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Russia on the march - again
By Con Coughlin
Last Updated: 12:01am BST 13/04/2007
Inside Abroad
The new Cold War won't be like the last one, with massed tank divisions stretched across the German plain ready to repulse a Communist invasion of Western Europe. No, the looming power struggle between resurgent Russian nationalism and Western liberty will be determined by raw economic muscle and political clout or, in Russia's case, blackmail and intimidation.
You have only to look at the implosion of Ukraine's fledgling democratic institutions to see the effectiveness of the new tactics the Russian bear is using to claw back its influence over its former empire.
Moscow has not forgiven Ukraine for its Orange Revolution in late 2004, which saw Kiev sweep away decades of Soviet repression and assert its desire to become a functioning, Western-style democracy. On that occasion, the Kremlin resorted to the decidedly unsubtle tactic of poisoning Viktor Yushchenko, the principal pro-democracy campaigner, who, thanks to the prompt intervention of a team of Viennese toxicologists, survived the assassination attempt and went on to win the election.
Since then, Moscow has adopted a different approach, seeking to use its new economic strength to intimidate its former ally. Early last year, it switched off the oil and gas supplies, in effect leaving the country without heat or light in the depths of a Ukrainian winter.
More recently, the Russians reached for their cheque books and bought off enough parliamentarians (the going rate for a Ukrainian MP is said to be £2.5 million) to render the democratic process unworkable, to the extent that President Yushchenko, as he now is, was compelled this week to prorogue parliament and call new elections.
The reason the Russians have gone to such lengths to eradicate the seeds of Ukrainian democracy is their fear that, left to its own devices, Kiev would follow the same path as other former Soviet republics and seek to guarantee its hard-won freedom by joining the EU and Nato.
This is anathema to Moscow, where the heady days of glasnost and perestroika, and the prospect of Russia becoming a democracy, are but a distant memory. These days, Vladimir Putin, the autocratic Russian President, makes no secret of his contempt for the EU and Nato, which he insists took unfair advantage of Russia's economic weakness in the 1990s to advance into areas in eastern Europe that the Kremlin regards as its natural sphere of influence.
Putin wants to restore Russia to the superpower status it enjoyed under the Soviet Union, whose demise he describes as "the geopolitical catastrophe of the 20th century".
It is often said that the primary cause of the collapse of the USSR in the 1980s was the fall in oil prices to $10 a barrel. Now, with crude prices averaging $60, Moscow is awash with petrodollars, not least because of the brutal manner in which Putin has renationalised the nation's lucrative energy resources, with opponents driven into exile or, in the case of Mikhail Khordokovsky, the former head of the Yukos oil conglomerate, handed lengthy jail sentences in Siberia.
And Putin has not been slow to use these riches to fund a range of subversive activities aimed at destabilising and reclaiming the former satellite states. Apart from usurping Ukrainian democracy, the Kremlin has placed an economic stranglehold on Georgia and Moldova, arguably two of the weakest former Soviet republics.
Similar pressures have been applied to the Baltic states, which, despite joining both the EU and Nato, have found themselves subjected to economic and political intimidation by their former occupiers.
It is against this unpromising background that Putin has found the confidence to confront the West, citing the Bush Administration's plans to establish missile defence bases in Poland and the Czech Republic as his justification. The intended purpose of America's national missile defence project is to protect both America and most of Europe from nuclear missile attacks from rogue states such as Iran and North Korea.
The Pentagon insists the new system will be configured to intercept ballistic missiles fired from the Middle East and Far East, and that they would be useless against the much more sophisticated Russian missile technology. It has even been suggested that the system could be used to protect Russia, a notion dismissed out of hand by the Kremlin.
Not for Putin the detente of the Reagan-Thatcher era that ended three decades of nuclear stand-off. On the contrary, the Russian President seems intent on using the proposed American missile deployment to fund a new East-West arms race. Russia's all-powerful security council - which reports directly to Putin - announced earlier this month that it needed a new military "configuration" to counter the threat posed by Nato's expansion and Washington's missiles, and Russia's military budget has been dramatically increased.
Nor is there any realistic prospect of Putin being dissuaded from initiating a second Cold War against the West. The Kremlin's suppression of political opposition has been so successful that the most vociferous opponents today are the likes of Garry Kasparov, the former chess grand master, whose bravery in denouncing Putin's autocratic tendencies is not matched by any groundswell of public support.
Kasparov and his supporters have been successful in organising a number of street protests - more are planned for this weekend - but, in Putin's Russia, such open defiance is more likely to see Kasparov languishing in Siberia than taking over the Kremlin.
