«To serve a criminal regime or not — that is a matter of conscience.» Alexey and Masha Moskalyov on war, emigration, and moral choice

Ksenia Kirillova:

I never planned to emigrate. My husband and I planned to go to the USA on his temporary work contract back in 2013, before Crimea, and it just so happened that our departure and the start of the war coincided. And when I found myself in the USA, it was important for me to understand what happened to Russian society: how could people accept first Crimea, and then the war. Because Crimea can still be explained somehow — propaganda, national pride — but when people started getting killed and there was no reaction, that was a shock for me.

I started doing social analysis — what is now called propaganda analysis: how it affects people and how people adapt. Already in 2014, it became clear that people believe what they want to believe, to preserve their inner comfort. I myself didn’t expect to be one of the first to describe this, because now everyone talks about it, but I started writing about it back in 2014.

The first to notice this analysis were not even experts, but American intelligence veterans from the Cold War era. American veterans, former intelligence officers, after retiring, become experts, join the expert community, and give interviews absolutely openly. I obviously have no and never had any ties to the intelligence services — if I did, it wouldn’t be public. But the younger veterans are still involved in the expert sphere, and the older ones are already out of it. My first acquaintances were exactly such people — wonderful grandfathers; one of them, Michael Davidson, also writes spy novels and knows Russian. For American culture, unfortunately, these are forgotten people, but for me they were a treasure trove of information.

Michael and I wrote our first novel together, he translated my chapters into English. It's a historical spy novel about the Cold War, called “In the Web of Madness,” and in addition to the espionage plot, it depicts Soviet punitive psychiatry. It was translated into Ukrainian and presented in Ukraine — this was important because after the annexation of Crimea, Russia began to use punitive psychiatry against Crimean Tatars. And here I realized that the spy novel for me is not just an entertainment genre.

I really wanted people to start reading about the war, because at that time, people simply didn’t notice it. So how do you attract attention to the war? Well, here’s a spy plot, it’s interesting. And these spy adventures are mostly not about professional spies. It’s a story about ordinary people — informants, their victims, people caught in extreme situations. Such a plot better shows the drama, the complexity of moral choice. I’m interested in showing not spies, but ordinary people in extreme situations.

Olga Proskurnina:
How did you decide to work on a spy trilogy about the war in Ukraine right in 2022?

Ksenia Kirillova:
The war in Ukraine was of course a huge pain for me, but it wasn’t unexpected, I mean the full-scale one. Since I was working on this topic, I had no doubt since the end of December that there would be an invasion. Even the analytical centers [in the US] were working in an intensified mode all of January. Americans knew a big war would start, and they were prepared for it before others. The Americans’ mistake was that they thought: is this blackmail and pressure or preparation? But it was both. First — to break through blackmail, and then still go in, but with a more plausible pretext.

So at first, there was no time for books at all. It was necessary to understand what was happening with people, how they perceived it. And for me, the main question became: why do people, being abroad, continue to work for Russia, although they are not stupid, they understand everything. Why wasn’t 2022 a shock for them? Why weren’t they afraid of the horror they’re participating in?

I wanted to show in literary language what I was already writing as an analyst: mechanisms of self-justification, mechanisms of how a person tries not to notice the war. My main character, Sergey Bessonov, is a fairly intelligent person, he understands everything. And I was interested in how you can convince yourself, how you can calm your conscience. Most people do this unconsciously, but he consciously suppresses this awareness in himself.

And at once I thought of Sergei Efron — Marina Tsvetaeva’s husband, who worked for the NKVD in emigration. And it seems he sincerely believed in the communist idea, at least according to his letters, but he also had a powerful nostalgia. And we will never fully know what it was: real faith, or a form of self-deception, when he believed in the idea to justify his inner motive, his nostalgia.

What struck me in Efron’s story was that he destroyed his whole family. I wanted to show people on the one hand these self-justification mechanisms, and on the other — the collapse. Where such a choice leads. Because I understood one thing, which unfortunately the wave of emigration in 2022 didn’t understand yet: at first, a person acts at the peak of conscience, at the peak of shock, guilt, horror, but then any person, even a dissident, still adapts. That’s how people are. And when people get used to it, but their life starts to fall apart, and it’s unsettled for years, after a few years a person becomes very fragile.

