There was a fascinating story on the front page of the New York Times yesterday by Andrew E. Kramer entitled Decoys in Service of an Inflated Russian Might about the use of inflatable “dummy” military lures by the Russians. There were so many things that intrigued me about the article:
- That there were photos of these inflatable MIG-31 fighter jets taken by the New York Times (James Hill) from a distance of what looked to be less than 10′. This in and of itself contradicted the secretive purpose of the objects. The descriptions of their inflation, the company that makes them, etc. indicate that it’s common knowledge that they exist. The article even cited the fact that you could see in radar images the inflation and deflation of the devices, but obviously the trickery must work or the Russians wouldn’t go to the expense of fabricating them and then rolling them out.
- The theatricality of these objects and their deployment is extraordinary. It is mind boggling that somewhere in Russia in a Rusbal warehouse there are people stitching together these set pieces (you can see the video on their website – looks like a costume shop). That military TDs then are sent out to load them into temporary sites and strike them immediately afterwards, so that they appear and disappear with the ephemeralness of a site-specific theatre piece is extraordinary. This underscored again the relevance of theatre to the larger human condition. Of course, I would prefer to not see theatre militarized in such a fashion. Not the first time, of course; we have had all too many examples of the militarization of personalities using theatrical practice – Hitler comes to mind.
But the article stayed with me last night and I sat down to blog about it but didn’t yet have the hook as to it’s staying power. It is a much more personal issue that the concept of Maskirovka awakens in me.
Recent press about presidential candidate Donald Trump’s sexual bravado (last Sunday) and accused sexual assault (by Wednesday) made tangible what I’ve been thinking a lot about this week. After watching students deal with the aftermath of being sexually assaulted, these inflatables seem metaphoric to the campus experience. I don’t just speak about my university – the statistics about young women on college campuses and sexual assault are staggering.
Putting aside the grossest metaphor of “inflatables” in a sexual sense, I am haunted by the image of the representation of a real object with a decoy as it relates to the aftermath of sexual assault. Disclaimer – I was the victim of a sexual assault in college, after leaving my eating club one night, having had way too much to drink. The episode, which I did not report because I was embarrassed to not remember what had happened, has remained with me for 35 years. I am a resilient person, and the event has less power in my life at this point; I have confronted it, examined it, flogged it, and more or less put it away. I do recall the time immediately following the event, when I had to continue attending classes, work at my student job, show up at the theatre at night as a stage manager, inflate myself with enough confidence to even come out of my dorm and not be afraid of every man on campus because I had no memory of what “he” looked like. I was a walking decoy for my wounded and vulnerable self. Classic Maskirovka.
Spending time on campus now as an adult and professor, I am aware of events that unfold for many young women, and I see the aftermath of the abuse, but in a peripheral way, like the Times photographer standing close by and watching the military decoys inflate and deflate. The other aspects of Maskirovka, denial and deception, are very much at play in these circumstances. In my own case, I practiced a huge amount of denial with myself and with my closest friends, concealing from them any and all details of the event, not discussing it with anyone, and stuffing it away. It was only 25 years later when I had some counseling that I realized, AHA! I could have dealt with it more directly, treated myself more kindly by accepting assistance in processing the event with counselors who were, even in the early 1980s, available to me on my campus.
Hear me, Donald Trump, 25 years had passed since the event before I sought to explore it in any way.
A sexual assault is a lot to process. Time doesn’t slow down while one does or doesn’t do the processing. The daily demands to remain connected, far more than when I was in college with no email, rudimentary computers, no cell phones, places even more pressure on young women to conceal their panic, their grief, their heartbreak about what has happened to them.
Last night I listened to a CNN panel discussion about the “opportunistic” timing of Jessica Leeds’ and Rachel Crooks’ accounts of inappropriate touching by Donald Trump as a means to slander him. It made me furious just as obviously his statements galvanized something in both of them on Sunday night to make them reach out to tell their stories.
The story about decoy, denial and deception is an old story for many of us and a painful new story for many young women. We all need to be aware of the people around us, some of whom are not themselves, but inflated stand-ins passing for themselves as they move through processing their experiences.
So, as if I needed any more reasons to be with Her, thank you Donald Trump for triggering this last one.
lifeinthethe8tre 
I’m sorry you had this experience, Els, and you are brave to recount it. Today – as you know – the college alcohol and party scene is even worse. Witness the Stanford case, or the young woman who has told me that her policy is to accept only soft drinks at fraternity parties, and only in unopened cans. Nor does she use any ice cubes, glasses or paper cups because they may have been drugged. Self protection may have been easier in the past, but still, men and women don’t experience the world in the same way. I once heard John Gray speak about differences between men and women, and he asked for the women in the crowd to raise a hand if they had ever felt threatened. A hand went up for virtually every woman present; not so many for the men. That is the fundamental difference between the way women and men experience life. We inhabit different worlds.
Thank you Cindy for your sympathy, and for the story about the young woman. It’s really hard and it makes it so important that this election comes out the way it should
I was 13 and still don’t want to talk about it. But Trump has supplied the trigger that brought it all back. Dirty and disgusting and glad I have survived. Please.. stay away from this man.
So sorry to hear that, Mary. I, too, am glad you have survived. Triggers all around apparently. ❤️
Such a brave and intelligent piece, Els. I am a survivor of childhood molestation and your writing caught so much about the complication and the depth of the reaction to this degrading experience. The perpetrators and their ilk want to minimize it but it is up to us not to let them do it. Your writing has gone a long way in that direction. Thank you