January 9, 1998  
This Date's Issues: 2008  •2009  2010 2011

Johnson's Russia List (List Two)
#2011
9 January 1998
davidjohnson@erols.com

[Note from David Johnson:
1. Albert Weeks: Books on the Soviet demise.
2. Ray Finch: Response to Alan Philps of Electronic Telegraph
on Chechnya.
3. Rossiiskiye Vesti: NATIONAL SECURITY CONCEPT OF THE RUSSIAN 
FEDERATION (Part 1).]

*******

Date: Thu, 8 Jan 1998 
From: Albert Weeks <AWeeks1@compuserve.com>
Subject: Books on the Soviet demise

'Transition's' Peter Rutland did an admirable exposition of the books on
the Soviet collapse written Brown, Hough, Kotz/Weir, Kontorovich/Ellman,
and Kagarlitsky.
However, a curious omission--a vacuum undoubtedly stemming from the books
themselves--leaves me and perhaps other Russian specialists suspended in
mid-air on the hook of a large question mark. 
Namely: Why didn't the authors whom Rutland reviewed assess the
"dissolving" factor of U.S. foreign policy, and specifically the policies
adopted by President Reagan, especially in his first term, as catalyst for
the Soviet demise?
Virtually every memoir I've read--whether in English or Russian--written
and published by former Soviet officials themselves, civilian and military,
attribute so much of the fall of communism in the "Soviet bloc" and in
Soviet Russia itself to Reagan's "propaganda/information offensive" against
the Soviets beginning in 1981. His speech to the British Parliament is a
good example. This offensive, moreover, was backed by an impressive
military buildup already partly in place under the "deutero"-Carter of
1979-80 following the shock of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. The
Reagan offensive cannot be ignored or discounted as potent, perhaps even
crucial factor leading to disarray and moderation of policy--foreign and
domestic--in Moscow.
I do not make this claim as a mere badge of courage to pin on Mr. Reagan.
Still, I suspect the neglect of a full-blown appraisal of his policy toward
the Soviets is more than partly responsible for some of the above authors' 
penchant to shy away from the proposition that Reagan's policies in any way
abetted the Soviet collapse. It is a well known fact that most of these
American authors in their previous writings of the early '80s had accused
Reagan of prolonging the Cold War. Which was such nonsense that I suspect
they would just as soon forget this earlier position of theirs and relegate
it to a private Memory Hole.

********

Date: Wed, 7 Jan 1998 
From: "Finch, Ray MAJ FINCHR" <FINCHR@LEAV-EMH1.ARMY.MIL> 
Subject: Response to Mr. Philps

Dear Mr. Johnson, please consider posting the following. Thanks. Happy
New Year! Ray Finch

Though it will probably be quite some time before the United
States and the world community recognize the sovereignty of the Chechen
people, I think that Mr. Philps of the Electronic Telegraph (UK) is a
bit off the mark when he refers to Shamil Basyaev as a "notorious
terrorist" and "hate figure for the Russians." (JRL #2001, 5 Jan 98)
That Mr. Basayev is despised by most of the Russian power ministers
(most notably, the Interior Minister, Gen A. Kulikov) is undoubtedly
true. I suspect that the source of this hatred, however, has less to do
with those Russian civilians who died in the Budennovsk raid of June +95
(many of whom were killed by Russian bullets during the botched attempt
to storm the hospital), than with Mr. Basayev's humiliating and exposing
the utter ineptitude of the Russian military, internal and special
forces. Though I have no statistical proof, I would wager that many
Russians have more respect for the current Chechen leadership (to
include Mr. Basayev) than for today's residents of the Kremlin. I do.

Over the long holiday weekend, I had the opportunity to watch
two Russian documentary films which describe some of the more unsavory
aspects of the fighting in Chechnya (Prokliatiia i Zabytie [The Damned
and Forgotten] and Vsia Voina [The Whole War].) I'd recommend that Mr.
Philps also take the time and watch these films. While the Chechens
were certainly guilty of using unorthodox methods of fighting (including
bribing, kidnaping, torturing their enemy), the Russians were equally as
brutal. Yet the scale of the Russian brutality was infinitely larger.
The Russian forces had an almost unlimited supply of armaments, and no
one will ever know the amount of ordnance fired in Chechnya by the
Russians, much of it indiscriminately. Russian soldiers (military,
internal, special and police) often conducted themselves with wanton
abandon and with an almost complete disregard for that handy military
euphemism "collateral damage". If it moved and looked like a Chechen,
it was fair game.

