Editing Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn (section)

== Views on history and politics ==

=== On Christianity, Tsarism, and Russian nationalism ===
{{Conservatism in Russia|Intellectuals}}
According to William Harrison, Solzhenitsyn was an "arch-[[reactionary]]", who argued that the Soviet State "suppressed" traditional Russian and [[Culture of Ukraine|Ukrainian culture]], who called for the creation of a [[All-Russian nation|united Slavic state encompassing Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus]], and who was a fierce opponent of [[Ukrainian nationalism|Ukrainian independence]]. It is well documented that his negative views on Ukrainian independence became more radical over the years.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Kriza |first1=Elisa |title=Alexander Solzhenitsyn: Cold War Icon, Gulag Author, Russian Nationalist? |date=2014 |publisher=ibidem Press |location=Stuttgart |isbn=9783838205892 |pages=200–201}}</ref> Harrison also alleged that Solzhenitsyn held [[Pan-Slavism|Pan-Slavist]] and [[Monarchism|monarchist]] views. According to Harrison, "His historical writing is imbued with a hankering after an idealized [[Tsarist]] era when, seemingly, everything was rosy. He sought refuge in a dreamy past, where, he believed, a united Slavic state (the Russian empire) built on Orthodox foundations had provided an ideological alternative to western individualistic liberalism."<ref>{{Cite news|last=Harrison|first=William|date=4 August 2008|title=William Harrison: Solzhenitsyn was an arch-reactionary|language=en-GB|work=The Guardian|url=https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2008/aug/04/solzhenitsyn.russia|access-date=8 July 2020|issn=0261-3077}}</ref>

Solzhenitsyn also repeatedly denounced Tsar [[Alexis of Russia]] and [[Patriarch Nikon of Moscow]] for causing the [[Raskol|Great Schism of 1666]], which Solzhenitsyn said both divided and weakened the Russian Orthodox Church at a time when unity was desperately needed. Solzhenitsyn also attacked both the Tsar and the [[Patriarch]] for using [[excommunication]], Siberian exile, imprisonment, torture, and even [[burning at the stake]] against the [[Old Believers]], who rejected the liturgical changes which caused the Schism.{{citation needed|date=August 2024}}

Solzhenitsyn also argued that the dechristianization of Russian culture, which he considered most responsible for the [[Bolshevik Revolution]], began in 1666, became much worse during the Reign of Tsar [[Peter the Great]], and accelerated into an epidemic during [[The Enlightenment]], the [[Romantic era]], and the [[Silver Age of Russian Poetry|Silver Age]].{{citation needed|date=August 2024}}

Expanding upon this theme, Solzhenitsyn once declared, "Over a half century ago, while I was still a child, I recall hearing a number of old people offer the following explanation for the great disasters that had befallen Russia: 'Men have forgotten God; that's why all this has happened.' Since then I have spent well-nigh 50 years working on the history of our revolution; in the process I have read hundreds of books, collected hundreds of personal testimonies, and have already contributed eight volumes of my own toward the effort of clearing away the rubble left by that upheaval. But if I were asked today to formulate as concisely as possible the main cause of the ruinous revolution that swallowed up some 60 million of our people, I could not put it more accurately than to repeat: 'Men have forgotten God; that's why all this has happened.'"<ref>Ericson, Edward E. Jr. (October 1985) "Solzhenitsyn – Voice from the Gulag,"</ref>

In an interview with [[Joseph Pearce]], however, Solzhenitsyn commented, "[The [[Old Believers]] were] treated amazingly unjustly because some very insignificant, trifling differences in ritual which were promoted with poor judgment and without much sound basis. Because of these small differences, they were persecuted in very many cruel ways, they were suppressed, they were exiled. From the perspective of historical justice, I sympathise with them and I am on their side, but this in no way ties in with what I have just said about the fact that religion in order to keep up with mankind must adapt its forms toward modern culture. In other words, do I agree with the Old Believers that religion should freeze and not move at all? Not at all!"<ref>Joseph Pearce (2011), ''Solzhenitsyn: A Soul in Exile'', [[Ignatius Press]]. pp. 329–330.</ref>

