Category: WORLD POWER RELATIONSHIPS

Does the Prism scandal challenge America`s democratic values?

On By Patrick ArmstrongIn CONTRIBUTIONS TO GROUP DISCUSSIONS, WORLD POWER RELATIONSHIPS

http://us-russia.org/1342-does-the-prism-scandal-challenge-americas-democratic-values.html

http://english.ruvr.ru/2013_06_17/We-can-never-be-sure-when-gathered-information-can-become-vital-2367/

In connection with the PRISM scandal, we should remember the Venona intercepts. Back in The Day, a number of broadcasts to Soviet agents in the US, Canada and the UK were intercepted and saved. They were in a code that was never completely broken but they were pondered over and over again, for years – decades – by Western intelligence agencies. Bit by bit parts of the messages were understood. But never completely; full understanding came only after the collapse of the USSR opened the original messages.

Those charged with the security of their country had better take this source of information seriously. The Enemy communicates. After 911 (and lots of it before, truth be known) all this stuff – ie everything – was vacuumed up and stored in case it had to be searched later. The PRISM data collection effort is, as it were, the gathering of a mountain of dross in which there may be a few nuggets of ore. John Smith’s phone calls (or yours) hold no interest today and there is no reason to take the enormous effort to look at them, but they might be later when we find out who he really is. Billions of phone calls, tweets, twitters, e-mails and everything else. It’s all out there, it’s all recordable, almost all of it is of no interest at all, but we don’t know today which is and which isn’t. So keep it all, because we can. Perhaps it might have been better to have explained the process openly at the beginning but intelligence organisations do have a bias towards secrecy.

Putin’s comments are carefully chosen and honest as far as they go. One can be quite certain that Spetssvyaz, the Russian signals intelligence organisation, is doing the same thing to the best of its abilities and budget. Putin said nothing that he will have to apologise for later. But he said nothing very informative either.

The point is that this stuff is all collected and stored and, maybe, later, a bit is looked at in detail, in theory, when a judge or other legal authority grants permission. In theory. The practice, of course could easily be different. Some rogue breaks into the database; security requirements are twisted into industrial espionage; the tax people want information on somebody the authorities don’t like; some other government authority – with, of course, the very best and purest of motives – needs to know something.

Contemporary technology allowed Sir Francis Walsingham to intercept only letters. But modern technology makes possible the collection of enormous amounts of information: he intercepted hundreds of letters; his successors intercept millions of tweets. Simply put: you either trust the authorities to make the correct judgement to look only at the bad guys or you don’t. There is no easy answer. If you trust the authorities to create the right safeguards, and follow them, you can sleep peacefully. If not, not; the future will tell whether you were right or wrong.

But the USA under Obama is not the only one doing this, and no one should be simple enough to think it is.

What are the prospects for effective US-Russia anti-terror cooperation in the wake of the Boston bombings?

On By Patrick ArmstrongIn CONTRIBUTIONS TO GROUP DISCUSSIONS, WORLD POWER RELATIONSHIPS

http://us-russia.org/1239-what-are-the-prospects-for-effective-us-russia-anti-terror-cooperation-in-the-wake-of-the-boston-bombings.html

http://english.ruvr.ru/2013_05_08/Anti-Russia-bias-and-political-correctness-are-too-deeply-embedded-for-there-to-be-true-cooperation/

It would be good if the Boston attacks were to lead to serious cooperation. It is possible this will happen. I hope it will. It would also be good if Americans came to understand that almost everybody in Chechnya’s leadership today fought against Moscow in the first war. A fact that shatters the conventional view.

But we have seen this movie before.

Moscow warned the West about the common enemy it was fighting at the Munich Security Conference in 2001, no reaction. Putin told Bush the USA was on the target list, no reaction. Taliban sought an anti-American alliance with Moscow and was stoutly rejected. After 911 Putin used Moscow’s considerable influence with the Northern Alliance to establish cooperation and, it was the Northern Alliance, using weapons provided by Moscow, which actually overthrew Taliban – admittedly with considerable US support. Without Moscow’s influence the swift overthrow of Taliban would have been much harder, if not impossible. The two then tackled another problem: for years Moscow had been saying that jihadists had infiltrated the Pankisi Gorge in Georgia and for years Washington accepted Tbilisi’s claims that this was just another lie. But Moscow was telling the truth; a joint operation drove the jihadists out of Pankisi.

