INTRODUCTION

Welcome back to the Ex-Worker. On April 19, 2023, three anarchists were killed in battle near Bakhmut: an American named Cooper Andrews, an Irishman named Finbar Cafferkey, and a Russian named Dmitry Petrov. People in our networks have shared undertakings with all three of these comrades over the years. In the following eulogy, we explore the life of Dmitry Petrov, who also went by the names Ilya Leshy and Fil Kuznetsov.

A few weeks before the war began, Dmitry participated in an interview that we included in our coverage of the unfolding situation. On the first day of the Russian invasion, under what must have been challenging conditions, Dmitry took time to speak with us about how anarchists were responding. Throughout our exchanges over the following year, we were impressed by his humility, the earnestness with which he approached his efforts, and his sincere desire for critique.

One of Dmitry’s virtues, at least in our communication with him, was that he retained a humble, open-minded approach to strategy while nonetheless acting decisively. This stands in stark contrast to the strident voices on every side of the debate about the Russia-Ukraine war who lecture each other from a position of absolute certainty without ever having set foot in either country. In the interview we published at the beginning of 2022, asked how he might answer those who charged that participating in the military defense of Ukraine would make anarchists into accomplices of the Ukrainian government, Dmitry responded, “First of all, I would answer them—thanks, this is a valuable critique. We really need to evaluate how to intervene so as not to just become a tool in some state’s hands.” In the last message we received from him, in March 2023, he concluded, “If you have any questions, if you have any advice, any thoughts, any analysis to share, I would be super happy to hear it, and super interested.” This is a remarkable thing for a person who is risking his life daily to say to people far away in conditions of relative safety.  No one in our collective believes that state militarism can bring about the world we desire to live in. We are internally divided over the issue of anarchists participating in military resistance to the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Some of us believe that serving in a state military formation can never advance the anarchist cause. Others believe that the decision to do so can only be understood in view of the brutal autocracy that prevails in Russia, in which committed anarchists like Dmitry had tried virtually every other approach. If we reject state militarism, it is an open question how else to respond to imperialist invasions—and we will be better equipped to approach that question if we understand the life trajectory of Russian anarchists like Dmitry.

When Dmitry was killed, his comrades revealed that he had been involved in some of the most significant anarchist initiatives in 21st-century Russia, including co-founding the Anarcho-Communist Combat Organization. Here, we will provide an overview of his efforts as a snapshot of the past two decades of struggle in the post-Soviet world, concluding with a translation of his text, The Mission of Anarchism in the Modern World.

In the original article version of this episode, there are dozens of links to Dmitry’s writings, as well as statements from his comrades in the Anarcho-Communist Combat Organization, the Resistance Committee, and Solidarity Collectives. We encourage you to check out more about his incredible life and the many anarchist projects he helped to sustain. You can read more through the links on our website, crimethinc.com/podcasts. Thanks to all of you for listening, and for helping us to remember and celebrate a beloved comrade who we will dearly miss.

A LIFE IN COMBAT

According to one of our contacts in the Russian anarchist movement, Dmitry was an active participant in anarchist activities in Moscow starting when he was a teenager, as early as 2004. He became known to other comrades as Ekolog (“ecologist”) on account of his environmentalism, organizing against the construction of incinerators and for the defense of Bitsevski Park in Moscow. He also participated in Food Not Bombs, the anarchist “Interprofessional Workers’ Union”, and a variety of other initiatives.

While Dmitry was becoming more active in the anarchist movement, fascists and police were escalating their violence against it. They had begun maiming and killing activists and journalists and even their lawyers. In January 2009, the lawyer Stanislav Markelov and the journalist and anarchist eco-activist Anastasia Baburova were murdered in downtown Moscow. The previous summer, Dmitry had fought alongside Baburova to defend Georgian refugees in Moscow.

The following month, Dmitry took part in a clandestine action claimed under the name People’s Retribution. According to one account, this was a landmark event in Russia: The first anti-cop arson of a new generation of anarchist rebels took place on the night of February 19-20, 2009. The next day, a video was published on the internet on behalf of the group People’s Retribution, showing anonymous people throwing Molotov cocktails at police cars. “People’s Retribution” announced the destruction of two cars and called on “every self-respecting person… to stand up against the arbitrariness and despotism of the police, secret services, and bureaucracy.”

Afterwards, Dmitry participated in establishing an anonymous platform for reporting such clandestine actions, the Black Blog, which began publishing in May 2010. When the anonymous editors announced the end of the Black Blog in March 2019, they alluded to the burning of the police cars on February 19, 2009: “More than ten years have passed since we threw our first Molotov cocktail at the police.”

One of the flashpoints of conflict around Moscow at that time was the Khimki forest, which anarchists and ecological activists were defending against corrupt officials and loggers and the fascists in their employ. On July 28, 2010, the fight over Khimki came to a head when hundreds of anarchists and anti-fascists marched on the local municipal offices in response to a fascist attack. We don’t know what Dmitry’s precise involvement in these events was. The anonymous report we received from Russian anarchists seems to bear the work of a familiar hand; but in an interview, an anonymous representative of Black Blog denied that they had participated in the demonstration at the municipal offices.

Over the following months, the authorities detained and tortured over 500 anarchists and anti-fascists. Several were forced to flee the country. Nonetheless, this was not enough to suppress what was at that time a powerful movement. As one account reported, “2009-2012 was the peak of anarchist resistance in the history of the post-Soviet region of Russia, Belarus, and Ukraine. Something happened almost every day, especially in the Moscow region, day and night.”