When asked by Pearce for his opinions about the division within the [[Roman Catholic Church]] over the [[Second Vatican Council]] and the [[Mass of Paul VI]], Solzhenitsyn replied, "A question peculiar to the [[Russian Orthodox Church]] is, should we continue to use [[Old Church Slavonic]], or should we start to introduce more of the contemporary [[Russian language]] into the service? I understand the fears of both those in the Orthodox and in the [[Catholic Church]], the wariness, the hesitation, and the fear that this is lowering the Church to the modern condition, the modern surroundings. I understand this, but alas, I fear that if religion does not allow itself to change, it will be impossible to return the world to religion because the world is incapable on its own of rising as high as the old demands of religion. Religion needs to come and meet it somewhat."<ref>Joseph Pearce (2011), ''Solzhenitsyn: A Soul in Exile'', [[Ignatius Press]]. p.  330.</ref>

Surprised to hear Solzhenitsyn, "so often perceived as an arch-[[Traditionalist Catholicism|traditionalist]], apparently coming down on the side of the reformers", Pearce then asked Solzhenitsyn what he thought of the division caused within the [[Anglican Communion]] by the [[Ordination of women in the Anglican Communion|decision to ordain female priests]].<ref>Joseph Pearce (2011), ''Solzhenitsyn: A Soul in Exile'', [[Ignatius Press]]. pp.  330–331.</ref>

Solzhenitsyn replied, "Certainly there are many firm boundaries that should not be changed. When I speak of some sort of correlation between the cultural norms of the present, it is really only a small part of the whole thing." Solzhenitsyn then added, "Certainly, I do not believe that women priests is the way to go!"<ref name="Joseph Pearce 2011 Page 331">Joseph Pearce (2011), ''Solzhenitsyn: A Soul in Exile'', [[Ignatius Press]]. p. 331.</ref>

=== On Russia and the Jews ===

[[File:Frenkel2.jpg|thumb|[[Naftaly Frenkel]] (far right) and head of Gulag [[Matvei Berman]] (center) at the [[White Sea–Baltic Canal]] works, July 1932]]

In his 1974 essay "Repentance and Self-Limitation in the Life of Nations", Solzhenitsyn urged "Russian Gentiles" and [[Jews]] alike to take moral responsibility for the "renegades" from both communities who enthusiastically embraced [[atheism]] and [[Marxism–Leninism]] and participated in the [[Red Terror]] and many other acts of torture and mass murder following the [[October Revolution]]. Solzhenitsyn argued that both Russian Gentiles and Jews should be prepared to treat the atrocities committed by Jewish and Gentile [[Bolsheviks]] as though they were the acts of their own family members, before their consciences and before God. Solzhenitsyn said that if we deny all responsibility for the crimes of our national kin, "the very concept of a people loses all meaning."<ref>[[#Ericson2009|Ericson (2009)]] pp. 527–555</ref>

In a review of Solzhenitsyn's novel ''August 1914'' in ''[[The New York Times]]'' on 13 November 1985, [[Jewish American]] historian [[Richard Pipes]] wrote: "Every culture has its own brand of [[anti-Semitism]]. In Solzhenitsyn's case, it's not racial. It has nothing to do with blood. He's certainly not a racist; the question is fundamentally religious and cultural. He bears some resemblance to [[Fyodor Dostoyevsky]], who was a fervent Christian and patriot and a rabid anti-Semite. Solzhenitsyn is unquestionably in the grip of the Russian extreme right's view of the Revolution, which is that it was [[Jewish Bolshevism|the doing of the Jews]]".<ref>[[#Thomas|Thomas]] p. 490</ref><ref>{{cite news |last=Grenier |first=Richard |date=13 November 1985 |title=Solzhenitsyn and anti-Semitism: a new debate |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1985/11/13/books/solzhenitsyn-and-anti-semitism-a-new-debate.html |work=The New York Times |location=New York |access-date=6 October 2019 }}</ref> Award-winning Jewish novelist and [[the Holocaust|Holocaust]] survivor [[Elie Wiesel]] disagreed and wrote that Solzhenitsyn was "too intelligent, too honest, too courageous, too great a writer" to be an anti-Semite.<ref>[[#Thomas|Thomas]] p. 491</ref> In his 1998 book ''Russia in Collapse'', Solzhenitsyn criticized the Russian far-right's obsession with anti-Semitic and anti-Masonic [[conspiracy theory|conspiracy theories]].<ref>[[#Ericson2009|Ericson (2009)]] p. 496.</ref>

