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PRESS CONFERENCE WITH USA AND CANADA STUDIES INSTITUTE DIRECTOR SERGEI ROGOV
[RIA NOVOSTI, 14:00, JUNE 4, 2004]
SOURCE: FEDERAL NEWS SERVICE (http://www.fednews.ru/)

Moderator: Good day, colleagues. We begin our press conference. So, a small but victorious war in Iraq is a failure. And everything is now unfolding clearly not in accordance with the American scenario. Developments in Iraq stimulated several sensational exposures that affected the very top of US leadership and have already caused the resignation of the CIA chief. The mass media are reacting very sharply, including US journals and magazines.

I will just quote a few headings of publications "The Empire and Its Dark Sides," "Militarism, Secrecy, End of the Republic." Another publication -- the "Chimera of History: What Is the New US World Order?" "The Colossus or the Deficiencies of US Imperialism." And another article: "The Empire of Fear, War, Terrorism and Democracy." And another title -- "A Flabby Empire" and so on. In general, one traces some similarity with the names of articles in the newspaper Pravda of the Soviet period.

And now "The US-Iraq: Ways Out of the Dead End." Today our guest here is director of the US and Canadian Studies Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Doctor Sc. (History) Sergei Rogov. Sergei Mikhailovich is just back from his trip to the United States and his impressions are still fresh about what is happening in the United States and what is related to events in Iraq. You have the floor.

Rogov: Thank you. My impressions are not that fresh because I have already begun to feel the jet lag and for several days after my return I find it difficult to get back to normalcy. Now I sleep, now I don't. Still, however, impressions there are. And I must tell you that these are very strong impressions. I came to the United States for the first time 32 years ago when I was doing a post-graduate study. Since that time I spent quite a lot of time in the United States and I visit it on a permanent basis. And the mood that I sensed now in America was not there 30 years ago. I have the feeling as if it is the beginning of the 1970s, the time of the Vietnam war and the Watergate. That is why what I am going to tell you now may sound overly sharply but I have this impression based on what I saw, on what I discussed with people in power and out of power and there is the impression that now a most acute crisis has been unleashed in America. You mentioned the newspaper Pravda. So, indeed, it is a crisis and a double crisis: a crisis of internal policy and a crisis of external policy. And there is something lacking, which is an economic crisis.

Over the past year the US economy is registering quite good rates of growth and unemployment in diminishing. There is, it is true, one problem. When I was leaving the price of gasoline at gas stations was 2.20 dollars per gallon. A lunch one and a half years ago cost one ruble twenty (sic.-FNS). This is to say that the price of gasoline has more than doubled and this is quite felt by an average America. Now summer is beginning, the time of vacations and Americans are mobile people, they travel a lot and they don't like the gasoline price very much.

Also, the political irony is that despite on the whole the state of the economy which is not bad, barring the gasoline prices, according to all opinion polls, the Americans are much more trustful of Kerry on economic and domestic issues than of Bush and on matters of external policy, the war on terrorism they trust Bush not Kerry. Probably, this may be perceived as some contradiction because I have just said that in America there is a double crisis. Well, it is indeed double.

A year ago America was very proud of its successes. The war in Iraq ended victoriously. Whose next: Syria, Iran, North Korea? The sea is knee deep to us. This was the sense of the situation that Washington had.

Now the sense is perfectly different. The confidence in the authorities has been undermined. There is the expression -- credibility. And today the Americans are becoming increasingly aware that the authorities have lied to them. And there is one more factor, and it became especially obvious as the commission to investigate the events of September 11, 2001 proceeded with its task, that this was not only a major miscalculation by the Bush administration, that it missed the attack but now it is doing its best to hide this circumstance. Tenet's resignation yesterday is the beginning of a full-scale investigation as to who is to blame. And I believe that Tenet is only the first head that rolled. That is why it is perfectly clear that the main responsibility for the recent events is borne not by the CIS but by the Pentagon. And that campaign against conservatives, which centers in the Pentagon and partly in the staff of Vice-President Cheney and in other departments.

