identified as the family’s confidant and advisor (Berezovsky isrnwidely believed to be building a nice nest egg for the Yeltsins,rnprobably by investing recycled state funds in foreign banks andrnbusiness enterprises via Yeltsin’s son-in-law, who heads the airlinernAeroflot), but also, tellingly, as an inorodets, an alien, arnmuch stronger word than inostranets, foreigner. In thernMoskovsky Komsomolets satire, the Russian reading publicrncould not have missed the obvious parallels between thernsimple-minded Nicky and the senile Boris, the strong-willedrnAlexandra and the domineering pair, Tah’ana and Naina, orrnbetween the hypnotic influence of Rasputin and the apparentrnpower of Berezovsky. Even the crude “alien” charge invokesrncollective memories of Stalin unearthing plots by “roodess cosmopolitans”rnand of Czar Ivan III unmasking the court phsician.rnMaster Leon the Jew, who allegedly was planning thernmedical murder of Ivan’s son and heir.rnThis mock soap opera was the most serious attack on Berezovskyrnin the Russian press up to that time, though the 52-yearoldrnbusinessman and power broker seems, at this juncture,rnstronger than ever. Stronger, but not invulnerable, for the talernof Boris Berezovsky involves the whole of the transition of Russiarnfrom communism to what critics have dubbed “robber capitalism,”rnwhich may be close to exhausting its potential for developmentrnby exhausting Russia.rnThe financial oligarchy that shares power in the Kremlin todayrnis built around the “industrial financial” groups thatrnhave sprung up from what is left of the old Soviet financial andrnindustrial ministries. Among the myriad strata of loosely connectedrn”elites” are both new and old oligarchs who seized controlrnof financial institutions and the Russian industrial base inrnthe transition period from the late 1980’s to the early I990’s.rnThe old oligarchs are ex-Soviet ministers, plant directors, andrnindustrial branch managers. During the initial phase of economicrnreforms in the late 1980’s, they became “businessmen,”rnmanagers and often stockholders (or at least trustees for managingrnstate shares) in revamped industrial enterprises. The mostrnimportant—and lucrative—of these are involved in extractivernindustries, particularly in oil and gas. The most prominentrn”old” oligarch is Chernomyrdin, whose base is the gasrnmonopoly he built, Gazprom. The new oligarchs tend to havernmade their mark as bankers, either using state connectionsrn(Berezovsky’s partner, Mikhail Khodorkovsky, worked in thernKomsomol, the communist vouth league) to gain a foothold inrnbanking, or making their fortunes in shady business deals (thernimport-export business and financial pyramid operationsrnproved lucrative for many aspiring oligarchs, including Berezovsky)rnand then quickly buying into banks.rnThe particular attraction of the banking industry is not difficultrnto ascertain. First, as state financial institutions were transformedrninto joint-stock companies, those who could secure arnfoothold in the fledgling banking industry gained access to thernforeign currency reserves of the former system. With bankingrnlaws as yet uncodified, opportunities for plunder readily presentedrnthemselves. Second, by making sweetheart deals withrnKremlin apparatchiks, the newly minted bankers were oftenrngranted “authorized” status, meaning that they were authorizedrnto handle the accounts of certain still very productive state enterprises,rnsuch as Moscow’s state-run arms sales agency. Third,rnwhen then privatization guru Anatoly Chubays began the processrnof privatizing huge state conglomerates, such as therntelecommunications monopoly Svvazinvest, he made sure thatrn”authorized” financial concerns won the auctions (it was therndispute between Berezovsky and Potanin over just who hadrnbeen “authorized” to win the Svyazinvest auction that sparkedrnthe “bankers’ war” in the first place), thus securing influentialrnfinancial interests as his backers in Kremlin power games. Finally,rnby plundering state coffers and arranging insider dealsrnwith state officials, the new oligarchs became wealthy enoughrnto branch out, buying up newspapers and television stations (forrnpropaganda purposes) as well as oil companies and metallurgyrnconcerns.rnThe new oligarchs were now strong enough to deal face-tofacernwith the “old,” even to outstrip them in wealth and influence.rnBy 1996, Russians spoke of a semibankershina (“rule ofrnthe seven [largest] banks”) dominating Russia, an oligarchyrnheaded by kingpins Berezovsky, Potanin, Khodorkovsky,rnVladimir Gusinsky, Pyotr Aven, Mikhail Fridman, andrn’ladimir Smolensky. The “rule of the seven banks” ensuredrnYeltsin’s re-election. Berezovsky, the unofficial first amongrnequals of the banking oligarchy, engineered the campaign himself,rnwith help from Tatyana, then publicly emerging as a powerrnin her own right, and Chubays, then in tight with the sevenrnstrongmen. But the Svyazinvest row and the “bankers’ war”rnspoiled the oligarchs’ carefully laid plans and left the door openrnfor some very unpleasant warfare in the oligarch-controlled media:rnsix of the seven bankers are Jews. Potanin, all but cut out ofrnKremlin insider deals since the flare-up of the “bankers’ war,” isrna Russian. But Berezovsky at one time held an Israeli passportrn(he claims he no longer does); Gusinsky, a leading figure in thernWorld Jewish Congress, has bragged (on Israeli T^) of the powerrnof the “Jewish lobby” in the Kremlin; and other leading Jewishrnbankers are rumored to hold foreign passports.rnTheir enemies have not let this opportunity slip past them.rnPotanin’s newspaper, Russk)’ Telegraf, occasionally drops notso-rnsubfle hints that Berezovsky’s loyalt)’ to Russia is, well, questionable.rnBerezovsky, for his part, has gone to great lengths torndepict himself as devoted to Russia and defending Russia’s nationalrninterests. He is even said to finance certain “patriotic” organizationsrnas a sort of insurance policy for him and his allies,rnand he has clearly aligned himself with hard-liners like formerrnInternal Affairs Minister Anatoly Kulikov, who commandedrnground forces in the disastrous Chechen campaign, and thernstodgy apparatchik, Chernomyrdin. Berezovsky’s insurancernpolicy may prove its worth in the near future.rnThe end game mav have been foretold by the inclusion ofrnBoris Nemtsov, formerly governor of the Nizhegorod region, arnshowcase of economic reform and relative stability in the Russianrnheartland, in the government in the spring of last year.rnFirst Deputy Premier Nemtsov, not yet 40 years old, is an outsiderrnand Kremlin neophyte who espouses what he calls “people’srncapitalism,” a program influenced by his political advisor,rnViktor Aksyuchits, a Solzhenitsyn-inspired political philosopherrnand leader of the center-right Christian DemocraticrnMovement. “People’s capitalism” is a melding of Russian socialrntraditionalism with “Westernizing” ideas of decentralizationrn—including a distributist-oriented economic decentralization.rnAlong with quintessential outsider Aleksandr Lebed, whornespouses a remarkably similar political-economic line, and Dumarnfaction leader and economist Grigory Yavlinsky, who designedrnNemtsov’s successful regional economic program,rnNemtsov shares a reputation for honesty and integrit)’ that is arnrare commodity in Russian politics. Popularity polls consistenrivrnrate Nemtsov and Lebed at or near the top of the charts.rn28/CHRONICLESrnrnrn