This was Washington’s opportunity to learn that Russia has the two essential requirements to make it an ally: a common enemy and experience and knowledge to bring to the alliance.

But, if learned, this was forgotten as Washington reverted to its instinctive anti-Russian position. Jihadists in Chechnya were called “rebels” as if it was just a revolt against Russian heavy-handedness; Russian elections were excoriated; the “human rights” weapon was deployed; “colour revolutions”, missile defence and NATO expansion continued; Russian concerns were contemptuously ignored or re-branded as “threats” (as in Russia threatens to react to missile defence). American animosity to Russia seems impenetrable to reality.

The “Rose Revolution” was especially hallucinatory: Bush was completely taken in by Saakashvili. (Medvedev tells us the first thing Bush ever said to him was: “You know, Misha Saakashvili is a great guy.” During the South Ossetia war Bush said: “It was clear the Russians couldn’t stand a democratic Georgia with a pro-Western president”. Pretty foolish sounding these days as the new government in Tbilisi reveals the reality of Saakashvili’s regime.) The jihadist centre in Pankisi, Tbilisi’s lies and Moscow’s truth, were forgotten and further chances for cooperation against the common enemy were lost as Washington believed everything Saakashvili told it. The US training program for Georgia’s armed forces – begun when Moscow’s allegations about Pankisi were confirmed – transformed into encouragement for Saakashvili’s military ambitions.

So here we are again: Boston has shown that the North Caucasus is a theatre of the world-wide jihad: after all, the Tsarnaevs may have hated Russia but they actually attacked the USA. Jihadists driven by the familiar ideology from ibn Taymiyya, through al-Wahhab, through Qutb, to Khattab and bin Laden; their Chechen connection is as incidental as the “underwear bomber’s” Nigerian origin or the “beltway sniper’s” American origin. Again Russia’s warnings were dropped; again Putin offers cooperation.

Will this opportunity for improving mutual security be dribbled away again? Perhaps the climate is better in that NATO expansion is dead and Saakashvili is gone.

But I expect little: the causes of these errors – anti-Russia bias and political correctness – are too deeply embedded to be overcome yet and we will never know, therefore, what true cooperation could achieve.

Breaking the code of human rights

On By Patrick ArmstrongIn ACCUSATIONS, WORLD POWER RELATIONSHIPS

http://media.washtimes.com/media/misc/2013/05/08/130509-voiceofrussia.pdf

Many countries like to think of themselves as a shining example to others but the USA seems more prone to this belief than most. Often present in its foreign policy – “Wilsonian” is a common name for the trend, “a city upon a hill” another – the tendency was given new emphasis by Carter and, since his time, an annual human rights report has been produced by the State Department. The USA is also home to many “human rights” organisations, ever quick to judge. Russia under Putin is a frequent target of these judgements. Russian elections, never mind that they are accurately predicted by numerous opinion polls over time, are always “irregular” and suspect. Although Russian reporters seem oddly free to complain and criticise, the press in Russia is always tightly controlled. Despite the largest anti-government protests for years, protest is always impossible. A Russian version of FARA is unacceptable. Russia is rated by Freedom House ever trending downwards even when it reverses actions Freedom House formerly condemned. Moscow always threatens its neighbours even though they remain independent and some are in NATO, where one would think they were well protected. And so on and on: the details change but the denunciations never do.

But, every now and again someone gives the game away.

The Executive Director of the US branch of Amnesty International when Pussy Riot was declared to be prisoners of conscience was Suzanne Nossel. In and out of US administrations and NGOs, at AI she boasted she was the author of a 2004 article in Foreign Affairs magazine entitled “Smart Power”. “Progressives now have a historic opportunity to reorient U.S. foreign policy around an ambitious agenda of their own… the great mainstay of twentieth-century U.S. foreign policy: liberal internationalism… liberal internationalists see trade, diplomacy, foreign aid, and the spread of American values as equally important.” She now heads PEN American Center and still boasts of “smart power”. She evidently sees no conflict of interest advancing “human rights” inside the US government structure or outside.

