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Issue #104 | June 2, 2000 | ||||
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Issue #104 | June 2, 2000 | ||||
CDI Russia Weekly-#104
2 June 2000
Edited by David Johnson
Center for Defense Information
1779 Massachusetts Ave. NW
Washington DC 20036
phone: 202-332-0600; fax:202-462-4559
djohnson@cdi.org
The CDI Russia Weekly is an e-mail newsletter that carries news and
analysis on all aspects of today's Russia, including political,
economic, social, military, and foreign policy issues. With funding
from the Carnegie Corporation of New York, CDI Russia Weekly is a
project of the Washington-based Center for Defense Information (CDI),
a nonprofit research and education organization.
CDI Russia Weekly web page (with archive): http://www.cdi.org/russia/
Visit CDI's web site: http://www.cdi.org
Contents:
1. Moscow Times: Robert Coalson, MEDIA WATCH:
Clinton's Moral Obligation.
2. Obshchaya Gazeta: Viktor Litovkin, ABROGATING
THE ABM TREATY: PROS AND CONS. Russian generals suggest that the Kremlin
make a last stand.
3. MSNBC: Tom Curry, Step back from the brink?
Ahead of Moscow summit, U.S. debates nuclear ‘hair-trigger’
4. The Global Beat Syndicate: Mikhail Pogorely, The
Summit of Low Expectations.
5. The Irish Times: Disquiet over Putin's
appointments grows. The Russian leader is regarded as a centralist
intent on concentrating power, writes Seamus Martin.
6. The Russia Journal: Alexander Golts, Russia’s
militaristic vertical line.
7. The Globe and Mail (Canada): Geoffrey York, Camp
rejects terrorism claims. Impoverishment more evident than missiles as
thousands fear retaliation from Russia.
8. Moscow Times: Pavel Felgenhauer, DEFENSE
DOSSIER: No Safety in Numbers.
9. RFE/RL: Paul Goble, U.S./Russia: Analysis From
Washington -- Containing Rogue States, Maintaing Balance Of Power.
*******
Moscow Times
June 2, 2000
MEDIA WATCH: Clinton's Moral Obligation
By Robert Coalson
Robert Coalson is a program director for the National Press Institute.
The
views expressed here are not necessarily those of NPI.
I imagine that sometime during this weekend's summit between presidents
Bill
Clinton and Vladimir Putin, the conversation will turn to the state of
press
freedom in Russia. The scandals around Radio Liberty correspondent
Andrei
Babitsky and the recent raid against Media-MOST make it inevitable that
Clinton will express his concern that Putin's oft-stated predilection
for a
"dictatorship of law" masks a fundamentally hostile attitude
toward open
society and democratic institutions.
Nonetheless, concern for civil liberties and freedom of the press is
nowhere
near the top of the summit agenda. According to a spokesman for the U.S.
State Department, it is not formally on the agenda at all, although we
are
told, "President Clinton will be speaking to the media and
publicly" on this
issue.
One crucial aspect of the government's recent actions with regard to the
press that I pray Clinton will address is a phenomenon that I call
"creeping
xenophobia." I have been particularly alarmed over the last year or
so by
repeated efforts of authorities at all levels to tar the nonstate media
and
civic groups generally with the accusation that they are in the pay of
either
Chechen terrorists or foreign security agencies.
Such unsubstantiated accusations have played a major role in many recent
high-profile scandals, from the case of environmental activist Alexander
Nikitin to that of journalists Grigory Pasko and Babitsky. Every time
Media-MOST comes into conflict with the authorities, there is a subtext
of
innuendo about the fact that Vladimir Gusinsky is a Jew and holds
Israeli
citizenship.
In the last two weeks, officials of the Press Ministry have spoken out
on
several occasions against "media that act against the interests of
Russia"
and have called for tougher laws to combat the "abuse of freedom of
speech."
Putin himself, it will be remembered, stated in January that he thought
that
Babitsky was "clearly in the service of the enemy."
In February, national state media spread the story that millions of
dollars
had been smuggled into Russia by Chechen terrorists in order to bribe
journalists "to communicate distortions and false information about
acting
President Vladimir Putin and the armed forces in Chechnya." This
shows how
easily the charge of foreign infiltration can be expanded from merely
affecting outlets that are formally foreign-owned to virtually any
company or
even individual that the state decides to target.
Clinton should take these developments very seriously and should use the
summit to unambiguously deflate these dangerous trial balloons. After
all,
Western (particularly U.S.) assistance has, in one way or another,
touched
virtually every nonstate media outlet and every civic group in the
country
over the last eight years. There is hardly a journalist in Russia who
has not
attended a Western-funded seminar (been "brainwashed," as the
xenophobes
would say) and hardly a single significant nonstate media outlet here
that
has not received some form of Western-financed assistance (been
"bought").
In 1997, I participated in a U.S.-funded project that installed a
private
newspaper printing press in Volgograd. Local state-controlled media
rabidly
attacked the project: Volgogradskaya Pravda printed an interview with
Vladimir Zhirinovsky in which he said, "Your newspaper Gorodskiye
Vesti
received $500,000. For what? In order to be a pro-American organ in
Volgograd. Americans don't give money out of the goodness of their
hearts.
... It is obvious who is for Russia and who is against."
Two years later, another Western-funded organization completed a similar
project in Chelyabinsk. The official reaction was identical. Deputy
Governor
Andrei Kosilov told reporters that "local organs had been asked to
keep track
of the Americans in a region that has concentrated so much of the
country's
strategic nuclear potential." The paper that hosted this project
has been
under unrelenting assault for more than a year.
For nearly a decade, the West has been aiding a vast range of
non-governmental organizations and nonstate media outlets across Russia.