In 2001, Solzhenitsyn published a two-volume work on the history of Russian-Jewish relations (''[[Two Hundred Years Together]]'' 2001, 2002).<ref>{{cite news | url = https://www.theguardian.com/world/2003/jan/25/russia.books | title = Solzhenitsyn breaks last taboo of the revolution | first = Nick Paton | last = Walsh | newspaper = [[The Guardian]] | date = 25 January 2003}}</ref> The book triggered renewed accusations of anti-Semitism.<ref>{{cite news|url=http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3763/is_200609/ai_n18622003 |title=Dimensional Spaces in Alexander Solzhenitsyn's ''Two Hundred Years Together'' |work=Canadian Slavonic Papers |date=2 June 2009 |access-date=14 February 2010 |first=Zinaida |last=Gimpelevich |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100805141955/http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3763/is_200609/ai_n18622003/ |archive-date= 5 August 2010 }}</ref><ref>{{cite web | url = http://berkovich-zametki.com/2006/Zametki/Nomer6/VOstrovsky1.htm | title = В Островский (V Ostrovsky) | language = ru |trans-title=In Ostrovsky |publisher= Berkovich zametki |access-date= 14 February 2010}}</ref><ref>{{cite web| last = Khanan | first = Vladimir | title = 22 | url = http://www.sunround.com/club/22/133_chanan.htm | script-title=ru:И в Израиле – с Наклоном | language = ru |trans-title=And in Israel – with Naklonom |publisher= Sun round | access-date=14 February 2010}}</ref><ref name=young /> In the book, he repeated his call for Russian Gentiles and Jews to share responsibility for everything that happened in the Soviet Union.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Lustiger |first=Arno |date=7 October 2003 |title=Alexander Solschenizyn versucht sich an der Geschichte der Juden in der Sowjetunion: Reue wäre der sauberste Weg |trans-title=Alexander Solzhenitsyn attempts a history of the Jews in the Soviet Union: Repentance would be the simplest way |url=https://www.berliner-zeitung.de/alexander-solschenizyn-versucht-sich-an-der-geschichte-der-juden-in-der-sowjetunion-reue-waere-der-sauberste-weg-li.6483 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200926042812/https://www.berliner-zeitung.de/alexander-solschenizyn-versucht-sich-an-der-geschichte-der-juden-in-der-sowjetunion-reue-waere-der-sauberste-weg-li.6483 |archive-date=2020-09-26 |access-date=2021-11-09 |website=Berliner Zeitung |language=de}}</ref> He also downplayed the number of victims of an 1882 pogrom despite current evidence, and failed to mention the [[Beilis affair]], a 1911 trial in [[Kyiv|Kiev]] where a Jew was accused of [[Blood libel|ritually murdering Christian children]].<ref name="schmid">{{Cite news |last=Schmid |first=Ulrich M. |date=2001-08-11 |title=Solschenizyn über das Verhältnis zwischen Russen und Juden: Schwierige Nachbarschaft |trans-title=Solzhenitsyn on Russian-Jewish Relations: Troubled Neighbors |url=https://www.nzz.ch/article7K87E-1.463769 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160107223858/https://www.nzz.ch/article7K87E-1.463769 |archive-date=2016-01-07 |access-date=2021-11-09 |website=Neue Zürcher Zeitung}}</ref> He was also criticized for relying on outdated scholarship, ignoring current western scholarship, and for selectively quoting to strengthen his preconceptions, such as that the Soviet Union often treated Jews better than non-Jewish Russians.<ref name="schmid" /><ref name="siegl">{{Cite web |last=Siegl |first=Elfie |date=2003-05-12 |title=Alexander Solschenizyn: Zweihundert Jahre zusammen – Die russisch-jüdische Geschichte |trans-title=Alexander Solzhenitsyn: Two Hundred Years Together - Russian-Jewish History |url=https://www.deutschlandfunk.de/alexander-solschenizyn-zweihundert-jahre-zusammen-die.730.de.html?dram:article_id=102032 |access-date=2021-11-09 |website=Deutschlandfunk |language=de-DE}}</ref> Similarities between ''Two Hundred Years Together'' and an anti-Semitic essay titled "Jews in the USSR and in the Future Russia", attributed to Solzhenitsyn, have led to the inference that he stands behind the anti-Semitic passages. Solzhenitsyn himself explained that the essay consists of manuscripts stolen from him by the [[KGB]], and then being published, 40 years before, without his consent.<ref name=young>{{cite news|url=http://www.reason.com/news/show/29113.html|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081218001702/http://www.reason.com/news/show/29113.html|title=Traditional Prejudices: The anti-Semitism of Alexander Solzhenitsyn.|first=Cathy|last=Young|date=May 2004|archive-date=18 December 2008 }} Traditional Prejudices. The anti-Semitism of Alexander Solzhenitsyn ''[[Reason Magazine]]'' May 2004.</ref><ref>Cathy Young: [http://www.reason.com/news/show/29241.html Reply to Daniel J. Mahoney] in ''Reason Magazine'', August–September 2004.</ref> According to the historian [[Semyon Reznik]], textological analyses have proven Solzhenitsyn's authorship.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.vestnik.com/issues/2003/0611/win/reznik.htm|title=Семён Резник: Лебедь Белая И Шесть Пудов Еврейского Жира[Win&#93;|publisher=Vestnik.com|access-date=14 February 2010}}</ref>