Another revealing quotation appeared in April in the Washington Post in a piece on US policy in Africa, specifically Niger. The author mentions several countries in which, notwithstanding certain human rights difficulties, Washington provides the governments with substantial money and keeps silent. Propping up the governments, in fact, as this government critic understands: “There is a need for change in our country, but our government doesn’t want to do what is necessary. Having a foreign military presence protects them”. “Human rights” are not so pre-eminent in these cases. Cynics have long suspected that Washington deploys “human rights” as a tool according to the conceptions of national interest but the author of the Washington Post piece found someone who actually admitted it: “‘The countries that cooperate with us get at least a free pass,’ acknowledged a senior U.S. official who specializes in Africa but spoke on condition of anonymity to avoid retribution. ‘Whereas other countries that don’t cooperate, we ream them as best we can.’”

So, let us see what we deduce from these two statements. Nossel, who happily moves between US administrations and NGOs – the G in NGO is apparently used here in a Pickwickian sense – lets us in on the secret that “human rights” are contingent and the “senior official” tells what they are contingent on. The phrase “human rights” is a code word: follow Washington’s lead and your “human rights” score will be OK, thwart it and the score will be bad. Quite easy to understand, isn’t it? (I can’t help wondering what became of our “senior official” – I don’t think you’re supposed to be that frank.)

Let us apply what we have learned to the case of Russia. Does Russia cooperate? No it does not, or at least not as completely as it apparently should. Therefore its “human rights” performance must be condemned and all Nossel’s N“G”Os will do so. Loudly.

So, Dear Reader, the next time you read a headline, or State Department utterance, saying “Russia’s Human Rights practice is bad” you now know what it really means: “Putin isn’t cooperative”. QED.

Are the international stances of Russia and the US inherently incompatible?

On By Patrick ArmstrongIn CONTRIBUTIONS TO GROUP DISCUSSIONS, THE WORLD IS CHANGING, WORLD POWER RELATIONSHIPS

http://us-russia.org/1193-are-the-international-stances-of-russia-and-the-us-inherently-incompatible.html

http://globaldiscussion.net/index.php?/topic/291-are-the-international-stances-of-russia-and-the-us-inherently-incompatible/

http://www.facebook.com/AmericanUniversityInMoscow/posts/514076858651580?notif_t=like

http://english.ruvr.ru/2013_04_18/Russia-is-not-very-pertinent-to-Washington-s-strategic-and-security-concerns-it-is-not-threatening-nuclear-war-today-expert/

JRL/2013/ 73/32

Countries enjoy claiming highfalutin values and principles as justification for their often sordid actions. But these principles are usually pretty malleable. Washington, for example, was firm on the principle of inviolability of borders in the Georgian case in 2008 but not so much in Yugoslavia in 1999; Moscow firmly held the opposite position each time. Moscow was supportive of the human rights of Ossetians but not so much about those of Kosovars; Washington, again, the opposite. Each was adept at manufacturing reasons why the inviolable principles of one case did not apply in the other.

But it is pleasing to one’s to self esteem to claim high motives. For years Washington has claimed the moral high ground of “democracy” and now we see Moscow claiming to be the home of stability. These noble self-portraits look most convincing at some distance. For Moscow to claim to be the thumb keeping the scales of world power balanced is to slip over its partial responsibility for the transformation of another Balkan squabble into a world war in 1914 and ignores most of the years between 1917 and 1990. Washington focuses its moral quizzing glass on Russia rather than say, Saudi Arabia: an “Arab Spring” for Libya but not for Bahrain.

But above this normal level of sanctimony-cloaked interest, the USA goes father with its bizarre obsession about Russia. It is bizarre because Russia is not very pertinent to Washington’s strategic and security concerns: it is not threatening nuclear war today; nor is Obama considering using force against it; neither does he see it as the greatest threat. Russia has surely seldom appeared in White House threat briefings for a decade and a half. If not a real opponent, then, Russia must fill some other need: a cost-free shadow opponent; a contrast that can be painted as dark as you like; an object of feel-good moral righteousness; a sullen teenager who must be brought to obedience.

Americans seem to need a rival, an opponent, a type of geopolitical chiaroscuro: the light can only shine against the darkness. Russia is large, significant and gives a contrast more substantial than, say, Venezuela.

