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Russia’s
Renewed Quest for Power
“Russia
does not negotiate with terrorists, it eliminates them.” -
Russian President, Vladimir Putin
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Russian
strongman Vladimir Putin |
In
1999, mysterious newcomer Vladimir Putin appeared on the Russian
political scene, attempting to succeed an ailing Boris Yeltsin. The
latter had ruled over a stormy decade of haphazard reforms during
which the country was paralyzed and its political, military, and
economic sources of power were virtually devastated. Under
Yeltsin’s authority, what was hailed by the West as Russia’s
extraordinary transformation from communist dictatorship to a
multiparty democracy was nothing more than the establishment of
oligarchic capitalism, in which wealth and power accumulated in the
hands of the few. The semi-shadowy figures lurking at the helm of
power during the Yeltsin era, usually referred to as the Semya
(the Family), became post-Soviet Russia’s business elite.1
After
the election of Vladimir Putin, however, Russia enjoyed several
years of strong, uninterrupted economic growth (4.3% in 2002, 7.1%
in the first half of 2003), a stable currency, and became the second
largest producer of oil and the largest producer of natural gas in
the world.2 Putin emerged as one
of the world’s most dynamic leaders, a frequent and welcomed guest
for President George W. Bush and a force in European diplomacy.3
In other words, the transition on New Year’s Day 2000 from Yeltsin
to Putin put a strong, new face in charge of Russian policy and
symbolized the prospects of Russia’s return to the ranks of the
major powers.
On
March 15, 2004, a few hours after he’d won a resounding and
entirely expected re-election victory, Vladimir Putin pledged to
drive Russia’s economy forward, improve the lives of impoverished
citizens and increase democratic freedoms. He said that his key
policy goal was to modernize a country in which a quarter of its 145
million residents live below the poverty line.4
Putin
won almost 71% of the Russian vote in elections opposition
candidates insist were a sham, arguing that state-run television ran
biased coverage, with rule violations discrediting the elections.
The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) said
that the elections lacked elements of a genuine democratic contest,
and US Secretary of State Colin Powell warned of increasing
“authoritarianism” creeping back into Russian society.5
Raising
Russia from the Rubble
Despite
some impressive gains in terms of overall Russian policy
performance, a daunting task remains ahead of Putin in his second
term. Although his administration has curtailed the power of the
industrial barons, it has had little success reforming the system of
crony capitalism that emerged under Yeltsin. A handful of large
financial-industrial enterprises reportedly still control
three-quarters of the Russian economy.6
In fact, the World Bank’s most recent study on corruption ranks
Russia among the top 25% of the world’s most corrupt countries.7
Russia’s
unhealthy centralization of industrial and financial power in the
hands of a few is a harbinger of the difficulties that lie ahead as
it sets to work modernizing its economy, creating open markets, and
integrating the country into the global marketplace.
More
seriously, Russia has to deal with the problem of an unhealthy,
aging, and less productive population. Alcoholism and heart disease
have increased as a result of the economic dislocation of the 1990s.
Russia also has the highest rate of growth in HIV infection in the
world. By 2005, as many as 5 million Russians could be HIV-positive.
With the lack of advanced care facilities and drug-treatment
regimens, by 2010 these individuals will begin to develop full-blown
AIDS and die.8 A World Bank model
of the long-term effects of HIV/AIDS on the Russian economy
concluded that “the uninhibited spread of HIV would diminish the
economy’s long-term growth rate, taking off half a percentage
point annually by 2010 and a full percentage point annually by
2020.”9
Russia’s
Strategic Predicament
Russia
seeks to influence policy in Belarus, Ukraine and Moldova to
counter NATO’s enlargement and limit American involvement in
Eastern Europe.