A
lot of dedicated people have responded to Western-supported efforts to
stimulate public life in the regions and have put themselves in truly
dangerous positions. President Clinton has a moral obligation to defend
them
forcefully before it is too late. Otherwise, I fear we will see more and
more
cases where Western assistance actually serves as the pretext for
further
crackdowns.
*******
Obshchaya Gazeta
No. 22
[translation from RIA Novosti for personal use only]
ABROGATING THE ABM TREATY: PROS AND CONS
Russian generals suggest that the Kremlin make a last stand
By Viktor LITOVKIN, Obshchaya Gazeta's military analyst
The Russian Federation's Defense Ministry has
suggested
that the Kremlin make a last stand reminiscent of the battle
for Stalingrad during the forthcoming Russian-US summit that
would deal with ways of amending the 1972 ABM (Anti-Ballistic
Missile) Treaty. As distinct from president Yeltsin, who didn't
have the habit of asking the advice of Russia's top brass on
the most important strategic issues, the new Russian leader has
held large-scale consultations involving the General Staff's
representatives, as well as experts from this country's
Strategic Missile Forces, on the eve of the Moscow summit. The
concerned parties have made an unequivocal decision, which was
stated last week by Col.-Gen. Valery Manilov, who serves as
First Deputy Chief of the Russian Armed Forces' General Staff.
To cut a long story short, the Russian side believes that the
document's modification or its partial amendment are
unacceptable.
Moscow thinks that the deployment of a national
US ABM
system would thus destroy the corner-stone of all disarmament
accords, which had been reached by our two countries over the
last 30 years. Consequently, any decision to deploy such an ABM
system would propel us back to that Cold War-style
confrontation. However, this doesn't constitute Russia's
choice; besides, all those, who refuse to abide by their
voluntary commitments, should assume responsibility for such a
choice. One gets the impression that such a position implies
the Washington administration alone.
Neither the Kremlin, nor Russia's military are
scared over
the fact that the demolition of all START treaties, the INF
(Intermediate Nuclear Force) Treaty and other bilateral accords
would wreck the current shaky Russian-US balance of power, also
providing the United States with huge advantages (as regards
the subsequent re-deployment of strategic offensive arms) and
ruling out the possibility of that long-awaited START III
treaty's elaboration. Besides, such actions would prevent our
two countries from coordinating the reduction of their
respective nuclear arsenals from 3,000-3,500 to 1,500 warheads
(in line with the START II treaty). In the long run, a new arms
race would get underway.
However, Moscow keeps saying that it would make an asymmetrical
response to such a decision, as it comments on the aforesaid
apprehensions.
Still no one can explain, what this means. Or,
perhaps,
they don't want to offer such explanations because the list of
possible retaliatory measures (in the wake of a US decision to
shred the ABM Treaty) remains largely unclear at this stage.
However, independent experts claim that, owing to purely
economic factors, Russia can't afford to take part in yet
another arms race. Nevertheless, this country can deploy MIRVed
Topol ICBMs, fitting them with three warheads each.
Apart from that, Russia can field new generation ICBMs aboard
SSBNs (Strategic Submarines Ballistic Nuclear), also deploying
their mobile and silo-based versions. The relevant ICBM designs
can be altered anytime now. As a result, Russia would be able
to penetrate just about any national ABM system with nearly
100-percent certainty during the next 15-20 years.
Besides, Russia and China might well expand their cooperation,
invigorating mutual efforts to develop strategic missiles and
ABM systems. Russia would also join hands with India, Iran and
Libya, also deploying medium-range missiles in its European
regions and, maybe, even in Belarus. In other words, neither
the United States, nor its European allies would get away with
it, in case they abrogate all those strategic accords, our
interlocutors claimed.
Meanwhile some Russian experts, including
Alexei Arbatov,
who serves as deputy chairman of the State Duma's defense
committee, believe that this country can make some apparently
profitable concessions with regard to the US administration.
Arbatov is inclined to think that the Russian side could agree
to the creation of a second US ABM district on Alaska (in
addition to North Dakota). Incidentally, this scenario had been
suggested by the very first ABM Treaty version. In exchange,
Russia could demand that the United States approve the
deployment of those versatile MIRVed Topol ICBMs featuring
three warheads each. Besides, the US could provide the
appropriate START III guarantees, also agreeing to prune the
number of nuclear warheads down to 1,500. Similar proposals are
currently being voiced by some US presidential candidates.
The men in the Kremlin are still trying hard to
disregard
such scenarios. The Russian side would like the Washington
administration to make the next move, obviously expecting it to
ostentatiously scrap the 1972 ABM Treaty. However, the Russians
say nothing about the gist of such possible US decisions.
Russia doesn't want to stipulate any specific deadlines for
making statements that would deal with an asymmetrical response.
Meanwhile the United States has already started
shredding
the ABM Treaty, as it continues to build an early-warning radar
in the vicinity of Norway's Vardo town. It ought to be
mentioned in this connection that the 1972 ABM Treaty expressly
forbids the deployment of such facilities outside national
territories.
*******
MSNBC
Step back from the brink?
Ahead of Moscow summit, U.S. debates nuclear ‘hair-trigger’
By Tom Curry
MSNBC
NEW YORK, May 30 — As President Bill Clinton heads to a meeting
with
Russian President Vladimir Putin, arms control advocates and members of
Congress are urging him to reach an agreement with Putin on taking
nuclear
weapons off “hair-trigger alert.”
“THESE WEAPONS should not sit like cars at a drag
race with revved
engines waiting for the start light to turn green,” says Rep. Edward
Markey,
D-Mass. But the Clinton administration warns that taking nuclear weapons
off
alert might increase the risk of an attack on the United States.