Because US-Russia trade is pretty inconsequential, Russia is a low-cost object of periodic American fits of moral censure. An issue as trivial as Pussy Riot can be played up as a momentous violation whereas any sustained condemnation of the treatment of Shiites or Pakistani and Filipino servants in Saudi Arabia would come with a cost. Outrage against Russian “occupation” of parts of Georgia is cheap; outrage about Chinese occupation of Tibet is not. Russia’s sins are a perfect fit: giving a pleasing moral superiority without expensive consequences.

Or is Russia an ungrateful child? In the 1990s there was much talk about US aid and advice reforming Russia and some saw it as on the edge of becoming “just like us”. But it didn’t and such back-sliding cannot be forgiven.

And, of course, when you are looking down from a moral prominence, disagreement is sin. Moscow cannot just be disagreeing about the Syrian nightmare; it must be blocking “the legitimate aspirations of the Syrian people.”

So, the differences do seem incompatible so long as the curious American obsession endures.

As for global realities, how are the last two “humanitarian interventions” working out? The Guardian quotes reports identifying Hashim Thaçi, put into power by NATO, “as one of the ‘biggest fish’ in organised crime” in Kosovo and the less said about the “success” in Libya, the better. In these two cases, therefore, it doesn’t seem to be Moscow that is out of touch with global realities.

Can the West and Russia find a common approach to the Arab Spring?

On By Patrick ArmstrongIn CONTRIBUTIONS TO GROUP DISCUSSIONS, THE WORLD IS CHANGING, WORLD POWER RELATIONSHIPS

Note March 2016: I am considerably more sceptical about the independent nature of the “Arab Spring” revolts now than I was then.

http://us-russia.org/842-can-the-west-and-russia-find-a-common-approach-to-the-arab-spring.html

http://english.ruvr.ru/by_author/94378709/

The “Arab Spring” is becoming rather wintry. I foresee three end states, varying by country: return to the status quo of military-based kleptocracies tinctured this time with Islamism rather than national socialism; full Islamist takeovers; continual chaos. The revolts are responses to the failure of the “Arab socialism” of Nasser’s coup in Egypt in 1952 and the Baath coups in Syria and Iraq and Gaddafi’s eccentricities in Libya a decade later. Despite the customary fly-blown promises of future happiness, the realities were military dictatorships, corruption, injustice and hopelessness. Mohamed Bouazizi’s suicide in Tunisia lit the fuse.

Outside powers had no causative responsibility: it was a combustible mass awaiting the unpredictable event that would spark it off. The speed of development outpaced all Western reaction and there was nothing Western capitals could do either to speed or slow the flames.

In Libya the “West” (but note that Germany kept out of the operation) was animated by reports of humanitarian outrages, most notably that “Gaddafi is bombing his own people”. (But was he? “No confirmation” agreed US Defense Secretary Gates and Admiral Mullen. So what was a no fly zone supposed to achieve?) But the pressure “to do something” grew and, after seven months and an ever- escalating intervention, Gaddafi was killed: “we came, we saw, he died”. Cynics say oil was the “real” motive, but it would be absurd to argue that Libyan oil exports are more secure today. What national interest was there in overthrowing the eccentric, cruel but harmless (to us) dictator of Tripoli? What motive but transient humanitarian hysteria? That the intervention might make Libyans more miserable; that Libya might remain mired in devastation for years; that turmoil might spread are consequences no one considered in the passionate desire to “do something”. Now we hear similar reporting on Syria and the same demands to “do something”. But what if there is nothing any outsider can do but make it worse?

Moscow and Beijing take a more rational and self-interested position. Moscow is an intensely status-quo power: not only does it need peace and quiet to reconstruct but a historically-grounded pessimism tells it that much change is only change for the worse. China has few interests and has no desire to parade humanitarian pieties. And it too, has seen advertised better futures turn to dust.

The truth is that, short of picking a side and helping it win (something that did not work out well in Libya and would surely be worse in Syria) there is nothing outsiders can do to stop the fighting. Irreconcilable ends are struggling: the regimes are fighting for their lives and the jihadists for their Caliphate; neutrals are ground between these millstones.

