Vladimir Zhirinovsky

File:Election russia 2007 004.jpg

Advertising for the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia depicting Zhirinovsky. Text reads, "[One should] not lie and not be afraid!"

Vladimir Volfovich Zhirinovsky (Template:Lang-ru, formerly Vladimir Volfovich Eidelshtein, born April 25, 1946) is a Russian nationalist and populist politician and the founder and the leader of the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia (LDPR), Vice-Chairman of the State Duma, and a member of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe.

Early life and politics

Zhirinovsky was born to a jewish family in Alma-Ata, the former capital of the then-Soviet Republic of Kazakhstan.

In July 1964, Zhirinovsky moved from Alma-Ata to Moscow, where he began his studies in the Department of Turkish Studies, Institute of Asian and African Studies at Moscow State University, from which he graduated in 1969.

Zhirinovsky then went into military service in Tbilisi during the early 1970s. He would later get a law degree and work at various posts in state committees and unions. He was awarded a Ph.D. in philosophy by MSU in 1998.

Although he participated in some underground reformist groups, Zhirinovsky was largely inconsequential in Soviet political developments during the 1980s. While he contemplated a role in politics, a nomination attempt for a seat as a People's Deputy in 1989 was quickly abandoned.

Zhirinovsky, whose father was a Polish Jew, began his formal political career in the Shalom Cultural Society, a Jewish organization given support by the Soviet government in order to compete with independent Jewish groups which sprang up during the era of glasnost under the tenure of Mikhail Gorbachev in the latter part of the decade.

On a private visit to Israel in June 2006, Zhirinovsky paid his first visit to the grave of his father, Wolf Isakovich Eidelshtein, who is buried in the Tel Aviv suburb of Holon.

Liberal-Democratic Party

In 1990 Zhirinovsky, along with Vladimir Bogachev, took initiatives which led to the founding of the Liberal Democratic Party, the second registered party in the Soviet Union and therefore the first officially sanctioned opposition party. In elections that same year, after which Gorbachev became the first President of the Soviet Union, the LDPR officially gathered 8% of the vote. Afterwards, the LDPR garnered a reputation as an ineffective vehicle for opposition against the government, and one that lacked either credibility or authenticity, particularly given Zhirinovsky's vocal support for the Soviet coup attempt of 1991. This view was further encouraged by rumors, denied by Zhirinovsky, that he was an agent of the KGB and that the LDPR was a farcical creation meant to either discredit or distract earnest opposition to the government. Such impressions would last even as the Soviet Union was dissolved and the Communist Party itself was thrown into an opposition role.

Nonetheless, the Liberal-Democratic Party remained an important force in Russian politics. At the height of its fortunes, the LDPR gathered 23% of the vote in the 1993 Duma elections and achieved a broad representation throughout the country - the LDPR being the top vote-getter in 64 out of 87 regions. This fact encouraged Zhirinovsky to once again vie for the presidential office, this time against incumbent Boris Yeltsin. The fact that Yeltsin's candidacy seemed seriously challenged by Russian nationalist groups and a rejuvenated Communist Party alarmed many outside observers, particularly in the Western world, who were concerned that such developments posed a serious threat to the survival of Russian democracy, already in a very fragile state. Zhirinovsky became a focal point of harsh criticism and seemed to be the living embodiment of authoritarianism and militarism in modern Russia.

Politician

For his own part, Zhirinovsky has done a great deal to foster a reputation as a loud and boisterous populist who speaks on behalf of the Russian nation and people, even when the things he says are precisely what many people, at home or abroad, do not want to hear. Zhirinovsky infamously promised voters in 1991 that if he were elected, free vodka would be distributed to all. Similarly, he once remarked, during a political rally inside a Moscow department store, that if he were made president, underwear would be freely available. He has on several occasions been involved in altercations with other politicians and debate opponents. As a candidate Zhirinovsky also took part in 2000 Russian presidential elections, and may participate in the 2008 elections as well.

Anti-Semitism and political controversies

Zhirinovsky has been widely accused of anti-Semitism for statements in which he accused Jews of ruining Russia, sending Russian women to foreign countries as prostitutes, selling children and organs to the Western world, and provoking the Holocaust. He repeatedly denied his father's Jewishness until he published Ivan Close Your Soul in July 2001, describing how his father changed his name, Volf Isaakovich Eidelshtein, from Eidelshtein to Zhirinovsky. He rhetorically asks, "Why should I reject Russian blood, Russian culture, Russian land, and fall in love with the Jewish people only because of that single drop of blood that my father left in my mother's body?" He has expressed admiration for 1996 U.S. Presidential contender Pat Buchanan. Referring positively to a comment in which Buchanan labeled the United States Congress "Israeli-occupied territory", Zhirinovsky remarked that, "We have the same situation in Russia." He said that both countries were "under occupation" and that "to survive, we could set aside places on US and Russian territories to deport this small but troublesome tribe." Buchanan strongly rejected Zhirinovsky's endorsement, eliciting a harsh response by Zhirinovsky: "You soiled your pants as soon as you got my congratulations. Who are you afraid of? Zionists?"

He is also well known for his boasts pertaining to other countries, having expressed a desire to reunite countries of the ex-Soviet "near abroad" with Russia, and dreaming of a day "when Russian soldiers can wash their boots in the warm waters of the Indian Ocean". Zhirinovsky has advocated forcibly retaking Alaska, dumping nuclear waste in Germany, and using nuclear weapons against Japan.