The strategies of Russia and the United States are
governed as they
were during the Cold War by the “mutually-assured-destruction”
concept of
deterrence. The theory holds that Russian leaders will not order an
attack on
the United States because they are certain their American counterparts
would
have enough missiles left to launch a devastating counter-attack.
TWO MINUTES TO LAUNCH
And both sides keep their nuclear weapons
primed for quick launch.
Bruce Blair, the president of the Center for
Defense Information,
explains: “If a launch order were sent right now from the Pentagon and
its
counterpart south of Moscow in Russia, that launch order would be
received by
the crews in the field, validated using codes from their safes, and then
implemented by inserting on to computer keyboards a series of coded
commands
that would send electronic signals to the missiles to re-target them and
to
fire.”
All this would take no more than two minutes,
Blair says.
But hasn’t Clinton said that no Russian
missiles are targeted at any
American city?
So he did, but Blair and other experts contend
that the 1994
U.S.-Russian de-targeting accord was merely symbolic — a “cosmetic
agreement
that had no impact on the nuclear hair trigger,” Blair said.
“It takes about two seconds to re-target
missiles,” Blair says.
Arjun Makhijani, a nuclear engineer and head of
the Institute for
Energy and Environmental Research, says, “The de-targeting of nuclear
weapons
didn’t have much technical effect on the time it would take to launch
nuclear
weapons, but it did have a very big political effect: it has put the
country
to sleep. The Berlin Wall has fallen, the Soviet Union has fallen apart,
and
the weapons have been de-targeted, so people think they have gone
away.”
RUSSIAN FEARS
The Russians “have the incentive to put their
weapons on higher and
higher alert as their infrastructure deteriorates,” says Makhijani.
“They
cannot keep their submarines at sea because they can’t afford it. Most
of
their submarines are in port. They are afraid of being wiped out in a
first
strike. So they keep their weapons on higher alert than the United
States.”
A National Academy of Sciences panel of retired
generals and
civilian strategists reported three years ago: “the dangers of
initiation of
nuclear war by error (e.g., based on false warning of attack) or by
accident
(e.g., by a technical failure) remain unacceptably high.”
The panel called for “dramatically reduced
alert levels.” De-alerting
would entail such steps as:
Taking the “launch keys” away from the crews in missile silos and on
submarines.
“Pinning” missiles in their silos so they could not receive
electronic
launch signals from any source, a step that would take a day or so to
reverse.
Removing warheads from missiles and putting
them in storage, which
Blair says, “would take days to reverse, because it would be a very
labor-intensive and technical procedure to mount warheads back on
missiles.”
Blair insists that de-alerting does not
undermine deterrence.
“The fact that the missiles were off alert
shouldn’t change that
calculation whatsoever,” he contends. “If those weapons were secured
and
essentially invulnerable, they could be re-constituted, maybe it takes a
day
or even a week. They could be fired in retaliation. This is not an
argument
for complete abolition of nuclear weapons.”
But Blair notes that “there is a school of
thought in U.S. military
circles that prompt retaliation to an attack is essential to deterrence
and
that if the United States were attacked and it took hours, days or
longer to
reconstitute the capability to respond, that this would represent a
window of
danger that could be exploited by an aggressor. I think that argument
does
not hold water.”
UNDERMINING DETERRENCE?
Calling the de-alerting of missiles a
“hare-brained idea,” former
Reagan administration Defense Department official Frank Gaffney says,
“it is
highly problematic to maintain deterrence if you willy-nilly start
disabling
your weapons.”
Deterrence means “maximizing the feeling a
political adversary has
that they will suffer vastly greater pain than any pain they can inflict
on
us,” Gaffney says. “If the adversary starts having illusions about
that and
thinks that you will not be able to inflict greater or commensurate
pain,
then you may have increased considerably the incentive he feels to
attack
you.”
Last week the idea of taking U.S. missiles off
alert was endorsed by a
man who might be in a position to implement the policy next January,
Republican presidential contender George W. Bush.
“America should rethink the requirements for
nuclear deterrence in a
new security environment,” Bush declared in a speech in Washington.
“The
United States should remove as many weapons as possible from high-alert,
hair-trigger status…. Preparation for quick launch — within minutes
after
warning of an attack — was the rule during the era of superpower
rivalry. But
today, for two nations at peace, keeping so many weapons on high alert
may
create unacceptable risks of accidental or unauthorized launch.”
RISKS OF AN ABM SYSTEM
While lauding Bush for endorsing to the
de-alert idea, arms control
advocates criticize Bush’s proposal for building a national missile
defense
system. “A U.S. national missile defense will simply reinforce
Russia’s
readiness to launch quickly on warning or in a crisis in order to be
confident that Russia could overwhelm any national missile defenses that
the
United States might deploy,” Blair says.
By advocating both de-alerting of nuclear
arsenals and an ABM system,
Bush is trying to outflank Gore and portray himself as a president who
would
break the mold of Cold War thinking.
Bush’s rival, Vice President Al Gore, says
that the Clinton
administration has already taken steps to lessen the risk of accidental
war
such as de-targeting missiles. Gore’s campaign spokesman Douglas
Hattaway
says that Bush’s ambitious missile defense plan “is irresponsible
and shows
that he lacks the depth of experience to keep America safe and
secure.”
But Bush insisted last week that, “It is
possible to build a missile
defense, and defuse confrontation with Russia. America should do
both.”
******
The Global Beat Syndicate
The Summit of Low Expectations
By Mikhail Pogorely
June 1, 2000
Mikhail Pogorely heads the Nuclear Reporting project of the National
Press
Institute in Moscow.
