrades who apparently found it pleasing. So pleasing was the re-enactment considered to be that it served as the basis for Sergei Eisenstein's brilliant 1927 film, Октябрь «Десять дней, которые потрясли мир» (October, Ten Days That Shook the World), excerpts of which I have posted on this blog. Oh look, here's one now:



The funny thing about this breathless RT retelling of the events is that even though the presenter tries to correct some of the record by pointing out that only about fifty armed Bolsheviki actually did the Storming, the dramatic movie version is presented and strangely, at least according to my understanding of the sequence of events on the night of the Storming, he then seems to say that the Congress meeting at the Smolny that solidified the Bolshevik Revolution took place after the Storming when as far as I can tell from the eyewitness accounts I've read, the Congress meeting at the Smolny was still going on as the Storming got underway and continued...

And continued... and continued... (one thing about the Bolsheviks, they loved to talk!)

John Reed's account in "Ten Days That Shook the World" is really quite riveting. He was there, after all, racing back and forth between the Winter Palace and the Smolny Institute, having dinner at the Hotel France, listening to the gunfire, trudging through the cold, dark streets of Petersburg among the Revolutionaries, yet watching life go on as normal (well, as normal as those things could be in 1917 Russia) only a few blocks away.

An excerpt: [You may embiggen the pages with mouse clickage]












From: "Ten Days That Shook The World" by John Reed, 1919

And that was that. Plus ça change, eh?

Revolts can go on almost endlessly, but Revolutions seem to come upon the scene suddenly. Imperial Russia went through numberless revolts during the 19th Century and into the 20th, most of which were called Revolutions, though only the Soviet/Bolsheviks actually succeeded in Revolution as opposed to just one more revolt. Even the Neo-Liberal Counter Revolution that presided over the break-up and extinguishment of the Soviet Union was more akin to a revolt rather than a Revolution in that it wasn't trying to create something new, it was only interested in reviving what had long passed away. While there isn't a whole lot of nostalgia in the former Soviet Union for the days of the Commisars, neither is there much glee at the results of from sliding so far backwards into some warped vision of what the Autocracy might have been had the Bolsheviks not succeeded in 1917.

The stories will long be told of what happened that fateful November, just as the stories of the Revolutionary fervor happening now will never die.

The question always is, "What do you get for your Revolution?"

There is yet to be a full answer.

Why "Village" is the Wrong Metaphor

For some time now, Digby has used the "Village" metaphor to describe the collective known as the Washington Press Corps, a metaphor that ultimately comes from a Sally Quinn piece quoting David Gergen from almost a decade ago in which she defended the world she and her colleagues lived and worked in from the Evil That Was Clinton. Gergen supplied the memorable quote:

"We have our own set of village rules," says David Gergen, editor at large at U.S. News & World Report, who worked for both the Reagan and Clinton White House. "Sex did not violate those rules. The deep and searing violation took place when he not only lied to the country, but co-opted his friends and lied to them. That is one on which people choke.

"We all live together, we have a sense of community, there's a small-town quality here. We all understand we do certain things, we make certain compromises. But when you have gone over the line, you won't bring others into it. That is a cardinal rule of the village. You don't foul the nest."

Quinn and Gergen were serious -- it was about SEX after all -- and Digby is overtly satiric in using the metaphor to describe a rotten to the core press corp in DC. And the Village metaphor has spread throughout the blogosphere to describe these decrepit media functionaries (no longer describing a place but merely the denizens thereof).

I have objected and tangled with Digby more than once over her devotion to this metaphor -- it is now pretty much universal in the so-called lefty blogosphere -- because I believe that it is a grossly inaccurate and potentially self-defeating metaphor.

A "Village" has certain -- generally positive -- evocations for most people, and artists have made whole careers out of depicting village values, characters and ways of life. Gergen himself was using the metaphor in a positive way to describe how closely and intimately linked the Washington Press Corps was with one another and with their all-important sources and how the insider linkages are fundamental to the operations of the "Village."

