LOS ANGELES.–Completing his martyrdom for the cause of a Free Russia, 47-year-old dissident Alexi Navalny collapsed and died in a remote Artic maximum security penal colony where he served a 19 year sentence for a variety of charges, going from two-and-half years to 19 years, mostly for subversion of the Russian state. Navalny fell ill Aug. 20, 2020 on a flight after drinking a cup of tea in Tomsk, Siberia, then airlifted to Omsk, Siberia, where he was briefly treated then flown to Berlin where he was hospitalized and treated for Novichok poisoning, a Soviet-era radioactive poison used by the FSB [formerly the KGB] for attempted assassination. Navalny remained in Geramny receiving treatment until he decided against all advice to return to Moscow Jan. 21, 2021 on a flight from Berlin to Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport where he was promptly arrested by Russian authorities.
Former dissident and presidential candidate Mikhail Khordorkovsky, once Russia’s richest oligarch, who lives currently lives in Switzerland, warned Navalny to stay away from Russia if he wanted to survive, but Navalny, a headstrong anti-Putin activist, went against all advice and returned to Russia to face a variety of charges, starting with violating terms of probation, eventually to subversion of the Russian state. Navalny was remanded to Russia’s federal penal colonies where he lived until in death today. Western press was obsessed with Navalny especially after the Feb. 24, 2024 Ukraine invasion, largely because Navalny sold himself as Russia’s most powerful anti-Putin dissident, capable as most Western news outlets wanted, toppling Putin’s totalitarian government and bringing democracy to Russia. It was that kind to rubbish and Western claptrap the resulted in the Russian state locking up Navalny permanently until his death today.
Western governments, especially in the United States, glorified Navalny as the one dissident capable to doing what the U.S. military couldn’t do, toppling Putin’s repressive Kremlin regime. Western news organization operate in complete fantasy often giving Russian dissidents, like Navalny, the financial means to continue their subversive activities, despite all the risks prosecution, incarceration and eventual liquidation, one way or another. Navalny was given nearly daily headlines in the Western press about his organization’s mission of exposing corruption in Putin’s government, creating an eventual revolution to overthrow Putin’s totalitarian regime. Considered a hero in the West for opposing Putin, Western governments and the press were responsible for martyring Navalny.
What did Western government think would happen to Navalny if he returned to Russia after recovering from alleged Novichok poisoning under Putin’s orders at the hands of the FSB? Navalny took over six months to recover in Berlin, only to wind up falling into his own trap returning to Moscow to apparently return to his fictional role as Russia’s last best hope to toppling the Putin government. Navalny was egged on by Western governments and the press, eventually believing his own self-destructive narrative and crusade to rid Putin of his stranglehold on the Russian state. Even on word of Navalny’s death, Western leaders and the press lamented the fact that he was the last dissident capable of fomenting revolution in Russia. Western governments and the press knew that Navalny would not survive at the “Polar Wolf” gulag in the Arctic Circle.
Navalny was never what Western governments and the press made him out to be. Called a courageous opposition leader exposing Putin’s corruption for years, Navalny received funds from the West and free publicity to carry out his mission of toppling Putin’s Kremlin government. Many Western leaders think Navalny rose to prominence as a dissident because of his Western-backed work to expose corruption at the highest levels of the Russian state, especially with Putin. Speaking at the Munich Security Conference, Navalny’s wife Yulia Navalnaya said she wasn’t sure of her husband’s death. “Putin and his government . . . lie incessantly,” Yulia said. “But if this is true, I want Putin , his entire entourage, Putin’s friends, his government to know that they will bear responsibility for what they did to our country, to my family, to my husband,” said Yulia.
What in the world is Yulia, the wife a dead dissident, doing at the Munich Security Conference? Western governments and the press are the ones responsible to giving Navalny and his followers the cash and publicity to martyr himself, thinking they have the right to subvert the Russian government. “This regime and Vladimir Putin must bear personal responsibility for all the terrible things they’ve been doing to my country, to our country, Russia, in recent years,” Yulia said, pandering to the West to continue Navalny’s dissident work. Yulia’s appeal is to the Munich Security Conference to continue backing the Ukraine War, for the purpose of toppling the Putin government. Yulia now speaks for the Western mission, led by 81-year-old President Joe Biden, to continue the destructive proxy war to topple Putin’s government. Yulia is now the new hero to carry on her husband’s work.
About the Author
John M. Curtis writes politically neutral commentary analyzing spin in national and global news. He’s editor of OnlineColumnist.com and author of Dodging The Bullet and Operation Charisma.
