#15
Moskovsky Komsomolets
January 9, 2003
A GENERAL'S FORECAST
General Baluevsky speaks about his service record and cooperation with NATO
Author: Yulia Kalinina
[from WPS Monitoring Agency, www.wps.ru/e_index.html]

THERE ARE SEVERAL REASON WHY RUSSIA-NATO COOPERATION IN BATTLING TERRORISM IS MAKING SLOW PROGRESS. RUSSIAN CITES DIFFERENCES WITHIN NATO, WHILE THE US WISHES TO LIMIT COOPERATION TO OBTAINING SOME INFORMATION AND PRODUCTS FROM RUSSIAN PRODUCERS. NATO SAYS THE RUSSIAN MILITARY CAN'T AFFORD JOINT EXERCISES.

The Senior Deputy Chief of the General Staff granted us an interview shortly before New Year. We publish it today - the birthday of General Yuri Baluevsky, and we heartily wish him many happy returns of the day.

THE COMBAT PATH

Question: "We didn't go to the bathhouse." These are your words. Approximately six months ago you gave this response to a question about the bombings of the Pankisi Gorge by unidentified aircraft. Why did you say that?

Yuri Baluevsky: Because there is a saying: innocent until proven guilty.

Question: Do you have something personal grudge against the Georgians, since you served in Tbilisi?

Baluevsky: I have very kindly feelings towards that people. In 1993 I came to Tbilisi as a colonel, served as chief of staff of the Russian Force in the Trans-Caucasus, and saw there both good and hard times. Once I went on a service trip though, and my apartment in Tbilisi was seized during that time... But this is less important. The matter is that there are uniform rules for states. Thus, within the scope of the Security Council a resolution on terrorism was adopted. Georgia did not execute that resolution, although bandits were really located on its territory. Therefore, the operation for cleaning the Pankisi Gorge which Georgia's force structures conducted in September was a dummy, and I told journalists about that.

Question: But what do you want? Would you like Georgians to clash with the Chechen gunmen and set the whole Caucasus against themselves?

Baluevsky: I do not want to get involved in politics. I just want to say that I have most kindly memories about Tbilisi and Georgia. My wife also came there in half a year. I had to teach her to shoot all sorts of arms though. And at night, when there was shooting outdoors, I knew they would not hit us, but she was nervous. But all the same, the memories are most pleasant.

THE WAR

Question: Do the foreign policy contacts of our military institution mostly rest on you currently?

Baluevsky: I wouldn't make the functional duties of a senior deputy chief of the General Staff that narrow. Besides the foreign policy contacts, I also handle all the other matters within the General Staff jurisdiction, including those directly related to the operations in Chechnya.

By the way, you took heed that my predecessor in this post, Valery Leonidovich Manilov almost every week had appeared on television with a "report" on the casualties of the Russian troops. This practice has been ceased currently. I believe it inhuman - to report on casualties. Any fight is characterized through people's deaths - with and without good cause. The English have good experience. At the beginning of the World War II they resolutely banned media even the publication of the pictures of the dead.

Question: I hope we are not going to take part in war with Iraq?

Baluevsky: Iraq is not that far from our borders. Remember that our oil people have had concerns in Iraq's economy. Of course, LUKoil represents private capital, but this is Russia's concern.

Question: Needless to say, you are negative about the US plans in relation to Iraq?

Baluevsky: The military solution is not the best. As a military expert I am sure that the Americans will crash Iraq, sure enough. But in any war there are unnecessary deaths. I often tell American military people: "Your have determined that Iraq is a rogue state and North Korea is a rogue state. You dislike Saddam Hussein, Kim Jong-Il, and whoever. But what do the people have to do with that? Isn't it easier to clear away one person, that cast down the entire military force on innocent people?"

TERRORISM

Baluevsky: I will venture a small remark here. Did you follow the Russia-NATO conference at the Defense Ministry last month? It was devoted to cooperation of the military in fight with terrorism. In the broader meaning of the word, the conference had a result. In the narrow, professional meaning, I as a military man did not see any result.

Question: And in what do you see the result?

Baluevsky: The military together determine specific lines of fight with terrorism by military means - this, no doubt, is a result. But we did not see exchange of experience of using forces in Chechnya and Afghanistan. There was much milk and water and theory though... No, I take no offence of the NATO people, they themselves have a mass of inside discrepancies they cannot resolve. A simple example: Americans alone have three definitions of terrorism. Terrorism as defined in military regulations, terrorism as defined by the Department of State, and terrorism as defined by the Department of Justice. According to which of the definitions do we have to work with them?

NATO AND THE BEARS

Question: How much serious is the wish to cooperate on the part of Russia? Or perhaps the present rapprochement is a purely short-term outlook, and no one is going to draw together in reality?

Baluevsky: Who says we are against cooperation? The Declaration between Russia and the US, signed on May 14, has a separate clause which reads that we will cooperate with the US and NATO, including in the missile defense area.

Question: But so far no steps have been taken?

Baluevsky: Some have been taken. These steps have become more practical after the Russia-NATO Council was created. And there are definite results. A specific example: we met with our NATO counterparts in The Hague, in July, and determined a joint plan of action. A special working group on missile defense was set up, and this group is working. However, the cooperation principles have to be determined clearly. If the entire principle boils down to your buying something and the cooperation end with that - this is a disadvantage for me. We believe that we should work together on a joint product. But Americans would like to set the entire cooperation with direct contacts with our industrial designers - obtaining from them the necessary "product" and forgetting them. But we say: no way, friends. What if the information transmitted to you today comes to third persons yesterday? Do you guarantee protection of the information?

Question: NATO representatives name some different factors that hamper closer cooperation. They say: "It's a bad thing your army has no money. We cannot even conduct joint exercises because of that..."

Baluevsky: Conducting joint exercises requires determining our enemy. We do not know that to date. There has been confusion is the General Staffs of the world armies after the Warsaw Treaty disappeared. Why, what is the enemy, there is no enemy. The first question is therefore: with whom are we going to fight?

THE NUCLEAR CHALLENGE

Baluevsky: Today there is criticism in respect of the Treaty on Offensive Nuclear Arms Cuts which was signed between Russia and the US on May 14. I believe the contrary: that treaty is very important to us. We obtained a treaty of equal partners, although the US potential far exceeds both Russia and other states taken together. And the US Armed Forces surpass those of Russia and other states...

Question: The treaty has not been ratified yet.

Baluevsky: Not yet. However, I strongly hope it will be, as this is extremely important from both the political and military-strategic point of view. Maximum efforts must be taken to ratify the treaty. But if we bind it with terms like "Let Americans not create a national missile defense", it will get stuck. Because they are already creating it. They cannot be stopped!

Question: The national missile defense system is a system for defense, not offense. It is naturally unpleasant that Americans will have something we don't have, but their missile defense system does not make a direct threat to us, doesn't it?

Baluevsky: I totally disagree that the missile defense system does not threaten Russia. The system is organized in such a way that it will have effect on every missile and warhead flying in the direction of the facility or country it covers. It is therefore illogical to say that it does not threaten a country. The question is different: is it possible to create such a system?

I often met General Kadish who heads these projects in the States. To be sure, one may envy their funding of $8 billion a year. Why not make experiments? But he is perfectly aware that presently, and in the short-term outlook, it is technically impossible to create a system that would give a 100% guarantee of intercepting every warhead flying toward the target.

(Translated by P. Pikhnovsky)

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