=== Criticism of communism and allegations of fascist sympathies ===

[[File:The monument to Solzhenitsyn in Moscow 2.jpg|thumb|409x409px|Monument to Alexander Solzhenitsyn in Moscow]]
[[File:Brodnica sołżenicyn.jpg|thumb|A monument dedicated to Solzhenitsyn in [[Brodnica]] in Poland]]
Solzhenitsyn viewed the Soviet Union as a [[police state]] significantly more oppressive than the [[Russian Empire]]'s [[House of Romanov]]. He asserted that Imperial Russia did not censor literature or the media to the extremely systematic style as the Soviet-era [[Glavlit]],<ref>{{usurped|1=[https://web.archive.org/web/20030525182749/http://www.beaconforfreedom.org/about_database/russia.html "A brief history of censorship in Russia in 19th and 20th century"]}} ''Beacon for Freedom'' </ref> that Tsarist era political prisoners were not forced into [[katorga|labor camps]] to even remotely the same degree,<ref>{{Citation | last = Gentes | first = Andrew | year = 2005 | chapter-url = http://espace.library.uq.edu.au/eserv/UQ:8015/katorga.pdf | chapter = Katorga: Penal Labor and Tsarist Siberia | title = The Siberian Saga: A History of Russia's Wild East | editor-first = Eva-Maria | editor-last = Stolberg | place = Frankfurt am Main | publisher = Peter Lang }}</ref> and that the number of [[political prisoner]]s and [[Special settlements in the Soviet Union|internal exiles]] under the Romanovs were only one ten-thousandth of the numbers of both following the [[October Revolution]]. He noted that the Tsar's [[secret police]], the [[Okhrana]], was only present in the three largest cities, and not at all in the [[Imperial Russian Army]].{{Citation needed|date = July 2011}}

[[File:RR5110-0156R 2 рубля 2018 100 лет Солженицыну.png|thumb|200x200px|A commemorative Russian coin of 2 rubles with the image of Alexander Solzhenitsyn]]

Shortly before his return to Russia, Solzhenitsyn delivered a speech in [[Les Lucs-sur-Boulogne]] to commemorate the 200th anniversary of the [[Vendée Uprising]]. During his speech, Solzhenitsyn compared Lenin's [[Bolshevik]]s with the [[Jacobin Club]] during the [[French Revolution]]. He also compared the Vendean rebels with the Russian, Ukrainian, and Cossack peasants who rebelled against the Bolsheviks, saying that both were destroyed mercilessly by revolutionary despotism. He commented that, while the French [[Reign of Terror]] ended with the [[Thermidorian reaction]] and the toppling of the Jacobins and the execution of [[Maximilien Robespierre]], its Soviet equivalent continued to accelerate until the [[Khrushchev thaw]] of the 1950s.<ref>''The Solzhenitsyn Reader: New and Essential Writings 1947–2005'', (2008), [[ISI Books]]. pp. 602–605.</ref>

According to Solzhenitsyn, Russians were not the ruling nation in the Soviet Union. He believed that all the traditional cultures of all ethnic groups were equally oppressed in favor of atheism and Marxist–Leninism. Traditional Russian culture was even more repressed than any other culture in the Soviet Union, since the regime was more afraid of peasant uprisings by ethnic Russians than among any other Soviet ethnic group. Therefore, Solzhenitsyn argued, moderate and non-colonialist [[Russian nationalism]] and the [[Russian Orthodox Church]], once cleansed of [[Caesaropapism]], should not be regarded as a threat to the civilization of the West but rather as its ally.<ref>{{cite journal | title= Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn and Russian Nationalism |first= David G | last= Rowley | journal = Journal of Contemporary History |volume=32 |issue=3 |year=1997 |pages=321–337 |jstor= 260964 | doi=10.1177/002200949703200303|s2cid= 161761611 }}</ref>