The third point. The Americans have become accustomed to think that they are the guiding light for the whole world. And again there is the American expression "The shining city on the hill." But it goes back to the beginning of colonization when people said they would build the shining city on the hill. This was meant to set an example for the whole mankind and all mankind was supposed to emulate us because we are the most democratic, we are the freest. And there are those horrible pictures of video recordings.

And they are much more terrible than those that were published. It came as a shock to the US society. They recall in this connection the Vietnam village of My-Lai (sp.--FNS. Older people remember what happened there and what reverberations were caused by a report that the American troops had burnt down the village and its residents in Vietnam. Americans still think that it was only one such village. But it happened all the time there.

Today when the Americans see these photographs, they find it hard to prove to themselves that they brought democracy and freedom to that country. In other words, this undermines their faith in America's strong stereotype. Of course, what I am saying must not be absolutized. I didn't sleep last night and I looked up the latest public opinion poll on the Internet. They posted the results of the latest poll on which war is fair and which is unfair.

Interestingly, 90 percent of Americans think that World War II was a fair war, but only 30 percent consider the war in Vietnam a fair war. And the opinions split 49 to 49 about the war in Iraq. In other words, half of the Americans think that their country is waging an unfair war there. Of course, this may be a result of some emotional outburst and everything will soon be forgotten. But I don't think so. One of the factors is that America is sustaining heavy losses in Iraq.

It seemed that America had overcome the Vietnam syndrome. Several years ago it was believed that America could not start new military operations if they were fraught with casualties, that is, if American soldiers would be killed, that America wanted to wage a bloodless war, like it did in Kosovo. As you probably remember, not even one American soldier was killed in Kosovo. Then several died during the occupation, but --

Now every month 50, 60 or 80 servicemen get killed. About 10 percent of the American contingent are so-called contractees. But it's different from our contract servicemen. These are not contract servicemen. I think this is a new and very dangerous phenomenon that has become popular in recent years. I am talking about mercenaries. There is a whole industry in America and Europe, but especially in America, there are commercial organizations that render security and military services. It's like the agencies that abound here.

But in America they are used for participation in combat actions. The total number of such contractees in America -- I mean in Iraq, of those who are working for the American army on a contract basis -- the Italian who was executed also was a contractee, but not a serviceman -- is about 15,000. If we take these tortures in prisons, the military policemen whose photographs we have seen, they subjected Iraqis to humiliating and disgraceful treatment but they did not torture them. They were tortured by military intelligence and contractees who are outside the law, I mean the laws that are binding on servicemen, are not applied to them.

So, if we add casualties among contractees, the figure will be even bigger. And to what extent is the American society capable of responding to this continuous flow of dead bodies from Iraq? There are different points of view, but I think there is a limit to it.

Now about the foreign political crisis. As I have said many times in this room, the Bush administration's strategy was based on ideology. Some of you may remember that before the war in Iraq I said that oil was not the main reason. Oil was an important factor but not the main factor in the Bush administration's decision to begin the war. The main factor was the ideology of American global supremacy based on military force. The logic was as follows: we are the only super power, the Soviet Union is gone, and no one can stop us. Therefore we must show the world by using military force that no one should argue with America, so that everyone makes a conclusion, not only Iran or Korea, but also China and Russia that they'd better not argue with America.

This ideology hyped by neo-conservatives underpinned the decision to being the war. And look what has happened. This strategy has failed flat. Washington is no longer even trying to say that they may win a victory. And what is a victory in Iraq? Just think about it. How could one define a victory in Iraq? The dominating feeling now is fear that they may suffer a defeat. In other words, the task is not to win, but to avoid a defeat and another Vietnam.

In my view, there are three possible scenarios. First, the present administration will push its way through and try to win a victory by using military force. I have met with American servicemen, including from the US Army, and they are stationed in Iraq now, and I got the impression that they were sort of demoralized: we kill one terrorist, but he is immediately replaced with 10 more. In other words, the tactic is we can kill them. But what is the strategy? I was told all this by American servicemen.

In other words, the American army understands that it is doing something that it itself does not understand quite clearly. And I think that American society will not support an attempt of the administration to push its way through. I do not rule out that it may make such an attempt, but it is very unlikely that it may win by using only military force.

