David Satter, Washington, D.C. Nov. 28, 2025/By Patricia Leslie
On a recent Friday night, about 20 attended one of the many weekly public sessions at Washington’s Free Peoples of Russia House, "a platform for the democratic opposition to the Putin regime" that "facilitates dialogue between resistance representatives and the American political elite."
The speaker was David Satter, the author of articles and books about Russia and the Soviet Union (all books published by academic presses) who lived there from 1976-1982.
Satter has been a research fellow at the Hoover Institution and the Hudson Institute who testified before the U.S. Congress in 2007, delivering his constant message of FSB involvement in the murder of Russia's citizens to get Vladimir Putin elected.
Russia expelled him in 2013.
David Satter, Washington, D.C. Nov. 28, 2025/By Patricia Leslie
Satter encourages audiences to "spread the word," about Russia's involvement in numerous murders of its own people intended to scare them and instill fear which got Vladimir Putin elected president of Russia the first time.
And the last time.
And those in-between, totaling five elections.
The sad tactic worked.
During times of national catastrophes, public opinion of leaders tends to grow; Russia was no exception.
As Boris Yeltsin's two terms were ending in 1996, a major calamity was predicted.
More explosions followed, including a September bombing in an apartment house which killed 64 and injured 133. Another one killed 106, injured hundreds and damaged several buildings nearby.
Another bombing later that month killed 119 and injured hundreds.
There were more explosions.
Yeltsin ordered 30,000 buildings to be inspected.
The apartment bombings linked to the FSB demonstrated Russia's contempt and lack of respect for its people, Satter said.
The explosions were intended to panic the people and create animosity towards Chechnya and use the tragedies as a reason to attack that republic.
It’s a story of how Putin, a FSB leader, rose to power. Scare the citizens and make them afraid, Satter said. Putin's popularity grew.
In January the BBC will air Satter's program about Russia; “American Society is going to have to wake up.”
The results of the Russia's last election in 2024 were obviously falsified; Putin has never been legitimately elected, according to Satter.
After the Soviet Union fell in 1991, a study of the mental health of its citizenry revealed that one-fifth suffered from some kind of mental illness which Satter thinks is a low estimate.
At the time, Russia's mortality rate skyrocketed resulting in the highest death rate of a country not at war, exceeded only by warring Somalia and Ethiopia.
I was likely the only non-Russian speaking guest to attend the gathering on Capitol Hill which Ilya Ponomarev, a former member of the Duma, also attended. According to Wikipedia, he and his wife were injured last year in a drone strike at their home in Kyiv Oblast, the fifth attempt by Russia to kill him.
Presidents Lech Wałęsa and Viktor Yushchenko lead the Free Peoples House board of trustees.
(Writer's note: For the first time in researching Wikipedia on a person, place, event or thing, I was unable to find a page on the FSB or its predecessor, the KGB, because, say the Economist and Foreign Policy, Russia is rewriting Wikipedia and won't allow it!)
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