On Wednesday, a real shooting took place a few blocks away from the Kremlin, or rather, a deadly shootout in the spirit of the 1990s. Vladislav Bakalchuk, Tatiana Bakalchuk’s estranged husband (she filed for divorce in July) and co-founder of her company Wildberries, Russia’s largest online retailer, tried to break into the business center where the company is headquartered with a group of armed men. When they arrived, they were intercepted by business center security. A fight broke out and shots were fired, killing two guards and wounding several policemen who responded to the scene.
Vladislav Bakalchuk opposed the Kremlin-approved merger of Wildberries with the Russ Group outdoor advertising company and refused to grant his wife a divorce in order to retain control of Wildberries. The businessman enlisted the support of Chechen leader, Ramzan Kadyrov, who began publicly appealing to Tatiana Bakalchuk urging her «to return to the family,» calling the merger a «predatory takeover» and Russ Group’s owners — «devils.» Kadyrov promised that his «people will solve the problem». However, Tatyana Bakalchuk showed no intention of returning to her husband. Nor did she want to give up on the merger. In a sense, the violent clash was almost inevitable, although no one expected it to be so public. The armed confrontation unfolded in the central district of the capital, a well-known location to both the public and the elite. The business center where Wildberries is headquartered also houses one of the Moscow City Hall subdivisions. However, this did not stop Bakalchuk’s support team from engaging in a murderous shootout. The official media did not provide details about the ethnic background of the armed men in Bakalchuk’s entourage, but the Telegram channels were quick to identify them as Chechens.
The conflict over the marketplace has shattered two important myths that the Kremlin and Ramzan Kadyrov have been building for years and fed both the public and the elites. The first and most important myth is that Putin has rid the country of the legacy of the «lawless and violent 1990s,» especially the violent property disputes that often claimed the lives of well-meaning entrepreneurs as well as random passersby. The shift away from the 1990s was part of a larger myth of «Putin’s stability»: the streets were finally safe, business could be conducted in a civilized manner without fear of attacks by gangsters or competitors, and ordinary employees of companies were not afraid of becoming accidental victims of violent clashes. The Wildberries office shootout conducted by Bakalchuk and his backup group showed that the chaos of the 1990s is back, or at least not defeated. Even in the 1990s, it was hard to imagine that those involved in such a conflict would have a shootout right in the heart of the city, a few blocks away from the Kremlin, and that this clash would even involve an armed attack on the security of the business center. Shootouts and clashes usually took place in the suburbs, or were acts of intimidation or targeted assassinations. The shooting near the Kremlin that claimed the lives of random people and which became known to the entire country, plunges Russia into the atmosphere of the 1990s. For a long time, the Kremlin has been methodically employing the narrative of the «tumultuous and violent 1990s» as one of the worst eras in the country’s history to scare the public, largely exaggerating its shortcomings and horrors. Now this scare tactic may be turning against the country’s leadership. Society is already very anxious as is: it is tired of the war, worried about the invasion of the Kursk region by the AFU, afraid of new mobilizations, and annoyed to see the prices rise. Shootings near the Kremlin will not boost people’s confidence in the future, but they will make people doubt the ability of the regime, and Putin in particular, if not to maintain the already destroyed stability, then at least to prevent the return of violent conflicts over private businesses. The Russian elite may have even more complaints: the shooting took place not far from cafes and restaurants that officials and businessmen frequent in order to settle problems or negotiate deals over lunch or dinner. It turns out that the regime cannot guarantee safety even for representatives of the elite.
Another myth that has been shattered is that official Moscow has a total control over the leadership of the Chechen Republic and its loyal population. It turned out that Ramzan Kadyrov, driven by his own private interests, could challenge a Kremlin-approved business deal and even send armed men to accompany a warring business who resorted to his «Chechen protection racket.» It is quite likely that the head of Chechnya did not anticipate how his authorization to provide Vladislav Bakalchuk with an armed entourage would end, but whatever happened, happened. Ordinary people, and especially the elites, can ask Putin and Kadyrov a «Chechen question»: where does Kadyrov’s authority begin and end, and how much control does Putin really have over his Chechen vassal? The head of Chechnya calls himself «Putin’s foot soldier» and emphasizes his personal ties to the president, so it is the head of Russia who can and should be held accountable for the actions of this «foot soldier.» In this sense, it is telling that the president recently visited Chechnya, was photographed with Ramzan Kadyrov’s sons and kissed the Quran. Putin’s recent visit could indeed be called a triumph for the head of the republic. With such meetings, Kadyrov proves to his critics that he is still in Putin’s good graces and can do whatever he wants. It is quite possible that the president’s visit was the Chechen leader’s prologue to a shootout in the heart of Moscow.
So far, the Kremlin has time to influence the situation: for example, it can force Ramzan Kadyrov to speak out and condemn the violent attack against the Wildberries headquarters, and even to apologize for it in some way. But Kadyrov has remained silent so far, and there is a clear attempt to pin all the blame for the violence on Vladislav Bakalchuk and him alone, even though he is clearly responsible. This reaction seems disproportionate and inadequate to the damage to the Kremlin’s image caused by the power struggle over Russia’s largest online retailer. As the myth of Putin rescuing the country from the lawlessness and violence of the «turbulent 1990s» appears to be cracking, it can dramatically undermine Putin’s own popularity, which has been already declining for some time.
Putin with eyes wide shut
Traditionally, the Russian president prefers to ignore problems and to distance himself from them. Neither the president nor any prominent officials have made any statements about the Wildberries conflict, nor have they promised to get to the bottom of it. The president personally attended the Eurasian Women’s Forum in St. Petersburg and held a video meeting with the newly elected governors. Of course, there is always a place for some war-related events: in this case, it was a video call with law enforcement officials and a visit to a drone factory. This «business as usual» attitude is meant to demonstrate that there are supposedly no crisis events around the Russian president that would be able to disrupt his routine schedule.
We have repeatedly written about this tactic: Putin shows by his behavior that crises (Prigozhin’s rebellion, terrorist attacks, the AFU invasion) are not significant enough to merit his attention or to affect his plans. This means that the public, too, supposedly has nothing to worry about — the authorities will routinely solve the problems anyway. For a while, this tactic worked: crises passed and Putin made short statements to therapeutically reassure the public. After the AFU’s invasion of the Kursk region, this tactic no longer had the desired effect: the Kremlin’s approval ratings, even according to data from sociological centers that cooperate with the Kremlin, began to fall. The decline in the ratings has stopped, but the indicators of approval of Putin’s activities and trust in him have not returned to their previous values. It is likely that members of the presidential administration are aware of the problem, but they do not want to alarm the boss. Therefore, Putin continues to turn a blind eye to the crisis, which is obvious to everyone. In the future, this tactic may lead to serious problems for the vertical of power. The Russian president will become a weak politician, afraid of reality and running away from it.