By summer 2012, over a hundred arson attacks had taken place targeting police stations and vehicles, military enlistment offices, cars belonging to state officials, and construction equipment intended to destroy forests. The Black Blog reported many of these actions, including some claimed by additional groups that Dmitry reportedly participated in, such as Anti-Nashist Action (countering the pro-Putin youth group, Nashi) and ZaNurgaliyeva (likely an ironic reference to then-Minister of Interior Rashid Nurgaliyev, a former KGB functionary). On June 7, 2011, for example, an improvised device exploded beside a traffic police post at kilometer 22 of the Moscow Ring Road. The Anarchist Guerilla group claimed responsibility with a video of the explosion on the Black Blog. According to the Anarcho-Communist Combat Organization, Dmitry participated in this action. In a subsequent interview, pseudonymous participants in the burning of the police post described the action in detail. Here is an excerpt:

DENIS: We are descending from the crossing over the Moscow Ring Road. It’s almost light now. Some pensioner is already here walking his dog. I must say, according to our experience of night outings, this category of citizens is one of the very first to appear on the city streets in the morning. They say that in old age people sleep very little. Although our faces are covered, I still feel anxiety—after all, a witness can remember something. Of course, this is complete madness—to return to a failed bomb, and even in the light, in full view of the whole neighborhood. But so much effort has been expended—it is impossible to leave with nothing.

Let’s return to the post. Everything is the same as we left: a basin with coal and a cylinder stands between the fence and the booth. Alexei goes to the edge of the concrete ditch, lights a phosphorus match, and throws it into the basin. Nothing happens. Has the gasoline burned away? Discouraged, we slowly walk back to the bridge. “Listen, did you definitely see the match fall into the basin?” I ask Alexei. “Yeah, it looked like it.” “But you can’t say for sure?” “No, I’m not sure.”

Last try. We return, I climb over the ditch, approach the fence, light a match, throw it right into the basin and… a bluish flame spreads over the coal. It happened! Now we are running, our hearts are beating—what if the explosion catches us in a conspicuous place? But the joy of success drowns out the anxiety.

BORIS: It was starting to get light. I noticed an incomprehensible movement behind the booth. I looked closely, I realized that it was the reflection of fire on the trees. It was burning! But suddenly a car quickly drove into the parking lot, illuminating the booth with its headlights. A traffic cop ran out of the car, took out a fire extinguisher, and began to put out the flames. Unsuccessfully. On the contrary, it seemed that the fire flared up more and more. The traffic cop ran into the post and came out with another fire extinguisher, a larger one. Again, failure—the flame only blazed more and more. Apparently, having decided not to risk it, the traffic cop returned to his post. The flame, meanwhile, rose above the booth—but there was still no explosion. The camera I was using stopped recording for the second time; I pressed “record” again. Police cars began to arrive at the post.

And then there was an explosion.

Everything was lit up by a flash, a bright orange flame shot up about fifteen meters. We continued filming. Cars began to drive away from the traffic police post, and just then our comrades returned. Alexei nervously shouted: “What are you doing, they are coming after us!”

According to a post by the Anarcho-Communist Combat Organization, the one who returned to try again with one more match—the one called Denis in the above account, if it is to be credited—was Dmitry.

The account concluded with a warning characteristic of Dmitry’s later writing:

You cannot seize power and impose anarchy on people from above. You cannot make a revolution for them and force them to live in a new society. Anarchist ideals will win only when people realize their strength, taking responsibility for their own lives and each other’s. Therefore, the main thing is to restore people’s faith in their own strength.

The same social tensions expressed in these clandestine actions eventually came to a boil in mass participatory events. Across Russia, hundreds of thousands of people participated in the opposition movement of 2011-2012. On May 6, 2012, the “March of Millions” ended in clashes with the police in Moscow’s Bolotnaya Square. Once again, according to the Anarcho-Communist Combat Organization, Dmitry Petrov participated in the events in Bolotnaya Square, alongside the anarchist Alexei Polikhovich and others who were subsequently imprisoned for attempting to defend demonstrators from armored riot police.

That was arguably the high-water mark of political possibility in Russia. Over the years that followed, Putin’s government managed to establish a stranglehold on the country, systematically destroying or assimilating all forms of opposition. When we interviewed the Anarcho-Communist Combat Organization last August, they traced the beginning of the process that eventually led to the Russian invasion of Ukraine to the defeat of that movement:

Perhaps, in theory, the political crisis of 2011-2012 could have ended Putin’s rule, if all the opposition forces had acted more cohesively and radically. The anarchists tried to radicalize the protest, but our forces were not enough, and the authorities decided to launch the first serious waves of repression.

After the clashes on Bolotnaya Square, Dmitry continued to participate in both clandestine action and public organizing. As the Anarcho-Communist Combat Organization told us:

“We are aware of examples in which some comrades have managed to balance between public activity and the underground for quite a long time, and to be quite active in both.”

In 2013, a protest movement broke out against the pro-Putin government of Ukraine, culminating in the Ukrainian Revolution of February 2014. Although nationalists elbowed out anarchists and other anti-authoritarians to take a prominent place in these events, that outcome was not foreordained; things might have turned out differently if anarchists had been more numerous and better prepared. The Yellow Vest movement of 2018-2019 in France offers an example of a social movement in which nationalists initially had an advantage, but anarchists and anti-fascists managed to outflank them.

