Darkness at Dawn: The Rise of the Russian Criminal State by David Satter (PDF)

Description

Anticipating a new dawn of freedom after the disintegration of the Soviet Union, Russians could hardly have foreseen the reality of their future a decade later: a country impoverished and controlled at every level by organized crime. This riveting book views the 1990s reform period through the experiences of individual citizens, revealing the changes that have swept Russia and their effect on Russia’s age-old ways of thinking. “The Russia that Satter depicts in this brave, engaging book cannot be ignored. Darkness at Dawn should be required reading for anyone interested in the post-Soviet state.”―Christian Caryl, Newsweek “Satter must be commended for saying what a great many people only dare to think.”―Matthew Brzezinski, Toronto Globe and Mail“Humane and articulate.”―Raymond Asquith, Spectator“Vivid, impeccably researched and truly frightening. . . . Western policy-makers, especially in Washington, would do well to study these pages.”―Martin Sieff, United Press International

User’s Reviews

Editorial Reviews: Review “A stunning book that honestly confronts the continuingly difficult birth of post-Soviet Russia: dictatorship, economic collapse, and depopulation may still be in Russia’s future and much depends on oil. Bravo to Satter―a clear, troubling, brave work.”―Jim Woolsey, former CIA Director“David Satter has written a compelling and provocative indictment of post-Soviet Russia. He grounds his stern judgment in years of his own reporting on real people’s experiences, and he brings to the task he has set himself a powerful intellect. This book is a major contribution to the debate over what has happened in Russia―and why, and what it means.”―Strobe Talbott, president, The Brookings Institution About the Author David Satter, former Moscow correspondent for the Financial Times of London, is affiliated with the Hoover Institution, the Hudson Institute, and the Johns Hopkins University Nitze School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS). He is the author of Age of Delirium: The Decline and Fall of the Soviet Union, alsoavailable from Yale University Press.

Reviews from Amazon users which were colected at the time this book was published on the website:

⭐The book provides a detailed factual account of man’s inhumanity to man in the context of Russia after the fall of the USSR. I do wonder what was the role of Western ‘advisers’ in the looting of Russia’s natural resources and other assets by those who became oligarchs.

⭐This book is an outstanding series of vignettes (there! I used that word) but is unbalanced in that nothing positive is described. But it’s good to read, like modern crime non-fiction.Some ‘favorites’:Introduction: Miss Russia 1996 is killed being at wrong place, wrong time when Russian Mafia bump off her benefactor.Chap 1: On the Kursk, and Russian cover-upChap 2: Ryazan incident. WORTH THE PRICE OF THE BOOK. This is a spectacular chapter. I won’t spoil it with spoilers but the circumstantial evidence is very strong that the Russian FSB (like FBI) basically planted bombs in 1999 to justify a second invasion of Chechyna. But I will give one spoiler: the Duma, on a pro-Kremlin party block vote, voted to seal the Ryazan incident and all materials used for the next 75 years and forbade an investigation of what really happened. The official explanation (which defies logic): ‘The FSB was conducting an unannounced training exercise involving non-explosive materials with civilians as the target, and were caught by mistake by the local Ryazan police. The local police, despite having state of the art bomb detecting equipment and many hours of defusing actual bombs, misdiagnosed the material used in the training exercise as hexogen; in fact it was sugar. The FSB attempted to flee the area undetected after the bomb was found in accordance with training procedures, to see if they could escape” Do you think this would fly with the American people? But having visited Russia I can assure you–it works in Russia because nobody short of a suicidal or brave journalist wants to know. Patriot Games with a vengence.Chap 3- Gaidar/Chubais and the Young Reformers. Not that interesting since better done in other books.Chap 4 – The History of Reform – ” “Chap 5 – The Gold Seekers – on the MMM pyramid scheme and the guy that got away (senatorial immunity)Chap 6 – The Workers–how they get shafted after management buys out their factory at 1/1000th market value in a rigged auction and then offshores the capital (leaving the factory running at a technical loss). Better covered by Klebnikov’s “Godfather of the Kremlin”Chap 7 – Law Enforcement – where crooks are copsChap 8 – Organized Crime – a lovely tale about two stubborn Canadians who wanted to open an ex-pat bar in Moscow. They did, after becoming managers for rival mafia gangs. But ironically they love it. Typical foreigner in Russia mindset–they love the great sex and excitement of Eastern Europe.Chap 9 – Ulyanovsk – hunger strike claims a victimChap 10 – Vladivostok – the mayor, who for once is a decent person loved by the population (which generally backs anybody with power), is run out of town by a mafia.Chap 11 – Krasnoyarsk – the infamous aluminum factory run by convicted gangster Bykov and his friends (some still on Forbes Richest 400 Russians list, and all under 40 years old, some under 30). Value add, Russian style. Read this to see what it costs to convict a mafiya member in Russia–a lot of innocent people have to first die, even die testifying. And our friend Bykov? He’ll be eligible for parole soon.Chap 12 – The value of human life – zero. Some case studies including surgery without lights (patient died); falling into a boiling hot water sinkhole (not uncommon since Moscow uses hot water to heat buildings, in fact, happens every other year). Boy and father trying to rescue him both die–slow agonizing deaths “4th degree burns”. Woman trying to find her soldier son’s corpse in Chechyna finds cadavers routinely appear to be mistakenly identified and buried under wrong name.Chap 13 – Criminalization of Consciousness – on the Uralmash criminal gang, and how free beer and candy won over the hearts of the populace. Typical Russian tactic. Gang got elected to power.Chap 14 – Conclusion