From the military standpoint, this David and Goliath struggle
was both amazing and somewhat disturbing to watch. How did this tiny
nation of some 1 million people defeat the remnants of our Cold War
nemesis? Since Hiroshima, military thinkers have postulated that with
the advent of weapons of mass destruction, the traditional correlation
of forces were somewhat skewed. Even a smaller country with a weak
military, if it had the "bomb", could stand up to a larger one. This is
the basis of all the fuss over Iraq, N. Korea or some other "rogue"
state getting these weapons. Chechnya demonstrated something altogether
different (as did Vietnam for the Americans). The critical issue isn't
whether or not a nation possesses weapons of mass destruction, but the
strength of its will and belief in its cause. Even in our nuclear-info
age, military planners must take into account Napoleon's maxim "that the
moral is to the material as three is to one."

During the course of a project which looked at the Russian
military's performance in Chechnya (see our homepage at
http://leav-www.army.mil/fmso for a number of articles dealing with this
subject), I collected a number of quotes from Mr. Basayev. Though they
don't tell the whole story, they might helpfully dispel the notion that
Shamil Basayev as a "notorious terrorist". 

Quotes from Shamil Basayev during the Chechen conflict.

"I do not like war, nor do I like waging war, but I have to." 15 Feb 95

"We have been an independent country now for four years, and we will
fight until Russia pulls out its troops from Russia". 16 Feb 95

"I shall fight to the end even at my vegetable garden".15 Jun 95

"To get to Budennovsk (185 miles from the Chechen border), I had to
spend $22,000 dollars....to get to Moscow I need $34,000."

"I don't want to engage in blackmail, but it's true, that as far as we
are concerned, it's a thousand times easier to fight in Russia, because
if civilians must die, they won't be ours."

"Even in Budennovsk, they did not understand that it was only a pale
copy of what has been going on in Chechnya for six months."26 Jun 95

"If someone spat in your face every day for seven months, wouldn't you
spit back once?"

"We're not asking for anything but our freedom. We just can't sit here
and be exterminated."

"The Russians keep saying that we have almost no territory left, but we
still control 25 percent of it, including the high mountains, the
hardest territory of all".

"I want them to know that I'm in Chechnya because I have nothing to run
from. I'm not a bandit on the run, I'm fighting for my people's
freedom".

"If they bomb here because of me, I'll leave Chechnya, but I'll go to
Russia and bomb them there".
6 Jul 95

"We resorted to the operation [Budennovsk]because of the cruelty of the
Russian soldiers. We could no longer fight them normally. They were
shelling our villages. They were destroying houses with six-ton bombs".

"It is of little importance whether Russia or the world community
recognize us. We have never been a part of Russia. They won us over 137
years ago, but it has never broken us down. It ended up the same way 74
years ago. The current war is a war between two states".

We do not think about death. That is in the hands of the Almighty. Our
motto was the dictum of one entire Chechen generation: 'Freedom or
death'. We keep holding on to it".

"This war is completely built on pillaging and bribing...We cultivate
marijuana, manufacture vodka and barter with them for arms. They call
the prices. Vodka always is the hardest currency". 18 Jul 95

"We do not want to be slaves. We don't want another knock on the door
tomorrow morning, or have them marching in without knocking and giving
us half an hour to assemble, 20 kilos of hand baggage, and off to
Kazakhstan. We do not want that, understand? We want to be masters of
our own destiny". 21 Jul 95

Are the weapons coming through Dagestan? No, we buy them from Russian
officers...It's easier with the Russian military: In the last month they
have sold us several Grad missiles at 100,000 rubles apiece".
25 Jul 95

"We've won of course--we won this war before it started, because we were
right from the start".

"If the fighting starts again I swear to you that Moscow will be
destroyed--not one person will be left".
13 Aug 95

"As long as just one Russian soldier remains on Vainakh [Chechen] soil,
peace and calm will be incomplete".

"For two centuries of relentless struggle for freedom and independence,
the Chechens have earned full sovereignty". 16 Sep 95

"We have chosen our path: freedom or death, and we will secure our
freedom".

Are you afraid that they may kill you? "The bullet with the name
'Shamil' on it will not bypass me. Whatever God has predestined for me
will be". 3 Oct 95

"I will swear to you right now that we will not seize anything ever
again. Give us an airplane and we will bomb you instead".

"We are fighting for Chechen independence...What good would "special
status" do me? Do you know what that's like? It's like a dog on a chain.
He doesn't have room to move, he barks all the time, he's vicious. If
the owner lengthens the chain by one meter, the dog is happy, because
now he's free, you see? Even better if the owner makes it so the chain
can slide up and down a long wire--now that's special status. But we
don't need that. We are not dogs, we are wolves, you see. I am fighting
because I don't want to see 1944 repeated. So that tomorrow some new
Stalin cannot take me or my people and load us on cattle cars and exile
us from our native land".