While the outcome of the Ukrainian uprising was still up in the air, Dmitry Petrov traveled to Kyiv to participate in the struggle on the Maidan, the central square of Ukraine’s capital city. According to Vladimir Platonenko,

In February 2014, Ekolog [Dmitry] spent about ten days on the Maidan, having come to Ukraine specifically for this. He took part in the arrangement of Ukrdom [the “Ukrainian house,” a staging point for anarchists and anti-fascists during the uprising, which was burned on February 18], delivering food to positions, and even in the battle on February 18. But at the same time, he constantly tried to develop an anarchist component in the general popular, complex, and heterogeneous Maidan protest movement. He participated in an attempt to create the “Left Hundred,” created an “anarchist regiment” (with anarchist literature) in the library of the Ukrdom, told the Maidan participants about the protests in favor of the uprising that had taken place in Moscow and about the reasons for the defeat of the protesters. He did not go with the flow; rather, he participated in determining the flow of events to the best of his ability.

In his reports from the Maidan protests, Dmitry describes his dismay about the militarization of the movement and the introduction of reactionary structures:

I can’t help but appreciate that everything is organized so seriously. However, this situation also has a drawback, perhaps more significant than its advantages. The presence of professional (or quasi-professional) military men inevitably means the collapse of any kind of democracy in the movement, since, by decision of their commanders, these people can impose this or that order on everyone else in an organized way by force. In addition, according to my subjective feelings, these people are unlike those who came here at the call of the idea, and even if I am wrong, their values ​​and goals most likely have little in common with mine. A thick atmosphere of the right of force, the power of a man with a gun (or club) hung there. This is a problem that requires reflection and solution. The contradiction, the conflict between the “military” and “civilian” Maidan, is very clear.

In his last report, Dmitry described in detail his part in the battle of February 18, when many people were killed or severely injured:

Let’s try without great poetics, but in essence. This may be useful when you happen to be in a similar situation, dear reader. It is important to use your fear: so that it helps you to avoid getting into certain troubles, but does not flow into panic and flight. Personally, I had an incessant fear that a bullet or a grenade would hit me. I have long known that I am far from being a daredevil, and I say that without a hint of coquetry. Now, for the first time, I became interested in the essence of such a feeling as courage. What is it, anyway? Fear forced me to stay closer to people, not to stick out too much, not to run out in front of the crowd. There was a petty feeling: there are a great number of us here, the chance that they will shoot at me is small. There was a childish feeling: “Wow, I saw it on TV during the riots…” But that was the least of it. Next to fear, there was a feeling similar to emptiness—a silent obligation to stay and act. It is almost never formulated verbally. It just is. Maybe courage is just about that? Further, it is important to begin to act meaningfully, and not just to stand or stupidly rush back and forth. Here, the first stones are flying, the first bullets of the cops and flash-bang grenades…

The situation in Ukraine was never simple. In the final entry on the Black Blog, dated February 2015, the editors describe the debates among themselves regarding whether the arsons in Ukraine that were reported to their platform represented genuine anti-state activity or pro-Putin authoritarian activity. Rather than present a facile or sanitized narrative, the authors summarized both views so that readers could draw their own conclusions—but that was the last update to the Black Blog. This debate foreshadowed the later controversies about how anarchists should position themselves in the war between the Russian and Ukrainian governments.

In the years following his participation in the Ukrainian uprising, Dmitry maintained an online journal chronicling his travels to sites of natural beauty and historical interest, including parks, forests, and museums around Russia. In 2016, he obtained a PhD in history; his dissertation was titled “Sacred geography of the eastern parts of the Arkhangelsk region.” He engaged in anthropological studies as a researcher at the Center for Civilizational and Regional Studies of the African Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

Inspired initially by an article written by David Graeber, Dmitry went to Rojava while the war against the Islamic State was at its fiercest. He spent six months there. Afterwards, in 2017, he discussed his experiences in this interview and participated in the research project “Hevale: Revolution in Kurdistan,” which published multiple books.

Later, he contributed articles to the Ukrainian leftist site Commons about the impact of COVID-19 in Rojava and the conflict between confederal and imperial models in Kurdistan. According to Ukrainian anti-fascists, “He studied the revolutionary experience of the Kurds deeply, and while he was critical, he respected it and sincerely tried to convey its most valuable lessons.” By his own account, Dmitry aimed “not only to tell the Russian left about the social revolution in Kurdistan, but also to share the anti-authoritarian worldview with the Kurds themselves.”

In 2018, Dmitry left Russia. By that time, Putin’s regime had tamed the violent fascist movement of the preceding decade and moved on to crushing all other social movements. It was becoming standard practice for the Russian Federal Security Service to round up suspected anarchists and anti-fascists and torture them via electrical shock and other horrific methods in order to force them to sign false confessions admitting to participating in invented “terror networks.”

As Dmitry later told the news site Doxa,

I avoided leaving the country as long as I could, but I left when I learned that the security forces were interested in my modest person.

He chose Ukraine as his point of destination, considering its government to be the least successfully authoritarian of the post-Soviet countries. In the Doxa interview, he described his activities upon arriving there:

In Ukraine, we had initiatives among anarchist emigrants from Russia and Belarus, a kind of diaspora. And so it was a lot of different things: from the cinema club and discussions to street actions. But the main thing was to establish ties and an attempt to form systematically operating structures.

As we have noted elsewhere, it is becoming more and more important to find ways to center the agency of refugees as wars, state repression, ecological catastrophes, and economic crises force millions into exile. Yet at the same time that he was getting situated in Ukraine, Dmitry continued organizing with anarchists in Russia from afar. The Telegram channel Anarchist Combatant appeared that same year, in 2018. According to the Anarcho-Communist Combat Organization, “Dmitry was a participant in all the processes of creating the Anarcho-Communist Combat Organization—its theoretical work, practical training, and the organization of training and combat actions. But his chief merit—and we think this will not surprise anyone who knew him—was his ability to establish ties with other people, with comrades both at home and abroad… He was always open to new people. He always believed in the best in them—he was mistaken more than once, but he continued to believe and seek.”

