August 21, 1998   
This Date's Issues: 2318  • 2319

Johnson's Russia List
#2319
21 August 1998
davidjohnson@erols.com

[Note from David Johnson:
1. Mariam Lanskoy: Charities.
2. CP Refoundation: Internet Conference: Russia at the Crossroads.
3. Rossiiskaya Gazeta: WHY WE TOOK UNPOPULAR MEASURES.
Yesterday a session of the Russian government took place. Prime Minister 
Sergei Kiriyenko spoke at it.
4. Matt Taibbi: Independent editorial. [2318/Rupert Cornwell].
5. AP: Russian Prime Minister Faces Duma.
6. Wayan Vota: Expats in Russia.
7. The Times (UK): Matthew Parris, Is Russia ripe for democracy? Or is the
people's will too fickle even for us?
8. RIA Novosti: GALINA STAROVOITOVA URGES SERGEI KIRIYENKO AND 
SERGEI DUBININ "TO WORK ON, WITHOUT PAYING ATTENTION TO 
PROVOCATIONS."
9. RIA Novosti: YAVLINSKY INSISTS ON WHILE SHOKHIN DECLARES 
AGAINST FACING PRESIDENT WITH IMPEACHMENT AND GOVERNMENT
WITH NO-CONFIDENCE VOTE.
10. Komsomolskaya Pravda: ALEXANDER PROKHANOV: RUSSIA HAS NO 
MARKET VALUE.
11. PRNewswire: Secret No More: A Look Into Russian Nuclear Weapon Museums 
Opens at the National Atomic Museum.
12. Moscow Times: Leonid Bershidsky, MEDIA WATCH: TV's Non-Financial Crisis.
13. Russia Today satire: Mary Campbell, Say Anything.]

*******

#1
Date: Fri, 21 Aug 1998 
From: Miriam Lanskoy <mlanskoy@bu.edu>
Subject: charities

There was a question yesterday about US based charities operating in
Russia. I received a flyer recently from the CIS Development Foundation
which is based in New Jersey. They provide medical supplies, clothing, 
and food to orphanages and hospitals in Russia, Ukraine, and Georgia. 

email: cisdf@cisdf.com
fax:908-862-3912
tel:908-862-4733

*******

#2
Date: Fri, 21 Aug 1998 
From: CP Refoundation <CPR@netcomuk.co.uk>
Subject: Internet Conference: Russia at the Crossroads
Starting 24 August, the Leninist-International elist will hold a
one-week cyber conference on Russia. Materials posted on the List will
be archived on the List website. The purpose of the conference is to
assess the direction and evolution of the crisis in Russia in the wake
of rouble devaluation and in particular to consider the articulation of
the Russian crisis into the general crisis of world capitalism.

To register for this moderated Internet Conference, simple reply to 
[repost] this email or send email to <majordomo@lists.econ.utah.edu> 
with the message <subscribe leninist-international> in the body. 

Leninist-International is part of the Utah Marxism Space.
--
Jim Hillier
Mark Jones
Moderators

*******

#3
>From RIA Novosti
Rossiiskaya Gazeta
August 21, 1998 
WHY WE TOOK UNPOPULAR MEASURES
Yesterday a session of the Russian government took place. 
Prime Minister Sergei Kiriyenko spoke at it

What choice did we have at the end of last week? said
Kiriyenko. According to him, investors did not believe that the
government would be able to balance the budget on the threshold
of a politically critical autumn. This led to the situation
where the shares of Russian enterprises and state securities,
both internal and external, sharply depreciated and panic
emerged in Russian financial institutions while Russian banks

began to be demanded the early return of credits or the
replenishment of collateral, against which the credits were
received. Anxiety also spread among the population,
over-excited by the rumours about the forthcoming land-slide
devaluation. 
Why didn't the government take the measures, it resorted
to since Monday, before? The curing of the economy, perhaps,
resembles the medical treatment of a person. When there is the
possibility to use pills and not to turn to a surgeon, we must
not resort to a surgical operation. When there was the
possibility to do without tough and unpleasant decisions, we
did this. This chance existed and the set of measures
elaborated in July could make this chance come true. But last
week it became clear that this chance no longer existed. Under
favourable external factors, possibly, we would have been able
to get out of this situation without these measures. But the
risk was too high. Investors did not believe in the balanced
budget. This means that the world markets of borrowings turned
out to be closed for us and we cannot borrow any more money
either in August, or in September or in October. Our monthly
debt repayment requires 35 billion roubles, with the budget's
monthly revenues of 25 billion roubles. 
That is why we had to restructure the domestic debt. The
domestic GKO pyramid became an unbearable burden for the
budget. Now we must put on the priority list the repayment of
state debts to the employees of the budget-financed sphere, the
social protection of the population, and not try to fulfil the
unrealistic domestic debt commitments. 
We shall restructure the GKO debt and start returning it
within the framework of the real possibilities of the budget by
dividing these commitments into equal shares and extending them
to three, four and five years, creating specific conditions and
specific yields on GKOs. So, we do not restructure these debts
for free. In this way, we shall be able to repay debts and they
will not prevent us from ensuring normal budget financing. 
Yesterday a regular term for the redemption of a GKO
tranche matured. Had we not restructured it, we would have had
to spend about 4 billion roubles additionally from the budget
on it. Next Wednesday this would have consumed another 4
billion roubles and then, from 4 to 7 billion roubles every
week. Today, by holding restructuring we "clear" this debt
until the end of the year, make it minimal in 1999 and get the
possibility to channel funds for budget expenditures. 
We announced a 90-day moratorium on capital currency
operations. This is done in compliance with the IMF charter and
without the violation of international norms. In this case, the
ban applies only to the return of foreign loans and not to
current settlements, payments or interest payment. There is no
restructuring of these loans or their cancellation and in 90
days they will become valid again. 
The third decision is, perhaps, the most unpleasant from
the viewpoint of ordinary citizens - the alteration of the
exchange rate policy. We could have adopted it afterwards since
the key issue is the restructuring of the domestic debt. But in