Digby and most of the rest of the so-called lefty blogosphere of course consider the incestuousness and clannishness of the Washington Press Corps and their sources to be a very negative thing, and so their use of the "Village" to describe the same thing David Gergen did is meant as a satiric jab, with a highly negative connotation.

The problem is, despite its universality, it doesn't work.

It doesn't work in part because it doesn't describe reality. Gergen, in other words, was wrong, even deliberately deceptive, in trying to put a positive gloss or spin on the incestuousness of Washington and its many layers of courtiers, eunuchs and functionaries by calling it a "Village."

It's a "Village" in somewhat the way Marie Antoinette's Petit Hameau was.



In other words, a subdivision of a Palace like Versailles.



And the Washington Press Corps is a bunch of powdered and perfumed, bewigged and panniered courtiers.



The Palace metaphor was even Digby's preferred metaphor, one that is used very effectively by Paul Rosenberg, but she says she shifted to the Village metaphor after reading Quinn's piece in the Washington Post all those years ago and hasn't been able to let go of it.

Sally Quinn -- and David Gergen -- rules her world. Which is silly.

And yet, once the Village metaphor was adopted by Digby it became the standard on the lefty blogs within weeks or months.

Only a few of us hold out for the old fashioned Palace metaphor, which I believe is a far more accurate and telling descriptive of the nature of DC courtier media and "source" incestuousness.

And there's another thing, I think a more important thing than being accurately descriptive with ones metaphors: The Palace Media and its layers of sources, it's go-to eunuchs, functionaries, and gossips, is something that most people can come to revile. Indeed, rebel against. A "Village" metaphor short-circuits the rebellion before it begins and transforms the natural revulsion at the goings on of the Palace and its retainers -- especially when exposed as being as bloodthirsty and corrupt as they truly are -- into a sort of tittery joke. A "Village" metaphor makes them and their evil seem quaint, charming, cute.

And that won't do. It just won't do. How can you do anything about something you think is so 'darling?'

Whereas Storming the Winter Palace has more than a little evocative and powerful meaning.



You see?




Ain't nothin' quaint or cute about it.

You want cute? I gotchur cute right here:

Punkinhead has an aneurysm

Politico's Mike Allen went over to Borders in DC and bought a copy of Little Scotty McClellan's book -- which is to be released next week, hmmm -- and then blared all over creation that Little Scotty is dissing Bush and -- get this -- the Media, and all of a sudden there is massive spin under way to protect and defend the Media and the Busheviks from the dangers of an insider run amok.

Just observe Timmeh's "concern" in the clip above. This is, like, serious as a heart attack.

Propaganda

Permanent campaign

Serious strategic blunder

Insulated from reality

Deceiving

Lie

State of denial

Out of touch

As Meridith says, he's just plain bitter, bitter, bitter, bitter Little Man.

On Storming the Winter Palace, pt 2

Just for the sake of argument, let's say that Cheney holes up in his bunker at the Naval Observatory and ShitBoy and Pickles hole up at the White House cum Winter Palace and -- following recent examples in Kenya or Zimbabwe -- refuse to acknowledge the election results this November (assuming Scarlett McCain is squashed like a bug as the Warrior Princess should be) and declare their Necessity to the Nation. Or, even more interesting, let's say that "events" -- of whatever kind, there are so many possibilities -- interfere with the conduct of an election, and there isn't one this November, but the masses become restless out of economic or other distress. Whatever the case, the usurping Cheney regime makes clear its intent to hold on to the government it seized in 2000/2001.

What do you do? Do you storm the Winter Palace?

I think not.

First, note that gaining access to the White House and/or Naval Observatory is no easier for Americans than it was for the Russian Proletariat to gain access to the Alexander Palace at Tsarskoe Selo where the Romanovs actually were. Notice that in the picture above, which is of the Winter Palace in St. Petersburg in 1917, the People were able to assemble right at the front door. There was and is a vast parade ground directly in front of the Winter Palace where both rebels and Romanov cheerleaders had been gathering for generations.