While some observers were inclined to consider such comments as stark efforts to drum up nationalist support and should not be viewed as anything more serious than electoral fodder meant for domestic consumption, there was great consternation at the fact that in February 1996, months before a presidential election, Zhirinovsky placed second in opinion polls, behind Communist Gennady Zyuganov and ahead of Boris Yeltsin. In the end, however, Zhirinovsky placed fifth with a 5.7% share in the first round of voting. Since then, the party's fortunes have somewhat stabilized, with 2003 seeing a LDPR vote share of 11.7%, while the effect of Zhirinovsky's personality only increased his irrelevancy in successive presidential elections. In 2004, he declined to even be nominated by the party, leaving that role to Oleg Malyshkin, who received a nearly negligible portion of the vote.

Ongoing controversies

Zhirinovsky hailed what he described as "the democratic process" in Iraq under Saddam Hussein, whom he supported strongly. The friendship dates at least until the first Gulf War, during which time Zhirinovsky sent several volunteers from the "Falcons of Zhirinovsky" group to support the Iraqi president. Allegations have dogged Zhirinovsky closely since the fall of Baghdad that he personally profited from illicit oil sales as part of the Oil-for Food scandal, a charge investigated in 2005 by the Independent Inquiry Committee into the Oil-for-Food Programme (Volcker Commission) and the US Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations (PSI).

Zhirinovsky also has a history of igniting violence in political contexts. In June 2003, Zhirinovsky celebrated the eighth anniversary of his notorious debate with Boris Nemtsov in 1995, during which a "juice fight" broke out. Zhirinovsky had deliberately spilled the contents of his glass, namely fruit juice, onto Nemtsov. The celebration in 2003 involved an open tournament of splashing juice onto one's opponent. This "tournament" was opened by Zhirinovsky himself by splashing juice onto a group of volunteers, and the event was held in the open near a theatre in Moscow. In 2003, Zhirinovsky engaged in a fistfight after a television debate with Mikhail Delyagin. In 2005, Zhirinovsky ignited a brawl in the parliament by spitting at a Rodina legislator, Andrei Saveliyev.

In 2005 the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Kazakhstan declared Zhirinovsky persona non grata on the territory of his historical homeland, due to the politician's controversial speech about the change of the Russia–Kazakhstan border, in which he questioned the Kazakh people's place in history. Zhirinovsky maintains his view, claiming that his position is backed by a number of academic works on history and geography. Moreover, he called on the government of Kazakhstan not to take offense on the matter.

In reaction to Condoleezza Rice's criticism of Russian foreign policy during the January 2006 Russia-Ukraine gas dispute, Zhirinovsky stated that Rice's comments were a reflection of her own unmarried and childless status, and that "Condoleezza Rice needs a company of soldiers. She needs to be taken to barracks where she would be satisfied."

Also (as of October 2006), he was persona non grata in Ukraine, although this was revoked in April 2007.

On the November 2006 death by poisoning of Russian defector Alexander Litvinenko, he said: Any traitor must be eliminated using any methods. If you have joined the special services to work, then you should work, but to betray, to run away abroad, to give up the secrets you learned while working - all of this looks bad. Sergei Abeltsev, Zhirinovsky's former bodyguard and State Duma member from the LDPR, also stated: The deserved punishment reached the traitor. I am sure his terrible death will be a warning to all the traitors that in Russia the treason is not to be forgiven. I would recommend to citizen Berezovsky to avoid any food at the commemoration for his crime accomplice Litvinenko.

In July 2007, in response to questions about Russian troops carrying out extensive war games around the town of Pskov, which reportedly included rehearsals of a Baltic invasion, Zhirinovsky endorsed the forcible re-occupation of the Baltic States.

External links

• "Vladimir Zhirinovsky" - Biography on the Indiana University Department of Computer Science site.
• Liberal Democratic Party of Russia Website (in Russian)
• "Zhirinovsky Vladimir Volfovich" - Panorama.ru.
• "Organized National Life of Russian Jews in the Late Soviet and Post Soviet Era: a View from Moscow by Eugene Satanovsky" - Jewish Political Studies Review, Spring 2002.
• "Flamboyant Russian lawmaker in parliament chamber brawl" - Associated Press, March 30, 2005.
• "Russia's Zhirinovsky now blasts Buchanan as `crap'" - Lev Krichevsky, Jewish Telegraphic Agency, March 1, 1996.
• "Oil for Influence: How Saddam Used Oil to Reward Politicians Under the United Nations Oil-for-Food Program" - Hearing Before the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations of the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, May 17, 2005.
• "Vladimir Zhirinovsky: The political entertainer" - Sergey Yugov, Pravda, April 24, 2002.
• "Condoleezza Rice's anti-Russian stance based on sexual problems" - Yaroslava Krestovskaya, Pravda, January 1, 2006.
• "Philosophy in Post-Soviet Russia (1992-1997)" - Valentin Bazhanov, Studies in East European Thought, 1999.
• "Zhirinovsky: Russia's political eccentric" - BBC News, March 10, 2000.
• Russian Federation - Psephos - Adam Carr's Election Archive.
• 2002 unofficial appearance of drunk Zhirinovsky in which he warned Bush against war in Iraq.