this case we would have faced another threat: how to cover the
domestic debt? With the help of a printing machine and
inflation? But this will eventually lead to the fall of the
rouble rate and the complete loss by the country of its gold
and had currency reserves. GKO yields would have soared to 100
per cent and more and, taking into account the fact that the
government ensures the rouble's fluctuations to the dollar
within no more than 10 per cent per year, speculative investors
would have received 90 per cent of annual interest in hard
currency by converting yields on GKOs and bringing the currency
out of the country. If not the unpopular measures, in three or
four months we would have completely "eaten up" the country's
gold and hard currency reserves. 
The government calculates the 1999 budget proceeding from
the most pessimistic scenario. We do not have any longer the
right to hope that the market will help us in any way, that the
situation on it will be favourable for Russia - either in terms
of prices for energy products or the situation on the world
financial market. We must rely on the scenario under which in
1998-1999 Russia will have both the negative situation with
respect for the prices for our basic export commodities and the
closed markets of financial borrowings. The country will have
to count only on the real possibilities of the budget. That is
why we propose to postpone the term of submitting to the State
Duma the 1999 draft budget since it is necessary to
re-calculate the real parameters for GKO restructuring, the
possibilities and the need for external borrowings. 

********

#4
From: "matt taibbi" <exile.taibbi@matrix.ru>
Subject: Independent editorial
Date: Fri, 21 Aug 1998 

I'm writing in response to the Independent editorial you posted this
morning, "Here's a Novel Idea: The West Takes over Russia's Management."

I remembered, as I read this piece, a story I covered two years ago for the
Moscow Times and the Daily Mail, about the expulsions from Russia of a
group of British diplomats who were suspected of espionage. For comment on
the story I called Edward Luttwak, a U.S.-based defense/security analyst,
and asked him why the Russians would target the British. "That's easy," he
said. "Britain is a country that has the largest gap in the world between
its perceived importance and its actual importance. Russia is doing this
because it reap the largest political benefit-- due to the perrception that
it is pushing around a major Western power-- while only imperiling a
relatively unimportant foreign policy relationship."

I had to laugh at the idea that a British newspaper like the Independent
would complain that the United States was coddling Russia, trying to avoid
"hurting its feelings" by allowing it to still feel like a major power. I
mean, what has the rest of the world been doing for Britain for the last
fifty years? Britain gives the world nature show hosts, obsequious waiters,
bisexual actors, and James Bond, and for that it gets to sit at the table
with the U.S., Germany, and all the other countries that matter. If Britain
collapses, the only effect the world will notice is a rise in international

dental standards. If Russia spins out of control, we're all screwed. 

Just thought I'd point that out.
*******

#5
Russian Prime Minister Faces Duma 
By Vladimir Isachenkov
August 21, 1998

MOSCOW (AP) -- Prime Minister Sergei Kiriyenko on Friday defended the
surprise devaluation of the ruble before a hostile parliament dominated by
Communists and other hard-liners who called again for the government's
ouster. 
His finance minister, adding to international investors' unease about
the nation's economy, said the government was considering imposing new
restrictions on taking money out of the country in an effort to boost the
ruble, the currency. He gave no details. 
Worries about Russia's financial problems -- and fears German banks that
lent heavily to Russia could be hurt -- caused share prices to plunge on
European markets. Wall Street also tumbled, with investors reacting not
only to financial turmoil but also new political tensions around the world. 
Kiriyenko, defending the government's economic steps in a 10-minute
speech before the parliament's lower house, the State Duma, said, ``We
can't afford the luxury of being a popular government.'' 
The Duma was holding an emergency session to discuss Russia's financial
crisis, including the decision earlier this week to effectively devalue the
ruble by as much as one-third and suspend debt payments. 
Kiriyenko accused the Duma of dragging its feet on approving a series of
government-proposed steps to boost revenues and said the lawmakers'
indecision precipitated the latest financial upheaval. 
``Let's honestly recognize that there is no political force in the
country that is ready to undertake political responsibility for the economy
in crisis,'' he said, drawing angry shouts from the Communists and their
allies. 
Communist leader Gennady Zyuganov assailed the government, saying it had
``put the country on the verge of a precipice.'' 
"Russia has devalued itself to the point where a single multibillionaire
can buy it,'' he said. ``This is the full collapse of the course carried
out in the past seven years.'' 
Zyuganov repeated his call for Yeltsin to step down and proposed a vote
of no-confidence in Kiriyenko's Cabinet. The Duma later approved a
non-binding resolution calling on the president to resign, saying he had
failed to end a financial crisis ``that now threatens Russia's national
security, territorial integrity and independence.'' 
The Duma has set a panel to prepare legal grounds for Yeltsin's
impeachment earlier this summer. Once the panel finishes its work,
two-thirds of the Duma's 450 members must vote to formally launch the
motion, which would then go to Russia's high courts and the upper chamber. 
Russia's constitution gives the president a strong hand in
confrontations with parliament and the motion is expected to fizzle, as
have previous attempts. 
During the parliament debates, all Duma factions, including the
pro-government Our Home Is Russia group, called for Kiriyenko's
resignation. The premier greeted the call with a dismissive smile and urged
lawmakers to approve government-proposed fiscal steps. 
``It's very unpleasant to take responsibility for the unpopular actions,
but there is no pleasant and popular way out of the crisis,'' he said. 

