A good legend takes at least a hundred years to establish itself. That’s because the heroics, magic and certainty that legends are made of aren’t real. It takes time for reality to die out and for the evidence to be buried where no one alive can find it. That King Arthur was a Russian has […]

by John Helmer - Friday, April 13th, 2001
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A few days ago, the British Broadcasting Corp, published what its researchers claim is the most accurate likeness ever made of the face of Jesus Christ. The face of the bearded, thick-lipped youngish man reveals a slight asymmetry between right and left eye, and a disheveled look, as if he had just woken up and […]

by John Helmer - Friday, April 6th, 2001
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If you knew the people I know, it would not require advanced science to realize there is no fundamental difference between some people and rats. Don’t get me wrong – I respect rats for their resourcefulness under pressure and for the sharpness of their teeth. I wasn’t surprised when the English and American partners in […]

by John Helmer - Saturday, March 3rd, 2001
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A great writer who was dying of cancer once told a television interviewer, days before his death, that he had decided to call his cancer Rupert. The reason, he said, was that the media proprietor Rupert Murdoch represented a cancer that was destroying the media world. The remark had both a particular and a general […]

by John Helmer - Monday, February 19th, 2001
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PRESIDENT Vladimir Putin rides into the Apec summit in Brunei this week on a wave of foreign-policy successes his predecessor Boris Yeltsin never enjoyed. But, if you listen to the Russian and Western press, you would never know it. “”What was the cause of the fire in the Moscow television tower?” is the question in […]

by John Helmer - Thursday, November 16th, 2000
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THERE is an old Russian saying that if you drink, you die. And if you don’t drink, you die. So it’s better to drink. If that was the choice facing Russian policy towards last week’s events in Belgrade, the Russian parliament was first to point out that President Vladimir Putin’s endorsement of Kostunica’s election was […]

by John Helmer - Wednesday, October 11th, 2000
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It is recorded in the Analects Of Confucius that Yuan Xian once asked Confucius about the virtue of benevolence and the four vices, “”insisting on winning, boastfulness, greed, and harbouring bitterness”. Confucius acknowledged it was extremely rare for people to be without these vices. But whether they are also benevolent, he said: “”I cannot tell.” […]

by John Helmer - Tuesday, July 18th, 2000
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When Russia’s leadership thinks seriously, strategically, about Greece, not very much comes to mind, except a faucet. To the Russians, Greece is the tap at the Mediterranean end of a Russian oil pipeline. For President Vladimir Putin and his Security Council, it is far better for Russian economic and regional security, if that tap is […]

by John Helmer - Friday, July 7th, 2000
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By John Helmer in Moscow Many things can make a person greater than he or she really is, except time. Time activates the bacteria that strip the flesh off the bones, until only a forensic pathologist can detect the tiny signs of individuality; and even they add up to nothing more than a catalogue of […]

by John Helmer - Friday, December 24th, 1999
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By John Helmer In 1833, four years before his wife’s flirtation caused the death, in a duel, of Alexander Pushkin, Russia’s greatest poet, he wrote her a warning letter. “You like it when the dogs trail after you like a bitch in heat,” Pushkin said bluntly. “All you have to do is make sure everyone […]

by John Helmer - Tuesday, August 10th, 1999
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