Arno Forbids You to Grieve
I didn’t catch it personally, but I think many recognize the genre of the Soviet editorial: «While cosmic ships plow through the vastness of the universe, certain unconscious citizens indulge in petty bourgeois moods!»
The text birthed by the Free Russia Foundation, signed by Natalia Arno, Vladimir Milov, and a longtime noname declared as the foundation’s vice-president, Grigory Frolov, is an absolute, distilled classic of this genre. Only instead of «builders of communism,» we now have «globalist visionaries,» and instead of «petty bourgeoisie,» we have the trendy word «resentment.»
But the essence, damn it, is the same. Sated, packaged people sit in Washington, their lives a success, and through a curled lip teach the miserable relocant in Yerevan or Belgrade—whose only card and Wise account were blocked yesterday, and whose residence permit won’t be renewed tomorrow—that he is, it turns out, suffering incorrectly. That thinking about one’s own problems is «egoism.» And one must think about the global. About how to please a Euro-bureaucrat.
I think it’s obvious that this text is not for Russians. It is a checkmark in a report on the path to cementing FRF’s position as the main window for cash flows.
Apparatus Victory Over Reality
Just the other day, we observed an ugly scene in Paris and Strasbourg. The «Great Schism,» the «shitshow in PACE,» where respected people divided the skin of a bear that wasn’t even killed yet—quotas in the contact group.
And who won there? Bureaucratic logic won. The Arno-Milov-Kara-Murza group, using the simple trick of «hold me back, I’ve been insulted,» flipped the table, walked over heads, left the coalition, and de facto declared their rights to a monopoly. «Either we are alone, or no one.»
The technology of the hostile takeover was executed brilliantly. They cynically used Vladimir Kara-Murza as a battering ram. His status as a recently released political prisoner and moral authority was turned into an indulgence. Any attempt at discussion or objection from other groups (like Kasparov’s) was immediately declared «rudeness» and an attack on the sacred. This allowed FRF to exit negotiations, slamming the door loudly, and present themselves as the only «constructive force» Europe should deal with. And write everyone else off as fringe elements.
And now, on the «smoking ruins» of this «coalition,» they release a manifesto about… unity! About how one must turn out to be like Adenauer. What the hell kind of Adenauer? You just ate your own allies without choking, just so you wouldn’t have to share the microphone with them. You are not Adenauer, you are a classic Politburo purging «deviationism» in the face of Khodorkovsky, making Kasparov the scapegoat so that only one general line remains.
In their press releases, FRF accused Khodorkovsky and the ARC of «cartel collusion.» This is said by people who are literally trying to monopolize opposition activism! It is, after all, a classic Freudian projection: accuse your opponent of what you are doing yourself.
Free Russia’s Family Business
In general, the phenomenon of «Free Russia» deserves a separate novel. It is an amazing success story. Natalia Arno, whose biography in retellings becomes increasingly heroic (there are already poisonings, chases, and almost James Bond in a skirt), teaches us morality.
While Natalia Arno tells Western audiences chilling stories about how the FSB hunted her in the early 2010s, her husband, American political technologist Michael Arno, felt more than comfortable in Russia. A man who consulted Sobchak’s mayor’s office back in the 90s (hello to Vladimir Vladimirovich), in 2009 tried to bring Walmart into Russia through the head of the Presidential Administration, Naryshkin.
Moreover, in 2015—already after Crimea, after the murder of Nemtsov, when Arno herself was already positioning herself as the main victim of the regime—her husband calmly arrives in Moscow for a conference at MPGU, where he is presented as an honorary guest. How does this square with the image of «enemies of the regime No. 1,» for whom a deadly hunt is underway? It doesn’t. But it squares perfectly with the image of people who have everything «covered.»
In the US, Michael Arno’s firm, «Arno Petition Consultants», has for years been caught using, let’s say, very specific methods of collecting signatures, bordering on fraud. This Russian-American family contract for absorbing democracy budgets now explains to us that demanding not to block cards is shameful. That defending one’s rights is the «path of the AfD.» The only surprising thing is that they didn’t mention Hitler.
They cynically convert the suffering of real people into their grants (just in 2024, five million dollars came from the US government). The worse it is for Russian emigrants, the more reasons FRF has to go to the State Department and say: «Look, resentment is growing there! Give us ten million now, we will hold a seminar and explain to them that they are wrong.»
The Factory of Trolls Elves
The irony is also that while accusing the emigration of «bitterness,» FRF itself produced this bitterness. It is no secret that the foundation is linked to the so-called «Legion of Elves»—a bot farm created for «counter-propaganda.» At the same time, it turned out that the leadership of one branch of the bot farm was engaged in the smear campaigns of certain media figures.
