June 30, 1999    
This Date's Issues: 3368 • 3369 •3370 

Johnson's Russia List
#3370
30 June 1999
davidjohnson@erols.com

[Note from David Johnson:
Thanks to those who have already responded to my request for comments
on JRL. If you have some thoughts please pass them on. Now's the time.
1. Itar-Tass: Justice Ministry Entitled to Take Steps Against Extremists.
2. Itar-Tass: Communists Stay in Duma during Holiday for Fear of Ban.
3. Reuters: Ex-Russia PM Chernomyrdin returns to Gazprom.
4. Newsweek International: Yana Dlugy, The Prisoners' Plague. Overcrowded 
jails are fueling a frightening new epidemic of drug-resistant tuberculosis.
5. Fritz W. Ermarth {then-Chairman, National Intelligence Council):
The Russian Revolution and the Future Russian Threat to the West (1990).
6. Reuters: IMF mission hails Russian successes.
7. RFE/RL NEWSLINE: ZHIRINOVSKII SAYS RUSSIA NEEDS TO BECOME A NATO 
MEMBER and CHINA QUIETLY EXPANDING INTO RUSSIA?] 

********

#1
Justice Ministry Entitled to Take Steps Against Extremists.

MOSCOW June 30 (Itar-Tass) - "The Justice Ministry is vested with the right 
to take steps against certain public organisations and political parties, 
including the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, to "prevent 
eruptions of extremism" in Russia," Justice Minister Pavel Krasheninnikov 
told journalists on Tuesday after his meeting with President Boris Yeltsin. 

The minister said that in the course of their talk in the Kremlin they 
"discussed the upcoming parliamentary elections and the presently existing 
extremist background". He noted that "passions, naturally, tend to mount" 
during the electoral campaign, which has actually been started, although 
legally it is to begin a little later. Krasheninnikov stressed in this 
connection that his ministry was entitled to take measures against individual 
organisations and parties "to prevent eruptions of extremism". 

He said that in the course of his meeting with the president they discussed 
problems linked with the re-registaration of public organisations and steps 
to combat political extremism. Yeltsin make critical remarks about the work 
of the Justice Ministry and expressed the view that it should be improved on 
the eve of the elections. 

Krasheninnikov said that they discussed also some problems linked with the 
activities of the "most influential public organisations, which have the best 
chances to win seats in the next State Duma". "The talk was quite exacting 
and critical", the minister said without indicating the exact names of the 
organisations in question. 

The minister stressed that he had received instructions from the president to 
firmly adhere to the stand that the activities of all the parties and public 
organisations must always be in keeping with the law and the Constitutions. 

********

#2
Communists Stay in Duma during Holiday for Fear of Ban.

MOSCOW, June 30 (Itar-Tass) - Fearing that the Kremlin may ban them in the 
coming months, the Communists and other left-wing parties who were elected to 
the State Duma lower house of parliament have decided to stay in Moscow 
rather than go on holiday elsewhere, a Communist MP told Tass on Wednesday. 

"It is no secret that decrees banning the CPRF (Communist Party of the 
Russian Federation) have been drafted," chairman of the Duma committee for 
security Viktor Ilyukhin said. 

"Information is being persistently spread that a decree disbanding the State 
Duma has been prepared," Ilyukhin said, adding that those plans may be 
fulfilled in late July or early August. 

What fuelled the Communists' fears was President Boris Yeltsin's Tuesday 
statement that the Justice Ministry had failed to carry out his instruction 
to check the CPRF for conformity with the Constitution. 

Yeltsin told off Minister Pavel Krasheninnikov for his inability to dig up 
evidence against the Communists. 

"That confirms once again that preparation for serious unconstitutional acts 
on behalf of the president and his team is under way," Ilyukhin said. 

He did not rule out that the whole affair might start with the removal of 
Lenin's mummy from the Red Square mausoleum. "There is much probability that 
'the body programme' will be fulfilled soon" which will cause widespread 
discontent among Communists, providing the pretext for slapping a ban on the 
party. 