"Everyone we have is a professional...In order to become a professional,
all you have to do is survive one battle".

How can you explain your success so far? "God's mercy. You are always
counting forces, you count airplanes and tanks. But we take the divine
factor into account. We are people of faith... Allah has been merciful
to us. Because we are fighting from our hearts, for our freedom in God's
name."

"I can't even remember how many centuries we've been fighting. We're not
afraid to die".

"Russia will soon break up into 43 parts. And the Northern Caucasus will
unite and be one great state. All the peoples of the Caucasus, including
the Cossacks, will live together". 1 Mar 96

"I was preparing for war with Russia a long time before the aggression
against Chechnya began. Together with fighters from my Abkhazian
battalion, I paid three visits to Afghan Mujahedin camps, where I
learned the tactics of guerrilla warfare". 25 Apr 96

To the question, where did he receive his military training: "From 1991
on, I engaged in independent study. And with Russian textbooks. I began
to study because I had a goal...I realized that Russia was not going to
let Chechnya go just like that, that liberty was a costly thing and that
one must pay for it in blood".

"I am not a nationalist. I am simply not a Russian, but a citizen of the
Chechen Republic of Ichkeria. And today and henceforward, I will fight
against any man who would by force encroach on our state power, whatever
it might be".

"They say that Budennovsk was terror. And the fact that the Russian Air
Force is bombing our villages every day--that is not terror? Only
peaceful citizens are dying, in broad daylight". 15 May 96

"This is a Jihad, a holy war, like the one in Afghanistan. We are
fighting for our independence and for Allah. The Koran says: If your
enemy invades your land, you must rise and confront him".

"We have been fighting the Russians for 300 years. We Chechens have
never invaded another country. We do not say good morning or good-bye.
Do you know how we address people? We say 'come free' when someone
arrives and 'go free' when he leaves. The Russians? The Russians are
slaves. The Russian soldiers entered Chechnya because they were ordered
so. They are always drunk".

"I am not a bandit...They call us wolves. Fine, I am a wolf, a wolf like
my father was, and my grandfather, and my great grandfather, and my
great great grandfather before that". 12 Jun 96

"I don't trust any Russian and, as I believe Churchill once said, an
agreement with them is not worth that paper it is written on".

"I hope this conflict will end quickly. I do not like fighting at all".
16 Aug 96

"The Russians can take the city [Grozny] back. It would take half a year
and they would have to destroy the town. They can take it in even a
month, but it would cost them 10,000 to 15,000 men".

"The Russian soldiers did not want to fight and were reluctant to leave
their bases to storm the town again. We lost our patience when Moscow
went back on its word to end the war peacefully, and launched bombing
raids in the mountains in July [96]".

Asked if his humiliation of Russia would bring better results than peace
talks: "Do you not think Russia has humiliated us for 300 years? It
cannot even feed its own people--that is its humiliation. It should pay
its hungry miners rather than spend money on this war. Soldiers were
eating dogs from the streets here in January, they were so hungry". 17
Aug 96

********

>From RIA Novosti
Rossiiskiye Vesti
December 25, 1997

NATIONAL SECURITY CONCEPT OF THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION [Part 1]

Endorsed by the Russian Federation President's 
Decree No. 1300 (dated December 17, 1997)

The Concept of the Russian Federation's National Security
(hereinafter referred to as the Concept) is a political
document, which reflects a total combination of officially
accepted views as regards specific goals and the appropriate
state strategy aimed at ensuring individual, public and state
security against political, economic, social, military,
man-made, environmental, information and other internal and
external threats (with due account taken of available
resources and possibilities).
The Concept formulates the most important state-policy
guidelines and principles, constituting a foundation for the
elaboration of concrete programs and organizational documents
in the field of ensuring the Russian Federation's national
security.