In 2019, the editors of Black Blog announced the conclusion of the project. It had been four years since the last post had appeared. They emphasized that they remained convinced of the value of the strategy they had embraced in 2009:

We have sown our seeds and we are already seeing sprouts. Our enemies—the oppressors and their henchmen within the “power structures”—could not stop us, no matter how hard they tried.

We do not do these things to feed our egos. Everything we do, we do not for personal ambition, but to advance the struggle for freedom and justice. We are convinced that we have succeeded. And now, ten years later, we declare to you, as we did before, that we believe that our anti-authoritarian ideas are correct and the radical path we have chosen is correct. The fight continues.

On June 10, 2020, at the high point of the George Floyd uprising in the United States and in response to police violence in Ukraine, anarchists set fire to the Investigative Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs in Kyiv, sending a communiqué that appeared on the Anarchist Combatant website. This should address any lingering doubts about whether Dmitry sought to make peace with the Ukrainian authorities.

That summer, when an uprising broke out in Belarus, Dmitry illegally crossed the border to participate. According to an account by Belarusian anarchists:

During his stay in Minsk, he took part in dozens of marches, helped organize an anarchist bloc at demonstrations, and even managed to pelt cops with their own stun grenades. At night, when many Belarusians were resting, Leshy [Dmitry] and other comrades took to the streets of Minsk and destroyed the surveillance cameras that played an important role in the infrastructure of repression… In the fall of 2020, he prepared several materials for our website. If you’ve ever marched through Minsk beside an anarchist column, chances are that you’ve walked shoulder to shoulder with this incredible man.

The uprising in Belarus was ultimately crushed; many of the anarchists who participated remain in prison today, underscoring the considerable risks of insurrectionary activity in the post-Soviet sphere. In September 2020, a blog post appeared from the Anarcho-Communist Combat Organization: a communiqué from a clandestine partisan action in Belarus.

Surveying this trajectory, it is possible to interpret Dmitry’s path from the Black Blog through the uprisings of 2012, 2014, and 2020 to the Anarcho-Communist Combat Organization as the continuous development of a single strategy. Blending public activity and clandestine organizing, he sought to create a model suited to the volatile and dangerous conditions of the post-Soviet countries, a model that could serve both to take advantage of moments of possibility and to survive periods of intense repression. As state violence and surveillance intensify, activists in other parts of the world may find that they need something similar.

Starting before Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, Dmitry joined Ukrainian and Belarusian anarchists in attempting to put together an explicitly anarchist and anti-authoritarian military unit. One function of such a unit was to ensure that the participants would not have to fight side by side with fascists, who are indeed present in the Ukrainian military. In addition, Dmitry saw participating in the defense of Ukraine as an opportunity to gain credibility for anarchist ideas in the eyes of the general public in Ukraine, and to continue his own longstanding fight against Putin’s regime. During the first phase of the Russian invasion, Dmitry and his comrades participated in the territorial defense of the region around Kyiv, becoming integrated as an independent unit in the Territorial Defense Forces. After this, their “anti-authoritarian platoon” became mired in military bureaucracy, putting the status of the non-Ukrainian members in limbo and keeping the entire unit away from the fighting.

In July 2022, Dmitry wrote an analysis of the first four months of the “anti-authoritarian platoon,” discussing its internal structure and evaluating its successes and failures. This is an important historical document for those who are curious about the extent to which the military model developed in Rojava can be reproduced in other circumstances. It will be instructive for anyone who wants to discuss anarchist involvement in military affairs, whether they seek to improve on it or to critique it.

Dmitry and others in the platoon were eager to get to the front. Eventually, the platoon disbanded, and they succeeded in going to the front in a different formation. When last we heard from him, he told us that he was about to leave that unit, in hopes of trying once more to establish some kind of explicitly anti-authoritarian unit.

We will leave it to others to debate whether Dmitry’s persistent attempts to establish an anarchist military unit represent the honorable continuation of his lifelong anarchist project, a misguided departure from it, an error arising from some preexisting flaw within it, or a courageous attempt to grapple with an almost impossible situation. Those who wish to hear his own thoughts on the matter may choose from an array of interviews. It must not be forgotten that in addition to fighting in Ukraine, he continued to support sabotage and other forms of subversive activity in Russia through the Anarcho-Communist Combat Organization, and he continued to emphasize the importance of autonomy, horizontality, and direct action to the anarchist struggle.

The sincerity of his effort, in any case, is beyond question.

As Dmitry wrote in his final statement:

My dear friends, comrades and relatives, I apologize to all those I hurt with my leaving. I appreciate your warmth very much. However, I firmly believe that the struggle for justice, against oppression and injustice is one of the most worthy meanings that humans can fill their life with. And this struggle requires sacrifices, up to the complete self-sacrifice.

The best memory for me is if you continue actively struggle, overcoming personal ambitions and unnecessary harmful strife. If you continue to fight actively to achieve a free society based on equality and solidarity. For you and for me and for all our comrades. Risk, deprivation and sacrifice on this path are our constant companions. But be sure – they are not in vain.

In an interview published in December 2017, Dmitry said “In general, almost everything that is created by human hands is the fruit of the labor of countless people.” In that spirit, we do not seek to hold Dmitry up as an exemplary figure. Rather, his life affords us a glimpse into the lives of many Russian anarchists, illuminating their courage and the challenges they have faced. Above all, Dmitry’s life is a testament to how much is possible even in the most difficult conditions. Under a brutal dictatorship, faced with mounting adversity, he repeatedly found ways to continue organizing and fighting for the future he desired.