However, Valentin Kuptsov, deputy leader of the Communist faction in the 
Duma, said he was sure the party had nothing to fear. 

Kuptsov said any action by the Kremlin would only boost the party's standing. 

"This is a means to exert influence on the party and create an atmosphere of 
lack of confidence to our organisation in society," he said, adding: "The 
CPRF has a steady 35-per cent approval rating, and its adversaries are afraid 
it can win a majority in the parliamentary election." 

"The party has nothing to be afraid of because we are doing our best to 
comply with legislation and sure that our organisation is working within the 
legal framework," he said. 

Meanwhile, despite the parliamentary holiday which will last till late 
August, opposition parties and movements are set to stay in the Duma by 
shifts. A rota is likely to be drawn up for MPs remaining in the building. 

A Communist said on condition of anonymity that Yeltsin is "obsessed with the 
idea to ban the CPRF in order to go down in history as the destroyer of the 
Communist idea in Russia." 

"We are ready for any development" and CPRF cells all over the country "are 
instructed (how to behave) in case of an unconstitutional development," 
Ilyukhin said. 

********

#3
Ex-Russia PM Chernomyrdin returns to Gazprom
By Aleksandras Budrys

MOSCOW, June 30 (Reuters) - Former Russian Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin 
was appointed chairman of the world's biggest gas company, Gazprom, on 
Wednesday, bringing him back to the powerful company he used to run. 

Chernomyrdin's election by the new, 11-member board at a shareholder's 
meeting capped his return to the political and industrial frontlines in 
Russia, just over a year after he was sacked as premier by President Boris 
Yeltsin. 

The choice of a former prime minister who remains close to the government, 
most recently as Russia's envoy over Kosovo, shows the government wants to 
increase its muscle in the company ahead of elections, one analyst said. 

``It presages greater government influence over the company, which is not 
surprising with two elections coming up,'' Stephen O'Sullivan, head of 
research at United Financial Group in Moscow, told Reuters. 

He was referring to a parliamentary polls in December and to the presidential 
election due midway through next year, in which Chernomyrdin could be a 
candidate. His return to Gazprom could again provide a springboard for his 
political ambitions. 

Gazprom chief executive Rem Vyakhirev retains his seat on the board and 
remains as chief executive, the position he has held since Chernomyrdin 
became prime minister in December 1992. 

Although some analysts had speculated that a return by Chernomyrdin could 
create tensions at the top of Russia's largest company, the two men appeared 
relaxed and good humoured at a news conference following the shareholders' 
meeting. 

``There is no need to seek differences between us. There are those who want 
to split Gazprom but this will not happen,'' Interfax news agency quoted 
Chernomrydin as saying. 

Vyakhirev said he was glad Chernomyrdin had returned and did not regard him 
as a rival. 

``Gazprom is consolidating, it's filling up with our own people,'' he said 
adding the state's representatives on the new board were professionals who 
knew the gas business. 

O'Sullivan said their relationship over the next six months would be critical 
for future control of Gazprom. 

The monopoly is of overwhelming importance in Russia, accounting for around a 
quarter of the state's budget revenues. 

It is the world's largest gas company, easily Russia's biggest enterprise, 
and its assets include a quarter of the world's gas. Control of Gazprom, 
which is 38.37 percent owned by the state, is a key economic prize for the 
country. 

In a sign of its political importance, Prime Minister Sergei Stepashin and 
Kremlin chief of staff Alexander Voloshin visited Gazprom on Tuesday -- the 
eve of the shareholder's meeting. 

Chernomyrdin has returned to his roots in industry following his experience 
as prime minister and Kosovo mediator. In both roles he was sharply 
criticised by the main opposition Communist Party, which accused him of 
betraying Russian interests. 

Chernomyrdin, who is head of the centrist Our Home is Russia political party, 
said the board would be apolitical. But O'Sullivan said: ``Gazprom is too big 
not to be political.'' 

Vyakhirev said Gazprom had no immediate plans to increase its gas exports. 
Last year it exported 120.5 billion cubic metres (bcm) of gas to markets 
outside the former Soviet Union. 