It seems to me that the first book in this trilogy — “Efron's Mistake” — is more relevant now than in 2022 [Most.Media is preparing a new Russian edition of “Efron's Mistake”; the French edition was published by Marie Barbier Editions on March 27]. Because back then everything felt very clear, but now it seems nothing has changed, but psychologically there is no strength left. And someone might think: my God, what have I done, why did I destroy my life, after all, I couldn’t save anyone, but my life is ruined, and it turns out no one in the West was waiting for me. And to remind people that there is a choice, which under no circumstances can be made, no matter how hard it is in emigration, is very important.

Olga Proskurnina:
Let’s talk about emigration and moral choice with people who know this firsthand — Alexey and Masha Moskalyov. You spent more than a year waiting for a humanitarian visa to Germany in Armenia. How did you get there and how did you survive that waiting period?

Alexey Moskalyov:
The first big doubts were about whether we would even be able to leave Russia. As soon as I was released from the colony, on the way home I immediately got calls from people helping us: “Alexey, don’t go home, go straight to the airport, to Moscow.”

For me it was strange: how, I hadn’t seen my apartment, my home for two years — I decided to go there anyway. So Masha and I, at our own risk, came home, spent the night, and the next day went shopping. When we got back, the neighbor told us that while we were out, the police had come: they knocked on the door, looked at the balcony for a long time, walked around the house, that is, they were looking for us. We realized that staying any longer would be very dangerous. There were suggestions that they could open another case against me, a repeat one, and we had to leave Russia with Masha literally in a few days. At that time, neither Masha nor I had foreign passports, so we had to leave for a third country that accepted Russian internal passports — Armenia.

We spent a year and four months there, waited for a visa from Germany for about a year. As far as I know, the German Foreign Ministry approved our case, but when it was handed over to the Interior Ministry, at that time the humanitarian visa program was suspended, so we were left in limbo. At the end of December, Masha and I decided not to wait for German visas and to apply to France. I must give credit to the French authorities — they acted very quickly, literally in a month and a half they processed our documents, and on March 11 we arrived in Paris.

There were doubts that we would be allowed to leave Armenia — Russia could have put out a warrant, so we could have been detained.

Olga Proskurnina:
And when you left Russia for Armenia, were there any problems at departure?

Alexey Moskalyov:
No, we left without any problems.

Olga Proskurnina:
And how did you live in Armenia, what did you live on? I understand you didn’t have work there?

Alexey Moskalyov:
Mainly we were supported by the Nevzlin Foundation. Leonid Borisovich [Nevzlin] paid for our apartment and helped financially. Activists and volunteers also helped, sent us some money. So we didn’t have any problems in that regard.

Olga Proskurnina:
Masha, how did you study during that time? Are you studying somehow?

Masha Moskalyova:
When we arrived in Armenia, I was still studying, continued in ninth grade remotely, but when the OGE exams came up, I contacted my supervisor, she said I had to come to Moscow and take the exam in person, as it was absolutely impossible otherwise. I had to leave school. Then I studied to keep up with the school program, studied with tutors, then caught up and studied fine on my own, without a tutor. Now I plan to go to a French school.

Olga Proskurnina:
Listen, how did you even meet and start a creative project together, how did that happen? Ksenia Kirillova is in Serbia, the Moskalyovs are in Armenia...

Ksenia Kirillova:
I listened to one of Alexey’s interviews, and he said that Masha writes stories. Of course, I knew Masha’s story from the moment it became famous. But I never imagined that I would ever not only see Masha, but even talk to her in person!

I started thinking how I could be useful. My own life in emigration isn’t particularly secure or settled, you never know what will happen tomorrow. But I found Masha’s stories on a small website, read them, and there was Masha’s contact. We called and at first just talked about creativity. Then, since I was writing actively for Most.Media at the time, I decided to suggest to both Masha and Olya: why not do an interview? Since Olga herself was also following the case of Masha Moskalyova.

Olga Proskurnina:
I was a subscriber of the Telegram group “Freedom for Alexey Moskalyov” from the very beginning.

Ksenia Kirillova:
As were we all, probably. Of course, Masha didn’t know us, but we all knew her in absentia all these years. Of course, Olya agreed, Masha agreed, since we were already acquainted, already communicating informally by then, and we did the interview.

