Subject: [CivilSoc] Two Tracks Essential to Relations with Russia
From: Center for Civil Society International (ccsi@u.washington.edu)
Date: Wed Jan 24 2001 - 19:33:38 EST
The excellent essay below, by Michael McFaul, appeared yesterday in
The Washington Post and was posted today on Johnson's Russia List,
#5047, 24 January 2001, davidjohnson@erols.com
Washington Post
January 23, 2001
Moscow, Misreading Bush
By Michael McFaul
The writer is a senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for
International Peace and an assistant professor and Hoover fellow at
Stanford University.
A wave of Soviet nostalgia is sweeping Russia. A former KGB official
now runs the country. His comrades still in the KGB (now called the
FSB) have revived old Soviet practices of harassing and arresting
journalists, academics, human rights activists and nonofficial
religious leaders. When President Putin called for the reinstatement
of the Soviet hymn as the Russian national anthem, the parliament
endorsed his idea without pause.
Now Putin's team is waiting for the final piece of the Soviet era to
fall into place--a more realpolitik relationship with the United
States. Putin supporters have even coined a term for
it--neo-Nixonism.
Russia's state media openly championed the benefits of a George W.
Bush victory for Russia. Under Bush, so Putin's people believe, the
United States will no longer care about domestic politics in Russia,
such as human rights, independent media or the war in Chechnya. With
Bush in power, so the thinking goes in Moscow, the Kremlin will have
a free hand to roll back democracy in the name of restoring law and
order.
They also believe that Russia once again will be treated like a great
power. They are nostalgic for the good old days of detente-superpower
summits, arms control and discussions about balancing American and
Russian power in regional conflicts.
Obviously, Putin and his people have a cartoonized understanding of
the new Bush administration's foreign policy philosophy, a crude
reading of how foreign policy is made in the United States and a
flawed historical reading of Nixon's policy toward the Soviet Union.
It is not the job of the new Bush team to give history lessons or
civics courses about the U.S. policy process to its Russian
counterpart. But it is imperative that the new Bush foreign policy
team signal clearly and immediately to Moscow its true intentions
regarding Russia, which above all else should reflect no nostalgia
for the "good old days" of the Cold War era.
To be sure, the new Bush team should assign greater emphasis to
traditional strategic issues in the U.S.-Russia relationship. The era
for international micromanagement of Russia's domestic reforms ended
long ago. In consultation and cooperation with their Russian
counterparts, members of the new Bush team should give first priority
to reducing nuclear arsenals, increasing control over the
proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, checking Russia's
hegemonic aspirations toward its neighbors and beginning a real
dialogue on national missile defense. But this set of priorities
should in no way be cast or interpreted as a return to the old
practices of superpower detente.
Previous administrations, Republican and Democratic alike, have
mastered multi-track diplomacy when issues of human rights and
religious freedom were pressed vigorously, though not always
publicly, at the same time that strategic issues were being
negotiated. The Russians need to understand that the Bush
administration can devote greater attention to these strategic issues
while at the same time continuing to promote democracy.
In introducing his future secretary of state, Colin Powell, Bush
stated clearly that "our stand for human freedom is not an empty
formality of diplomacy but a founding and guiding principle of this
great land. By promoting democracy we lay the foundation for a better
and more stable world." The Russians did not seem to hear this part
of the speech or similar rhetoric during the Bush campaign. It needs
to be communicated loud and clear and soon.
Support for democratization abroad, including Russia, has strong
bipartisan support on Capitol Hill. Because their own parliament is
so weak, Kremlin officials underestimate the role of Congress in the
making of foreign policy. The Bush team should signal quickly to its
Russian colleagues that it has no intention of challenging this
bipartisan support, especially when the new administration is seeking
bipartisan coalitions on other issues.
The Bush foreign policy team also would do well to politely remind
Kremlin officials that Russia has changed dramatically since the days
of detente. Not only is Russia radically weaker today in traditional
power measures but Russian society is much stronger. During the Nixon
era, the United States had only one real point of contact in the
Soviet Union, the state. Working with Kremlin leaders was not a
choice; it was the only option. Today, though weak and embattled, a
private sector, a civil society and a political class independent of
the Kremlin exist in Russia. These new pockets of independent power
offer the United States a wide range of contact points to engage the
Russian people. The Bush administration should cut all democratic and
economic aid to the state and redirect these funds to Russian
society.
Through state-to-state channels, the Bush team must pursue strategic
issues with Putin and his team. Through societal channels, however,
the new administration can promote market and democratic ideas within
Russia.
From Wilson to Reagan, American support for democracy abroad endured
as a bipartisan theme of American foreign policy, and it will not
disappear with a change in administration. The sooner the new Bush
team communicates this message to the Russians the better.
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