⭐This book is about the rise towards the absolute power of russian criminals and oligarhs, supported by FSB after the collapse of USSR. Just terrible to follow very close the events what actually happened just few years ago, but which actually have led this most hated state in the world to the present situation. Even more crazy is to understand that the present events in Ukraine have possibly been just the part of the much bigger agenda: to re-create the empire. And to understand that the price of human life in Russia is basically zero. Well written, lots of facts and names. Love his book!

⭐By this I mean that while Satter has done an excellent job of outlining the corrupt regime of modern Russia, he has left out an important player which shares equally in the moral miasma of modern Muscovy. A hint is provided in the rave review by Strobe Talbott, the man who said “the Soviet Union needed a wrecking ball.”Nicely excluded from Satter’s otherwise gripping account is the responsibility of the West – particularly the US. When the US was shipping out carloads of advisors, from private foundations, corporations, and the US government, not a one of them counseled moderate reform, a “social market,” nor social democracy. They all – to the last yuppie graduate – advocated the most radical and sweeping de-Communization, heedless of the social cost, playing right into the hands of the very corruption they now profess to find so shocking.Not only was there an overt political agenda at work, but a naivite regarding the West itself. One need only look at Enron, the SEC, Arthur Andersen, and the US mafia to see how pervasive corruption and organized crime are in US “market democracy.” The nouveau riche New Russians did not operate under the deceiving pangloss of Old Money, which naive US advisors took for granted as they dispensed their agenda under the guise of said advice.As for Russia’s lack of the rule of law, these same insider traders, profiteers, and mafiosi in the US are the first to buy politicians, judges, and to resist any law, rule, or regulation that interferes in their right to make money, no matter the social cost to fellow citizens.In short, Russia showed the West its true face without the makeup. Don’t break the mirror because you can’t handle the image.

⭐A very well-documented book, which I think it had to be in order to convince someone like me (a California native) that life is so poor for 75% of Russians. Not poor as in “my rent just went up and the refridgerator is on the blink” but poor as in close to death, as in you collapse at work from no food and no medicine and you haven’t received a paycheck in over 4 months even though you have this job and do it well.I had no idea the quality of life is so poor there, that the establishment really protects itself, and the cops are more likely to shake you down for a bribe than arrest a crook who stole from you. Further, most all the government assets were, I’m struggling for words here, turned into cash for the corrupt people who were running them before the fall of communism. Everything the countrymen worked their lives for to build up was converted into cash, given to those with connections, and massive debt was then given back to the countrymen.In closing, a very dark book. Perhaps a foreshadowing of what is to come in Iraq.

⭐The nature of the rise of Russian oligarchs.

⭐Good read, would have enjoyed more analysis of the Russian apartment bombings

⭐Very insightful book.I was truly horrified by the well illustrated moral depravity of the Russian ruling class.

⭐This book is very well written & even the unsophisticated person like me, with very little knowledge of the subject, can follow it & understand it. I feel a sense of despair as I read the book.The poor, down-trodden, ordinary Russian citizen doesn’t stand a chance against the criminality of the new masters. There is no justice, no law to protect the ordinary Russian, but the criminals have made fortunes. What I find hard to comprehend is the lack of compassion for the ordinary Russian shown by the Mafia & the government. What has happened to morality? I do not see an easy solution to the problems in Russia.

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