MOSCOW -- Even before between Presidents Clinton and Putin meet, the
media in
both the United States and Russia are wondering why these talks are
expected
to be so much less effective than those super-power summits of old.
The answers are obvious. During the Soviet era, such sessions were rare
and
dramatic occasions, filled with the potential for danger and
confrontation
for both sides.
In more recent times, the meetings between Clinton and former president
Boris
Yeltsin took on a more workmanlike tone. But even these talks were often
preceded by months of preparatory work, conducted under the aegis of the
commission chaired by Vice President Al Gore and former Russian prime
minister Viktor Chernomyrdin.
This time, however, there appears to have been little work done in
advance of
the upcoming talks. For Russians, it's almost as if they expect their
new
"czar" to miraculously solve international problems, just as
he has internal
issues.
Given the absence of drama and preparation, what can Russia
realistically
hope to gain from these talks?
For one thing, the new leadership in Moscow hopes to achieve a certain
amount
of legitimacy from the meeting. Since being elected president, Putin
only
foreign travels have been to London and Kiev, not enough to make him
feel
like a real world-class statesman. But these talks in Moscow will put
him on
a par with the president of the United States.
In addition, Putin hopes the meeting will help shore up his position at
home.
He has just started his attempt to consolidate both his personal power
and
that of the federal government inside Russia. But he continues to face
many
challenges to his authority, both from those who question the results of
the
recent elections and those who are uneasy with his KGB-military style of
leadership. A visit by the U.S. president is expected to solidify his
position domestically.
It is well understood here that Clinton is coming with the hope of
achieving
some type of compromise on the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty and the
potential deployment of a missile defense system by the United States.
Since it was signed in 1972, the ABM treaty has never been the focus of
internal Soviet or Russian policy, no matter how important it may be for
world stability. Even when former president Ronald Reagan challenged the
world with his Strategic Defense Initiative back in 1983, there was
little
panic in the USSR. While the issue was exploited by the state propaganda
organs to show the world just where the threat to peace came from, the
country's military and diplomatic elite were relatively unconcerned by
the
proposal.
But nowadays, even though military and technological experts acknowledge
that
a U.S. missile defense system poses little threat to Russia for the next
10
to 15 years, the nation's military and diplomatic leaders' display much
more
concern -- some might say they're somewhat hysterical -- over the issue.
Why?
Russia's exaggerated reaction to any modification of the ABM Treaty
stems
from the fact that there currently are no other channels through which
it can
communicate with United States other than on issues of strategic
weapons,
arms control and nuclear disarmament. Talks over changes in the ABM
Treaty
are one of the few levers of influence left to Russia in its relations
with
the United States.
It's ironic that negotiations between the two nations will once again
focus
on arms control, the issue that dominated such meetings in the 1970s and
1980s. Almost all the agreements expected to be signed by the two
leaders
over the coming days -- agreements and statements confirming strategic
missile de-targeting, conversion of weapons-grade plutonium, the
exchange of
data on accidental missile launching -- focus on this topic.
>From Russia's viewpoint, any discussions about modifying the ABM
Treaty must
take into account that:
-- The treaty today is the cornerstone of strategic stability and one of
the
major means to guarantee Russia's security;
-- Any nuclear missile defense system is hardly feasible in the near
future;
-- A U.S. nuclear missile defense system is aimed against the Russian
missile
arsenal, not "rogue states," as the Clinton administration
contends;
-- Any future U.S. administration will continue to pursue a
nuclear-missile
defense system;
-- Russia will be unable to maintain a strategic nuclear arsenal with
more
than 1,500 warheads over the next decade;
-- The Pentagon is unwilling to reduce its strategic nuclear arsenal
below
2,000 or 2,500 warheads.
Therefore, Russia is likely to display a willingness to negotiate a deal
that
would allow the U.S. to continue work on a missile-defense system -- a
technology that it believes is hardly achievable anyway -- in exchange
for
progress on START III negotiations that would reduce the size of the
U.S.
nuclear arsenal.
Sources in the Russian Security Council, Ministry of Defense and
Ministry of
Foreign Affairs indicate that such a trade-off can hardly be expected at
this
summit. At best, both sides may agree to begin a dialogue that may
eventually
lead to such an agreement at future meetings.
After all, even though Clinton has only a short time left in office,
it's
likely that he and Putin will meet several times, including talks at the
G-8
summit in July in Okinawa and at the United Nations Millennium Summit in
September.
>From Moscow's point of view, there's still plenty of time to strike
such a
bargain.
******
The Irish Times
June 1, 2000
Disquiet over Putin's appointments grows
The Russian leader is regarded as a centralist intent on concentrating
power,
writes Seamus Martin
RUSSIA: When President Clinton meets President Putin in Moscow at the
weekend
the main issue, ostensibly, will be Russia's fierce opposition to NMD,
the
US's proposed defence shield against nuclear attacks from "rogue
nations"
such as Libya, Iran, Iraq and North Korea.
But following allegations by the French newspaper Le Monde that Mr Putin
had
links with a German company whose co-founder has been charged with
money-laundering and organised crime, a great deal of attention will
focus on
the Russian President's personality.
On the nuclear front Russia does not believe for a moment that the NMD
shield
is being designed to protect the United States from countries whose
missiles
are incapable in any event of reaching the American continent. It
regards the
moves as a blatant breach of the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty
(ABM) and
has declared its stance on that treaty "immutable".
Mr Clinton has failed in his eight years in office to sign a major arms
reduction agreement with Russia. He will arrive in Moscow as a lame-duck
President and is increasingly likely to leave a decision on NMD to his
successor.