I. RUSSIA INSIDE THE GLOBAL COMMUNITY

The current global situation is characterized by more
pronounced tendencies leading to the formation of a
multi-polar world.
This is manifested in stronger economic and political
positions of quite a few states and their integration-oriented
associations, a streamlined machinery for ensuring
multilateral control over international political, economic,
financial and data-exchange processes.
Military factors and power politics still retain their
positions inside the overall system of international
relations.
At the same time, economic, political,
science-and-technological, environmental and information
factors are coming to play an increasingly important role in
this context.
Meanwhile international competition aimed at ensuring
control over natural, technological and information resources,
as well as specific sales markets, is becoming more and more
pronounced.
It will take a lot of time for a multi-polar world to
assert itself. Various repeated attempts, which aim to create
such a structure of international relations that would be
based on unilateral solutions of key international problems
(including military and power-political solutions), are still
being manifested rather actively during the current stage of
the multi-polar world's emergence.
The widening gap between industrialized and developing
countries will continue to affect the relevant pace as regards
the formation of a new structure of international relations,
as well as specific directions of its formation.
The present-day period in the development of
international relations provides the Russian Federation with
new opportunities for ensuring its security. However, that
period is also fraught with a number of threats connected with
Russia's new international positions and domestic-reform
difficulties.
Various pre-requisites for the demilitarization of
international relations have now been created. Such
pre-requisites also make it possible to strengthen the role of
law during the settlement of contentious inter-state problems.
Besides, the danger of a direct aggression against the Russian
Federation has diminished. All this opens up entirely new
opportunities for mobilizing resources that would be expected
to resolve our domestic problems.
There have now emerged prospects for the Russian
Federation's more profound integration into the global
economy, including international credit-and-financial
institutions, e.g. the International Monetary Fund, the World
Bank and the European Bank.
Russia has also started expanding its cooperation with a
number of members of the Commonwealth of Independent States.
Russia and other states now share more common interests
on such international-security issues as efforts to counter
the proliferation of NBC (Nuclear, Bacteriological and
Chemical) weapons, the settlement and prevention of regional
conflicts, the crackdown on international terrorism and drug
trafficking, the solution of pressing global environmental
problems (nuclear and radiation safety included).
All this provides much more impressive opportunities for
ensuring Russia's national security with the help of
non-military methods, e.g. contractual-legal, political,
economic and other measures.
At the same time, Russia now exerts much less influence
on the solution of cardinal international issues that affect
the interests of our state. In the obtaining situation, a
number of states more seriously aspire to weaken Russia's
political, economic, military and other positions.
The process of creating a universal and comprehensive
security model for Europe in line with principles that have
been largely advanced on Russia's initiative is linked with
serious difficulties.
Russia views NATO's projected eastward expansion as
something unacceptable because such expansion threatens its
national security.
Various multilateral peace-keeping and security
mechanisms are not yet effective enough. This is true of
global (the United Nations) and regional mechanisms (the
Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe and the
Commonwealth of Independent States) alike.
This limits our opportunities during the use of such
mechanisms for ensuring Russian national-security interests by
political and legal methods.
Russia is being isolated from Asia-Pacific integration
processes to a certain extent.
Russia, which is an influential Eurasian power and which
has its own national interests in Europe, the Middle East,
Central and South Asia and the Asia-Pacific region, finds all
this to be unacceptable.
Positive trends as regards the internal development of
the Russian state and society are not yet stable enough. This
is mostly caused by the persisting Russian economic crisis.
Production has plunged, with its patterns deteriorating on the
pre-reform period. Investment and innovation activity is
subsiding. Russia's science-and-technological lag behind
industrial nations is becoming more pronounced. Russia is
becoming more and more dependent on foreign-made food,
consumer goods, machinery and know-how imports. The nation's
external and public debts continue to skyrocket. Skilled
experts keep leaving the material-production sphere and the
R&D sector. The number of "man-made" emergencies is also on
the rise. Russian society is becoming increasingly stratified.
On the other hand, the living standards of most Russian
citizens continue to decline. The level of crime and
corruption is still very high.
The nation's economic, research and demographic potential
continue to dwindle. Sales markets and Russian industry's
raw-materials base have also become depleted.
The share of foreign trade in Russia's GNP has soared
unprecedentedly; nonetheless, Russia's integration into the
global market often takes place in line with unfavorable
terms.
Public accord has not yet been achieved. And a
consolidating national idea, which determines Russian
society's world-outlook basis and long-term development goals,
as well as the main ways and methods of achieving them, still
remains to be finalized.
The old-time defense system has now been disrupted.
Meanwhile a new defense system is being created rather slowly.
Vast stretches of the Russian Federation's state border are
not being protected in any way at this stage.
At the same time, Russia has all the pre-requisites for
maintaining and strengthening its positions as a power that
can ensure the prosperity of its people and to play an
important role in global processes.
Russia boasts an impressive economic and
science-and-technological potential, which determines any
country's ability toward sustainable development.
Russia occupies a unique strategic position on the
Eurasian continent, possessing considerable raw materials
reserves and other natural resources.
This country has created all the main institutions of
democratic statehood and a multi-sectoral economy. Work is
proceeding apace to stabilize the economy and to create
production-growth pre-requisites on the basis of
economic-restructuring programs.
Russia is one of the world's biggest multi-ethnic states,
boasting a many-century-old history and culture, as well as
its own national interests and traditions.
All these factors, as well as the existence of a powerful
nuclear arsenal, create the pre-requisites for ensuring
Russian national security throughout the 21st century.