The government has long asked the Duma to meet and consider a package
of austerity measures aimed at boosting revenues, but lawmakers have
resisted. The government has been forced to implement some by decree. 
Finance Minister Mikhail Zadornov said the government would soon be
proposing new legislation to control the flow of money out of Russia. He
gave no details, but said they may affect export revenues and the movement
of capital. 
``We think it necessary to tighten currency controls in a number of
directions,'' he said. 
The Interfax news agency said that Central Bank Chairman Sergei Dubinin
also favored more currency controls to stop flights of money from the
country. 
The government said Thursday that between $3.5 billion and $4.5 billion
were taken out of the country legally between May and mid-August. 
The ruble fell slightly on Central Bank-controlled Moscow currency
exchange to 7.005 to the dollar on Friday from 6.995 the previous day. The
government said it will allow the ruble to plunge as low as 9.5 rubles a
dollar before the end of the year, but predicted that it would stabilize at
around 7 for the time being. 
*******

#6
From: wayan.vota@ru.pwcglobal.com (Wayan Vota)
Date: Fri, 21 Aug 1998
Subject: Expats in Russia

In response to Paul Baker's questions (#2317 expats in Russia w/o jobs, w/o
dollars), I found that this crisis is a leveler of sorts. Since so many
expats are paid offshore (USA/GB/D accounts), and usually get USD or RRL
out of ATM's, the loss of ATM activity has put us in the same boat as the
Russians with Russian bank accounts, we are all living off the cash in our
mattresses.

Most of my expat friends keep a fistful of USD in their homes, just for
situations like this. As these are emergency funds, and we don't know how
long this emergency may last, we are restricting some extraneous activity
(tonight will show how much). The large USD payments, rents and personal
services, are understandably delayed. I don't know of any landlords who
have kicked out tenants, no one has USD. Most landlords, like mine, are
just being patient, they know we can pay when the banks work again.

One solution Mr. Baker can engage in, is a vacation. There is no USD
currency crunch in Finland, Estonia, Latvia, or Ukraine, all a short train
ride/flight away. You can still use credit cards to buy tickets, and once
you are outside Russia, those ATM machines work wonderfully.

As to expats without jobs. In this climate, we should all worry.

********

#7
The Times (UK)
August 21 1998
OPINION
Is Russia ripe for democracy? Or is the people's will too fickle even for us? 
Russian roulette
By Matthew Parris

Is democracy the best form of government for Russia? I ask not because I
know the answer. Russia is a place and a problem of vast and fiendish
intricacy, and even if I could show that democracy is unlikely to save her,
those who know more might show me that the alternative would be worse. 
My question is a Russian doll of a question: within it another. I ask it
as a way of asking why the question is so seldom put. Why are we always
reluctant to consider the suspension of democratic politics? The argument
is strong, strong enough to deserve a vigorous airing. Consider Russia by
way only of example. Plainly the immediate crisis with the rouble is being
exacerbated by the need to keep Russian voters on board: a free hand for
Sergei Dubinin, head of the central bank, would assist his endeavours: he
is caught between reality and the politicians' necessary lie to the
electorate. The ever-present threat of a no-confidence vote in the Duma
horribly complicates the administration's task. Democracy makes trouble in
the short term. 
But not only the short term. In the middle term the harsh measures
everybody agrees are needed to get the Russian economy into balance are
hampered by the need to keep the voters sweet. When reform is needed,
democracy can prove a paralysing force, and so it proves in Russia. 