None of this is intended to glorify death in battle. As the 21st century progresses, life is becoming increasingly cheap—witness how the Wagner Group has intentionally used prisoners as cannon fodder. Anarchists should be in no special hurry to risk our lives—soon enough, there will be chances aplenty to die in the service of a variety of causes, or for no cause whatsoever. Rather than seeking to prove our commitment by our deaths, let’s express our passion for freedom in the way we live every moment of our lives.

Yet as authoritarianism rises around the world and war spreads from Syria to Ukraine, from Ukraine to Sudan, we too may have to answer the questions that Dmitry confronted when Russia invaded the country to which he had fled. If we are to be prepared for that situation—especially if we want to propose other answers to those questions—we need to study what has taken place in Russia. It may be that there is still time for things to turn out differently in other parts of the world, if we act boldly enough—but time is growing tight. When an anarchist dies, it is up to those of us who survive to put that comrade’s experiences at the disposal of future generations. We can’t know for sure which perspectives those who come after us will need most. Seeking to do our part, we have translated the following article that Dmitry published on June 17, 2020 via the Anarchist Combatant Telegram channel, in which he spells out what he saw as “The Mission of Anarchism in the Modern World.”

APPENDIX I: THE MISSION OF ANARCHISM IN THE MODERN WORLD

It is not a new idea that today the great projects of rebuilding the world are in decline. In the twentieth century, mighty movements mobilized millions of people to storm the heavens, politically speaking, and carry out “great constructions” [in the sense of Soviet-era projects aimed at reinventing society]. But over the course of the last century, one after another, they went bankrupt both ethically and practically and soon lost relevance. Here, first of all, fascism and communism of the Leninist variety come to mind. Even the seemingly triumphant liberal project, in fact, simply dissolved into the global capitalist system and geopolitical game, in which the mechanics are hardly liberal.

Of the ambitious ideocrats who dare to rebuild the world in accordance with their convictions, perhaps the voice of the jihadists is the only one that rings out loudly today. Yet Islamic fundamentalism is obviously not the sort of project that a person with an anarchist worldview can get behind.

Ill-fated global plans at the end of the twentieth century gave rise to deep pessimism and paralysis in regards to the idea of transformation. However, the first decades of the new century have clearly shown that the “end of history” is cancelled. Growing instability, rebelliousness, and ungovernability have manifested themselves. The number of anti-government demonstrations under a variety of slogans and flags has increased by several orders of magnitude compared to the previous era.

At the same time, there is an acute need for fundamental change on the widest possible territorial scale. We still need a new world, just as we did before. Almost everything that exists in society is unacceptable and cannot serve as a framework for the present or the future. But what will the transformed reality be like? There are unpromising prophecies of a “brave new world” ruled entirely by elites of post-humanity, or, conversely, of a new feudalism and a great schism accompanied by a surge of brutal cruelty. These pictures are accompanied by the prospect of a global ecological catastrophe. But in parallel with these varieties of gloom, a different trend is becoming more and more apparent: the desire for direct democracy, for egalitarian collectivity, for the eradication of inequality and oppression, for a harmonious coexistence with nature. This trend is still “sprinkled” across many different social currents, which have not yet formed into a united stream. Nevertheless, it brings the relevance of anarchism back to life.

At a time when all other missionaries have shown themselves to be deceivers or maniacs, the time has come for anarchists to remember their mission and reassert their global project. What might its common features be?

Dismantle the Megamachine

Modern mass society is crowded into gigantic urban agglomerations. The lion’s share of human life is controlled and directed by the laws of states, as well as by capitalist relations in the sphere of production, exchange, and consumption. As a result, modern man finds himself in the position of an object manipulated by gigantic machine-like forces. At the same time, we are immersed in constant turmoil. The modern world is characterized by the sleep of reason and the suppression of deep feelings, replaced by momentary, externally controlled desires. This state is repugnant to human nature; it causes dissatisfaction, followed by a longing for something different.

But the monstrous scale of the state fills us with fear and doubt: could we ever get out from under its iron heel? The endless buying and selling that fills our daily lives along a million different vectors aggravates our dependence and, even worse, corrupts and twists us as if from within.

Yet the very course of life pushes a person to rebel—and a wealth of historical evidence shows that even the most seemingly omnipotent social systems eventually collapse like a house of cards, sometimes quite unexpectedly. These are the starting points of our struggle against the prevailing order. To crush and dismantle the megamachine is the ambitious task before the anarchist movement.

New Community

Today we see a progressive atomization and weakening of collective ties. Neighbors know less and less about each other, and sometimes they completely avoid each other. Noisy family gatherings are becoming rarer and more forced. The causes of this are complex and it is not easy to single out the main ones. There is the growing sphere of individual entertainment, the general trend towards individual comfort, which is always threatened by “excessive” intimacy, and the notorious egoism, organic to capitalist market society, which transforms any relationship into a temporary interaction between two consumers for mutual benefit. The word “partner” is becoming more and more conventional; in Russian, it suggests alienation, functioning as a kind of antonym to terms like beloved, friend, comrade…

We consider the crisis of collectivity, of the joint existence of people, to be one of the most catastrophic consequences of capitalism and state power. In addition to moralizing of a purely ethical nature, the anarchist revolution also has concrete institutional instruments for creating what we might call a “new communality.” These include popular assemblies, gatherings, collective self-governing bodies, and economic entities. When the parasite of the system, which has penetrated deep into the social fabric and separated us from each other, is ripped away from the body of society, we will be faced with the necessity to restore warm horizontal bonds and connect together in bonds of solidarity.