II. RUSSIA'S NATIONAL INTERESTS

Russia's national interests are based on the national
heritage and national values of the Russian Federation's
peoples. They are ensured by this country's economic
potential, that of the state's political and military
organization, as well as by the spiritual-moral and
intellectual potential of Russia's multi-ethnic society.
The system of Russia's national interests is determined
by a combination of the main interests of the individual,
society and the state.
The interests of the individual now boil down to the
observance of constitutional rights and freedoms, personal
safety, more impressive living standards and quality of life,
as well as physical, spiritual and intellectual development.
Social interests comprise consolidated democracy, the
attainment and maintenance of public accord, the population's
greater creative activity and Russia's spiritual revival.
State interests constitute the protection of Russia's
constitutional system, sovereignty and territorial integrity.
Apart from that, it is in the state's interests to establish
political, economic and social stability, to unfailingly
observe laws, to maintain law and order and to expand
international cooperation based on partnership.
A combination of the main interests of the individual,
society and the state determines Russia's national interests
in the field of economics, domestic political, international
and defense spheres, as well as those in the field of
information, the social sphere, spiritual life and culture.
Russia's national economic interests are seen as a key
aspect. A comprehensive solution of problems connected with
the realization of Russia's national interests, is only
possible on the basis of a multi-sectoral and hi-tech
production complex's sustainable operation.
Such a production complex must be able to supply leading
economic sectors with raw materials and equipment, delivering
the required weaponry to the nation's armed forces. Besides,
it must supply the population and the social sphere with
consumer goods and services, providing the foreign-trade
sector with competitive export-oriented goods.
The economy's ability to ensure worthy living standards
and quality of life to all citizens is seen as an extremely
important factor. The economy must also enable them to realize
their creative potential, spiritual demands and material
requirements. Russian society must eliminate poverty as a
social phenomenon. We must ensure worthy living standards to
the nation's veterans, handicapped persons and senior
citizens. Besides, the entire population must have access to
education, culture, medical care, transportation,
communications networks and municipal utilities.
Speaking of national economic interests, we must ensure
the economy's operation in the extended-reproduction mode;
besides, the economy must protect the interests of domestic
producers; innovation and investment activities have to be
expanded; we must control this country's strategic resources
on a permanent basis; and, finally, we've got to maintain an
adequate research potential capable of asserting Russia's
independence along strategic avenues of
science-and-technological progress.
The Russian economy must switch over to the
sustainable-development model featuring state regulation of
economic processes (to a certain extent) that would guarantee
the stable operation and sustainable development of a
multi-sectoral economy and that would ensure a well-balanced
solution of socio-economic tasks and environmental-protection
problems with a view to satisfying the requirements of
present-day and future generations.
This constitutes the most important precondition for the
realization of national interests in the given field.
An integral economic space, as well as the existence of a
huge and diverse domestic market, constitute Russia's most
important national asset. We must preserve and develop that
asset with due account taken of regional production
specialization. This presents a consolidating factor of
Russia's economy.
Russia also has national interests in the
foreign-economic field. Such interests are as follows--Russian
producers must be entitled to economic ties that would ensure
the realization of Russian corporate interests, facilitating
greater competitiveness of Russian-made products, production
efficiency and economic growth. 
Russia rejects any foreign-economic violence and coercion
whatsoever.
Russia has the following national interests in the
domestic-policy sphere. This country must ensure civil peace,
national accord, territorial integrity, a common legal
environment, the stability of state power and that of its
institutions, as well as law and order. Apart from that,
Russia must complete the process of democratic society's
assertion, neutralizing factors and conditions that facilitate
social and inter-ethnic conflicts, ethnic and regional
separatism.
The solution of the following top-priority tasks will
make it possible to ensure Russian unity and
domestic-political stability: 
- coordinating the interests of Russia's peoples;
- streamlining their all-round cooperation; 
- conducting a responsible and well thought-out state
nationalities policy.
A comprehensive solution of these tasks must constitute
the basis of the domestic state policy, ensuring the Russian
Federation's development as a multi-ethnic, democratic and
federal state.
The Russian Federation's national interests as regards
the crackdown on crime and corruption require concerted action
on the part of society and the state. Besides, the economic
and socio-political basis of these unlawful phenomena must be
drastically curbed. The state must work out a comprehensive
system of legal, specialized and other measures making it