The second scenario is that America will declare a victory and quickly, by Christmas, withdraw its troops from Iraq. We have won and fled. And this will turn Iraq into a source of such global chaos and terrorism that everything we had before will seem nothing. We cannot rule out this scenario. And if we look at the public opinion polls, they show that 45 percent of respondents call for the withdrawal of American troops. Remember, I said 49 to 49, but here it's 45 to 55, but the tendency is the same.

And the third scenario is that America returns to the legal turf. You know there is a favorite American term, rogue states. Now some of those who write articles in America use another term, a rogue super power. That is, the US is a pariah super power. Indeed, it turned out that America has become the main anti-systemic element at the beginning of our decade by refusing to adhere to the generally recognized international rules. America ignored international law.

So, there is a chance that the US will get back to international law. I do not want to make forecasts, but I think that this is possible. If we look at what the Bush administration is doing today, we will see chaotic attempts to garner at least some international support. A year ago the Bush administration ignored the UN Security Council. Now it goes to the Security Council and asks it to adopt a resolution or send peacekeepers. Likewise, Rumsfeld scolded the Old World and instead of relying on NATO started talking about a coalition of the willing, as if to say that they don't need NATO anymore. Actually acting like a sheriff who says, let's go chase Indians, bandits and gangsters.

So, now Americans go to NATO and say, let NATO go to Iraq. Why are they doing this? The impression is that the US is overstrained. Yes, America is a super power. The only super power. But there is a feeling in America that it has gone too far. Today there are 480,000 people in the US army. Two thirds of them are either in Iraq, or have come back from Iraq for a vacation, or are going to Iraq to relieve their fellow servicemen or strengthen the contingent. Given the American plans of global presence, if something, God forbid, happens on the Korean peninsula, America will simply have no troops to send there. To my surprise, America is openly discussing the possibility of restoring conscription, mandatory conscription to the armed forces. Of course, American society doesn't want this.

It has transpired that none of the senior officials in the present administration served in Vietnam. All of them, just like the president and Cheney, dodged it. If we take members of the Congress, only one of them has a son who is serving in Iraq. And the question is, do they get involved so easily because it is not their children who have to fight, but professional servicemen? But there is a shortage of servicemen.

Second, the federal budget deficit in the US this year will be about $500 billion. What does this mean? This means that the American government in the current fiscal year -- the figures are really horrifying. It's hard even imagine such figures because $500 billion is more than the entire gross domestic product in Russia -- US government expenditures this year stand at about $2.3 trillion. I understand that it's hard to perceive this figure by ear. But let us use trillions, not billions. So, expenditures are 2.3 trillion and federal budget revenue is 1.7 trillion. In other words, the problem that Bush created by cutting taxes and increasing military expenditures, and not only military, created a big gap. And this deficit will not be eliminated tomorrow or even in five years. It is there for long.

Because of demographic factors it become clear that the post- war generation -- I mean after World War II, my generation -- in America, when these people retire, they will get truncated social allowances, healthcare service and so on because there is no money. And how is America covering this deficit? The country has a tremendous debt that is growing at a tremendous rate. You and we and the whole world are actually paying for this debt. Today in addition to the federal budget deficit there is also a negative balance of trade in the US and a negative balance of payment that also stands at $500 billion. In other words, America consumes $500 billion worth of commodities and services more than it makes and pays us and other countries with green backs. They will print as much as may be necessary.

But this game could be effective when the dollar was the only world currency. But today it's not so. Today there are two world currencies. Today there is the euro.

And these considerations are affecting the progress of the election campaign in the USA. I would like to put it clearly from the outset that they are categorically refusing to make forecasts. The fifty-fifty chances. It is true that according to some estimates, Kerry is slightly outpacing Bush but not very much. The present election campaign is being pursued with very dirty methods but this was also the case in the past as well. But in this case the fire is aimed at personalities. Bush is accused by the democrats of complete incompetence. The film projected at the Cannes festival was supposed to demonstrate that. Kerry is accused of opportunism, of having no clear convictions and he changes his position this way and that way.