Total Gazprom production last year was 553.7 bcm. By comparison, the next 
largest producers supplying the European market were Britain, with 90.3 bcm, 
Algeria with 72.8 bcm, and Norway with 47.8 bcm. 

*******

#4
Newsweek International
July 5, 1999
[for personal use only]
RUSSIA 
The Prisoners' Plague
Overcrowded jails are fueling a frightening new epidemic of drug-resistant 
tuberculosis 
By Yana Dlugy (dlugy@matrix.ru)

Kostya Vinogradov, 22, never imagined that a teenage mistake would carry such 
a steep price. At 18, after stealing one car too many, the Siberian native 
found himself in prison. A year later he was told he had tuberculosis. "My 
knees almost gave out on me," he says. "You should have seen the death around 
here back then." A year later still, he learned that the treatment he'd 
received for the disease didn't work. Kostya Vindogradov had a strain of TB 
that is drug-resistant, and difficult to treat even in the West's best 
medical facilities. In Russia's prisons, it is a death sentence. 

One of the world's oldest plagues is now its latest. For thousands of years, 
tuberculosis ravaged European cities. Today an epidemic is spreading through 
Russia, engulfing its prisons and posing a threat to the West. "If it's not 
controlled here, it is going to spill over into Western Europe," says Arata 
Kochi, head of Communicable Disease Prevention and Control at the World 
Health Organization. 

The reason lies in the nature of the disease. Tuberculosis spreads through 
the air—and can be contracted simply by standing close to an infected person. 
Last autumn a Ukrainian immigrant infected dozens of people who shared his 
Paris-New York flight. To make matters worse, he carried the drug-resistant 
strain of the disease. 

Such strains—dreaded by the medical establishment—are thriving in Russia's 
over-crowded prisons. "It is a pump," says Alex Goldfarb of New York's Public 
Health Research Institute (PHRI). "Practically everyone who goes there gets 
TB... and every year 300,000 prisoners leave." Things are about to get even 
worse: with Moscow's Justice Ministry clamoring to decrease the prison 
population, the government recently passed a prison amnesty. That means that 
nearly 90,000 newly released prisoners will be on Russian streets this 
summer, the height of the tourist season. No fewer than a third will have the 
drug-resistant strain of TB. 

The problem is so dire that it has captured the attention of international 
health and humanitarian organizations. Currently the Red Cross, the Belgium 
branch of Doctors Without Borders, Britain's Merlin and the George 
Soros-sponsored New York PHRI all have tuberculosis programs, and a $150 
million loan for tuberculosis and AIDS treatment is making its way through 
the World Bank. 

Yet officials readily admit that the threat will not dissipate any time soon. 
While the government may want to release prisoners early to alleviate 
overcrowding, the public is demanding harsher penalties. The result is a 
public-health disaster: more criminals go inside, and a few years later, more 
TB victims come out. 

That's quite a change from the old days. Not long ago the Soviet Union touted 
its elaborate treatment industry: six institutes, thousands of special 
hospital wards, convalescence sanitariums and tens of thousands of workers. 
Their treatment approach— X-rays and surgery, methods the West abandoned for 
antibiotics in midcentury—was successful enough to contain the disease. In 
1991, the tuberculosis rate in the U.S.S.R., at 34 cases per 100,000 people, 
was still triple the U.S. level of 10.4 cases per 100,000. But it was nowhere 
near epidemic levels. Still, the system was wildly expensive and bloated. And 
it certainly wasn't meant to handle an epidemic. 

But that's exactly what it faced after the Soviet Union collapsed. Living 
conditions slid, TB cases rose and budget funds withered to the point where 
prison administrators could barely provide their charges with the necessary 
2,800 daily calories. The scarcity of medicine created another danger. "We 
have half of the medicine we need," says Ludmilla Neshumae, medical director 
at the holding center in Ulan-Ude, in Buryatia, along the eastern coast of 
Lake Baikal. "But we do what we can with it." Such misplaced good intentions 
make fertile ground for drug-resistant TB strains, which proliferate when 
antibiotics don't kill all of the bacteria, and those that remain develop an 
immunity to drugs. So far this year, 94 percent of the prisoners in Buryatia 
with active TB were found to carry the drug-resistant type. 