The collective creation of social life will stand in stark contrast to contemporary social practices. Just look at the current initiative of the Russian authorities to organize voting by mail—now even the imitation of choice will not draw together a crowd of strangers at the ballot box. Yes, we plan to get together to make decisions, to prepare food in crowded and noisy kitchens instead of receiving it in sterile delivery bags, to introduce our children to their peers on the street instead of just sitting them down to watch a cartoon alone… The degradation of humanity that is unfolding before our eyes can stop. It must be stopped.

The Economy

Managing people for the purpose of personal gain, perceiving everything in the world—both living and inanimate—as raw material with which to make a profit, the pathological luxury of a tiny minority at the expense of the deprivation of the vast majority: these are just a few of the most striking illustrations that characterize the modern economic model. Its essence is diametrically opposed to what we consider just and right. All the reasons to reject capitalism can be boiled down to two main theses: 1) This economic system is unethical, unjust, and degrading; 2) It fails to provide a decent standard of living for all.

Cash and commodity relations, wage labor, investments, bank loans, and interest rates are so deeply rooted in our everyday life that sometimes it seems as if it would be impossible to get rid of them—as if without them, there would be immediate famine and decline. But we do have something to oppose to them: it is the human labor force (many thousands of people today waste their labor on useless work, doing what are called “shit jobs”); it is the labor experience of workers, which will enable them to maintain a boss-free economy; it is technology, which will enable society to regulate its production and distribution system according to its needs and values… This should be enough to transfer the economy from the hands of the elite to the control of society as a whole, to ensure the equitable management of production by laboring people and realize the principle “From each according to ability, to each according to need.”

The mission of the anarchist movement is to root in society, by word, deed and example, an understanding of the principles of economic justice and, having overthrown the state and the capitalists, to “clear a space”—to create the social and political conditions for its realization.

The Elimination of Discrimination

Modern society is filled with discrimination on a variety of grounds. People experience discrimination on the basis of a wide range of attributes and characteristics. The reasons for this include prejudice, whether centuries-old or new; the principle of collective responsibility; and the way that people are alienated from each other in a world permeated by capitalist relations.

Prejudice and collective responsibility are skillfully manipulated by unscrupulous politicians.

Gender oppression is one of the oldest and most harmful forms of discrimination. Although in Eastern Europe, as well as the “Western World,” the situation has changed significantly compared to the openly patriarchal past, women remain oppressed. This is confirmed by data regarding domestic, sexual, and gender-based violence and by the difference in average incomes. Practices and patterns of behavior that denigrate woman retain their force. Take, for example, the attitude that “Politics is not a woman’s business.” There are many such invisible cultural obstacles in our social reality that obstruct women from exploring their full potential.

And there is another detail that often goes unnoticed, although it is one of the most important. Relationships between all people in general are poisoned by gender stereotypes and the mutual consumer attitude and selfishness rooted in them. Because of this, even the most seemingly intimate connections cause people pain and unhappiness. The capitalist and authoritarian worldview prevents true intimacy from emerging.

The mission of anarchism is to achieve genuine sisterhood/fraternity between people over and above any group identity. We have a variety of tools at our disposal to pursue this: the collaborative practice of building and managing society, which requires equal cooperation and mutual warmth among all participants in the process; a revolutionary political culture, which requires the conscious active involvement of representatives of all oppressed groups in social effort together; finally, a program of education and developing literacy, which helps people to leave prejudice behind.

Thus, the ambition of the anarchist project is, in eliminating discrimination, to improve interpersonal relations and, however naïve this may sound, to bring the love of the neighbor back into our lives. Capitalism and authoritarianism stand in the way of this, but they are not insurmountable obstacles.

Resolving National Conflicts

Since time immemorial, human society has been shaken and terrorized by violent confrontations motivated by ethnic or national cultural differences. Additional criteria have been invented and added alongside those, including religious and racial differences. Inter-national and inter-ethnic conflicts reached a new intensity in the era of nation-states, which remain the chief form of political organization to this day. With their emergence, the question of which nation has legitimate right to rule a particular state began to be raised with extreme urgency. Which land “rightfully belongs” to which national group? The result has been the immeasurable suffering of millions of innocent people: forced assimilation, mass deportations and, finally, brutal acts of mass murder. Yet after all this, national conflicts still flare up all over the world.

Hardly any other imaginary contradictions in the history of mankind have had as horrific consequences as ethnic conflict. National conflicts are often based on the interests of national political and economic elites and state bureaucracies, as well as the most ignorant prejudices and distorted ideas about their own neighbors—the Other, representatives of other national groups.

At the root of the idea of national conflict lies the question, “Us or them?” Anarchism offers an alternative: “Both we and they, together and as equals.” By rejecting the nation-state, which is nothing more than an instrument of oppression and injustice, anarchists open the way to confederation: the equal cooperation of peoples in all territories. The same land can be both Serbian and Albanian, Armenian and Azerbaijani… the list is endless. Equality and self-government, the social pillars of anarchism, are the indispensable conditions for fruitful and mutually beneficial dialogue between cultures. The need for this dialogue has not diminished—on the contrary, it has intensified in the twenty-first century.

Reharmonization with Nature

It has long been a commonplace that capitalism in particular and the ever-expanding economy and consumption in general have an extremely destructive effect on nature. Likewise the understanding that this vector of development threatens to destroy humanity and the planet we call home.

