The Potemkin Reflex
The ship was one of the navy’s pride, bearing the name of an esteemed statesman of its homeland. It served dutifully, carrying out its tasks with the professionalism and elan expected of its service’s long history. But morale had collapsed. The government had blundered into a war it assumed would be an easy victory over a weaker regional power — and it was not. Worse, conditions aboard the ship deteriorated so badly that even the food became unfit for consumption. Eventually the situation grew so dire that the crew mutinied. They seized the ship and fled while loyalist vessels scrambled to hunt them down. It played out like something straight from The Hunt for Red October — except this time the sailors weren’t defecting to a better world. They were escaping misery. That is the story of Potemkin, a pre-dreadnought battleship of the Russian Navy that mutinied during the disastrous Russo-Japanese War of 1904-1905. You can watch these events recreated in Russian director Sergei Eise...