How about the longer term, the far horizon? To Russian economists today
it must be evident that the undemocratic short-cut might get them over the
next hill fastest, but what (say democrats) of the distant peaks? Over
time, they insist (but only over time) the discipline of answerability to
the people matures the rulers; the discipline of choosing matures the people. 
But has it, will it, in Russia? Is it not at least arguable that her
economic and social crisis springs from democracy and is locked by
democracy into an unending and destructive cycle? The concentration of
economic power in the hands of a mafia came with, and as a result of,
political liberation. The powers needed to smash that mafia will be hard,
perhaps impossible, to assemble in a "free" country. Capitalism cannot work
when a criminal clique destroys competition. Far from marching in step with
a free market, constitutional liberty there is throttling the free market. 
I do not know, my friend; but people who do tell me the situation is
almost hopeless. They write to me of lawlessness and murder, social
disintegration, the failure of the free market, the inability of an
administration to collect revenue or to direct spending. And they see no
likely democratic way out of this mess. 
Yet put to them the thought that if democracy cannot save Russia then
perhaps autocracy or oligarchy can, and they fall silent. Ask whether the
catastrophe we call the Congo is likely to be put to rights by democracy,
and people fall silent. Ask whether Chile, Spain or Turkey could have been
modernised without an interim autocracy, and people fall silent. Ask
whether modern China is likely to work as an emerging free market without
repression and the question only unsettles - for we know the answer. Ask
whether any of Margaret Thatcher's important reforms would at the time have
been able to secure more than the fortysomething per cent support above
which she never rose - and silence falls. As the world approaches the end
of the first century in which government by the people on a universal
franchise has been put seriously to the test, we seem philosophically
afraid to ask whether it is passing the test. Is democracy working? 
I want to put four propositions, attaching myself to none: each bolder
than the last. The first grants that democracy is the ideal but insists
that, to reach the ideal, nations may need a period of government which is
not democratic. The second goes further: to renew or preserve itself,
democracy may need to yield for a time - to revert - to undemocratic
government. 
My third proposition concedes that the will of the people should be
paramount, but denying that what we call democratic government is the best
way of giving it effect. My fourth denies paramountcy altogether to the
will of the people. How far will you come on this four-stage journey? 
That a people may not be transformable overnight into a democracy is
surely arguable. Colonial powers forced to abandon their colonies, rather
than prepare them gradually for self-government, left disasters in their
wake. Few would doubt the benefit of Adolfo Suárez's interregnum between
Franco's dictatorship and today's fully fledged democracy in Spain. Easy to
assent, but consider to what you are assenting: that, perhaps for many
years, good and necessary government may exist without the consent of the
people. 
That a mature democracy may need to revert to undemocratic government in
times of war or other emergency is conceded by most European democrats,
though not by all Americans. Yet there is something troubling in the
reasoning. Are we saying government by the people is a luxury that cannot
be afforded when government really matters? If institutionalised opposition
is believed to give vigour and direction when a government is fighting
(say) poverty, or disease, or ignorance, or economic crisis, why is
opposition a canker when a government is fighting another country? 

Now for my third proposition. Even if we agree that government should do
what the people desire, does the election of representatives to govern
produce the desired outcome? 
What does "the will of the people" mean? Does it mean anything? Have you
ever seen or touched the will of the people? Just because a grammatical
phrase can be constructed to describe a phenomenon does not mean the
phenomenon occurs in nature. The most "the will of the people" can mean is
the coincidence of similar individual desires in sufficient number to
overwhelm conflicting desires. But such desires are ad hoc and time-bound.
Any attempt to construct them into a government or even a plan becomes
horribly tangled. 
A few days ago there was probably a majority for the internment and
execution of all suspected IRA terrorists. A few weeks ago there may have
been a majority for proscribing the Orange Order. On occasions you could
construct a majority for the castration of all sex offenders. A week's
headlines about Cedric Brown probably created a fortnight's majority for
renationalising gas. Some days into the miners' strike there was no
majority in Britain for continuing the fight. At significant moments in Mrs
Thatcher's Government there was no majority for anything she was doing.
There was never a majority for her Government. There was no majority for
Tony Blair's. Nearly half Britain did not watch the funeral of Diana,
Princess of Wales. 
First-past-the-post and constituency representation have rescued us from
the paralysing contradictions of pure democracy. Rough-and-ready was all we
could manage. Conceptual difficulties could be dismissed as academic, for
it was technically impossible to consult people every time the clock, or
the IRA, or depression struck: the only realistic government was by men,
not measures; men whose mandate we could renew (or not) from time to time.
But when every household is computer-linked it will be possible to hold
referendums on every issue as it arises. We will be forced to confront the
question of how much democracy we really want. 
A dilemma. Let me offer a possible escape. People may quite reasonably
assent to the proposition that the Government should not ask them what to
do. A coup in Russia might be more popular than the democratic Government
it usurped. Have we not the right to ask not to be asked? Are there no
circumstances in our national (as in our personal) life when we know in our
bones that we have to be told? I wonder whether the Russian people may come
to this. 

All the arguments canvassed so far, however, do require for their
legitimation some long-stop popular mandate. In the end the people must
approve. I rely upon a concept of the considered will of the nation to
confound the ebbs and flows of popular caprice. 
But my fourth proposition is that, even after long and hard thought, the
many may just be wrong. One mind, one judgment, one will, may find and
impose what is best for the happiness of the many, though they never
assent. Why might it not be true? This is too uncomfortable to think about. 