After that, we kept in touch, and Masha started sending me her drawings, and I sent her some poems. And then one time — we didn’t plan to publish anything, hadn’t discussed it — Masha sent me an illustration for my poem “For Easter,” just in response to it. In the fall, Masha drew eleven illustrations. We sent the collection to all publishers. And we heard about the same thing: the poems are wonderful, and Masha draws beautifully, but poetry doesn’t sell.

Olga Proskurnina:
All of you, friends, have the opportunity to disprove this unfair claim. And now I have questions for Masha. Everyone knows your anti-war drawing made at age 12, and it’s great that your art career didn’t end there. How do you see your future in France?

Masha Moskalyova:
Honestly, I don’t know yet. I think it’ll be clearer a bit later. But of course, I’m not going to give up drawing, I’ll continue. Maybe I’ll go to art school, but I can’t say for sure right now.

Alexey Moskalyov:
You know, it was a revelation for me from the very beginning — when Masha started drawing and writing her first stories. It was right after we arrived in Armenia, maybe for psychological reasons. She says: “Dad, do you want to read my stories?” I said: “Sure.” I read them — and I was amazed at how my child could come up with that. Then I saw her drawings, mostly portraits of politicians. That amazed me, of course.

Olga Proskurnina:
And you drew portraits on commission in Armenia too, is that right?

Masha Moskalyova:
I drew on commission once. It was for an acquaintance. His friend asked me to draw a portrait of his deceased girlfriend. They’re all opposition activists. There haven’t been other commissions yet, because I haven’t posted about it online.

Olga Proskurnina:
Friends, you get it, right? You can order commissions. If needed, write to Most.Media, we’ll pass it on.

Question from the audience:
I’m a bit interested in the history of the first White emigration. You spoke about Efron, but Efron wasn’t the only one. Their task was to break up the White movement. I’ll draw a small parallel with today. I’m not saying that everyone gathered here is the White movement, but the secret services back then, I think, are the teachers of today’s Russian secret services. Do you think there’s a chance that there are also forces here trying to break up Russian society?

Ksenia Kirillova:
Agents have always been recruited and are being recruited. That’s why I show this problem in the present — I write about a modern Russian secret service agent, not about Efron. And that’s already an answer to your question.

But when I wrote this novel, I didn’t fully understand the scale of agent work. There’s not going to be a crackdown on our diaspora now — it’s a different angle. I didn’t fully understand how hard it is for our people to survive in emigration, especially if they end up in unsafe countries. Because it’s a vicious circle. If you go to a third country and live there, that third country is considered safe, you can’t get a humanitarian visa. But in reality, you’re not safe there either. You can’t return to Russia. You depend on a Russian passport. You live in a country where dependence on a Russian passport is important, and you’re not entitled to protection elsewhere. But people like this Sergey Bessonov are still a minority. By the way, I couldn’t repeat such an experience again. In my next books, the main characters are already positive. This was my first and last such experience, the hardest. Such people exist, yes, they work for money, maybe for an idea. But I’m more concerned about something else. I think the next book in this war series, which I want to write, will be about how good people are broken. We haven’t shown that yet. Because if someone is now starting to work for Russia, maybe they’re doing it under duress — because of blackmail, because of pressure. I know what enormous pressure people are under in unsafe countries. And some break.

And of course, again, you have to show that there is a choice you should never make, under any circumstances. Yes, maybe you can try to be clever, find a way out, if you’re in a country where the authorities won’t protect you, but you can’t betray your friends, you can’t work for this evil. Because you can’t live with that. A person shouldn’t carry that inside and live with it.

And actually, you can show that there’s always a way out, no matter what happens. There’s always a choice. But I also want to show how they break people, because that’s not talked about now either. There’s a stereotype in safe countries that all agents work for money. No. Now there’s a wave where they started breaking people. Breaking them through their close relationships. And that problem also needs to be shown. Because we can’t influence the scoundrels who work for Russia. Only imprison them, yes. But this process, when ordinary people are broken — these people I feel sorry for. And this process can be influenced, going back to what we already said: provide people with protection so they don’t depend on Russia. And this is a question of EU security. It would be good if it was understood here: the more a person depends on Russia, the more vulnerable they are to these processes.

Olga Proskurnina:
How exactly are people blackmailed?