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On
the strategic front, Russia’s ability to project power beyond its
borders is being curtailed by NATO’s expansion into ex-Soviet
satellite states, as well as the spread of US bases across
Russia’s southern frontiers in the Caucasus and Central Asia in
the aftermath of September 11.10
The
most notable example of US-Russian geopolitical competition took
place in Georgia, viewed by the US as a strategic partner due to its
location, situated along an arc of instability, in a region that is
an important crossroads for Islamist movements.11
Additionally, the presence of US troops in Georgia secures US
influence over the Caucasus and undermines Russia’s influence in
its own backyard. On the other hand, the Russians fear that American
military advisors in Georgia will become the nucleus of a permanent
military presence in a nation that already has aspirations to join
NATO. In this regard, Georgia is of particular strategic
significance because of its warm water ports on the Black Sea and
its borders with Chechnya, currently at war with Russia.
Another
area of Western-Russian contestation is in Eastern Europe, where
Russia seeks to influence policy in Belarus, Ukraine and Moldova to
counter NATO’s enlargement and limit American involvement in
Eastern Europe. This was manifested in Russia’s attempts to unify
defense structures with former Soviet states and increase their
dependence on Russian energy supplies.12
Russia
entered the new millennium with its capacity to project military
power beyond its borders vastly reduced and its ability to defend
its territorial integrity and sovereignty severely tested by the war
in Chechnya.13 After 15 years of
attempts at reform, Russian defense forces are essentially a
shrunken version of the Soviet military. The weakness of Russia’s
military and especially its strategic forces was in stark evidence
in February 2004, with three missile launch failures in two days.14
During Putin’s first term, the Russian navy suffered the loss of
the nuclear submarine Kursk in 2001, with another breaking
down and being towed to port in August 2003. That same month, during
military exercises in Russia’s Far East attended by Defense
Minister Sergei Ivanov, two Mi-24 helicopters collided in mid-air.
Moreover, military bases have faced constant electricity cutoffs due
to lack of funds, and Russian newspapers have reported cases of
malnutrition and even starvation among conscripts.15
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Putin
and Moscow-loyalist Ahmed Kadyrov |
One
of the major military objectives of post-Communist Russia has been
to defeat Chechen independence and to project Russian power into the
Caucasus and Central Asia. The conflict with Chechnya is one of the
most pervasive and enduring conflicts in human history, spanning
more that two centuries. The bloodiest episode took place in 1944,
when the Soviet government deported as many as half a million
Chechens for allegedly collaborating with the Nazis.
In
the early 1990s, Boris Yeltsin and his advisors were convinced that
the growing militancy of the Chechen leadership and their
uncompromising quest for independence could produce a domino effect
- a cascade of independence movements that would end in the
disintegration of Russia itself.16
The result was a horrendous war between 1994 and 1996 in which the
Russian army was defeated and Chechnya enjoyed a short-lived period
of independence. However, using the pretext of a mysterious wave of
bombings in Russian cities in 1999 (Chechens denied responsibility
for them and Russia has failed to produce evidence to the contrary),
Russia invaded Chechnya once again. It is estimated that between
70,000 and 100,000 Chechens (from a total population of about 1.2
million) were killed during the last decade’s two wars, with an
equal amount made refugees.
The
Russian military has demonstrated an increasing inability to enforce
“law and order” in the breakaway republic, and Chechen fighters
have illustrated a tremendous ability to launch strikes against
Russian troops inside Chechnya. It is estimated that up to 15,000
Russian soldiers have been killed thus far.17
To
illustrate Putin’s inability to protect his own citizens, Chechen
fighters also launched several attacks inside Russia itself. Last
year, a commuter train was targeted in the Stavropol region in
southern Russia, killing more than 40 people. In October 2002,
during the siege of Moscow’s Dubrovka theater, at least 129 of
approximately 800 hostages held by Chechen militants died after
exposure to knockout gas pumped into the building by Russian forces.
One month before March’s elections, at least 41 people were killed
and more than a hundred wounded when an explosion took place in
Moscow’s busy subway system. Moreover, a few days before the
presidential elections, Abu al-Waleed, the recently deceased senior
Arab field commander in Chechnya, warned that should the Russians
elect a president who would continue the war in Chechnya, a new wave
of attacks would take place inside Russia in retaliation for
Moscow’s humanitarian abuses in Chechnya.