Public opinion in the West is easily swayed by biased and hysterical reporting and Western governments feel compelled to “do something” (even without the licence to interfere everywhere given by the “smart power” theory). NATO has now accumulated several “humanitarian interventions” with bad results. Not that the excitable Western media remembers Somalia or Kosovo, let alone Libya. But Russian and Chinese public opinion is not so easily swayed and Moscow and Beijing have a more realistic view of national interest. Thus there will likely not be a meeting of minds on a common approach other than anodyne (and unheard) calls for ceasefires.

And, I can’t help thinking, especially now that intervention in Mali has passed from possibility to actuality, that many a Western government is secretly relieved that it can blame Moscow and Beijing for blocking it from committing to another ill thought out “something” that will create another “something” later on.

Will US-Russia Relations Begin a New Chapter in 2013?

On By Patrick ArmstrongIn CONTRIBUTIONS TO GROUP DISCUSSIONS, WAR ON RUSSIA, WORLD POWER RELATIONSHIPS

http://us-russia.org/676-will-us-russia-relations-begin-a-new-chapter-in-2013.html

A very short answer.

No.

The overwhelming support for the “Magnitskiy Bill” shows that there is a considerable non-partisan majority in Congress that believes that Russia is an exception to normal rules: trade with Russia yes, but never without conditions.

The USA is lost to rational considerations in this respect; for Americans Russia is both the Eternal Enemy and The Brother Who Won’t Listen to Good Advice.

To Americans in power, that is: to ordinary Americans, Russia hardly signifies in the reality of unemployment and food stamps.

The opportunity that opened in 1991 has been squandered: Washington, and we who follow its lead, have taken another step to create an enemy. And at a time when we do not need any more than we already have.

Russian Interests in Syria

On By Patrick ArmstrongIn CONTRIBUTIONS TO GROUP DISCUSSIONS, SYRIA, THE WORLD IS CHANGING, WORLD POWER RELATIONSHIPS

http://us-russia.org/615-making-sense-of-russia-and-chinas-stance-on-the-middle-east.html

Moscow’s objections to a NATO-led intervention in the civil war in Syria stand on three legs: principled, practical and personal. I suspect Beijing shares at least some of them.

The principled objections – which are what we hear most about – have to do with Moscow’s belief that the United Nations, for all its imperfections, provides a degree of international order and that the international principles of non-interference in internal activities and the inviolability of borders are important guides for international behaviour. The weakness of the principled argument, of course, is that a nation’s loudly-proclaimed principles vary according to its perceived national interest in each case. For example, in NATO’s Kosovo intervention in 1999, Moscow was strong on the principle of inviolability of borders while NATO spoke endlessly about the humanitarian imperative; each piously claimed the moral high ground. In the Ossetia war in 2008, these positions were exactly reversed while each continued to parade the moral superiority of its new principles. Principled objections, therefore, are selected according to self-interest. States make the arguments, they should not be completely ignored, but they are usually window-dressing for more deeply-felt objections.

Moscow’s practical objections ought to be clear from a consideration of the West’s previous “humanitarian interventions”. No one today ever mentions Somalia (1992) or Haiti (1994); the first being an utter disaster (it convinced Bin Laden of the “extent of your [the USA’s] impotence and weaknesses”) and the second ineffective. As to Kosovo (1999) we never heard about the KLA and organ harvesting at the time nor much else today about the people NATO put into power. The less said about today’s chaos in Libya (2011) the better. In short, the conclusions are – or ought to be – that none of these four “humanitarian interventions” bettered either human rights or stability. Moscow prefers less uncertainty in the world rather than more: it is very much a status quo power at the moment and it would like to avoid the chaos that another NATO-led “humanitarian intervention” would leave behind it.

Moscow’s personal objections are equally easy to understand. NATO has now overthrown Serbian power in Kosovo and Gaddafi’s rule in Libya; who’s next to be destabilised or overthrown? Russians see NATO expansion, all the fuss about Putin-the-monster which is the common stock of Western commentary and the rest and wonder whether there is an attempt to create or push a “coloured revolution” in Russia. (Not that the ones in Ukraine, Georgia or the Kyrgyz Republic turned out so well, come to think of it). Too many Russians see the West’s use of the word “democracy” as a geopolitical code for distinguishing between allies and targets. Another consideration is that every time the UN is bypassed Russia, as a member of the P5, is also bypassed.