Ksenia Kirillova:
Any way you can imagine. They terrorize loved ones. They create legal problems because of which people can’t get documents in other countries. Because some countries never give asylum from Russia. And you depend on any piece of paper issued or not issued in Russia.

Olga Proskurnina:
Yes, in Efron and Tsvetaeva’s times there were Nansen passports that saved people and helped them survive and be able to travel. Now, unfortunately, there’s no such thing.

Question from the audience:
I follow what’s happening in Russia and Kazakhstan a lot, the processes are very similar. I tried to imagine the operative who flagged Masha’s drawing, did the paperwork, went to the prosecutor’s office. I’m very curious: did you see this person? What kind of person is this?

Alexey Moskalyov:
First, they never introduce themselves, so you can’t tell who they are — major, sergeant. And they never show documents. Second, whether a person chooses to serve a criminal regime or not — that’s a matter of conscience.

When Masha and I were first taken to the FSB, the FSB officer interrogated me for about three and a half hours. Masha was in the next office, as he explained, being interviewed separately. And after all the questions — the first ones were: what do you think of the president, what do you think of the “special military operation” — at the end of the conversation he offered: wouldn’t you like your daughter to head some youth patriotic movement, and she could be the leader, calling young people to patriotism, to support Putin, and so on. And they also said they’d help with Masha’s career: everything will be fine, she’ll finish school well, we’ll help her get into university without exams, there won’t be any problems. That’s why I say: it’s a matter of conscience. If at that moment I’d agreed, all the consequences — my imprisonment, jail, criminal case — could have been avoided.

Olga Proskurnina:
Interestingly, Naoko was offered the same thing, and so was her mother.

Ksenia Kirillova:
I just can’t comprehend it. How can a grown man interrogate a twelve-year-old girl? What kind of person do you have to be? Alexey, what’s your impression: do they really believe what they say, or do they just have to check a box? What’s in these people’s heads? Maybe Masha can say too. What is this phenomenon?

Alexey Moskalyov:
In my opinion, the initial pressure was on the child, to somehow influence the father.

Ksenia Kirillova:
But what do they feel? Do they believe what they say? Do they think Masha’s drawing is a threat? Or do they just need to check a box? Do they care at all? What’s in their heads?

Alexey Moskalyov:
It’s hard to figure out their inner psychology. In my opinion, the financial side plays the main role here. This whole structure is based on finances. They understand that if this criminal regime ends, their careers and financial support will end. Everything is tied to money. That’s why they’ll fight to the end.

Olga Proskurnina:
Russian secret services went through the traumatic experience of the USSR’s collapse, when for ten years they had a very hard time financially. They really don’t want to go back.

Ksenia Kirillova:
I think they understand that this time it’ll be worse. Because the USSR collapsed at its most “vegetarian” point, when society didn’t really demand it. And now they could be imprisoned at the peak.

Olga Proskurnina:
Masha, what were your impressions of interacting with FSB officers?

Masha Moskalyova:
Not the best. But I’d say there wasn’t really an interrogation as such. They understood I was a child, that there wasn’t much they could get from me. They asked more about what I wanted to be, whether I wanted to work in the police or be a teacher. The questions were pretty, but there was no pressure.

Olga Proskurnina:
Were you scared?

Masha Moskalyova:
No.

Olga Proskurnina:
Maybe you found it funny?

Masha Moskalyova:
Not funny, of course. But I was more worried not for myself, but for my dad. I didn’t know where he was. I thought they’d let me go, everything would be more or less okay, but I didn’t feel strong fear. I didn’t know what the consequences would be, just in a childish way.

Olga Proskurnina:
Considering how many political criminal cases are now opened against teenagers in Russia, which didn’t even happen in Stalin’s time, that’s not such an illusory threat. Do you keep in touch with anyone in Russia? Are you able to communicate with people from your past? How do people in your city view what happened to you?

Alexey Moskalyov:
I’ll say right away, we have no contact with relatives. When all this started, all the relatives we turned to refused, no one helped us. So after my release, we have no contact with them.

Olga Proskurnina:
Do you have any friends left?

Alexey Moskalyov:
You know, no. No supportive people. Let me elaborate a bit. If not for Putin, we probably wouldn’t know how much filth is around us. Neighbors, relatives, acquaintances — it all came out. What won’t sink, as they say.