If one looks at the programs of the parties, then generally there is no distinction in principle between the Democratic and the Republican programs and there has never been such a distinction. The candidates who indeed came out with a radical criticism of Bush are Howard Dean who was defeated by Kerry at the primaries and Ralf Nader, an independent candidate from the Greens party. He is also sharply anti-war. His chances are 3-5 percent but it was Nader who took away 3 percent from Gore in 2000. And these 3-5 percent now claimed by Nader are the votes of the Democrats. And thus Kerry is finding himself in quite a difficult position: on the one hand, he is supposed to fight for the center in order to prevent Bush from being able to pose as a centrist, as in 2000, and on the other, he is losing his left-liberal flank.

And one more point related to Kerry's program. In principle, it is a direct continuation of the Clinton line. Essentially, it is the same people who were in the Clinton administration, such as Sandy Burger, former National Security Adviser; Madelene Albright, former Secretary of State; Richard Halbrooke, former US representative with the UN. In general, these are familiar faces. And the line the represent is offered as a continuation of the Clinton line with a certain tactical difference from the Bush line.

What is the line? Self-same Kerry says: "We should not in any event leave Iraq. In no case should there be another Vietnam." But then what is to be done? And Kerry says: "We have to stake on our military alliances rather than to go it alone. It is necessary to avoid overextending the forces."

And we see that now the Bush administration is doing precisely that: it appeals to NATO, to the Security Council and so on. I think that now it would make sense for me to complete my introductory statement. I just tried to paint you a picture of an upset America where there is the acute sensation that something is wrong and that the Americans have perpetrated a big stupidity. And there is no idea as to how to get out of this situation.

But for me as a professional scholar of America, so to say, it is very interesting from the scientific viewpoint to observe and study and analyze the process. In the political sense I think that it is probably possible to conclude that this war of global -- I am trying to formulate it in Russian but there is something with my head -- an attempt on a global scale and in global actions to act unilaterally, using military force, foisting its will on the world - - against the existing rules -- is an attempt that seems to have fizzled out or is fizzling out.

And it is clear that now, unlike last year, it is extremely difficult to imagine Americans going into Iran, into North Korea and so on. It is not a matter of having a rich choice, it is important to get away alive. Although it is yet early to say that changes of principle have occurred. These are the three versions that I spoke about, concerning the further development of the US policy regarding Iraq. So far there is no clarity which version of these will be followed by the events.

Moderator: Thank you. The picture turned out to be interesting and picturesque and I think it has generated a host of questions. The floor is open. Is everything clear?

Q: Sergei Mikhailovich, don't you believe that now on the part of the United States the opposition to our firms and in general to Russia's economic presence in Iraq will be reduced on the part of the United States as regards the future plans of oil extraction?

Rogov: I don't think so. The fact is that now the situation is such that the rosy dreams of a year ago that "we will now harness the Iraqi pipe and have a field day, have receded into the background. The situation in Iraq is politically so volatile and the prospects of development of the Iraqi oil complex look so uncertain that those pieces of the pie that have now been divided may hardly be yielding any profit over the short term. In general, we are now evacuating our specialists and the American companies have found themselves even in more dire plight.

The second point is that under the US legislation the budget money can be received only by US companies. That means "buy America," which is to say that they can buy only American products and American services. That is why the money for economic projects, earmarked by the Bush administration, can only be received by American firms under the existing law. But like others we can also obtain secondary contracts, when we become subcontractors to the main contractors. And there are no obstacles. But do they need us as subcontractors? I doubt it very much. It is of course, possible to fantacize and ponder. It is indeed an unusual moment for America. Because today America needs Russia more than we need America. The Bush administration is in such a complex position that it needs Putin's support in the Security Council on the question of creating an international coalition. But if America needs Russia's support, is it prepared to pay for it?

So, theoretically, there is a possibility that in order to get Russia's support and convince it to send its troops to Iraq, it has to share, that is, give us something in Masoul or Kirkuk. Theoretically it's possible, but practically it's very doubtful. I think it's very doubtful that Russia will send its servicemen to Iraq under these circumstances. Even if this could help protect the interests of LUKoil or some other Russian company, I am not sure this would serve our national interests.