******

#8
GALINA STAROVOITOVA URGES SERGEI KIRIYENKO AND 
SERGEI DUBININ "TO WORK ON, WITHOUT PAYING ATTENTION 
TO PROVOCATIONS"
MOSCOW, August 21, 1998 /from RIA Novosti correspondent
Galina Filippova/ -- State Duma deputy Galina Starovoitova
addressed a State Duma plenary session today. She was speaking
on behalf of 32 independent deputies. 
Turning to Prime Minister Sergei Kiriyenko and Central Bank
chairman Sergei Dubinin, she said: "Work on, you have been
entrusted with your jobs and voted for, do not fret, and pay no
attention to provocations".
Otherwise, she said, "more Western investments will flow
out of the country and it will have less credibility".
"If you are in a critical situation, get out of it -- let
us do this together," remarked Starovoitova.
"Now I will say what many here will not like or find
paradoxical," she went on. "I will say that the present
government in Russia is perhaps the most apt and the best since
the beginning of reforms, if only because it is a close-knit
team of reformers, and not a coalition government where 'upward
strains the swan, the crab keeps stepping back, the pike is for
the pond'".
But, according to Starovoitova, the current government "was
really unlucky". There were objective reasons for that -- an
economic crisis in the Asian region, falling energy prices, and
play by domestic and visiting oligarchs on the national
currency. All this "cannot be dismissed out of hand". 
Starovoitova noted that the State Duma "has effectively
declined to pass the anti-crisis programme submitted by the
government" and it "will not be able to wash hands of that if it
topples this government".
"Both the Central Bank and the government are easy to
topple today. but think what you will tell your constituents
tomorrow when they take to the streets," she added. 
In the State Duma, she said, "there are plenty of people
interested in the 'Indonesian scenario', who want to stir up
trouble". It is they who are today demanding the resignation of
the President and the government. 

******

#9
YAVLINSKY INSISTS ON WHILE SHOKHIN DECLARES 
AGAINST FACING PRESIDENT WITH IMPEACHMENT AND 
GOVERNMENT WITH NO-CONFIDENCE VOTE
MOSCOW, AUGUST 21, 1998 /FROM RIA NOVOSTI CORRESPONDENT
YULIA PANYUSHKINA/ -- Alexander Shokhin, the leader of the Our
Home Is Russia faction (NDR), said today at the State Duma that
his faction declined the idea of the president's impeachment and
pre-term presidential elections. In his opinion, it is pointless
to engage in deliberations on a vote of no-confidence in the
government today. His faction's appeal is to prevent the
financial crisis from growing into a political one. I agree with
Communist leader Gennady Zyuganov that it is the government and
the central bank that are to blame for the current financial and
economic woes, said Shokhin. "It is natural under the
circumstances to call the prime minister and the central bank
chief to resign," said Shokhin.
YABLOKO leader Grigory Yavlinsky was up with his typical
rhetoric. He expressed full distrust in the government and the

president of the Russian Federation. He dubbed the policy they
pursue now as "narrow-minded". 

*******

#10
>From RIA Novosti
Komsomolskaya Pravda
August 20, 1998
ALEXANDER PROKHANOV: RUSSIA HAS NO MARKET VALUE

In his work as Editor-in-Chief of the newspaper Zavtra,
Alexander Prokhanov seems to be always headed for trouble.
Incidentally, his previous publication, Den, which later
re-emerged as Zavtra, was shut down in 1993 by the Justice
Ministry for supporting the rebel Supreme Soviet. For
authorities, Prokhanov is a totally unacceptable figure. For
the opposition, he is an indisputable intellectual leader. For
us, he is one of the guests, since we invite people of various
political orientation, so that our readers could hear their
opinions.

Question: Not so long ago, you confessed that [Viktor]
Chernomyrdin was lost for the opposition. Did that imply a
desire to expand the scope of hopefuls?
Answer: I meant a possibility of putting together a
so-called Centrist Alliance in the context of disintegrating
territory. My supporters and I are tirelessly proclaiming the
territory, the empire, a large scale, a nation - the Great
Russia, which is our sanctuary and our religion. Not the
freedom of speech, not socialism, not a post-industrial
society, but this geo-political issue, Russia's spacial
component. The three oceans, the Ural Range, the Trans-Siberian
railroad, and other traditional landmarks - let them all be,
and these foundations will hold any ideology and any society.
As for Chernomyrdin, before he shamefully lost his reputation,
he seemed like a Centrist to me, as he was literally "sitting"
on a gas pipeline. Gazprom is a truly centrist network.

Question: Do you consider Maslyukov from the same
perspective?
Answer: Maslyukov is not so much important and interesting
to me. His recent "leap" hasn't affected me in any way. It
seemed his last chance to take a revenge, "nomenklatura-style."
I even think that he is aware of the absurdity of his external
motivation. He has rushed to the rescue of the economy and the
defense industry, he is creating a mini-council of ministers,
and allegedly, he is the one who will revive the Russian
industries. Nonsense. A country which has no money, a country
trailing in the rear of civilization, a country, roughly
speaking, controlled by the CIA, cannot afford a defense
industry, an aerospace industry, nuclear catamarans and
independent foreign policies. It was a rather awkward
nomenklatura move, which demonstrated that the Communist party
now has a number of people who are quite influential and for
whom interaction with authorities is a type of political
behavior.