The Moscow summit is unlikely, therefore, to bring about any concrete
results
in the main area on which the talks will centre. Whether it will help
give
the Americans a clearer picture of Mr Putin's character is another
matter.
In recent days, three main indications as to Mr Putin's intentions have
emerged. First, he has come to be regarded as an undoubted centralist
attempting to concentrate power in the hands of a presidency already far
more
powerful than in any Western democracy.
There are indications, too, that media criticism will not be tolerated,
while
his selection of personnel for cabinet and other posts indicates that
links
with the shady Kremlin group known as "The Family" will be
maintained.
Mr Putin's main move in concentrating power has been to divide Russia
into
seven territories to replace the often chaotic system which evolved
under Mr
Yeltsin.
Under legislation which gained overwhelming initial backing in the lower
house of parliament yesterday, Mr Putin will be able to sack elected
regional
governors, dissolve regional assemblies and deprive governors of their
seats
in the Federation Council, the upper house of the national parliament.
These proposals are linked to a decree appointing seven presidential
envoys
to ensure that Mr Putin's rule is unchallenged in the new super-regions.
Most
Russians agree that something needs to be done about the vast country's
unwieldy system of government and the plan has strong support.
There are concerns, however, about the calibre of those chosen by Mr
Putin as
his envoys to the new regions. Two of them are former KGB officers, two
are
army generals, one is a former Interior Ministry official, one is a
former
diplomat and only one, former prime minister Sergei Kiriyenko, is a
politician.
In his own home region Mr Putin has appointed Gen Viktor Cherkesov,
one-time
head of the investigative department of the Leningrad KGB. In that
position
Gen Cherkesov prepared cases against people who distributed books by
Solzhenitsyn, Pasternak and Nabokov and was responsible for the
imprisonment
of a number of the city's intellectuals for "antisoviet
activities".
President Gorbachev later pardoned most of these.
Appointments to central political office are equally worrying. Mr
Putin's new
Prime Minister, Mr Mikhail Kasyanov, is known to have links to the
sinister
oligarch and media mogul, Mr Boris Berezovsky, and "The
Family". A majority
of the new cabinet is believed to have "Family" links and the
quiet
reappointment of Mr Alexander Voloshin as Mr Putin's chief of staff
indicates
that "The Family" has retained its power in the Kremlin.
Mr Voloshin's hold on Mr Putin is such that, according to the Russian
media,
he recently persuaded the president to scrap the appointment of Mr
Dmitri
Kozak from St Petersburg as prosecutor general, and appoint Mr Vladimir
Ustinov in his place. Mr Ustinov had not been noted for his enthusiasm
in
pursuing Kremlin insiders.
In Switzerland at least one prosecutor has taken a different stance. It
emerged yesterday that a Geneva investigating magistrate, Mr Daniel
Devaud,
planned to charge Kosovo-Albanian businessman Beghjet Pacolli with
money-laundering and membership of a criminal organisation. The charges
are
connected with the renovation of the Grand Kremlin Palace in which Mr
Putin
was inaugurated.
Mr Devaud also has issued an international arrest warrant against former
Kremlin property manager Mr Pavel Borodin, and claimed this week that he
had
assembled enough evidence to secure a conviction. It was at Mr Borodin's
invitation that Mr Putin left the relative obscurity of St Petersburg
politics and took his first job in the Kremlin. Mr Putin proposed Mr
Borodin
as secretary of the commission for the reunification of Russia and
Belarus, a
position he still holds.
While Mr Putin's tolerance of those accused of irregularities does not
mean
that he himself is involved in shady activities, Le Monde has for the
first
time made serious personal allegations against the Russian President. It
has
alleged that Mr Putin and Mr Gherman Gref, the Minister for Economic
Strategy, were involved with a German real-estate company whose
co-founder
was arrested earlier this month on charges of money-laundering and links
to
organised crime. The presidential administration has denied the
allegations.
In the area of freedom of expression the armed raid on the Media-Most
group,
which did not support Mr Putin's presidential campaign, has been the
main
cause of concern so far. A statement by the Information Minister, Mr
Mikhail
Lesin, that he was preparing legislation to suspend the activities of
"hostile Western media" raised eyebrows further.
The most bizarre media casualty, however, has been the lifesize doll
made in
Mr Putin's likeness and used in Kukly, the Russian version of Spitting
Image.
The NTV channel, which runs the country's most popular show, said the
Putin
puppet had been "temporarily withdrawn".
******
The Russia Journal
May 29-June 4, 2000
Russia’s militaristic vertical line
By ALEXANDER GOLTS
Columnist Alexander Golts looks at how the new seven regions correspond
almost exactly to the borders of military districts.
IS RUSSIA’S MILITARY now calling the shots in the seven new regions?
The first thing commentators noticed as soon as Vladimir Putin had
proclaimed
his decree on the creation of seven federal districts was that their
borders
correspond almost exactly to the borders of the military districts.
In preparing this decree, Security Council officials insisted that they
did
not want to reinvent the wheel. According to them, it was simply that
the
military had first applied a more rational method of dividing up the
country.
At the same time, the officials pretended not to understand that the
military
was first and foremost considering the possibility of creating a defense
against an outside threat and of mobilizing a sufficient number of
reservists
to carry out such a defense.
It would be more reasonable to assume that in demarcating the federal
districts, the main concern would be the characteristics of economic
cooperation and interdependence of the regions. We should remember that
these
characteristics are not a secret. They were taken into account and
displayed
during the creation of organizations such as "Great Volga" or
"Siberian
Agreement."
But for Putin, it is more important that his representatives have access
to
the capabilities of the military staffs operative links with the
armed
forces and Moscow, communications possibilities and the armed units
"at hand."