A small example. When Masha came home from school, she was afraid police would pull her out of class — she said, “I’m afraid to go to school.” I told her: tomorrow I’ll come for you, I’ll meet you myself. I waited in the foyer for her class to end. The principal saw me waiting with other parents and called the police. Four officers arrived, two went up to Masha’s classroom, two came to me, a man and a woman. And started questioning me: do you know what your daughter is doing? At that moment I saw her drawing for the first time. I’d never seen it before. They showed me the album. When I looked at it, I didn’t understand what could interest the police in this drawing. They said: “You understand we’re conducting military actions, a war with Ukraine.” I said: wait, you’re the ones at war — my daughter and I have nothing against Ukraine or Ukrainians, don’t drag us into this. And the parents waiting for their kids heard all this. Do you think any of them supported us — like, how can you go after a child for a drawing? No. All as one said: “Right, he should be deprived of parental rights, the child should be taken away, and he should be jailed.” Well, what did you expect? And remember, in Stalin’s time there were four million denunciations.

Question from the audience:
They say it was a teacher who reported on Masha, but I heard from my own sources that the teacher just mentioned it to someone without any bad intentions. What really happened? Who exactly reported?

Masha Moskalyova:
It was a classmate whose father works in the police. After class, she came up to me when the art teacher had already left. The teacher didn’t see any of the drawings in the class, including mine. When this classmate saw I’d drawn something completely different from the other drawings, she probably reported it to the principal — or to her father, and he to the principal. She was later called in for a talk about me with the principal.

Woman from the audience:
So it wasn’t the teacher, it was a student? Did the teacher hand you over to the FSB?

Ksenia Kirillova:
The teacher then handed me directly to the FSB and called the police.

Masha Moskalyova:
That was my homeroom teacher, a different teacher entirely.

Question from the audience:
How did your classmates react? What was their attitude toward you after that? You continued studying in the same class, right?

Masha Moskalyova:
For a while, not long, I stayed in the same class. The students treated me the same as before. I didn’t talk to any of them, we had no common interests. After it happened — just as indifferent. There were no questions, nothing more.

Olga Proskurnina:
And you didn’t have any friends left in Efremov either?

Masha Moskalyova:

No.

Question from the audience:
One more very personal question? How was your relationship with your mother? Was there really a threat that you could be left without parental care and end up in a state institution?

Masha Moskalyova:
Yes. When I was in that rehabilitation center in Efremov, they tried for a long time to persuade my mother to take me back. She got calls ten times a day. They called and tried to get her to take me — from the administration, officials, everyone talked to her. She said she couldn’t, she had work, she had debts. They paid off her debts, sponsored her. So because of financial help, she finally agreed and took me, they provided everything for her.

Question from the audience:
In the time you spent together, did you get to know each other better, maybe develop a warmer relationship?

Masha Moskalyova:
No. I already knew what kind of person she was. I didn’t learn anything new.

Olga Proskurnina:
What strikes me most here is that, despite all the acid poured over Russian society, there are still strong parents who unconditionally protect their children. We all, I think, saw Yuri Dud’s interview with Diana Loginova (Naoko) and her mother — and appreciated the efforts Irina Loginova made to protect her daughter, and the bond between them. In the story of Masha and Alexey Moskalyov, I see the same thing. Their circumstances are different, but the story is about the same thing.

Ksenia Kirillova:
That’s exactly what I was talking about: you can be blackmailed, but there’s always a way out. Look at what Naoko’s mom did. It would seem she’s a mother, she has to save her child. If she’d made her another Shaman, who would blame her? She was saving her child. But she tricked the security officers. She saved her child, and at the same time didn’t become an accomplice. And she lived in Russia. There’s always a choice, even if you’re in a terrible situation. You don’t have to choose between your child and your conscience. Three arrests in a row — and the mother still had a choice. And she made that choice.

Olga Proskurnina:
I think that’s the only thing that will save us all. The unconditional desire to protect, to support no matter what, and not to break, no matter how much pressure there is.

Ksenia Kirillova’s poetry collection with illustrations by Masha Moskalyova, in Russian and French, can be purchased at Most in electronic and print form. Visit our Bookstore! And this weekend we’ll tell you about our public talk for the Francophone audience in Marina Tsvetaeva’s last Paris apartment, and about Ksenia Kirillova’s spy novel “Efron’s Mistake,” which will soon be released by Most.