So these three easily understandable objections are at the root of Moscow’s attempts to block NATO-led attempts to intervene in Syria,

And, given that the intervention in Kosovo took three and a half months and the overthrow of Kaddafi’s ramshackle regime about eight months, and that each involved much more effort and involvement than was light-heartedly assumed at the beginning, it is clear that a NATO-led effort to overthrow Assad would take a great deal of time and effort.

Perhaps Washington and its willing allies are secretly relieved that they can blame Moscow for preventing them from “resolving” the situation.

Post-US elections 2012: Toward A New World Order?

On By Patrick ArmstrongIn CONTRIBUTIONS TO GROUP DISCUSSIONS, WORLD POWER RELATIONSHIPS

http://us-russia.org/550-post-us-elections-2012-toward-a-new-world-order.html

William of Ockham, if he were here, would probably tell us that the next four years in the USA will resemble the last four. Sluggish economy, growing deficit, high unemployment, drone strikes offstage, the occasional attack on a US facility, armed interventions (is Mali next?). Maybe he would be wrong. But he has been a reliable guide for seven centuries.

As for Russian-US relations, at least the US President doesn’t say that Russia is the “number one geopolitical foe” but he still says “America remains the one indispensable nation. And the world needs a strong America”.

Ask for what end the heav’nly bodies shine,

Earth for whose use, Pride answers, ‘Tis for mine!

What of Obama’s whispered “flexibility” on missile defence? Well, it might amount to some genuine considerations and satisfaction of Russia’s concerns, but it might just be some words. After all, what was preventing Obama from doing something in this direction in the last four years? We shall see, but I don’t expect anything much. And, as I have argued elsewhere, the famous “reset” has not reset Washington’s conviction that Moscow will never be a reliable sled dog in the team.

But the reality is that Washington’s foreign concerns will be driven, as they have been since 2001 (and earlier) by some unexpected development in the Middle East/jihadist nexus and not by anything that originates from Moscow.

Reset? What Reset?

On By Patrick ArmstrongIn WAR ON RUSSIA, WORLD POWER RELATIONSHIPS

http://us-russia.org/515-reset-what-reset.html

http://www.russiaotherpointsofview.com/

JRL/2012/196/33

An important part of the Obama Administration’s new approach was the improvement of US-Russia relations and accordingly Obama, soon after taking office, began to speak of a “reset” in relations. Secretary of State Clinton formally launched the “reset” in Geneva with Lavrov on 6 March 2009. She presented him with a “reset button”. Nothing wrong with that as a symbol and something to put on his desk except for the fact that the wrong word was used and that wrong word was written in the Latin alphabet. Are we to assume – Clinton said “we worked hard to get the right Russian word” – that the US State Department has no Russian translators or no people who know that the Russians have their own alphabet? Of course not, but she evidently couldn’t be bothered to consult them. Microsoft and Apple, by the way, know the right word and what alphabet to use. An amateurish beginning to something that was presented as a serious policy change.

But, in my opinion, revealing: if she got something so simple so wrong, was the “reset” ever a thought-out policy? Or was it just a transitory rhetorical flourish?

Yes missile defence installations in Poland and the Czech Republic were cancelled. But missile defence is very far from off the table and Russia’s concerns are still brushed off as not being worthy of a serious response.

Yes, after years and years, Russia is a member of the World Trade Organisation but the absurdly obsolete Jackson-Vanik Amendment endures. Possibly to be replaced by the “Magnitskiy List”.

Yes, Saakashvili is no longer loudly praised but Russia still “occupies” Georgian territory. There is no indication of any reconsideration of that bumper-sticker, and formally incorrect, view.

NATO expansion, arguably the most neuralgic issue for Moscow, has stopped, but it’s still Washington’s official policy.

And the nuclear weapons agreement – not trivial, to be sure, but something that would likely have happened anyway. And, even though it’s not fashionable to say so: perhaps these agreements are not as important as they once were.

There is still no understanding that Moscow has few reasons to, and several good reasons not to, trust mere assertions. We, Washington and the rest of us dragged in its wake, may indeed be the “good guys” but we need to do some work on keeping our promises.