All doubt as to the role due to be assigned to the presidential envoys
disappeared once their names were made known. Among the magnificent
seven
there are only two civilians. The rest are generals. They are used to
governing by decrees that are carried out by subordinate officers
without
question.
Only the most naive person could believe that Putin's envoys will be
able to
"develop programs for the socioeconomic development of the
regions" and to
"organize cooperation between the federal organs of executive power
and the
organs of state power in the regions of the Russian Federation."
They are not being appointed for this purpose. Putin, it would seem,
truly
feels that the greatest threat Russia faces is disintegration. Like
Bismarck,
he is ready to use force to keep the country together. To this end, all
regional forces are subordinate to the presidential envoys the
administration of the FSB, Interior Ministry, internal armed forces
groups
and border groups. Even Defense Ministry generals are somewhat confused
because it is not known how much the military district commanders will
be
subordinate to the presidential envoys.
At the same time, it is worth noting that the Kremlin strategists do not
intend for Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov’s Cabinet to be the real
Putin
administration. It will instead be the Security Council, whose members
are
the heads of the armed forces. This is supposedly where the most
important
political decisions will be drawn up.
It is telling that current Security Council Secretary Sergei Ivanov is
already commenting on the most important questions of international and
internal policy.
It follows that the executive vertical line Putin is busy creating at
the
moment has a distinctly military character. The president believes that
once
the military system of subordination is introduced throughout the state,
all
problems will be solved automatically.
Only people with no real military experience could believe this.
Otherwise,
they would know full well that military officials can "twist"
orders that
they do not wish to carry out. After all, the plans to combine armed
units
into 14 military departments have been under way for some time. But so
far,
not even their rear services have been combined.
If the armed forces become subordinate to the presidential envoys, not
only
will the governors have its authority undermined, but so will the heads
of
the armed forces who have only just been appointed. This is because any
military structure is built on the principle of sole authority.
In this case, the administrative vertical line will be forked, and
effective
management of both civilian and military bodies will become impossible.
The
governors cannot fail to understand this, unconcerned as they are that
generals are on their way to take control.
*******
The Globe and Mail (Canada)
June 1, 2000
Camp rejects terrorism claims
Impoverishment more evident than missiles
as thousands fear retaliation from Russia
GEOFFREY YORK
Pankisi Gorge, Georgia -- The Chechen points to a refugee girl wandering
near
a decrepit shack in their mountain valley. "There's our terrorist
training
base," he says, smiling grimly.
This is the rugged Pankisi Gorge of northern Georgia, on the edge of the
Caucasus Mountains, where thousands of Chechen refugees are sheltered in
impoverished villages near the Chechnya border.
This is also, according to Russian allegations, the site of a secret
Afghan
terrorist training camp, filled with hundreds of Taliban mercenaries and
1,500 Chechen guerrillas equipped with Stinger anti-aircraft missiles
and
other heavy weaponry.
"I haven't seen any Taliban terrorists here," Ali, a
27-year-old refugee,
says matter-of-factly. "It's really funny."
But they realize it is not a joking matter. The terrorism allegations
are
repeated daily by Russian military and government officials and the
Russian
media. It has become a steady drumbeat of verbal attacks, provoking
fears
that Russian warplanes are preparing to bomb the 7,000 Chechens in the
Pankisi Gorge -- even though the gorge is located in a foreign country
and a
bombing attack would mean a dramatic expansion of the Chechnya war.
Moscow has threatened to bomb Taliban "terrorist camps" in
Afghanistan. If
the Russians are prepared to attack Afghanistan, analysts say, they
might
also consider air strikes in Georgia.
The Chechens know how they will respond. "If the Russians bomb the
Pankisi
Gorge, I will have no alternative," Ali says, as other refugees nod
in
agreement. "They will force me to become a terrorist."
Georgian officials acknowledge that some of the Chechen refugees may be
rebel
fighters. Compared to the teeming refugee camps in the Russian region of
Ingushetia, Chechens in the Pankisi Gorge include a much higher
percentage of
young bearded men of fighting age.
Russian bombing attacks could serve a dual purpose: to harass the
Chechen
separatist rebels, and to destabilize the pro-Western government of
Georgia,
whose military is too small and weak to defend the country from air
strikes.
"They are trying to show that they can break Georgia's backbone
whenever they
want," said Zaza Gachechiladze, editor of a newspaper in Tbilisi,
the
Georgian capital. "We're frightened. It's very serious."
A visit to the gorge shows that the Russian terrorism allegations are
implausible. The valley is small and narrow, with only one potholed road
through it. Concealing a terrorist base would be difficult. If there are
1,500 guerrillas here, every fifth Chechen in the valley would have to
be a
rebel fighter -- yet the vast majority are women, children and old men.
These facts haven't deterred the Russian propaganda campaign. Two weeks
ago,
Russian Defence Minister Igor Sergeyev charged that Chechens in the
Pankisi
Gorge were planning to launch "terrorist acts" in late May or
early June. He
vowed to take "preventive measures" against the Chechens
before they enter
Russia.
A few days later, the Russian military said its warplanes had attacked a
"caravan of pack animals" accompanied by "about 80 Afghan
Taliban fighters"
as they travelled across the mountains from Georgia into Chechnya.
In Tbilisi, officials say the Russians are trying to fuel anti-Georgian
hysteria.
"It's a sort of psychological war," said Archil Gegeshidze, a
senior
foreign-policy adviser in the Georgian government. "Their actions
seem to
indicate that they want instability here, so that we don't move ahead
with
our rapprochement with the United States and integration into
Euro-Atlantic
institutions. Russia wants our conflicts to remain unresolved."
