#13 - JRL 6600
BBC Monitoring
Russia's membership in NATO would spell alliance's end - Chechen web site
Source: Kavkaz-Tsentr news agency web site in Russian 11 Dec 02

Russia is still an imperialist country but too weak to be so openly, the Chechen web site Kavkaz-Tsentr says in a commentary. Moscow employs "Jesuit tactics", and the USA and the UK are out to appease it, the web site said. Only Eastern Europe, led by the Czech Republic and its President Vaclav Havel, understands Russia well, while the Chechens are bearing the brunt of countering "Russian imperialism", it said. According to the commentary, granting Russia NATO membership would spell the end of the alliance. The following is the text of report by Kavkaz-Tsentr news agency web site entitled "Vaclav Havel, the Chechens and NATO"; subheadings have been inserted editorially:

New and old NATO members at odds

10 December, Kavkaz-Tsentr correspondent Boris Stomakhin: The NATO secretary-general [George Robertson] has visited Moscow. After speaking with Russian officials, he diplomatically said that Russia and NATO form the core of the fight against the new scarecrow of the 21st century, so-called "international terrorism". The age of the rosy illusions and hopes about a peaceful, democratic, and open to the world Russia is gone, but political speculation abounds. Russia, which has been carrying out genocide of the Chechen people since 1994, wants to become a NATO member.

Czech President Vaclav Havel, who recently received NATO leaders in Prague, is of course against this. Havel represents the nation which well remembers the iron fist of the Russian occupiers. Havel clearly sees the current level of Moscow's imperialist chauvinism, with Chechnya as an example. Robertson answered (not Havel but Moscow) that only the old members of NATO will decide in this regard, and the opinions of the "young" former Russian colonies will not be heeded. The masterplan is as follows: Russia could not prevent Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania - its former colonies - from entering NATO, and NATO, in turn, is unable to prevent Russia from slaughtering the Chechen people by using the world's most barbaric methods. That seems to be the current balance of power.

Moscow's Jesuit tactics

Russia is doing its best to alter the current balance of power. One of its favourite methods is to spread rumours about its forthcoming admission to NATO, as a logical step following "Partnership for Peace" and "close cooperation within the antiterrorism coalition". One can clearly envisage this happening - an elephant entering a china shop. Poor NATO has nothing else to do but to acquiesce, make an artificial smile, nod its head, and announce that it is now "more like a political organization, than a military alliance".

Accepting Russia into NATO would render meaningless the alliance which was once created with the sole objective to counter the Russian [USSR] threat. Many traditional cliches about "fighting international terrorism" were repeated in Prague like a mantra. And, as always, not a single word about fighting Russian state terrorism. It is good that seven former Russian colonies and satellites will at last become NATO members - at least some, albeit not sufficient, protection from the aggressive imperialist ambitions of the Kremlin regime, which is becoming increasingly diabolical.

Moscow carries on its Jesuit tactics: if it does not have enough strength for direct confrontation, then it must pretend to be a friend, and strangle the enemy with a "friendly" bear hug.

Vaclav Havel as leading fighter against Russian colonialism

In the light of all these events, Havel virtually becomes the standard-bearer of European freedom and liberation struggle against Russian colonialism. The Czech Republic was the first to deny a visa to the junior spiritual brother of [Russian President Vladimir] Putin - [Belarus President Alyaksandr] Lukashenka . It would have been too difficult to deny a visa to Putin himself, but Havel is an apologist of freedom and human rights, a symbol of the Soviet and East European dissidents' struggle, one of the few really conscientious Westerners. He is the author of the famous aphorism: "A sick Russia is better than a healthy Soviet Union."

Alas, today's Russia is very sick, and the symptoms of its malaise are very familiar: pure Soviet imperialism, militarism and colonialism, albeit not of the Marxist, but of the Fascist kind. Prague used to be one of the major stops on the path of the mad Russian bear through Europe in the 20th century: Berlin-Budapest-Prague-Warsaw-Tbilisi-Baku-Vilnius-Groznyy. The cause of Jan Palach, who burned himself alive in St. Wenceslaus Square [in Prague] in protest against the Russian occupation of Czechoslovakia, is not yet dead and his sacrifice was not in vain. Havel and the Czech people are still able to speak out in public against the imperialist boorishness and bloody atrocities of Russia, and be an obstacle in Russia's way.

Russia's admission would spell the end of NATO

It is true that if Russia entered NATO, the likes of Poland, the Czech Republic and Latvia would have to quit this organization. Because NATO will no longer fulfil their most urgent need, which is to protect them against their ferocious and mad Eastern neighbour. Right now, only the Chechens bear the brunt of this monster's bloody madness. The Chechens are fighting for themselves, for Eastern Europe, for West Europe, and for the entire world. The fat West Europe is silent, only NGOs, foundations and their like are protesting against the genocide in Chechnya . Eastern Europe stands as a bastion on the path of aggressive Russian revanchism. Eastern Europe learned the essence of that only too well in the 20th century. Havel protests against Russia's membership in NATO, Poland and Lithuania are refusing to close down Chechen representations, and the Ukrainian nationalist movement is ready to restore such a representation and is picketing Russia's consulates in Ukraine.

Well, the era of the Cold War of the 20th century is over, and maybe NATO will be sacrificed, if Russia is allowed to enter this organization. The new era demands new organizations, new approaches and new forms.

High time to unite against Russian imperialism

It is high time for all peoples still under Russian occupation and for the peoples of its former colonies, who are boorishly and aggressively pressured, and even bombed (Georgia), to come together in an alliance, to build up a joint front against the Kremlin's unbridled imperialist revanchism, against the forthcoming crusades of Putin's butchers against their lands in the name of "protecting Russia's strategic interests" or "restoring the great power". It does not matter if the armies of the former Russian colonies are smaller than the armies of NATO - we must defend ourselves even when outnumbered. NATO, and the West, namely the USA and the UK, have betrayed the Chechen people long ago, betrayed their own historical ideals of freedom, democracy and human rights, and paved the road to impunity for the despot and murderer. No punishment for terrible crimes against humankind. Just like those "great powers" "appeased" Hitler in the 1930s, Stalin in the 1940s, and Brezhnev in the 1970s. We all know what the final outcome was and how much that policy cost the peoples of the USSR and Europe. All we have to do is remind [US President George W] Bush, Robertson, and all NATO leaders, unwilling to listen to Havel and willing to become friends with Putin, of the Russian proverb "The clever man learns from the mistakes of others, while the fool from his own."