So some progress here and there but nothing to suggest any real effort to “reset” the assumption that Russia’s point of view is not to be taken seriously. Missile defence? We’ve told you it’s about “rogue states” with nuclear weapons and delivery systems and not Russia; you’re being obnoxious when you doubt our word. Ossetians and Abkhazians? They’ve been annexed by Russia and their opinion is worthless. Trade with Russia? Not without conditions. NATO expansion? Still a good idea, if not quite now.

But this small progress stopped with Russia’s elections. I have written elsewhere about BelayaLenta.com, “independent vote monitors”, the strange events in the US branch of Amnesty International. And then we come to the charge that Moscow prevents “progress” (what progress?) on Syria. For the Obama Administration, Russia remains deeply “undemocratic” and an obstacle. It’s as if there had been no “reset” at all.

So the “reset” seems to have been a stunt with nothing much behind it. And, at the end of 2012, relations between the US and Russia aren’t much better than they were four years ago. For official Washington, Russia is still an object of visceral suspicion, rooted mistrust and wilful incomprehension.

“Hot Spots” in the Former USSR

On By Patrick ArmstrongIn CONTRIBUTIONS TO GROUP DISCUSSIONS, HISTORY, SOUTH CAUCASUS, WORLD POWER RELATIONSHIPS

http://www.russialist.org/archives/russia-breakaway-states-903.php

Note February 2016. These were done for the Russia Profile Weekly Experts’ Panel which I cannot find on the Net now. Many were picked up by other sources and I have given links where I can find them.

Let’s start with a little chronology. Abkhazia and South Ossetia won their wars against Georgia in the early 1990s and each declared independence. Moscow did not recognise them. The clock turned over: new decade, new century; Moscow still didn’t recognise them. Georgia attacked again in 2008; Moscow recognised them.

Moscow has its own potential territorial problems: Kaliningrad, parts of Karelia, the “Northern Territories”; the border with China; North Caucasus independentists. It is a status quo power that prefers that everything stay the way it is because it has other things to worry about. It has little sympathy with irredentist claims.

So why did Medvedev decide to recognise the independence of Abkhazia and South Ossetia in 2008? Let’s ask him: “We restored peace, but we could not extinguish fears and hopes of the peoples of South Ossetia and Abkhazia in a situation when Saakashvili continued (with participation of and encouraged by the US and a number of other NATO members) to speak of re-arming his military and re-establishing control over ‘the Georgian territory’…. Russia was left no choice” (Regnum News, 28 August 2008). In short: recognition was the only way Moscow could think of to stop Tbilisi attacking again.

But why does Moscow care whether Tbilisi attacks again? My personal conviction is that its real fear is blowback. The last time Tbilisi went adventuring in South Ossetia and (especially) Abkhazia, North Caucasian militias (particularly Shamil Basayev’s Chechen Brigade) intervened. In those days, there was a desire to recreate the short-lived “Mountaineer Republic” of 1918. Basayev and his fighters, having defeated Tbilisi and established the western end of the “Mountaineer Republic”, returned to Chechnya to create the eastern end. Thus we can connect the Georgian attack on Abkhazia with the first war in Chechnya, the second war and Moscow’s troubles in the North Caucasus today. Ergo, Moscow does not want that to happen again; ergo it must ensure that Tbilisi will not attack Abkhazia and South Ossetia again; ergo recognition means that Tbilisi will know that another attack means it faces Russia; ergo that should stop it from attacking again. QED.

The other ex-Soviet “hotspots” are still negotiable. Transdnestr needs a guarantee that should Chisinau join Romania, this former piece of the Ukrainian SSR does not have to follow it and Karabakhians need a guarantee that they won’t be massacred by “Turks”. These are still imaginable. These borders are Stalin-Jughashvili’s creations and there’s no reason the rest of us should take them as sacred and unchangeable.

Few Western capitals have figured this out. In the meantime the status quo is endurable from Moscow’s point of view. Therefore, as things stand today with fragile ceasefires holding, Moscow has no reason to recognise either Transdnestr or Karabakh.

Everyone should have followed Kiev’s wise and just treatment of Crimea or Chisinau’s wise and just response to Gagauz wishes.

But who in the West has ever heard of either?