He acknowledged, however, that there could be as many as 100 Chechen
fighters
sheltering in the Pankisi Gorge.
"Among the refugees were wounded people who had fought against the
Russians,"
Mr. Gegeshidze said. "Now they have recovered and could go back.
The mountain
passes will soon be open. We cannot tightly control the whole border.
They
could easily penetrate the border in small groups of three or five. But
of
course there aren't any Taliban terrorists or Stinger missiles among
them.
Those are groundless allegations."
Some observers predict that Chechnya's rebel fighters could retreat
across
the mountains into the Pankisi Gorge if the Russian military succeeds in
pushing them out of their strongholds. This could also tempt Russia into
launching cross-border raids into Georgian territory.
Lieutenant-General Valery Chkheidze, chief of the Georgian border
guards, is
afraid of a Russian bombing attack or a "hot pursuit" of
Chechen rebels
across the border into Georgia. "When they constantly claim there
is a
terrorist base in the Pankisi Gorge, that makes it easier for them to
bomb
Georgia some day," he said.
Russia has already demonstrated how it can exploit a military conflict
to
divide and weaken Georgia. In 1992 and 1993, it gave military aid to
separatists in Abkhazia, a western province of Georgia. When the
Georgians
lost the Abkhazia conflict and were unable to defeat another rebel army,
Moscow finally gave support to Tbilisi -- in exchange for four Georgian
military bases and a Georgian promise to join the Russian-dominated
Commonwealth of Independent States.
Russian military intervention in the Pankisi Gorge could have the same
effect
on Georgian foreign policy. "A few Russian bombs and 100
paratroopers would
be enough," said Zviad Mirgatia, a political analyst in Tbilisi.
"We are
absolutely unprepared for it. Georgia would be forced to make
concessions,
including a more pro-Russian policy."
Although some Chechens fought against the Georgian army in the Abkhazia
campaign, Georgia has improved its relations with Chechnya in recent
years.
It even allowed Chechnya's separatist president, Aslan Maskhadov, to
make an
official visit to Tbilisi, where he was welcomed with an honour guard
and red
carpet.
Under Russian pressure, Georgia has limited its official contacts with
Chechnya since then.
But it allows a Chechen representative, Hizir Aldamov, to work freely in
a
Tbilisi office, where he proudly displays a Chechen flag and a portrait
of
the separatist Chechen president.
Mr. Aldamov, an ethnic Chechen with Georgian citizenship, claims the
status
of an ambassador of an independent nation.
*******
Moscow Times
June 1, 2000
DEFENSE DOSSIER: No Safety in Numbers
By Pavel Felgenhauer
The "special anti-terrorist operation" against Chechen rebels
will go into
its tenth month of hostilities next week, but there is no end in sight
to the
fighting. President Vladimir Putin and other officials said last fall
that
federal troops would free the Chechen population from the yoke of
bandits and
that many "liberated" Chechens would join the fray on Russia's
side. It was
announced that the Chechen population itself would "drive the
terrorists
out," that good Chechens would fight bad Chechens to ensure that
military
casualties were minimal.
For 10 months, the authorities have been seeking out staunch Chechen
collaborators to give credence to their propaganda. Beslan Gantamirov -
a
felon who was serving time for embezzlement - was pardoned specifically
to
lead a pro-Moscow Chechen militia to fight side by side with the Russian
military. But this week, Gantamirov was relieved of his official
position,
and most of his militia was disbanded.
Just a couple of weeks before Gantamirov was fired, another powerful
pro-Moscow Chechen warlord, Sulim Yamadayev - the oldest of the six
Yamadayev
brothers who virtually control Gudermes, the second-largest city in
Chechnya
- announced that he would disband his militia and would work as a
carpenter
from now on. Last year, the Yamadayev brothers surrendered Gudermes to
the
Russians without a fight, but their relations with Moscow have been
difficult
since.
Of course, no one expects that Yamadayev will indeed fully disband his
forces, or that Gantamirov's militiamen will now become law-abiding
civilians. Actually, both warlords wanted the authorities to legalize
their
private armies and pay them salaries. The authorities balked,
suspecting, not
without reason, that some of the pro-Moscow militiamen were indeed
anti-Moscow guerrillas in disguise, getting a salary during the day and
shooting at military outposts at night.
This week, Russian Colonel Sergei Zverev, who served as acting chief of
the
Russian civilian administration in Chechnya, was killed when his car was
attacked in Grozny. The Russian-appointed mayor of Grozny, Subian
Makhchayev,
who was traveling with Zverev, was seriously injured. The Russian
authorities
say that Makhchayev was the main target.
This attack not only proves that the Chechen resistance is very much
alive,
but also that being a Russian collaborator is an increasingly deadly
profession in Chechnya. The "antiterrorist" campaign has been
cruel to all:
Chechen civilians, Chechen fighters, Russian servicemen. There is so
much
hatred between all parties that revenge attacks are inevitable. Russian
troops attack Chechens indiscriminately to avenge dead comrades, while
the
rebels hit anyone in uniform or those close by.
Raising a genuinely loyal and disciplined pro-Moscow Chechen force has
turned
out to be an impossible mission because most Chechens who still live in
Chechnya, and many of those who have fled the republic, still support
the
rebels, provide them with food, money and often manpower for swift
mobilization.
Moscow's official military spokesman, General Valery Manilov, first
deputy
chief of the General Staff, announced at a news conference recently that
there are 80,000 Defense and Interior ministry servicemen in Chechnya
today
confronting "a maximum of 3,000" separatist rebels. Such a
significant
imbalance of forces would no doubt lead to the swift annihilation of all
rebel forces if the resistance did not enjoy widespread support.
