AHC: Post-Soviet National Bolshevik Russia

Anchises

Banned
After reading a bit about the crazy fringe of Russian politics, I thought about how screwed Russia would have to be to get these guys into power.

PODs during the Soviet Union are fair game, as long as the thing eventually collapses, lets say before the year 2000.
 

Anchises

Banned
To kickstart this:

I could see a Soviet Union that withdraws earlier from Afghanistan and decides to "crack the whip" in Eastern Europe and its Republics. Probably a POD involving a nasty flu, that kills most of the old fossiles in the Politbureau in the early 80s, before the advent of Gorbachev.

Instead we have a hardliner hellbent on keeping the whole rotten warsaw pact structure together. Reagan and a 2 term Bush really squeeze them, sanctions, a new arms race and all that jazz. The economy evaporates more and more, only blatant surpression keeps everything together.

Eventually somwhere between 92-96 the Politbureau slowly starts "selling off" Warsaw Pact members (withdrawing for economic concessions from the West).

In the late 90s the WP countries are gone. The Red Army is privileged and the only state institution that is somewhat working. Russian Nationalism is heavily promoted because the Republics are in a state of perpetual unrest and resistance, the Politbureau only trusts Russians (somewhat). The ranks are full of young officers and enlisted men who are fiercly nationalistic.

Eventually the hardliner dies and his successor sees the necessity to negotiate with the other ethnicities and the West. The West has no intention of helping the Soviets though, more than a decade of heavy human rights violations has even hardened leftists against the Soviets.

The whole reconcilation and negotiation approach is to little to late and fails, the Red Army meanwhile fears for its privileges. A bunch of officers start talking to several Russian nationalistic groups. At some point a mix of military coup and Revolution happens. Nationalistic groups riot in the street, while the military eliminates the Soviet Government.

Most Republics splinter off and in Russia an authoritarian Presidential system.is installed. National Bolshevist "thinkers" deliever a convenient ideology for the alliance of military and nationalists.

The new NatBol government immediately begins a bunch of military campaigns to reclaim lost lands, especially the Ukraine. Post-Soviet Russia is an even shittier place to live ITTL.
 
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Do they actually use that blatantly nazi-fied Hammer And Sickle that shows up on their wiki page? I would think that any association with Nazism would be electoral poison in Russia, even among people whose beliefs are basically indistinguishable from fascism.

I've spent a bit of time arguing with hardcore Russian nationalists on other sites, and one thing they always bring up is the Red Army's stand against Nazi Germany.
 

Anchises

Banned
Do they actually use that blatantly nazi-fied Hammer And Sickle that shows up on their wiki page? I would think that any association with Nazism would be electoral poison in Russia, even among people whose beliefs are basically indistinguishable from fascism.

I've spent a bit of time arguing with hardcore Russian nationalists on other sites, and one thing they always bring up is the Red Army's stand against Nazi Germany.

IOTL I think they do. But I think we don't have to replicate the exact National Bolshevik party of OTL. "Smarter" National Bolsheviks would probably avoid the obvious Nazi references to enhance their electoral appeal.
 
You could get a nazbol Russia or a Russia ruled according to a similar ideology if the '90s are worse than OTL.
1) If a non-communist Russian government (Yeltsin as in OTL) is forced to concede defeat in Chechnya and recognize a Caucasus Emirate, it would embolden other separatists and lead to a nationalist backlash against the rulers.

2) Privatization is somehow worse than OTL.

3) The communists manage to win the elections in '96, followed by an attempted coup where Zyuganov is killed, but nationalists combine with pro-communist elements in the military against any remaining pro-Yeltsin forces.

4) I'm guessing the new government would begin renationalizing the economy or at least expropriating the oligarchs' wealth while releasing pan-Germanism type rhetoric about a state that includes all ethnic Russians and restoring the motherlands's "rightful" borders. (Note: this map shows demographics from 1994)
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5) If you really want to make this scenario dystopian, you could bring elements of Russia's bioweapons program into play. This could be separatist releasing a bioweapon in St Petersburg or Moscow in a Aum Shinrikyo style attack or as a tool used by the Russian government to "Russify" areas of the Baltics, Eastern Ukraine, the Caucasus, or Central Asia. OTL, an air filter leak in Yekatinburg resulted in about 100 anthrax deaths.

6) Depending on the timing, things could get interesting in central and eastern Europe. This could seriously change or prevent the 1994 Budapest Memorandum in which Belarus, Ukraine and Kazakhstan agreed to give up their nuclear weapons in exchange for a guarantee of their frontiers. The pre-Nazbol government may flee to Kalinigrad oblast or the far east in a Taiwan-style situation.
 
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