The code of honour

Part 13 - The Russian mob claims respect and power through strict rules of conduct

Honour is a fundamental concept in the Vorovskoi Zakon, the code of the vory v zakone. Anton Chekhov wrote: "Honour cannot be taken away, it can only be lost." And this is something well known to the vory v zakone (thieves with a code) even if they may have never read anything by the great Russian writer.
The only thing they hold for sure is that honour is a quality under public scrutiny, legitimization of value by the group one belongs to; it has a relational characteristic, and points to social subjects in well-specified communities or groups. Since it is a virtue that resides in the eyes of the beholder, i.e., that exists only if it is recognized, it can only be lost, as Chekhov said. We should not forget that the Russian Mob, just like the Italian Mafia or the North American La Cosa Nostra, (according to Paolo Pezzino, professor of contemporary history at the University of Pisa), is a secret organization whose existence must be known to everybody.
Also in Russia, some shades of honour depend on sexual prowess: the dishonoured par excellence is the betrayed husband. But it would be a mistake to confuse this symbolic level, the metaphor of honour, with its essence.
Manliness, as an expression of honour, therefore stands for the ability to impose oneself over others. Only those who possess this quality can be vory v zakone, much like members of the Italian Mafia. Being able to impose oneself remains as an indisputable title of honour. The recourse to law being out of the question, this ability unavoidably implies violence. There is a tight connection among honour, violence and distribution of roles and resources in the Vorovskoi Zakon.
Who insults a vor must be punished, and the killing of a vor must be avenged. Sasha, for instance, is a Russian boss belonging to this criminal elite. Convicted of a theft when he was 16, he never left jail where he killed another inmate who has showed disrespect for him.
Lately, especially following the fall of the Soviet Empire, in Russia like in Italy’s underworld, honour has become synonymous for wealth, so that the accumulation of capital, regardless of how it is obtained, serves to conquer or gain back "honour" and consequently power, and a position of supremacy.
"Honour is tightly connected to silence," explains Sergeant Reg King, one of RCMP’s keenest analysts. "In their code, silence alone is great, everything else is weak. Who breaks this rule always pays with death."
The Russian pre-Revolutionary underworld required its new members to be "men of firm customs and unswerving character, devoted to the group and their mates, able to act without bringing trouble upon themselves and without damaging their mates." The reference to blind obedience and rigorous silence is clear.
Today, after almost 100 years, rules are still strict. These include cutting all connections with the natural family, not marrying nor having any children, not working but maintaining oneself with the revenue of one’s criminal activities.
More: "Help other members of the association, contributing to the mutual fund (obshchak); side-track investigations, eventually taking responsibility upon oneself in order to give the mate time to find a safe shelter; be cautious in telling anybody names of accomplices and addresses of hideaways; consult the skhodka (a kind of supreme court of the criminals) in case of conflict; be ready to judge a mate in case he should do something grave against the organization; execute any sentence passed by a court of the association; know perfectly well the jargon (fenia) of the group; not to gamble if unable to cope with eventual debts; teach the young to be smart and able, typical qualities of a vor; have someone who can be trusted to carry out tasks of all kinds (a sort of orderly); stay away from members of the police, and never think about enlisting in the army; but most of all respect the rules of the code designed by the vory and never betrayed."
Other important characteristics are the jargon, the tattooing and the nicknames. The criminal jargon includes about 10,000 words and expressions; there is a common one, and sector-specific ones for pickpockets, swindlers, embezzlers, antique dealers, drug peddlers, extortionists. They are used not just for addressing and recognition, nor just for keeping conversations private, but also to select the circle of interlocutors.
As to tattooing, it is like a business card for the criminal which allows him to recognize who he’s dealing with and what is his "field of business".
Claiming a rank one is not entitled to is absolutely forbidden. According to criminologist Arkady G. Bronnikov who’s been studying this phenomenon for 30 years, tattoos were a system used in the past.
Out of the 35 million people detained in the former Soviet Union between the mid-Sixties and the late Eighties, 85 percent were tattooed. Bronnikov says: "Tattoos represented the rank stripes of the underworld: from the highest, the one of avtoritety or bosses, to the one of pakhany, down to the soldiers, the lowest level of the various eshelon, the gangs."
According to the Russian criminologist, tattoos were a sort of passport, a biography, a uniform with the medals gained in the field, and also the criminal past of an individual. There was a constant: the tattoo always appeared on the body of criminals after a sentence, never before. Nowadays tattoos are less and less in use. Once uncovered as to their function, police use them to identify criminals.
"Nicknames are also important, widely used in the world of Russian organized crime," explains King. "The nickname is a symbol of belonging to the underworld."
"Little Japanese" is the nickname of Vyacheslav Kirillovich Ivankov, known in Russia as the father of extortion, arrested and convicted in the U.S. and considered to be the most powerful vory v zakone in the Russian Mob. In order to pay lawyer’s fees, his Russian friends collected 2 million U.S. dollars!
Two other powerful bosses living in the U.S. are known with the nicknames of "Taiwanese" and "Macintosh", the former who left Germany to avoid police investigations there, and the latter had many of his henchmen come to him after founding one of Moscow’s biggest banks.
"Poodle" is the nickname of Vladimir Podiatev who practically controls everything in Khabarovsk. After 17 years in the prison camps, the "Poodle" formed his own political party, TV station, and got official recognition by the Orthodox Patriarch who blesses his charities.

(translated by Emanuele Oriano)

Publication Date: 2001-06-24
Story Location: http://tandemnews.com/viewstory.php?storyid=94