Question: Who do you mean?
Answer: Seleznyov, Goryacheva, and Voronin, for instance.

Question: How big are your chances of reaching the
audience today? A generation has grown in this country, which
goes to the Rolling Stones concert paying $200 per seat without
turning a hair. They are many. They do not think in large-scale
terms. This day is done, a new one is dawning, bringing along
new enjoyment and temptations. What do they care about your

Messianism?
Answer: This is not Messianism. This is the way I perceive
this world. Very often, just like many of you, I feel quite
helpless. All things are in a flux, they say, and many things
devaluate with time. I do not know, what exactly was happening
in Hiroshima in 1945, when that aeroplane with nuclear bombs on
board was approaching. Maybe some kind of Rolling Stones was on
there, too, and people crowded a huge stadium. In Nagasaki,
people may have been drinking saki and singing ritual songs.
They didn't even suspect that the four-engine plane was so
near. The situation is similar here. I believe that the trend
outlining here is so terrible that, if nothing is done to
change it, it will bring us to a disintegration of the
territory. People are leaving Siberia and the Far East. Our
northern parts have become depopulated.

Question: This is not a new trend, is it?
Answer: True. But when Russia's ethnic north was dying, I
thought it could be saved by a Soviet military civilization
deployed there, which was essentially a "technosphere." It
brought a lot of people there, even if for temporary residence.
Officers, their wives, three children in each family,
cantonments, garrisons, and naval bases. All this is gone now.
If this trend persists, this country will break into fragments.
These fragments will immediately be attracted by the
"gravities" of the neighboring civilizations: Japan-China,
Turkey-Iran, Germany-Europe, and the US civilization. This may
not even be a tragedy for individuals, as Rolling Stones will
still be singing in Moscow, and Moon preachers will be
arriving, and this mighty market-place will function; but a
very important value will disappear on an international scale,
something named Russia.

Question: Do you believe that Russia will not unite even
faced with an external threat?
Answer: Yes I do. All my personal experiences, many of
them quite painful, suggest that it won't. We even fail to come
to an agreement within our movement.

Question: So when is Russia going to break to pieces?
Answer: The greater Russia has already broken, since 30
million Russians are now living outside of it. Where is the
Russian Crimea? Where is Little Russia (the old name for
Ukraine -- Ed.) What about the Northern Caucasus - is it not a
disintegration of Russia? Now it's Siberia we are going to give
up. We no longer need our northern lands, as they are
economically inviable. In the USSR, there was no issue of
economic efficiency. Ideological empires do not even use the
notion of "economic efficiency," they have different values. It
is the primitive liberal market emerging in Russia which
measures everything by efficiency. From this liberal market
perspective, the whole Russian nation is "inefficient" and
"inviable." The Russian North and the Russian Far East are
inviable, while Moscow is. I am not being ironic, it is truly
efficient both on the scale of Russia alone, and on the global
scale. Whatever happens, it will remain one of world's
megalopolises, where finances are concentrated - it is a
strategic point on the world map. It will be viable always. 


Question: Don't you think that the figure of Luzhkov,
mayor of profitable Moscow, may turn out to be the very same
figure around which a considerable part of society will rally?
Answer: Everything's possible. Maybe that's what will
happen. Because such is man's nature that his expectations
should be personified. And experienced and clever politicians,
among whom is Luzhkov, must certainly avail themselves of this.
Although we know very well that Luzhkov is not Marcus Aurelius.
And the genesis of Luzhkov - economic, political - is one of
the alternatives to Lebed, of course. But I would not send my
granddaughter for education to Luzhkov.

Question: But still, who of the two is nearer to you -
Luzhkov or Lebed?
Answer: They are sufficiently equally far from me. There
is the magic of Luzhkov. His propaganda includes some pleasant
things. Roads, housing, churches. It's another matter where he
took the money for this. But we do know why Moscow earlier was
not so well attired. Because Siberian cities rose up like
mushrooms after the rain. Subsidies were being given to
agricultural districts. If one does not know this or does not
want to, then, of course, long live Luzhkov. But will he be
able to translate his ability and those 80 per cent of capital 
to Kurgan or somewhere else? I don't think he will. Unless he
cardinally alters the policy. And a lifeline policy, this is my
point of view, should be a return to centralism, to a
persistently and consistently pursued state idea.

Question: Your forecast for this autumn? All those rallies
and meetings - won't they bring that very same unhappy breakup
of Russia nearer?
Answer: The situation now, I think, is as follows. Yeltsin
has got caught in a big trap. Everyone is against him: the
oligarchs, communists, a part of the world community, workers,
the army. Society is against him. He has only a small group of
people on his side, behind whom, of course, the United States
stands. Yeltsin is one together with the United States. We are
many, but we are without a homeland.

Question: There will be no explosion?
Answer: All that lives yields to rule. And I think that
there will be no large-scale crisis, no explosion.

Question: You talk word for word like Gaidar.
Answer: Gaidar, unlike me, hopes for development. Hopes
that federal mechanisms will be developed after all.