Solzhenitsyn made a speaking tour after [[Francisco Franco]]'s death, and "told liberals not to push too hard for changes because Spain had more freedoms now than the Soviet Union had ever known." As reported by ''[[The New York Times]]'', he "blamed Communism for the death of 110 million Russians and derided those in Spain who complained of dictatorship."<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1976/03/22/archives/solzhenitsyn-bids-spain-use-caution.html|title=Solzhenitsyn Bids Spain Use Caution|work=The New York Times|date=22 March 1976|access-date=13 August 2021|issn=0362-4331}}</ref> Solzhenitsyn recalled: "I had to explain to the [[Spanish people|people of Spain]] in the most concise possible terms what it meant to have been subjugated by an ideology as we in the Soviet Union had been, and give the Spanish to understand what a terrible fate they escaped in 1939". This was because Solzhenitsyn saw at least some parallels between the [[Spanish Civil War]] between the [[Nationalist faction (Spanish Civil War)|Nationalists]] and the [[Republican faction (Spanish Civil War)|Republicans]] and the [[Russian Civil War]] between the [[anti-communist]] [[White Movement|White Army]] and the Communist [[Red Army]].

This was neither a popular or commonly held view at that time. [[Winston Lord]], a protégé of the then United States Secretary of State [[Henry Kissinger]], called Solzhenitsyn, "just about a fascist",<ref>{{cite news|last=Caldwell|first=Christopher|date=10 January 2019|url=https://www.nationalreview.com/magazine/2019/01/28/aleksandr-solzhenitsyn-book-review/|title=Solzhenitsyn in Exile|work=National Review|access-date=13 August 2021}}</ref> and Elisa Kriza alleged that Solzhenitsyn held "benevolent views" on [[Francoist Spain]] because it was a pro-Christian government, and his Christian worldview operated ideologically.<ref>{{cite book|last=Kriza|first=Elisa|year=2014|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=t1H_BgAAQBAJ|title=Alexander Solzhenitsyn: Cold War Icon, Gulag Author, Russian Nationalist?: A Study of His Western Reception|publisher=Columbia University Press|page=235|isbn=978-3-8382-6689-3}}</ref> In ''The Little Grain Managed to Land Between Two Millstones'', the Nationalist uprising against the [[Second Spanish Republic]] is "held up as a model of a proper Christian response", to [[religious persecution]] by the [[Far Left]], such as the [[Red Terror (Spain)|Spanish Red Terror]] by the Republican forces. According to Peter Brooke, however, Solzhenitsyn in reality approached the position argued by Christian Dmitri Panin, with whom he had a fall out in exile, namely that evil "must be confronted by force, and the centralised, spiritually independent Roman Catholic Church is better placed to do it than Orthodoxy with its otherworldliness and tradition of [[Caesaropapism|subservience to the State]]."<ref>{{cite magazine|last=MacNeice|first=Louis|date=Summer 2010|url=https://drb.ie/articles/what-came-up-was-goosegrass/|title=What Came Up Was Goosegrass|magazine=Dublin Review of Books|access-date=13 August 2021}}</ref>

In 1983 he met [[Margaret Thatcher]] and told her "the German army could have liberated the Soviet Union from Communism but Hitler was stupid and did not use this weapon".<ref>{{cite web |last1=Demissie |first1=Simon |title=New files from 1983 – Thatcher meets Solzhenitsyn |url=https://blog.nationalarchives.gov.uk/new-files-from-1983/ |publisher=[[The National Archives (United Kingdom)|The National Archives]]}}</ref>

In "Rebuilding Russia", an essay first published in 1990 in ''[[Komsomolskaya Pravda]]'', Solzhenitsyn urged the Soviet Union to grant independence to all the non-Slav [[Republics of the Soviet Union|republics]], which he claimed were sapping the Russian nation and he called for the creation of a new Slavic state bringing together [[Russia]], [[Ukraine]], [[Belarus]], and parts of [[Kazakhstan]] that he considered to be [[Russified]].<ref name= RFLSolUKma>{{Citation | url = http://www.rferl.org/content/Solzhenitsyn_Leaves_Troubled_Legacy_Across_Former_Soviet_Union/1188876.html | title = Solzhenitsyn Leaves Troubled Legacy Across Former Soviet Union | newspaper = [[Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty]] | date = 6 August 2008}}</ref> Regarding Ukraine he wrote “All the talk of a separate Ukrainian people existing since something like the ninth century and possessing its own non-Russian language is recently invented falsehood” and "we all sprang from precious Kiev".<ref>{{cite news |title=What Putin's Favorite Guru Tells Us About His Next Target |url=https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/02/vladimir-putin-guru-solzhenitsyn-115088/ |agency=[[Politico]]}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Conradi |first1=Peter |title=Who Lost Russia? From the Collapse of the USSR to Putin's War on Ukraine |date=2017}}</ref>

