Mr. Miller, of the Economist writes to state that although Mr. Arkady Ostrovsky has recently joined the Economist, he was not personally responsible for the Economist piece with wish I recently took issue. The piece in question – a particularly nasty example of the overtly Russophobic, deeply irresponsible line taken by The Economist ever since the arrival of Edward Lucas a decade ago, was superficially reminiscent of some of Mr. Ostrovsky’s more unfortunate pieces in the FT. Given that Economist journalists hide behind the collective responsibility of a “journalistic cooperative”, I was misguided, and I stand corrected.

Upon closer examination, while in the past, Mr. Ostrovsky’s pejorative conclusions have gone far beyond what factual evidence he presents, at least, unlike the Economist, he has been diligent in his reporting of the facts. If he wishes to reject the misinformation carried in the article in question, I shall be delighted to issue a formal apology.

Beyond reiterating his untruthful statement that any meaningful proportion of Russian associating with foreigners has been in some way importuned, Mr. Miller does not address is the substance of my argument – which restated, is that major components of the Western press are dangerously irresponsible and provocative towards Russia, abandoning any pretense of balance or objectivity, and have contributed toward a dangerous souring of the relationship between Russia and the West.

The intellectual corruption of much of the Western press is far more insidious than the vulgar financial considerations which have been known to sway their Russian counterparts (at least, this bias has the advantage of being transparent…and readily reversible!)

A certain school of Western journalists of which Mr. Lucas is the best example was apparently born with a profound sense of their own intrinsic moral superiority as well as that of their own societies. This bias is compounded by an ideological rigidity worthy of the most doctrinaire Marxists – simply replacing the Dialect with liberal theory, which occupies the same pedestal, never subject to falsification, and ignoring any inconvenient empirical evidence. Nearer the top, senior editors covertly further the interests of specific power groups, owing their comfortable jobs to their finally honed skills at reading the prevailing political climate.

Western politicians repeatedly justify the superiority of their system by claims of how “free and objective” their press is; but, like Fox News’ hilarious claim to being “balanced and objective,” is this claim justified? Does the ownership of the main American press organs by major corporate interests not bias their editorial line? Is the Washington Post totally independent of powerful Washington political factions? Does the extreme Neo-Con orientation of the WSJ Op-Ed pages not leak over to the foreign policy views of their news editors?

Does anyone truly understand the financial interests behind The Economist?

When an individual pamphletist like your correspondent gets a point of fact wrong, it is a trivial matter. When the entire heavy artillery of the Western press shells the wrong positions, the costs can be exponentially greater. They have real power – coupled with a terrifying lack of responsibility.

In the immortal words of Karl Kraus, “How do wars starts?

Wars start when politicians lie to journalists, then believe what they read in the press!”

By way of example, the US press has belatedly discovered that Iraq was an insane and unwineable adventure, cobbled together by a pack of pathological liars and megalomaniacs, then sold to the global public by systematic deception, fraud and spin management What a shame it has taken the press almost four years to catch on to what should have been intuitively obvious to any bright 10-year old at the time! Had the press been less derelict in its duties, it is entirely possible that the Bush clique would never have been able to gain traction in its quest for war. Has anyone forgotten the baying for blood every week in the Economist – virtually the leader of the war party? Hundreds of thousands of dead, a country wrecked, an entire region dangerously destabilized…and yes, we really must begin to rethink our editorial policy!

Must we now wait for an unbridgeable rift to be dug across Europe, for a new cold war to push Russia solidly in the Chinese camp, for the dogs of war to bay again before the Economist and its ilk come to realize that something has gone wrong here too? That gratuitously antagonizing Russia was perhaps not such a grand idea? Will it not then be too late? Will it be their editorial writers who find themselves in the front lines?

Eric Kraus
Managing Director, Anyatta Capital, advisor to the:
Nikitsky Russia/CIS Opportunities Fund
website: www.nikitskyfund.com
Russia Strategy monthly - Truth and Beauty (and Russian Finance).