Lukyanov in Stockholm

Tobias Ljungvall took notes during a recent speech given at a Stockholm seminar by Russian political analyst Fyodor Lukyanov. As Tobias observes, Lukyanov more or less reproduces the Kremlin's current view of world affairs and of Russia's role in them [my tr.]:

1. Russian foreign policy under President Medvedev has not undergone any fundamental change compared to the foreign policy that prevailed under Putin. The differences in nuance can be partly explained by the fact that Medvedev is a different sort of person.

2. Russia is not like the Soviet Union, partly because it lacks an ideology.The loss of empire in1991 was worse than other countries’ similar experiences (e.g, Britain's loss of its colonies) as the lost areas were extensions of the country and some were a part of the national identity. The building of the Russian state began many centuries ago in Kiev, and therefore Russia finds hard to accept that Ukraine should join NATO.

3. A key concept is the so-called multi-polar world. The United States' attempt at hegemony has failed but has made the world more unstable because it cannot rely on international law any more. Relations between emerging new poles will shape the present century.

4. While in the West the Kosovo war of 1999 was perceived positively as proof that it was possible to defend human rights by force, Russia's interpretation of the Kosovo events was that national sovereignty no longer applies in the world. Russian public opinion turned its back on integration with the West and Western ideas of morality.

5. Instead, Russia was forced to strengthen its own capability. The only real guarantee of sovereignty for Russia is its nuclear weapons. In the absence of the former capabilities of the Soviet Union, Russia has also politicized gas and oil, in a way that Lukyanov thinks ultimately does most harm to Gazprom itself. The Soviet Union never mixed business and politics in the way that is now happening.

6. So now Russia is trying to avoid new gas conflicts with Ukraine. Today it is only Ukraine’s President Yushchenko who tries to provoke them. But hopefully after the elections which are due to take place in two months’ time Yushchenko will go into political retirement. 

There is more.

Moscow makes another nuclear threat

Having blithely threatened Poland with nuclear attack, the Russian leadership has apparently decided to follow this up with another such threat: the Sunday Times quotes a "senior military source in Moscow" as saying that "nuclear warheads could be supplied to submarines, cruisers and fighter bombers of the Baltic fleet based in Kaliningrad". This "press leak" is clearly intended for Western consumption, and should probably be treated with a modest dose of skepticism - given the current stance of the Russian government, the content of the statement is of less significance than its timing and form: it should - for the moment, at least -  be read as simply one more effort by Moscow to show its contempt for world opinion.

MSNBC on Litvinenko

On Februrary 24, MSNBC's Dateline aired an in-depth investigation of the Litvinenko poisoning affair by Ann Curry, with contributions by security expert Paul Joyal, among others.

As a subsequent NBC news report pointed out, however, there appears to be little likelihood that the assassins will be brought to justice, even though all the evidence appears to point to Moscow and the Kremlin as the likely instigators of the murder:

“Everything what happened in Russia, if it’s happened, it’s Putin decide to do it,” Marina Litvinenko, who speaks broken English, told “Dateline.” “Because without him, it’s just impossible.”

It is an assessment shared by Oleg Kalugin, the onetime top spy for the KGB.

Litvinenko “was a traitor. So was I and a number of others. They have a list,” Kalugin said. “They would love to kill him.”

And it is an assessment shared by Paul Joyal, the Russia specialist.

Joyal believes the Kremlin is resisting the British investigation because it is guilty and is hoping to run out the clock.

“It’ll go away in time,” he said. “Maybe not this week. Maybe not next week. But if you just hang in there and deny, at the end of the day — if there’s no one stepping forward saying, ‘I know’ — it will be forgotten.

“And there’s nothing anyone can do.”

From Partner to Adversary

Charles Krauthammer, writing about Vladimir Putin in the Seattle Times:

He wants Gromyko’s influence - or at least some international acknowledgment that Moscow must be reckoned with - without the ideological baggage. He does not want to bury us; he only wants to diminish us. It is 19th-century power politics at its most crude and elemental. Putin does not want us as an enemy. But at Munich he told the world that, vis-à-vis America, his Russia has gone from partner to adversary.

Litvinenko Poisoners' Identity Confirmed

From the Daily Mirror:

British detectives are certain they know who murdered former Soviet spy Alexander Litvinenko with radioactive poison.

But they say authorities in Russia are unlikely to send his two killers here to face trial.

Both were interviewed before Christmas by officers sent to Moscow.

They admit meeting Litvinenko in London, where he was slipped a powerful dose of polonium 210 in early November, but deny involvement.

Police will submit a file to the Crown Prosecution Service naming the two.

(Via AIA)