=== On post-Soviet Russia ===

[[File:Vladimir Putin with Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn-1.jpg|thumb|Solzhenitsyn with [[Vladimir Putin]] in 2007]]

In some of his later political writings, such as ''Rebuilding Russia'' (1990) and ''Russia in Collapse'' (1998), Solzhenitsyn criticized the [[Russian oligarchs|oligarchic excesses]] of the new Russian democracy, while opposing any nostalgia for Soviet communism. He defended moderate and self-critical patriotism (as opposed to [[Extremist nationalism in Russia|extreme nationalism]]). He also urged local self-government similar to what he had seen in [[New England]] town meetings and in the cantons of [[Switzerland]]. He also expressed concern for the fate of the 25 million ethnic Russians in the "[[near abroad]]" of the former Soviet Union.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Solzhenitsyn: A Centennial Tribute |url=https://www.city-journal.org/article/solzhenitsyn-a-centennial-tribute |access-date=2025-01-27 |website=City Journal |language=en}}</ref>

In an interview with [[Joseph Pearce]], Solzhenitsyn was asked whether he felt that the [[Distributism|socioeconomic theories]] of [[E. F. Schumacher]] were, "the key to society rediscovering its sanity". He replied, "I do believe that it would be the key, but I don't think this will happen, because people succumb to fashion, and they suffer from inertia and it is hard to them to come round to a different point of view."<ref name="Joseph Pearce 2011 Page 331"/>

Solzhenitsyn refused to accept Russia's highest honor, the [[Order of St. Andrew]], in 1998. Solzhenitsyn later said: "In 1998, it was the country's low point, with people in misery; ... [[Boris Yeltsin|Yeltsin]] decreed I be honored the highest state order. I replied that I was unable to receive an award from a government that had led Russia into such dire straits."<ref name="Solzhenitsyn 2007"/> In a 2003 interview with Joseph Pearce, Solzhenitsyn said: "We are exiting from communism in a most unfortunate and awkward way. It would have been difficult to design a path out of communism worse than the one that has been followed."<ref>Interview published in [http://www.catholiceducation.org/en/culture/art/an-interview-with-alexander-solzhenitsyn.html ''St. Austin Review'' 2 no. 2 (February 2003)]</ref>

In a 2007 interview with ''[[Der Spiegel]]'', Solzhenitsyn expressed disappointment that the "conflation of 'Soviet' and 'Russian'", against which he spoke so often in the 1970s, had not passed away in the West, in the [[Eastern Bloc|ex-socialist countries]], or in the [[Post-Soviet states|former Soviet republics]]. He commented, "The elder political generation in communist countries is not ready for repentance, while the new generation is only too happy to voice grievances and level accusations, with present-day Moscow [as] a convenient target. They behave as if they heroically liberated themselves and lead a new life now, while Moscow has remained communist. Nevertheless, I dare [to] hope that this unhealthy phase will soon be over, that all the peoples who have lived through communism will understand that communism is to blame for the bitter pages of their history."<ref name="Solzhenitsyn 2007">{{Citation | url = http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/spiegel-interview-with-alexander-solzhenitsyn-i-am-not-afraid-of-death-a-496211.html | type = interview | first = Aleksandr I | last = Solzhenitsyn | title = I Am Not Afraid of Death | newspaper = [[Der Spiegel]] | issue = 30 | year = 2007}}</ref>

In 2008, Solzhenitsyn praised Putin, saying Russia was rediscovering what it meant to be Russian. Solzhenitsyn also praised the Russian president [[Dmitry Medvedev]] as a "nice young man" who was capable of taking on the challenges Russia was facing.<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/dec/02/wikileaks-cables-solzhenitsyn-vladimir-putin|title=WikiLeaks cables: Solzhenitsyn praise for Vladimir Putin|first=Luke|last=Harding|newspaper=The Guardian |date=2 December 2010|via=www.theguardian.com}}</ref>