Question: And you?
Answer: If we can step over this boundary, we will enter a
new phase of stagnation?

Question: Still, to you which development of the situation
is more preferable - that Yeltsin should relinquish his powers
before the expiration of his term of office or complete his
full constitutional term?
Answer: After all, the second version is better. Nobody
wants chaos. Me too.
/Prepared by Vasily Ustyuzhanin./ 

********

#11
Secret No More: A Look Into Russian Nuclear Weapon Museums Opens at the
National Atomic Museum

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M., Aug. 20 /PRNewswire/ -- The break up of the Soviet Union
and the fall of the Berlin Wall marked the beginning of a new era of openness

between Russia and the United States. With the dawn of the post-Cold War
era,
the nuclear weapon facilities in the United States and Russia have established
new and more cooperative working relationships with each other. US scientists
and engineers routinely communicate with and visit colleagues in Russia's
formerly secret cities. Presently there are a number of collaborative science
and technology exchanges underway between these former foes. The two nations
are working together to contain the spread of nuclear weapons and to ensure
that the remaining nuclear weapons held by both nations are maintained with
safety and security. In addition, there are several programs that are
designed to adapt the technologies developed for military purposes to peaceful
civilian applications.

On August 25, 1998, the National Atomic Museum will unveil a one-of-a-kind new
exhibit that takes a look into the two Russian nuclear weapon museums. The
museums are in the two principal Russian nuclear weapon design laboratories in
the former secret cities of Arzamas-16 and Chelyabinsk-70. The exhibit
includes photographs and videos of Russian nuclear weapon testing activities,
the world's first hydrogen bomb, the world's most powerful nuclear weapon and
explosive devices designed for peaceful use such as large-scale excavation of
canals. This is the initial effort in the integration of arms control issues
into the National Atomic Museum's weapon history exhibit. Future plans include
exhibits of satellites, seismic material for test monitoring purposes and the
history of arms control.

The National Atomic Museum opened in 1969 and was chartered by Congress in
1991. It is America's only official museum resource for nuclear history and
science. Exhibits include nuclear medicine, aircraft, pioneers of science,
robotics, and weapon history.

The National Atomic Museum, operated for the US Department of Energy by Sandia
National Laboratories, is located on Kirtland Air Force Base in Albuquerque.
For easy access onto the Base, enter the Visitor's Parking Lot, just outside
the Wyoming Gate and show your driver's license, car registration and proof of
insurance to obtain a pass. Museum admission fees are $2 for adults, $1 for
seniors and youth, children under 6 are free.

Sandia National Laboratories is a multiprogram research and development
laboratory managed by a subsidiary of Lockheed Martin Corporation.

SOURCE Sandia National Laboratories 

********

#12
Moscow Times
August 21, 1998 
MEDIA WATCH: TV's Non-Financial Crisis 
By Leonid Bershidsky 

There is so little doubt about what happened to Russia's economy and 
government this week that people who hate each other's guts have been 
using the same formula to describe it. 

"The devaluation of the president," ran a headline in the daily Russky 
Telegraf, owned by Uneximbank. "The authorities themselves have 
undergone a devaluation," wrote Vitaly Tretyakov, editor of Nezavisimaya 
Gazeta, owned by Uneximbank foe Boris Berezovsky. "Our president has 
completely devalued himself," declared Communist Party boss Gennady 
Zyuganov, who hates both Uneximbank chief Vladimir Potanin and 

Berezovsky. 

It is important that only Zyuganov made his announcement on national 
television. He has made such statements with or without good reason for 
more than five years, and the public is used to his gloom-and-doom 
prophecies. Even if they have all come true, the viewer understands that 
the Communist leader is just pushing his agenda, and it is safe for 
station owners to let him spout his bile on the air. More credible 
opinions on the devaluation, political and economic, are in the press 
but not on television. 

Thirty years ago, during the Paris Revolution of 1968, everyone who was 
interested in how the student revolt developed -- and most people in 
France, understandably, were interested -- soon stopped watching 
television news because there was nothing on the barricades, the street 
fighting, the police brutality. The newspapers, however, did their best 
to cover the riots. The reason, of course, is that television was 
state-owned and the newspapers were private. 

In Russia, the NTV television network is privately owned and ORT 
television is semi-private. Yet their coverage of the government's 
surrender to the economic elements has been all but hard-hitting. On 
Tuesday and Wednesday, when banks were not letting clients withdraw hard 
currency from deposits, many ATMs were empty even of rubles and exchange 
offices were either closed or charging exorbitant prices for dollars, 
both ORT and NTV reported that everything was calm. There were no 
interviews with frustrated depositors -- the men-on-the-street seen in 
news programs were, in fact, saying they were not interested in buying 
dollars. 

On Wednesday night, both channels gave good play to a press conference 
by Sberbank Chairman Andrei Kazmin, who said his bank was working 
normally and even paying out hard currency deposits. That at a time when 
Kommersant Daily reported from a number of cities that Sberbank exchange 
offices were closed until further notice. Did the television channels, 
which have reporters across the nation, report that? Dumb question. The 
last thing a responsible television owner wants to do is instigate 
panic. Especially if he also owns a bank, as do most of the tycoons who 
hold shares in NTV and ORT. 