Both the White House and the Naval Observatory are deep in parks surrounded by heavy fencing and heavily armed security. Physically getting to these seats of the Imperium is no easy task, and trying it would result in much bloodletting. Which is one reason why no one except real cranks ever tries it. Any more than the assembled multitudes were able to get directly to the Alexander Palace or the Palace of Versailles.

No, when the Revolution came, in Paris, in St Petersburg, the monarch was either brought to the People from his redoubt (as in the case of Louis XVI) or was shut up in his suburban palace by his own guards (as in the case of Nicholas II). Something similar would have to happen if Americans ever took action against a usurping autocracy.

The miscreants would have to be brought to, say, the Capitol in DC. Or maybe somewhere else. Independence Hall in Philadelphia? Liberty Island? Hm?

And that would have to be done by their own Praetorians. Or on their own volition.

Not very likely, is it? Yet stranger things have happened.

Or let's say Scarlett McCain is given the Presidency through patently fraudulent "election" manipulation -- of which, of course, there is no perfect proof. There never is.

And let's say Scarlett swans to his inauguration on the steps of the Capitol, while hundreds of thousands of proles hurl invective from miles away (the revival of First Amendment Zones). Do they break free of their confinement and storm the Capitol, thus spoiling McCain's Perfect Moment?

Probably not.

What would Americans do under those circumstances?

Grumble? Write furious emails? Watch it on teevee, calling for someone to pass the popcorn?

What?

On Storming the Winter Palace

Between 1825 and 1917, there were numerous attempted revolts and uprisings in the shadow of the Winter Palace in St. Petersburg. The rebels were routinely shot down by the Tsar's guards, or cut to pieces by the Cossacks. The Romanov Autocracy endured through them all, except the February Revolution of 1917, when the Provisional Government, first under Lvov then under Kerensky, abruptly terminated the Autocracy and shut the Romanovs up in the Alexander Palace at Tsarskoe Selo ("Tsar's Village") outside of what was then known as Petrograd.


Came October 25 (or on our calendar, November 8), 1917, there was another revolt, this time by Lenin's and Trotsky's Bolsheviks, and the Winter Palace was once more under seige. Shortly, the Provisionals withdrew; the Soviet Union soon emerged under the Dictatorship of the Proletariat. The rest, as they say, is History.

"Storming the Winter Palace" became an iconic image in the Soviet Union in part due to Sergei Eisenstein's brilliant movie, "Октябрь" or "Ten Days that Shook the World" (1927).

The Winter Palace itself was the center of Russian rebellion for generations before the overthrow of the Romanov dynasty. It was not just the Tsar's in-town residence, it was the seat of the Russian Imperial Court, the government as it were, and the Winter Palace compound, begun by Peter the Great, came to symbolize everything good and everything malign in Tsarist Russia.

There was plenty of both.

By 1917, most of what the Winter Palace symbolized was malign. The Autocracy was rotten, corrupt, decadent and brittle, it was under immense strain due to Russian losses in World War I and privations on the home front, and its overthrow proved surprisingly easy when the time came.

For reasons that few can really understand, the Cheney/Busheviks have set themselves up a little autocracy of their own in our own Petrograd, Washington DC, and they have their own version of the Imperial Court within which their courtiers flit and sing praises.

In fact, our entire government has become the creature of this Autocracy, to the point where it has become a self-perpetuating institution divorced from The People, despite the illusion of periodic elections.

The image of Storming the Winter Palace starts taking on at least symbolic meaning under the circumstances.

Just recall the Romanov Autocracy endured about 300 years -- opposed from within and without for all that time -- and despite being one of the most repressive regimes on earth at the time of its fall, the Autocracy collapsed with barely a push when the revolution finally came.

Will our own Autocracy last as long? Or is it already as brittle and rotten as the Romanovs became?