Moderator: Any more questions? You all seem to be upset.

Rogov: I have drawn such a sad picture. But it really is an unusual picture.

Moderator: I understand that it's hard to make forecasts, but which of the three scenarios you mentioned is the most probable for the American administration with regard to Iraq?

Rogov: So far I have seen an attempt to combine the first and the third scenarios. The idea is to get a new resolution of the UN Security Council that will basically give the US full control of its operation in Iraq but at the same time create a semblance of international support to show that there is allegedly a sovereign Iraqi government in the country. But everything will remain the same. So, it's a combination of the first and the third scenarios.

As for the second scenario, their withdrawal we could fantacize here but it will be more probable if Kerry comes to power. First of all, Kerry bears no responsibility for this mess. Second, Kerry is a person whose political views were formed under the influence of the Vietnam war. And he has combat awards, he is a Vietnam war hero, and he became one of the anti-war movement leaders.

I have bought a DVD-rom with John Lennon's songs. He has a song called Power to the People. And when there was an anti-war demonstration in Washington, Lennon and Kerry were marching together. They belong to the same era. Kerry is trying to show now that he is not a pacifist. But if he wins the elections, and by that time it will get real hot in Iraq, the most probable scenario under Kerry would be the second one.

May Bush leave? It's hard to say. At least this will require his entire team to be changed, that is, the people who drew America into the war in Iraq. George Tenet's resignation yesterday was only a beginning of this team change. It is clear that the team in the State Department will change, that Powell and Armitage will leave. There is a lot of pressure on Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz to make them leave, and Cheney is under a lot of criticism. If the team changes, there may arise a situation where Bush's second administration will differ drastically from the first one. We should not rule this out. But so far it has been a combination of the first and the third scenarios.

Q: The Security Council is now discussing the draft of the US- British resolution on Iraq. Russia, and I think France and China as well, want the UN to play a bigger role in the post-war reconstruction in Iraq. What role do you think should the UN have in the resolution of the Iraqi crisis?

Rogov: This situation was not created by the UN. It was created by the US. And therefore a question may arise, why should the UN clean this mess? But if the UN acts as a key mechanism in the system of international relations to ensure global security, the UN and the Security Council should not be evasive and try to be an on-looker in this process.

What could be the solution? In principle, it would be stupid to talk about the restoration of the Saddam regime. In other words, there should be some political settlement that will include the restoration of the Iraqi state and the Iraqi economy, security, because unlike a year ago, now Iraq is crawling with terrorists of all kinds. And this task reminds me of what is written down in the UN Charter, which is so-called mandate government. After the Second World War the great powers were given a mandate to prepare several former colonies for independence during a certain period of time.

We in the Soviet Union called them colonies, but all mandate territories gained independence. And basically this UN function ceased to exist. But now because of the situation in Iraq and several other so-called faked states, that is states that do not really operate as states, but are in chaos, this function may have to be revived in order to prepare these countries for independence. But today is not 1945 and such a mandate should be given not to the US or Britain or any other country, it's a mandate for interim government to be performed by the UN itself. But it seems that things will take a different course.

The resolution you mentioned, the US-British one, basically creates outward features of Iraq's sovereignty but leave it under the control of the US troops. And this raises serious doubts not only in France and Germany but also in Russia. And hard work is now under way to work out a compromise on the text of the resolution. I don't want to anticipate things as to what this fight will lead to, but if there is a resolution that will make the UN a key organization, then our involvement in Iraq may be quite serious. But it is very likely that we will not send our troops there. Maybe police or paramilitary units to protect our specialists from LUKoil or other companies. We could do that if a mechanism of Security Council control is put in place.

But this is unlikely to happen and there will be a resolution that may be read both ways. And although the UN role will grow, the real situation will remain under US control.

Moderator: I see that there are no more questions. I think we should blame Sergei Mikhailovich for that because he has given us a very complete picture.

Rogov: No, I don't want to take the blame for Iraq and the American policy.

Moderator: Thank you. Our press conference is over.