No work on mistakes, of course, was carried out, no acceptance, no admission of guilt. Any attempts at constructive criticism (even framed as lists of questions) end for the authors with a ban and the brand of «Agent Nevzlin.»
I believe that now when you see a raid of bots on Twitter bullying anyone who dared to ask an inconvenient question to a representative of the Arno crowd, the thought «this is American taxpayer money allocated for the ‘development of democracy’ at work» will be quite justified.
Chronicles of the Apocalypse That Never Came
A separate line should mention the unique prophetic gift of Vladimir Milov. A man who, with the confidence of a cultist, teaches us to «think globally,» has spent the last three years burying the Russian economy monthly, each time postponing the date of the funeral. Read his reports for the same FRF: August 2024—«the corridor of possibilities is narrowing,» collapse is imminent; May 2025—«moment of reckoning,» the money has run out.
But the money, bitch, is still there, and the SMO continues. Milov has amazing, rubber optics: the ruble falls—it’s the collapse of the regime; the ruble grows—it’s an «even worse collapse» and «agony of imports.» This is not economic analysis, this is selling sedatives to Western bureaucrats. If his forecasts came true by even 10%, we would have been finishing the last hedgehogs in dugouts a year ago. But instead of hedgehogs, we are finishing the remnants of our patience, listening to how this «economist,» who never guessed even the immediate past, now plans our future with aplomb and writes out bills.
The Ghetto They Built
They scare us with a «political ghetto.» Like, if you whine—you will end up in isolation.
But the truth is that it is FRF and its entourage that is building this ghetto. With their calls for sanctions against everyone, their approval of visa bans (and they do approve of it, no matter what they write, because it makes them—holders of the right documents—the elite), their refusal to protect ordinary people.
They created a situation of segregation, where there are holders of the right passports and connections, and a disenfranchised mass that is supposed to only feel guilt and pay.
No, friends. It is not we who do not think globally. It is you who think exclusively within the framework of your business plan. Where Russia is simply a resource base, and the emigration is extras who must nod silently while big uncles and aunts in Washington decide their fate.
And this despondency that they so furiously denounce—it comes from there. From the understanding that even in the «Beautiful Russia of the Future» that they are building, we are again prepared a place as silent payers of other people’s bills.
Personnel Reserve of the Occupation Administration
Reading their texts about the «necessity to pay,» «global vision,» and «rejection of egoism,» you start to understand who they see themselves as. They are not politicians seeking voters’ votes. They are the personnel reserve of the occupation administration.
Vladimir Milov, for example, with extraordinary ease, has already calculated reparations: two trillion dollars. «A manageable sum,» he says. «No need to shake over a penny.» He behaves not like a politician, but like a liquidator, a bankruptcy trustee who came to sell off the bankrupt’s assets to get his percentage.
Their target audience is not the people of Russia, but the conditional State Department or the European Commission, which in the event of a (hypothetical) collapse of the regime will appoint external managers. That is precisely why they don’t give a damn about the visas and accounts of mere mortals. A Gauleiter does not need the local population to love him. He needs the population to be obedient, pay reparations, and not shine with their «skin interests.»
That is why they fight so furiously against any subjectivity of the Russian emigration. They do not need citizens with rights. They need a mandated territory and a population that will silently work off their geopolitical promissory notes.
End of the Beautiful Era (That Never Was)
The saddest thing here is not that a specific Arno, Kara-Murza, or Milov is fighting for «power.» The saddest thing is the total discrediting of the very idea of a democratic alternative. Looking at this circus with horses, at these intrigues, setups, and trading in loyalty, any normal person will say: «And how are they better?» In no way.
It is the same vertical, only with a flag «washed of blood» instead of the tricolor and Washington instead of Moscow as the decision-making center. And when they speak of «resentment,» they are actually speaking of their fear. Fear that people will stop believing in their fairy tales and start asking questions. But no one is really in a hurry to ask. After all, the reality is that interest in the gang of grant-eaters and protectors of thieves who washed the prosecutor’s common fund is shrinking rapidly.
And this, alas, suits everyone perfectly except us. The Europeans, frankly speaking, find it incredibly convenient when «Russkies don’t fuck around»—sit quietly, pay, repent, and don’t interfere with big uncles doing their business. And Russians…
And Russians are just fucking fed up. So much so that looking at this squabbling, many are already ready to wave their hand and admit that Putin, for all his cannibalism, at least does not try to pass off his thirst for power as a struggle against world evil. And this is the very dead end from which neither Milov, nor Arno, nor Kara-Murza will lead us out, because they are the ones cementing it.