=== Criticism of the West ===

Once in the [[United States]], Solzhenitsyn sharply criticized the West.<ref>[https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1978/06/09/solzhenitsyn-says-west-is-failing-as-model-for-world/69e9fb6c-60d6-41f3-9022-606631a60e35/?noredirect=on Solzhenitsyn Says West Is Failing as Model for World], by Lee Lescaze 9 June 1978, ''[[The Washington Post]]''</ref>

Solzhenitsyn criticized the [[Allies of World War II|Allies]] for not opening a new front against [[Nazi Germany]] in the west earlier in World War II. This resulted in Soviet domination and control of the nations of [[Eastern Europe]]. Solzhenitsyn said the Western democracies apparently cared little about how many died in the East, as long as they could end the war quickly and painlessly for themselves in the West.{{citation needed|date=June 2024}}

Delivering the commencement address at [[Harvard University]] in 1978, he argued that the United States had declined in terms of its "spiritual life" and called for a "spiritual upsurge". He added "should someone ask me whether I would indicate the West such as it is today as a model to my country, frankly I would have to answer negatively". He critiqued the West for its lack of religiosity, materialism, and a "decline in courage".<ref>{{cite news |last1=Lescaze |first1=Lee |title=Solzhenitsyn Says West Is Failing as Model for World |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1978/06/09/solzhenitsyn-says-west-is-failing-as-model-for-world/69e9fb6c-60d6-41f3-9022-606631a60e35/ |newspaper=[[The Washington Post]] |date=9 June 1978}}</ref> He critiqued what he described as "the calamity of an autonomous, irreligious, [[humanistic]] consciousness" which has "made man the measure of all things on earth—imperfect man, who is never free of pride, self-interest, envy, vanity, and dozens of other defects".<ref>{{cite book |editor1-last=Berman |editor1-first=Ronald |title=Solzhenitsyn at Harvard The Address, Twelve Early Responses, and Six Later Reflections |date=1980 |publisher=Ethics and Public Policy Center |page=19}}</ref> He considered the West to possess a blind sense of cultural superiority, and that this manifested itself as the belief that "vast regions everywhere on our planet should develop and mature to the level of present-day Western systems". According to Solzhenitsyn, the West believes that those who do not adopt the system and culture practiced in the West are only "temporarily prevented" due to "wicked government", crises, or due to "their own barbarity and incomprehension" of the Western way of life. This belief arises from Western misunderstanding which itself results from measuring the world by the "Western yardstick".<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Solzhenitsyn |first1=Alexander |title=Our Divided World |journal=India International Centre Quarterly |date=October 1978 |volume=5 |issue=4 |pages=234–46}}</ref>

Solzhenitsyn was a supporter of the [[Vietnam War]] and referred to the [[Paris Peace Accords]] as 'shortsighted' and a 'hasty capitulation'.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Solzhenitsyn |first1=Alexander |title=Detente, Democracy and Dictatorship |date=2009 |publisher=Routledge |pages=88–89}}</ref>

In a reference to the Communist governments in [[Southeast Asia]]'s use of [[Re-education camp (Vietnam)|re-education camps]], [[politicide]], [[human rights abuses]], and [[Cambodian genocide|genocide]] following the [[Fall of Saigon]], Solzhenitsyn said: "But members of the [[Peace movement#United States|U.S. antiwar movement]] wound up being involved in the betrayal of Far Eastern nations, in a [[Cambodian genocide|genocide]] and in the suffering today imposed on 30 million people there. Do those convinced pacifists hear the moans coming from there?"<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1978/06/13/archives/the-editorial-notebook-the-decline-of-the-west.html|title=The Editorial Notebook The Decline of the West|newspaper=The New York Times|date=13 June 1978}}</ref>

He also accused the Western news media of left-wing bias, of violating the privacy of celebrities, and of filling up the "immortal souls" of their readers with celebrity gossip and other "vain talk". He also said that the West erred in thinking that the whole world should embrace this as model. While faulting Soviet society for rejecting basic [[human rights]] and the [[rule of law]], he also critiqued the West for being too [[legalism (Western philosophy)|legalistic]]: "A society which is based on the letter of the law and never reaches any higher is taking very scarce advantage of the high level of human possibilities." Solzhenitsyn also argued that the West erred in "denying [Russian culture's] [[Autonomy|autonomous]] character and therefore never understood it".<ref name=harvard />