possible to effectively thwart crimes and violations of the
law, to protect private individuals, society and the state
from criminal encroachments and to create the required system
for monitoring crime levels.
The efforts of society and the state must aim to create a
system of effective social crime-prevention measures; such
measures would also be expected to bring up law-abiding
citizens.
The crackdown on organized crime, corruption, terrorism
and banditism must aim to prevent and thwart unlawful actions,
envisaging inevitable liability for any crime and defending
the right of each citizen to personal safety, irrespective of
his or her nationality, citizenship, religion, views and
convictions.
The pace of Russian reforms and their eventual outcome
are largely determined by Russia's national interests in the
field of spiritual life, culture and research. Society's
spiritual revival and its moral values have a direct effect on
economic-development levels and those of all walks of life.
It's imperative that we assert high moral and humanistic
ideals in our society, building upon many-century-old
spiritual traditions of our society.
The implementation of all this requires such a state
policy that would rule out any damage to Russian culture,
making it possible to preserve and multiply its national
values and heritage and ensuring the subsequent spiritual and
intellectual development of our society.
The Russian Federation's national interests in the
foreign-policy sphere require the implementation of an active
foreign policy aimed at consolidating Russia's position as a
great power and as one of the emergent multi-polar world's
influential centers.
Such a line has the following main components: 
- forming a voluntary integration entity of CIS
member-states;
- expanding relations of equitable partnership with other
great powers, centers of economic and military might;
- promoting international cooperation during the
crackdown on trans-national crime and terrorism;
- strengthening mechanisms for the collective management
of global political and economic processes, where Russia plays
an important role, the UN Security Council, first and
foremost.
It goes without saying that various activities aiming to
ensure the inviolability of borders, the state's territorial
integrity and to protect its constitutional system from
possible encroachments on the part of other states still
remains and will continue to remain a top-priority avenue of
Russian foreign policy.
The realization of Russian national interests in the
foreign-policy sphere is largely determined by the nature of
its relations with leading powers and the world community's
integration entities. The development of equitable and
partner-like relations with them conforms to the status of the
Russian Federation and its foreign-policy interests; such
expanded relations are called on to strengthen global and
regional security and to create a favorable environment
conducive to our country's participation in world trade,
science-and-technological and credit-financial cooperation.
Expanded dialogue and multi-faceted cooperation with
Central and Eastern Europe, America, the Middle East, West
Asia, Africa and the Asia-Pacific region meets Russian
national interests.
Russia's national interests in the foreign-policy sphere
also comprise such concepts as defending the life, dignity,
internationally accepted civil rights and liberties of Russian
citizens and our compatriots residing in other countries of
the world.
Russian national interests in the defense sphere boil
down to protecting private individuals, society and the state
from foreign military aggression. Society and the state must
concentrate their efforts on planned and systematic military
development, thereby ensuring security in the defense sphere.
The state regards the present-day military organization
as something rather burdensome. We've got to overhaul it in
the course of military development, which must heed changes in
the global balance of forces, effectively using the state's
economic potential for adequately reacting to military threats
to the Russian Federation's national interests.
Russia's national interests in the information sphere
necessitate the concentration of social and state efforts on
the solution of such tasks as the ensurance of citizens'
constitutional rights and freedoms in the information-receipt
and information-exchange field, the protection of national
spiritual values, the popularization of the national cultural
heritage, moral and public-morality norms, the ensurance of
citizens' right to authentic information and the development
of state-of-the-art telecommunications systems. The state's
purposeful activities to accomplish these objectives will
enable the Russian Federation to become a center of
international development throughout the 21st century. At the
same time, it's impermissible to use information for the
purpose of manipulating public opinion. We must shield the
state-run mass-media pool from important political, economic,
science-and-technological and military information leaks.
Russia has long-term national interests, which determine
all the main goals along the road of its historic development,
formulating strategic and current tasks of the state's
domestic and foreign policy. Such interests are being realized
through the state-administration system.
Russia must have an opportunity to independently tackle
domestic political, economic and social tasks (regardless of
intentions and positions of foreign states and their
communities) and to maintain adequate living standards that
would ensure national accord and socio-political stability.
All this constitutes a precondition for realizing Russian
national interests.

III. THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION'S NATIONAL-SECURITY THREATS

Russia now faces a new geopolitical and international
situation, as well as negative domestic economic processes,
aggravated inter-ethnic relations and social polarization. All
this directly threatens this country's national security.
The current economic crisis is seen as the main threat to
the Russian Federation's national security. Such a crisis is
manifested through a substantial recession, less impressive
investment operations and innovation activities, the
destruction of the nation's science-and-technological
potential, the agrarian sector's stagnation, a disrupted
monetary-and-payments system, dwindling federal-budget
revenues and the snowballing public debt.
The fuel-and-energy sector's share continues to expand.
Besides, Russia is now creating an economic model, which is
based on fuel-and-energy exports and which envisages the
importation of machinery, foodstuffs and consumer goods. As a
result, foreign companies might well conquer the Russian
domestic market.
All these undoubtedly menacing phenomena are
characterized by a more substantial "exportation" of
hard-currency reserves and strategic resources beyond Russia's
confines and the inefficient or criminal use of profit. In the
meantime, Russia continues to suffer from an all-out brain
drain, losing its intellectual property all the same.
Uncontrollable capital "leaks", greater dependence on
foreign hi-tech equipment manufacturers, rudimentary
financial, organizational and information support to Russian
exports, as well as irrational import patterns, are seen as
really pressing problems.
Russia's dwindling science-and-technological potential
results in the loss of its leading international positions;
the quality of research projects along strategic directions of
science-and-technological progress also continues to
deteriorate. The same can be said about hi-tech production
facilities. The technical level of material production also
keeps declining. "Man-made" disasters are now becoming a
distinct possibility.
Besides, Russia's technological dependence on the West is
becoming more pronounced. The state's defense potential is
also being undermined.
Consequently, the drastic modernization of this country's
technological base is seen as a really formidable task.
The Russian economy keeps receiving some rather
unimpressive investment. However, a Russian economic revival
is impossible without major investment in strategic economic
sectors.
Russia also faces a number of social threats, which have
been caused by the persisting economic crisis. Among other
things, more and more Russian citizens now live well below the
official poverty line. Besides, Russian society is now being
divided into a narrow circle of rich people and the
predominant mass of underprivileged citizens. Social tensions
are also heightening. 
Greater negative manifestations in the social sphere
serve to diminish Russia's intellectual and production
potential, as well as its population, depleting the main
sources of its spiritual and economic development. Such
manifestations can entail the loss of democratic gains.
We must work out the appropriate nationwide social
program in order to stave off this threat.
Russia can also deplete its natural resources and
aggravate the nationwide environmental situation. This threat
directly depends on economic-development levels and society's
readiness to comprehend the sweeping nature of these problems,
as well as their importance.
This threat is particularly serious, as far as Russia is
concerned, because this country attaches priority to
developing its fuel-and-energy sector. Besides, various
resource-intensive environmental-protection programs "boast" a
rudimentary legislative base. This country also lacks the
required environmental-protection technologies, applying such
know-how on a limited scale. The population's low
environmental culture must not be disregarded either.
Russia is being increasingly used as a burial site for
storing dangerous materials and substances; all kinds of
harmful production facilities are also being sited in this
country.
State control has become weakened here. This country also
lacks effective legal and economic mechanisms for preventing
various emergencies and for conducting the required clean-up
operations. All this is fraught with the risk of "man-made"
disasters in all spheres of economic activity.
Negative economic processes serve to aggravate all kinds
of centrifugal tendencies on the part of the Russian
Federation's constituent members. Consequently, the threat of
disrupted territorial and legal-space integrity is becoming
ever more pronounced.
The activities of some ethnic public organizations are
marked by ethnic egoism, ethnic centrism and chauvinism. All
this is conducive to greater ethnic separatism, creating a
favorable environment for inter-ethnic conflicts.
Apart from greater political instability, this tends to
weaken Russia's common economic space and its vital
components, e.g. production-technological and transport ties,
financial-banking, crediting and tax systems.
A number of factors are fraught with greater nationalism,
ethnic and regional separatism. 
Their list includes mass migration and the uncontrollable
nature of the workforce's reproduction in some Russian
regions. Such developments are being mostly caused by various
consequences of the USSR's disintegration into
national-territorial entities, by various blunders within the
framework of Russian and CIS nationalities and economic
policies, as well as by the dissemination and escalation of
national-ethnic conflict situations.
Foreign states and international organizations
deliberately and purposefully interfere in the domestic
affairs of Russia's peoples. Apart from that, the role of the
Russian language as the Russian Federation's state language is
being weakened.
Constituent members of the Russian Federation keep
adopting all sorts of normative legal acts and resolutions
which run counter to the Russian Federation's Constitution and
federal legislation. This is seen as an increasingly dangerous
factor, which weakens this country's common legal environment.
Russia's common spiritual space continues to
disintegrate. Besides, economic disintegration and social
differentiation provoke more tense relations between Russian
regions and the federal center, presenting a realistic threat
to the Russian Federation's federal system.
The threat of criminalized social relations emerging in
the course of socio-political transformations and economic
reforms becomes a particularly pressing problem.
Various blunders that had been made during the initial
stage of economic, military, law-enforcement reforms and other
