Thoughts on Alexei Navalny's Extraordinary Bravery and Sacrifice

When I learned that Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny had died in captivity, my first thought was about the late John McCain. Specifically, this excerpt that the late David Foster Wallace wrote in Rolling Stone about McCain while covering his first White House bid in 2000:

He was delirious with pain for weeks, and his weight dropped to 100 pounds, and the other POWs were sure he would die; and then after a few months like that after his bones mostly knitted and he could sort of stand up they brought him in to the prison commandant’s office and offered to let him go. This is true. They said he could just leave. 

They had found out that McCain’s father was one of the top-ranking naval officers in the U.S. Armed Forces (which is true – both his father and grandfather were admirals), and the North Vietnamese wanted the PR coup of mercifully releasing his son, the baby-killer. McCain, 100 pounds and barely able to stand, refused, The U.S. military’s Code of Conduct for Prisoners of War apparently said that POWs had to be released in the order they were captured, and there were others who’d been in Hoa Lo a long time, and McCain refused to violate the Code. The commandant, not pleased, right there in the office had guards break his ribs, rebreak his arm, knock his teeth out. 

McCain still refused to leave without the other POWs. And so then he spent four more years in Hoa Lo like this, much of the time in solitary, in the dark, in a closet-sized box called a “punishment cell.” Maybe you’ve heard all this before; it’s been in umpteen different media profiles of McCain. But try to imagine that moment between getting offered early release and turning it down. Try to imagine it was you. Imagine how loudly your most basic, primal self-interest would have cried out to you in that moment, and all the ways you could rationalize accepting the offer. Can you hear it? It so, would you have refused to go? You simply can’t know for sure. None of us can. It’s hard even to imagine the pain and fear in that moment, much less know how you’d react.

But, see, we do know how this man reacted. That he chose to spend four more years there, in a dark box, alone, tapping code on the walls to the others, rather than violate a Code. Maybe he was nuts. But the point is that with McCain it feels like we know, for a proven fact, that he’s capable of devotion to something other, more, than his own self-interest. 

Yes, we know McCain would be freed and would live a full life spending decades in public service nearly attaining the highest office in the land. Navalny died at the age of 47 in what should have been the prime of his life. Nevertheless, there is a thread of commonality which unites McCain and Navalny.

Just as McCain refused an early release from the Hanoi Hilton, Navalny refused to live his life in exile. It must be remembered that Navalny survived a poisoning attempt in August 2020 because he was evacuated to Germany. Given how the Putin regime nearly took his life, Navalny could have easily remained in Germany or perhaps migrated elsewhere in Europe or the U.K. or to the U.S. 

Instead, Navalny chose to board a plane from Germany back to Russia less than five months later. He did this knowing full well he would be immediately imprisoned and never see another day of freedom for the rest of his life. Just as McCain felt an obligation to the U.S. Military Code, Navalny felt a duty to the Russian people. I have no doubt Navalny's captors inflicted all forms of physical and psychological torture until his final days in the Polar Wolf north of the Arctic Circle. Yet judging by the last known photograph taken of Navalny a month ago, it does not appear they broke his spirit. Alas, it appears Navalny's spirit was stronger than his body.

Alexei Navalny's greatest legacy will be his bravery and his sacrifice. Because how many of us in his position would have voluntarily returned to a place we knew where our fate was imprisonment and death? 

With that said, will Navalny's death inspire Russians to take to the streets? That all depends on how many Russians are prepared to lose what little freedom and comfort they have so that complete strangers can live free. 

As for this country, there are a critical mass of Americans who would rather be a Russian than a Democrat. This critical mass is devoted to Putin and Trump while having disdain for McCain and Navalny. Those who express such devotion know neither of bravery nor sacrifice. R.I.P.