Solzhenitsyn criticized the [[2003 invasion of Iraq]] and accused the United States of the "occupation" of [[Kosovo]], [[Afghanistan]] and [[Iraq]].<ref>{{cite news |title=Solzhenitsyn: a life of dissent |url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/solzhenitsyn-a-life-of-dissent-884590.html |work=The Independent |date=4 August 2008}}</ref>

Solzhenitsyn was critical of [[Enlargement of NATO|NATO's eastward expansion]] towards Russia's borders and described the [[NATO bombing of Yugoslavia]] as "cruel", a campaign which he said marked a change in Russian attitudes to the West.<ref name="bbc"/><ref>{{cite news |title=Interview with Alexander Solzhenitsyn |url=https://www.spiegel.de/international/world/spiegel-interview-with-alexander-solzhenitsyn-i-am-not-afraid-of-death-a-496003.html |work=Der Spiegel |date=23 July 2007}}</ref> He described NATO as "aggressors" who "have kicked aside the UN, opening a new era where [[might is right]]".<ref>{{cite news |last1=Myre |first1=Greg |title=War in the Balkans: Protest - Solzhenitsyn angry at attacks on Serbs |url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/war-in-the-balkans-protest-solzhenitsyn-angry-at-attacks-on-serbs-1090243.html |work=The Independent |date=28 April 199}}</ref> In 2006, Solzhenitsyn accused [[NATO]] of trying to bring Russia under its control; he stated that this was visible because of its "ideological support for the '[[colour revolutions]]' and the paradoxical forcing of North Atlantic interests on Central Asia".<ref name="bbc">{{Citation | url = http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4953690.stm | title = Solzhenitsyn warns of Nato plot | newspaper = [[BBC News]] | date = 28 April 2006}}</ref> In a 2006 interview with ''[[Der Spiegel]]'' he stated "This was especially painful in the case of Ukraine, a country whose closeness to Russia is defined by literally millions of family ties among our peoples, relatives living on different sides of the national border.  At one fell stroke, these families could be torn apart by a new dividing line, the border of a military bloc."<ref name="Solzhenitsyn 2007" />

=== On the Holodomor ===
Solzhenitsyn gave a speech in America to [[AFL–CIO]] in [[Washington, D.C.]], on 30 June 1975 in which he said that the system created by the [[Bolsheviks]] in 1917 caused dozens of problems in the Soviet Union.<ref name="Seventy five">{{cite web|url=https://archive.org/details/SolzhenitsynTheVoiceOfFreedom|title=Solzhenitsyn: The Voice of Freedom |author=Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn|work=AFL–CIO|date=30 June 1975|access-date=22 June 2016}}</ref> He described how this system was responsible for the [[Holodomor]]: "It was a system which, in time of peace, artificially created a famine, causing 6 million people to die in the Ukraine in 1932 and 1933." Solzhenitsyn added, "they died on the very edge of Europe. And Europe didn't even notice it. The world didn't even notice it—6 million people!"<ref name="Seventy five"/>

Shortly before his death, Solzhenitsyn said in an interview published 2 April 2008 in ''[[Izvestia]]'' that, while the famine in Ukraine was both artificial and caused by the state, it was no different from the [[Russian famine of 1921–1922]]. Solzhenitsyn stated that both famines were caused by systematic armed robbery of the harvests from both Russian and Ukrainian peasants by Bolshevik units, which were under orders from the [[Politburo]] to bring back food for the starving urban population centers while refusing for ideological reasons to permit any private sale of food supplies in the cities or to give any payment to the peasants in return for the food that was seized.<ref name="Solzh"/> Solzhenitsyn further said that the theory that the Holodomor was a genocide which only victimized the Ukrainian people, was created decades later by believers in an [[Russophobia|anti-Russian]] form of [[extreme nationalism|extreme Ukrainian nationalism]]. Solzhenitsyn also cautioned that the ultranationalists' claims risked being accepted without question in the West due to widespread ignorance and misunderstanding there of both Russian and Ukrainian history.<ref name="Solzh">{{cite news|first=Alexander|last=Solzhenitsyn|author-link=Alexander Solzhenitsyn|url=http://www.izvestia.ru/opinions/article3114723/|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080405034053/http://www.izvestia.ru/opinions/article3114723|archive-date=5 April 2008|script-title=ru:Поссорить родные народы??|work=[[Izvestia]]|language=ru|date=2 April 2008|access-date=27 November 2011}}</ref>