We would like to take a deeper look at the problem. The anthropocentric worldview that dominates today and the way of life conditioned by it is a particular case of a hierarchical attitude to the world and toward being as a whole. Nature is “the workshop of Man”… This view is not natural, ethical, or acceptable. The true emancipation of humanity cannot take place unless we overcome our alienation from nature and finding harmony with it.

What ecological measures can anarchism offer? Modern technology should be reoriented from maximizing profit to conserving and restoring nature, as well as providing decent material living conditions for all. Ideally, we should put an end to the extensive expansion of human destructive influence on nature. The knowledge and capabilities humanity has accumulated should make it possible to fulfill this task, or at least to advance toward its fulfillment. It is of utmost importance to reorganize living space, getting rid of the monstrous megalopolis as a form of human dwelling. The settlement must be proportionate to the person, no matter how subjective this may sound. The lifeless anthropogenic landscape, which cuts people off from natural processes, must give way to the harmonious inclusion of the settlement in the natural landscape, the intertwining of the natural and the human.

Here and Now

The intolerable state of our present situation… and the outlines of a renewed world, like prophetic dreams, stir our minds and hearts. These are the points of mobilization that keep us from giving up and accepting. That is why we are ready to make efforts, to take risks, to make sacrifices in order to create a new society. An organized revolutionary struggle is the path by which we will reach the goal outlined in this text. Victory is possible—and therefore, we must win.

Signed, Phil Kuznetsov [alias of Dmitry Petrov], Anarchist Combatant

APPENDIX II: “DIMA ECOLOG’S PARTISAN PATH”

On May 8, 2023, after we published the above memorial, the following statement appeared on the Telegram channel of the Anarcho-Communist Combat Organization. We have translated it in full because it offers additional valuable context, especially on Dmitry’s youth.

It was his public activities which brought Dima to his first steps on the partisan path, when he was fighting against gentrification. In the process, he repeatedly ran into a situation in which the tenants were all trying to take the easy route of legalism (and there was no shortage of people calling on others to take this approach)—writing complaints to the administration that went directly to the trash cans. Tenants didn’t respond very enthusiastically to calls to block construction equipment and roads—and as a result, the police arrested the activists again and again while the construction continued. Hence the natural impulse to stop the construction physically. Destroy the construction equipment. Destroy the building materials. Damage the lighting wiring and fencing of the construction site. And, most importantly, to do it in such a way as to stay free and continue to help people.

That’s where the partisan journey began. His first action, if we’re not mistaken, was an attack on the gentrifying housing construction on the site of the radioactive waste dump in southern Moscow (which we then returned to several times to carry out additional actions). Compared to the other actions that followed, this was a pretty easy action, with some anti-construction propaganda graffiti on the fence, a flare pistol fired at a sign describing the site, and a film of the fence enclosing the construction site set on fire.

But that morning, we were pleased to see some pictures of the fire extinguisher foam that was used to put out the fence. It was lying around like snow that had suddenly fallen in the warm time of the year.

That was just the beginning.

At first, we were inexperienced. Some recipes were suggested by other comrades; some we found on the Internet ourselves and tested on various construction sites that were contributing to gentrification.

And Dima always kept trying to expand our struggle—to bring in new people, to develop our methods and tactics.

The killing of our comrades Stanislav Markelov and Anastasia Baburova in the center of Moscow by neo-Nazis was a turning point. We felt strongly that it was not just neo-Nazi aggression, but a direct attack by the state, which was fostering and supporting our enemies.

Starting then, we decided to move on to more serious targets.

The first of these attacks was the attack on the police parking lot near the police security force building in the south of Moscow.

More precisely, we planned to attack the building—I remember going with Dima on a reconnaissance mission, and it seemed that it was very close. But when in the end we climbed the garages (from which the Molotovs was thrown), it turned out that it wasn’t so easy to throw all the way and hit the building. We took responsibility for this action as a group called “People’s Retribution.”

Dima came up with the idea of claiming different types of actions on behalf of different groups. For example, against the police—on behalf of the People’s Vengeance (and the group “ZaNurgalieva!”—referring to [Rashid] Nurgaliev’s statement, which became a meme, in which he said that people have the right to fight back if police officers break the law, so that the phrase “Nurgaliev allowed it!” became popular). Against pro-government movements—as “Anti-Nashist Action,” and so on. [Nashi was a state-backed pro-Putin youth organization somewhat reminiscent of the Hitler Youth.] The idea was that other groups should carry out actions under the same names to confuse the enemy.

And a lot of actions took place. Now, looking back, one can’t comprehend how we had time for everything. Literally, sometimes one or two weeks passed between actions—we did an attack, went on a reconnaissance trip, told our comrades about it, went to the next one. On the dates when the military draft started, we attacked military registration and enlistment offices. In response to the persecution of [Soviet dissident Alexander] Podrabinek [who was targeted by Nashi in 2009], we visited the Nashists. For the elections, we attacked the offices and administration buildings of United Russia [the ruling party of Russia]. And we lost count of how many times we burned the police—on March 8 (the attack on the reception room of the Interior Ministry in the center of Moscow), after the arrests of comrades in other cities, and so on. In response to the abuse by the traffic cops, we burned their facilities. And all of this under a new group name every time, covered through new sites and blogs.

Yet gradually, we concluded that it takes too much effort to disseminate the information on behalf of a new group every time. And other groups preferred to conduct actions under their own name instead using ours. Therefore, as the next step, the concept of the Black Blog was born. Not an organization, but an aggregator of actions carried out by all the anarchist partisan groups—including ours. Although with time, the Black Blog began to be seen precisely as the name of a group (and sometimes the subtitle of the site, “Anarchist Guerrilla news,” was used as such, and we began to be called the Anarchist Guerrilla group after it).