Conclusions
With
the complex strategic and economic odds Russia faces, Vladimir Putin
faces a difficult task. The main platform of his first term was the
consolidation of power in the hands of the Kremlin and the
centralization of decision-making structures and institutions.
Russia seeks to reassert itself as a “Eurasian power,” capable
of influencing international events and playing a major role in
conflicts worldwide. Despite joining the US’ “war on
terrorism,” Russia has attempted to counterbalance US influence by
seeking diplomatic and commercial ties with Europe and other Third
World states such as Iran. Russia’s anti-Iraq war coalition with
Germany and France is a case in point. However, prospects for Russia
returning to its former Soviet pre-eminence and explicitly seeking
to undermine the US are bleak, due to immense economic, strategic,
and military obstacles.
The
weakness of Russia’s military and strategic forces was in
stark evidence in February 2004, with three missile launch
failures in two days.
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Despite
the military deadlock between Russia and the Chechens, Russia seems
more likely to continue its military campaign in the mountain
republic and work to bolster a pro-Russian leadership in Chechnya to
give the impression of normalcy. After questionable elections last
October, Putin endorsed the new Chechen president, Moscow-loyalist
Ahmed Kadyrov, and presented him in Washington and at the
Organization of the Islamic Conference Summit in Malaysia, thus
effectively placing all responsibility for the ongoing atrocities in
Chechnya squarely on the new president’s shoulders.18
Despite
Russian attempts at legitimizing the puppet government of Kadyrov,
and in the absence of a satisfactory resolution to the Chechen’s
struggle for freedom, coupled with continuing Russian atrocities, it
is expected that daring acts of resistance from Chechen fighters
will continue both inside and outside Chechnya.
Time
will tell whether Putin becomes Russia’s new Tsar, or just another
president clutching at the remnants of a past great power.
Kareem
M. Kamel is an Egyptian freelance writer based in Cairo,
Egypt. He has an MA in International Relations and is specialized in
security studies, decision- making, nuclear politics, Middle East
politics and the politics of Islam. He is currently assistant to the
Political Science Department at the American University in Cairo.
1-
Shohdy Naguib, “Fall of the Oligarchs,” Al-Ahram Weekly
November 20th-26th 2003
2-
Eugene B. Rumer and Celeste A. Wallander, “Russia: Power in
Weakness?” The Washington Quarterly (Winter 2003/2004) :
pp. 57-58
3-
Ibid.
4-
“Putin Pledges Reform in Second Term,” Al-Jazeera (English)
March 15th, 2004
5-
Frank Brown, “Easy Victory,” Newsweek March 15th, 2004
6-
Eugene B. Rumer and Celeste A. Wallander, “Russia: Power in
Weakness?” The Washington Quarterly (Winter 2003/2004) :
pp. 57-58
7-
Ibid.
8-
Ibid.
9-
Ibid.
10-
Thom Shanker, “Rumsfeld Offers Support in Georgia,” New York
Times December 6th, 2003
11-
Ibid.
12-
Janusz Bugajski, “Russia’s New Europe,” The National
Interest (Winter 2003/2004)
13-
Ibid.
14-
Jacqueline M. Miller, “Russia & Eurasia Report: Elections,
Russian Style,” Center
for Strategic and International Studies February 2004
15-
Eugene B. Rumer and Celeste A. Wallander, “Russia: Power in
Weakness?” The Washington Quarterly (Winter 2003/2004) : 62
16-
Charles King, “Crisis in the Caucasus: A New Look at Russia’s
Chechen Impasse,” Foreign Affairs March/April 2003
17-
“Russia Warned of New Attacks,” Al-Jazeera (English)
March 13th, 2004
18-
Shohdy Naguib, “Re-electing the Enigmatic Tsar,” Al-Ahram
Weekly March 11th - 17th, 2004
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