state-administration reforms, a weaker system of state
regulation and control, a far from perfect legal base, lack of
an effective state-backed social policy, as well as lower
spiritual-moral standards of our society, are seen as
objective factors that are conducive to the preservation of
crime and corruption.
The consequences of these blunders are manifested in
weaker legal control over the national situation, the merger
between executive-power, legislative-power branches and the
underworld, their invasion of such spheres as banking
business, as well as the management of major production
facilities, trade organizations and commodity-transfer chains.
In essence, the underworld has challenged the state,
openly beginning to compete with it.
Therefore the crackdown on crime and corruption
constitutes both a legal and political struggle.
The threat of terrorism becomes more pronounced in the
wake of that wide-scale and often conflict-ridden redivision
of property, as well as more intensive power struggles on the
basis of group, political-ideological and ethnic-nationalist
interests.
This threat affects society ever more seriously because
the authorities are doing little to prevent all sorts of
criminal manifestations and as a result of legal nihilism and
the resignation of skilled law-enforcement officers. 
One is also alarmed with a threat now facing the nation's
physical health. This threat is rooted in virtually every
sphere of the life and activities of the state, manifesting
itself most vividly in such phenomena as the critical state of
our public-health and social-security sectors, skyrocketing
alcoholism and drug addiction.
This profound all-out crisis has entailed the following
consequences--Russian birth rates and average life expectancy
have plunged a great deal; the Russian community's demographic
and social composition has become deformed; Russia's labor
resources, which constitute the foundation of production
development, have been undermined; and the family, which is
seen as society's fundamental unit, has also become weakened.
Such demographic trends serve to impair our society's
spiritual, moral and creative potential.
International threats to the Russian Federation's
national security are manifested through the attempts of other
states to counter Russia's consolidation as an influential
center of the emergent multi-polar world.
This is reflected in actions aiming to wreck the Russian
Federation's territorial integrity. Such actions try to take
advantage of inter-ethnic, religious and other domestic
contradictions. In some cases, the concerned parties lay
territorial claims, referring to the fact that mutual state
borders have not been formalized in line with the required
treaties and agreements.
The policy of such states aims to downplay the Russian
Federation's importance in the solution of key problems facing
the world community and in the course of international
organizations' activities.
On the whole, this can serve to limit Russian influence,
to encroach on its vital national interests and positions in
Europe, the Middle East, Transcaucasia and Central Asia.
Various political, ethnic and economic crises can flare
up or become aggravated on the territory of countries-members
of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS); such crises
can hinder or torpedo the entire integration process.
This threat acquires special importance, as far as the
Russian Federation is concerned. The Russian Federation would
like those countries to assert themselves as friendly,
independent, stable and democratic states, regarding this as
an extremely important objective.
In spite of positive global changes, the Russian
Federation's national security still faces a number of
defense-related threats.
Considering profound changes in the nature of relations
between the Russian Federation and other leading countries,
one can draw the following conclusion--Russia is virtually not
threatened with an all-out aggression in the foreseeable
future.
At the same time, some countries might resort to power
politics for the sake of competing with Russia.
Current and potential hotbeds of local wars and armed
conflicts near the Russian state border present the most
obvious defense-related threat to Russia.
The proliferation of nuclear weapons and other weapons of
mass destruction, as well as the relevant production processes
and delivery means (in countries bordering on Russia or in
nearby regions, first and foremost), also presents a serious
threat. 
At the same time, the entire range of threats connected
with international terrorism continues to expand; this also
concerns the possible use of nuclear weapons and other weapons
of mass destruction by terrorists.
The world's major powers and their coalitions still
continue to maintain powerful armed forces in the regions
located close to Russia. This constitutes a defense-related
threat to Russia's national security. Even if they don't
display any aggressive intentions with regard to Russia, such
armed forces still present a potential military danger.
NATO's eastward expansion and its transformation into a
leading European military-political force create the threat of
yet another continental split. Such a split would be extremely
dangerous at a time when forward-based forces and nuclear
weapons are still deployed in Europe, while multilateral
peace-keeping mechanisms are inefficient.
A number of the world's leading powers have surged ahead
in the hi-tech field, beefing up the appropriate potential
that makes it possible to develop new-generation weapons and
combat hardware. Consequently, this may lead to an entirely
new round of the arms race.
Incomplete process of overhauling the state's military
organization, the persisting gap between political directives
and their implementation within the framework of the military
and military-technical policy, insufficient defense spending,
lack of up-to-date approaches toward military development and
its far from perfect normative-and-legal base also harbor
defense-related threats to the Russian Federation's security.
Right now, this is manifested in the extremely acute
social problems of the Russian Federation's Armed Forces,
other troops, military units and bodies, as well as in the
critically low level of operational and combat training of
troops (forces) and headquarters. 
Apart from that, our troops (forces) do not have enough
up-to-date and advanced weapons systems and combat hardware;
in fact, the share of such technology has dropped to
inadmissibly low levels.
On the whole, the state now has a less impressive
potential for ensuring the Russian Federation's security.

(To be continued)

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