By the way, the site address (as well as the name in English) was deliberately chosen as blackblocg.info—both a reference to Black Bloc and a reference to the fact that we have a blog chronicling the guerrilla struggle (for the same reason we chose the .info domain). Only some isolated, especially vivid episodes flash in memory. The arson of the reception room of the Ministry of Internal Affairs in Moscow region—in response to [police officer Denis] Yevsyukov’s shooting of people in a supermarket.

How the flames run beautifully through the car when the police cars caught fire near Ostankino and at that moment, from the loudspeaker in the parking lot, we heard a voice yelling “Fire! Fire!” (Later, we made a beautiful music video of the Electric Partisans’ song “R.A.F.” for this attack.)

How after the arson of the police cars near the Chechulin street police station (the attack in which we’d first used an IED made from acetone peroxide with ammonal—Dima played the leading role, pouring the mixture and then throwing the grenade while sitting on the fence—and the explosion threw him right to the ground), a man who introduced himself as a police officer from that very station posted a comment to our site complaining that the chief of that station, lieutenant colonel Telelyuev, was very good—and now he was in trouble because of us. Dima immediately wrote a song in response:

“It’s cold and dark in the burnt office… Lieutenant Colonel Telelyuev is writing us a letter.”

In honor of all partisan anarchists, Vadim Kurylev (Electric Partisans) released the song “I am a Fighter of the Black Blog.” [See below.]

And, of course, the blowing up of a traffic police post on the Moscow Ring Road—organized as a protest against the numerous abuses of the law by the officers of that very agency.

We told about that action in detail in the past. We will only add that the comrade who returned to the failed IED, risking his life and freedom to complete the action despite the problems, was Dima.

Actions continued after that explosion, such as setting fire to the police department’s parking lot in Troitsk, attacks on [the political party] United Russia, and environmental actions like setting fire to the logging equipment in Khimki forest and to luxury cottage villages under construction near Yakhroma.

We know hardly anybody doubts it—but there was practically not a single action in which Dima did not actively participate.

However, a situation gradually developed in which, on the one hand, we no longer had any objects to attack (at least, that we could target with a high level of security with only a small group)—and at the same time, we realized that the hope to bring a revolution via disconnected affinity group actions did not seem to be justified.

And it was time to rethink things on the basis of experience—both our own experience and those of other successful revolutionary groups, not only anarchist ones. Dima gave us the idea of organizing a discussion club in which we studied the works of [anarchist Peter] Kropotkin and [authoritarian communist Vladimir] Lenin, works on the psychology of the masses, the works of [French revolutionary syndicalist Georges] Sorel on myth and its role in revolution, and conducted an analysis of the revolutions of the Arab Spring and [“nonviolent” democrat] Gene Sharp.

And this work led us eventually to what Dima rightfully calls our brainchild, the creation of the Combat Organization of Anarcho-Communists. This, of course, was a long undertaking—and the story is just beginning. But we can’t help noting that Dima was a participant in all the processes of creating the BOAC [Anarcho-Communist Combat Organization]—its theoretical work, practical training, and the organization of training and combat actions. But his chief merit—and we think this will not surprise anyone who knew him—was his ability to establish ties with other people, with comrades both at home and abroad. Finding new people for the organization—and organizing field camps in the Moscow region for foreign comrades. He was always open to new people. He always believed in the best in them—he was mistaken more than once, but he continued to believe and seek.

Among other things, this work took him to Kurdistan, where he participated in learning both the principles of a liberated society and in combat training.

And there’s another important detail about his character. Dima stayed in Northeast Syria for several long months, communicating with his family and us very irregularly and only by email. But when it was time to return—practically when he was already on his way home, a few days before his flight—we learned that the FSB was seriously interested in him.

And in this situation—missing his family and home, having a science career in Russia that was waiting for him—he decided (albeit not without the agony of choice) not to return home, but to go to Ukraine. He did this partly because he understood that if he returned and was arrested, not only he but other people as well would be at risk, along with his life’s work. So he chose the path of a professional revolutionary—denying his personal desires for the sake of the common cause, for the sake of the ideas he believed in.

Ever since, Dima has been moving our common cause forward, developing our organization from abroad. And no distance has diminished his contribution and his assistance in this.

APPENDIX III: “BLACK BLOG FIGHTER” BY ELECTRIC PARTISANS

Russian musician Vadim Kurylev wrote this song, “Black Blog Fighter,” for his band Electric Partisans in 2012. The lyrics are as follows:

Tonight, when the city is quiet, There’ll be an explosion and flames will burst out My devices are flying through the broken window and the special forces are on alert They’re making a big fuss, the minister’s on the phone But I’m already gone in the city at night I put up videos and links and fill new bottles with cocktails

I’ll let the cops’ lair burn, and let their souls be gnawed by anxiety, Not to find a needle in the middle of a haystack, Nor in the city a Black Blog fighter I have a lot of work to do here, let the honest citizenry not judge me harshly I have my own way to the truth, I’m a Black Blog fighter.

It’s convenient for you to make me out to be a bully, But you’re pissed off, you’re living a life of deceit I want you to learn this truth: you humiliate the people, you get a vendetta in return. Better go dig in the dusty archives, And you’ll understand how often you’ve been defeated. Let historians argue about the ways of society’s development, But my anarchism is stronger than your logic.

I’ll let the cops’ lair burn, and let their souls be gnawed by anxiety, Not to find a needle in the middle of a haystack, Nor in the city a Black Blog fighter I have a lot of work to do here, let the honest citizenry not judge me harshly I have my own way to the truth, I’m a Black Blog fighter.