Russia on the march - again | Dt Opinion | Opinion | Telegraph
By Con Coughlin
Last Updated: 12:01am BST 13/04/2007
Inside Abroad
The new Cold War won't be like the last one, with massed tank divisions stretched across the German plain ready to repulse a Communist invasion of Western Europe. No, the looming power struggle between resurgent Russian nationalism and Western liberty will be determined by raw economic muscle and political clout or, in Russia's case, blackmail and intimidation.
You have only to look at the implosion of Ukraine's fledgling democratic institutions to see the effectiveness of the new tactics the Russian bear is using to claw back its influence over its former empire.
Moscow has not forgiven Ukraine for its Orange Revolution in late 2004, which saw Kiev sweep away decades of Soviet repression and assert its desire to become a functioning, Western-style democracy. On that occasion, the Kremlin resorted to the decidedly unsubtle tactic of poisoning Viktor Yushchenko, the principal pro-democracy campaigner, who, thanks to the prompt intervention of a team of Viennese toxicologists, survived the assassination attempt and went on to win the election.
Since then, Moscow has adopted a different approach, seeking to use its new economic strength to intimidate its former ally. Early last year, it switched off the oil and gas supplies, in effect leaving the country without heat or light in the depths of a Ukrainian winter.
More recently, the Russians reached for their cheque books and bought off enough parliamentarians (the going rate for a Ukrainian MP is said to be £2.5 million) to render the democratic process unworkable, to the extent that President Yushchenko, as he now is, was compelled this week to prorogue parliament and call new elections.
The reason the Russians have gone to such lengths to eradicate the seeds of Ukrainian democracy is their fear that, left to its own devices, Kiev would follow the same path as other former Soviet republics and seek to guarantee its hard-won freedom by joining the EU and Nato.
This is anathema to Moscow, where the heady days of glasnost and perestroika, and the prospect of Russia becoming a democracy, are but a distant memory. These days, Vladimir Putin, the autocratic Russian President, makes no secret of his contempt for the EU and Nato, which he insists took unfair advantage of Russia's economic weakness in the 1990s to advance into areas in eastern Europe that the Kremlin regards as its natural sphere of influence.
Putin wants to restore Russia to the superpower status it enjoyed under the Soviet Union, whose demise he describes as "the geopolitical catastrophe of the 20th century".
It is often said that the primary cause of the collapse of the USSR in the 1980s was the fall in oil prices to $10 a barrel. Now, with crude prices averaging $60, Moscow is awash with petrodollars, not least because of the brutal manner in which Putin has renationalised the nation's lucrative energy resources, with opponents driven into exile or, in the case of Mikhail Khordokovsky, the former head of the Yukos oil conglomerate, handed lengthy jail sentences in Siberia.
And Putin has not been slow to use these riches to fund a range of subversive activities aimed at destabilising and reclaiming the former satellite states. Apart from usurping Ukrainian democracy, the Kremlin has placed an economic stranglehold on Georgia and Moldova, arguably two of the weakest former Soviet republics.
Similar pressures have been applied to the Baltic states, which, despite joining both the EU and Nato, have found themselves subjected to economic and political intimidation by their former occupiers.
It is against this unpromising background that Putin has found the confidence to confront the West, citing the Bush Administration's plans to establish missile defence bases in Poland and the Czech Republic as his justification. The intended purpose of America's national missile defence project is to protect both America and most of Europe from nuclear missile attacks from rogue states such as Iran and North Korea.
The Pentagon insists the new system will be configured to intercept ballistic missiles fired from the Middle East and Far East, and that they would be useless against the much more sophisticated Russian missile technology. It has even been suggested that the system could be used to protect Russia, a notion dismissed out of hand by the Kremlin.
Not for Putin the detente of the Reagan-Thatcher era that ended three decades of nuclear stand-off. On the contrary, the Russian President seems intent on using the proposed American missile deployment to fund a new East-West arms race. Russia's all-powerful security council - which reports directly to Putin - announced earlier this month that it needed a new military "configuration" to counter the threat posed by Nato's expansion and Washington's missiles, and Russia's military budget has been dramatically increased.
Nor is there any realistic prospect of Putin being dissuaded from initiating a second Cold War against the West. The Kremlin's suppression of political opposition has been so successful that the most vociferous opponents today are the likes of Garry Kasparov, the former chess grand master, whose bravery in denouncing Putin's autocratic tendencies is not matched by any groundswell of public support.
Kasparov and his supporters have been successful in organising a number of street protests - more are planned for this weekend - but, in Putin's Russia, such open defiance is more likely to see Kasparov languishing in Siberia than taking over the Kremlin.
Russia on the march - again | Dt Opinion | Opinion | Telegraph
Or is it Russia's answer to the disintegration of the Communist behemoth they were and getting back at those who are responsible for their demise?
Or is it a 'sour grapes' western propaganda?
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