Besides, television owners hate to anger the government, even a weak 
one. Newspapers are another matter. The daily Segodnya, which belongs to 
the same holding as NTV, on Tuesday came out with the headline, "Russia 
Is Bankrupt." That was pretty bold compared to what NTV was reporting -- 
no bankruptcy, no panic -- but not particularly surprising given 
Segodnya's circulation of about 50,000. 

With all their bravery in lashing out at the authorities, the newspapers 
were not brave enough to address the situation in specific banks. 

Kommersant Daily, which has a special relationship with SBS-Agro Bank, 
reported that the bank was not giving out dollars, but also ran a quote 
from an SBS spokesman who said everyone would be paid next week. Now, 
some SBS branches are not even allowing clients to order dollars in 
advance, but Kommersant did not report that, and there has been no 

analysis of the bank's deeper problems that led the Central Bank to bail 
it out recently. 

There have been an unusual number of apologies in the press, too. 
Tretyakov, normally feisty, apologized for writing in a front-page 
article that Central Bank Chairman Sergei Dubinin and Prime Minister 
Sergei Kiriyenko were not willing to resign because of the devaluation; 
it had turned out that both had tendered their resignations but were 
kept on by Yeltsin. Berezovsky had pushed for some high-profile firings, 
but when it turned out Yeltsin was not cooperating right now, an apology 
was in order. 

But specific information on what is going on with specific banking 
empires and industrial companies is scarce. In times of crisis such as 
these, if you want to know what's going on, you'd better pass on both 
the television and the newspapers. Whatever you want to know, find it 
out for yourself. 

*******

#13
>From Russia Today


http://www.russiatoday.com
Satire
Say Anything 
By Mary Campbell

Russian President Boris Yeltsin on Friday denounced U.S. strikes against
Afghanistan and Sudan and said he was upset that Washington had not warned
him in advance. 

Yeltsin's press secretary, Sergei Yastrzhembsky, seemed to try to soften
the Kremlin leader's statement. He may have been mindful of a U.S.-Russian
summit which is due to take place in Moscow on Sept. 1-2. ­Reuters, Aug.
21, 1998 

Yastrzhembsky: Mike? Mike McCurry? Hi, it's Sergei Yastrzhembsky, from
Moscow! 

McCurry: Sergei, hello! It's good to hear from you. How are things? 

Yastrzhembsky: Oh fine, just fine, Mike ­ give or take a complete financial
meltdown, of course! Listen, Mike, I just wanted to touch base with you…I
suppose you've read the Russian president's reaction to the bombings in
Sudan and Afghanistan? 


McCurry: Uh, well, actually Sergei, I have to admit, I've been up to my
neck in this Monica Lewinsky stuff, I didn't really have time for anything
else. What did Boris think of it? 

Yastrzhembsky: Well, he, uh, well, he thought it was …he thought it was
swell Mike! 

McCurry: Glad to hear it, Sergei, good to have you folks on board for this
one. 

Yastrzhembsky: Oh well, you know, we're all in the same boat when it comes
to terrorism! Unfortunately, Mike, Boris Nikolayevich sometimes has a
little trouble saying what he means, so if you do happen to catch the quote
on CNN, well… 

McCurry: Read between the lines? 

Yastrzhembsky: That's it! That's it exactly ­ read between the lines.
Because when he says "I am outraged and I denounce this," what he means to
say is "We're with you 100 percent of the way." 

McCurry: I see. 

Yastrzhembsky: And when he says his attitude is "negative as it would be to
any act of terrorism, military interference, failure to solve a problem
through talks," it's just his way of saying, "Well done." 

McCurry: Interesting. Just out of curiosity, how would Yeltsin admit that
he had had sexual relations with a 21-year-old intern? 

Yastrzhembsky: I couldn't really say, Mike. The subject has never come up. 

McCurry: Have you ever had to field questions about mysterious stains on
women's clothing? 

Yastrzhembsky: (thinking)
Hmm, you know, I think he spilled a cup of coffee in Madeleine Albright's
lap once, is that what you mean? 

McCurry: No, not exactly. 

Yastrzhembsky: Oh! You mean this Monica Lewinsky thing, Mike! I've been on
vacation with the president and I'm a bit out of touch ­ I mean, ASK me
about the ruble crisis! I haven't got a clue! 

McCurry: Yeah, it's the Monica Lewinsky thing. It's the toughest going of
my whole career as a White House spokesman. 

Yastrzhembsky: Ha! You're kidding, right? This is the worst your president
can throw at you? You mean he's never announced he was going to
unilaterally cut your nuclear stockpiles? 

McCurry: No. 

Yastrzhembsky: Described Japan as a nuclear power? 

McCurry: Well, no. 

Yastrzhembsky: Forgotten what country he was visiting? 

McCurry: No. 

Yastrzhembsky: Acted disoriented in public and failed to recognize one of
his own top aides? 

McCurry: No. 

Yastrzhembsky: Mike, my friend! You have the life ­ I want YOUR job. 

McCurry: Sergei, we should talk… 

********