Chechnya is a small country, about 160 kilometers long and 100
kilometers
wide. It is impractical and often virtually impossible to maintain large
guerrilla formations hiding in the hills. So the rebels actually
maintain
only a small core of seasoned fighters at any given time. But when any
major
operation begins, this core of fighters is joined by hundreds and
sometimes
thousands of well-armed, battle-ready volunteers, which allows the
rebels to
achieve local manpower superiority and the ability of launching
punishing
attacks on military units.
A trademark of such Chechen attacks was the assault on the Chechen
capital,
Grozny, in August 1996, when several hundred rebels entered the
well-guarded
city (where the military garrison was more than 10,000 strong). The
attack
seemed suicidal, but the number of armed rebels in Grozny swiftly
proliferated to 10,000 or more; the Russian garrison was overwhelmed,
and the
war ended in a victory for the Chechens.
Today, continued effective rebel attacks on military columns have forced
the
command to impose strict convoy instructions: avoid travel in small
numbers
and without armor, avoid travel at night in bad weather when close air
support is impossible. The federal force in Chechnya has become
increasingly
immobile and defensive in its posture. Military forces are occupying
hundreds
of fortified garrisons disseminated throughout Chechnya, awaiting attack
every night, not knowing for certain where the enemy is and in what
strength;
the rebels are agile, can concentrate forces for deadly attack and then
disappear.
Manilov may be right in his assessment of the number of fighters at
"a
maximum of 3,000," but their number can swell rapidly. As the
federal forces
in Chechnya are cut back, a serious Chechen counteroffensive that may
rock
the foundations of the Putin regime becomes not only possible, but
almost
inevitable.
Pavel Felgenhauer is an independent, Moscow-based defense analyst.
*******
U.S./Russia: Analysis From Washington -- Containing Rogue States,
Maintaing
Balance Of Power
By Paul Goble
Washington, 31 May 2000 (RFE/RL) -- The increasingly public disagreement
between Washington and Moscow over possible modification of the 1972
Anti-Ballistic Treaty reflects a deeper divide between the two capitals
over
the nature of the post-Cold War international system.
That divide is likely to cast a shadow not only over this week's meeting
between U.S. President Bill Clinton and Russian President Vladimir Putin
in
Moscow but over relations between the two powers in the years to come.
Washington, statements by senior officials there suggest, increasingly
views
the world as consisting of an international community with shared values
confronted by a few outlaw states which challenge that community and
which
therefore must be contained.
>From this perspective, any defensive measures taken by one country
such as
the United States against the possible actions of rogue regimes does not
threaten the international system but rather is in the interest of all
members of the international community.
By contrast, Moscow sees the world in more traditional terms, as a
collection
of states, many with very different sets of values, whose
interrelationships
are and should be defined not by shared values but by the state of the
balance of power.
According to this view, modifying the ABM treaty to allow Washington to
build
a shield against attacks by rogue states threatens the international
system,
not only by calling into question Russia's special status as coadjutator
on
disarmament questions but also by creating a system which might be
expanded
and thereby undermine the current balance of power.
Because the differences on the ABM Treaty itself are so deep, both sides
have
already discounted the possibility that there will be much progress on
that
issue when the two presidents meet in Moscow on Saturday and Sunday.
U.S. National Security Adviser Sandy Berger said last weekend that he
did not
expect any agreements on this subject at the summit but argued that the
meeting represented "a good opportunity" for Washington to
explain its view
of the nature of the threat.
First Deputy Chief of the Russian General Staff General Valery Manilov
said
that he and other Moscow officials had been discussing the American
proposals
to modify ABM not to reach agreement but to take it "off the
agenda" of the
meeting between the two presidents.
Despite this standoff, most commentary to date has focused on the
relatively
narrow issues posed by the ABM dispute itself rather than on the larger
ones
which stand behind it. But as this standoff continues, ever more
attention is
likely to be devoted to these larger and more fundamental concerns.
Over the last decade, the U.S. has taken the lead in talking about rogue
states and invoking the existence of an international community united
by
common values. It has pointed to countries like Iran and North Korea
which
openly flaunt international conventions and argued that the
international
community must unite against them.
Derived from domestic political life and based on the assumption that
democracy and free markets are universally accepted as the most valued
goals,
this model of international relations implies that there is broad
agreement
over who the rogue states are and what should be done to contain them.
This approach suffers from a potentially serious conceptual problem: In
many
respects, the two terms on which it relies are defined not so much
relative
to the actual world but rather with regard to each other, thus limiting
their
utility either as a description of reality or a guide to policy.
The international community, this view tends to insist, consists of all
those
countries which are not rogue states, thus reducing the definition of
that
community to the lowest of common denominators and unintentionally
permitting
the rogue states to define how the international community should
respond.
The Russian vision of the international system represents both a
reaction to
what many in Moscow see as an American effort at diktat and a means to
return
to the balance of power politics which characterized much of nineteenth
century Europe.
Russian officials routinely have objected to American efforts to prevent
Moscow or others from cooperating with Iran or other countries that the
U.S.
has labeled as "rogue states." Such efforts, these officials
have argued,
reflect the interests of the United States rather than those of the
international community.
But this approach has its problems as well: It ignores the genuine
evidence
of increasing international agreement on many issues and even more
importantly the compelling need in a democracy for a rationale to
mobilize
public opinion. Maintaining the balance of power is seldom enough;
containing
a rogue state can be.
Consequently, because these two views are deeply held and because they
are
each flawed in a particular way, the debate between Washington and
Moscow
highlighted by this summit is certain to continue well into the future.
*******
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