Critical Essay on The Degaev Affair by Richard Pipes

Introduction

In the late 19th century, the revolutionaries from Russia were a byword for terror and treason. Some of the self-declared Marxists and socialists were perfect in outlook, but rebels in the method. The killing of Czar and some of his advisers was perceived as a necessary prelude to making autocratic Russia into a nation that was ruled with equality and justice. The end according to the Marxists and socialists justified the unrestrained violence of the means. Far from reality, the revolutionists dwelled in a raging atmosphere of murder, self-deception, messianism, and conspiracy. For example Under Western Eyes by Conrad describes the life of a Russain who was caught in between his better feelings with those of the revolutionary terror: "For who, with us in Russia, is to tell a scoundrel from an exceptionally able man?" This is the question that serves as the work of Richard Pipes's in his book "The Degaev Affair."

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So how can the murderous or terrorist impulse be explained? That is the question Pipes tries to answer by describing the extraordinary life of Sergei Degaev. In this book, Pipes dismisses the common notion that terrorists are as a result of frustrations from poverty and political oppression. Pipes uses examples from Germany's Baader-Meinhof gang as an explanation for the murderous impulse seen in countries that are rich and law-abiding just like any other society in history. From the book, the explanation offered is found to be an overpowering impulse that showcases self-destructive signs that gets hold of a young adult in modern societies. When this impulse takes over, the objective of an ideal social and political order is attained but through violence, whereas violence in itself as an ostensibly means to end the oppression becomes an end in itself. Pipe thus suggests that people should view the violent revolutionary as a pathological type where the revolutionists are driven by the hatred towards society as well as their deluded vision for a better future.

The story of Degaev is always narrated in piecemeal and as a general history of terror in Russia, but not as a sustained narrative of the double life of the peculiar vocations of the agent as well as a police officer who had employed him. In the year 1884, the ending of the Degaev Affair brought chaos in the terror group that had masterminded the killing of Alexander II in the year 1881. With fears for the life of his successor, the regime was forced to deploy tactics that included the insiders making deals with terrorists as well as strenuous efforts to penetrate their defenses by the Okhrana. The narration of Sudeikin attitudes and intrigues led to the reflections regarding KGB at the conclusion of the Soviet period when the law enforcers assumed that they were activists as well as true conservators of Russia.

Richard Pipes in his book "The Degaev Affair" on the other hand depicts Sudeikin as an ambitious person who turned against his employers when they tramped on his toes. Certainly, the hypothesis of disillusioned drive that was borrowed from Kucharzewski shows the link of the stories between the radicals and the police inspector. It is, however, hard to conclude if Sudeikin was a liberal man or solely that he, manipulated the young revolutionaries by faking to share their ideologies and goals according to the account by Pipe. Nevertheless, the evidence presented in the book shows that Sudeikin was a self-destructive and an unbalanced intriguer while on the other hand, Degaev righted his life after killing his employer by becoming a decent person.

From a revolutionist to a professor that everyone admires, one would like to know the reason why a person could have such a contradictory behavior. Some would think that Degaev suffered from a split personality. After Degaev betrayed the revolutionists he was forced to expatiate his betrayal by killing Sudeikin. Degaev then plotted the murder of Sudeikin whereby he lured him to his apartment and shot him. Degaev later fled to France, and then to North America. He took on a new identity by studying mathematics and becoming a renowned professor who was registered under the name Alexander Pell. After his death in the year 1921, Degaev was remembered as a popular professor who was loved for his warm personality and friendship. So; "which was the true Degaev-Pell: the kindly professor . . . or the revolutionary turncoat?" Consequently, was North America adequately diverse as compared to Russia so as; "to transform him into a different human being"?

Conclusion

These are the questions the readers would ask after reading the book "The Degaev Affair" by Richard Pipe. People are therefore inclined to the theory that Alexander Pell was one of those humans who are destined to be a villain on a "big stage" and a noble actor in a "small stage". From a radical's point of view, St. Petersburg was a big stage for Degaev such that he managed to ruin the lives of those he had encounters with. It is also hard to fathom of a small stage than Vermillion where Degaev was able to find the peace and gentleness that he once thought only revolution and murder could bring. This ought to be the ultimate moral of the fairy tale "The Degaev Affair" by Richard Pipe.

Bibliography

Pipes, Richard. The Degaev Affair: Terror and Treason in Tsarist Russia. Yale University Press, 2005.