The main culprit for the proliferation of TB in the penal system is the 
holding centers where anyone arrested is sent to await a court date. 
Sometimes they wait for months in centers that are so overcrowded that 
prisoners have to sleep in shifts. When Natalia Vezhnina, director of Colony 
33, the prison where Kostya Vinogradov today languishes, returned in 1992 
after a five-year absence, she couldn't believe her eyes. "I used to complain 
about our conditions in the 1980s," she says. "I didn't know how good we had 
it." There was no money for food or medicine. Medics could do little more 
than watch their patients die. 

The desperate times called for desperate measures. Vezhnina convinced her 
boss to let her attend a human-rights convention in Moscow, where she pleaded 
from the podium for foreign help. "I have a real prison where real people are 
dying of a real disease and I can't do anything about it," she said. "If any 
of you can help, I'll welcome you with open arms." Doctors Without Borders 
took up her offer. In 1995 it began the Directly Observed Treatment 
Short-course (DOTS) in Colony 33 in Kemorovo. The program, endorsed by WHO, 
consists of six to eight months of antibiotic treatment, with nurses watching 
patients swallow the drugs. When the program started, the death rate was 400 
prisoners per year. Today it is 20, an improvement of 95 percent. 

So why don't the Russians just set up a bunch of DOTS programs? Partly 
because funds are too scarce to purchase the necessary medicine. And partly 
because of Russian pride—because DOTS doesn't require special wards or 
sanitariums, it would put hundreds of thousands of state employees out of 
work. Russians also consider it a Third World program, far beneath the 
Soviet-breed superiority complex. "DOTS is a simplified system for poor 
countries," says Mikhail Perelman, who heads one of two top tuberculosis 
institutes. "It's good for places like Africa and Southeast Asia. But it 
doesn't really apply to Russia." If such attitudes continue, more deaths will 
follow. 

Slowly, Moscow is beginning to take greater responsibility for ending 
Russia's TB epidemic. The Justice Ministry is pushing penal-system reforms 
through the Duma; the Health Ministry is encouraging its members to examine 
alternative treatments . And after years of denial, the Russian government 
has finally asked the World Bank for funding to fight tuberculosis and AIDS. 
"This is a Russian problem," says Aleksandr Kononets, who heads the 
penal-system medical department. Western organizations, he says, can help by 
establishing model programs, but only the country's leaders can put their own 
house in order. The alternative? Young men like Kostya withering away in the 
post-Soviet gulag. Death seems too steep a price to pay for car theft as a 
teenager. 

*******

#5
INTERVIEW-Russian ex-PM fears for post-Yeltsin era
By Brian Killen

MOSCOW, June 30 (Reuters) - Former Russian prime minister Sergei Kiriyenko 
said on Wednesday that hard won post-Soviet freedoms could be jeopardised if 
Moscow mayor Yuri Luzhkov became president and ran the country as he does his 
city. 

Kiriyenko, who is to challenge Luzhkov in a mayoral election in December but 
stands little chance of success, accused Moscow authorities of stifling 
freedom of speech and said the city was plagued with ``crony capitalism.'' 

But the youthful bespectacled ex-premier made clear that his campaign against 
Luzhkov had more to do with next summer's presidential poll than with a bid 
to oust the popular city boss. 

``He is presenting Moscow as a model for all of Russia. This is all about 
Russia's future,'' he told Reuters in an interview. 

Kiriyenko, who headed the government in the months leading up to last 
August's financial crisis, said he was more concerned about this than any 
threat posed by the Communist Party. 

President Boris Yeltsin, who is due to end his second and final term in 
mid-2000, sacked Kiriyenko after the crisis led to a de facto rouble 
devaluation and a domestic debt default. 

Earlier this month Kiriyenko urged Yeltsin to step down before his term ends 
in mid-2000, but he said in the interview that Russia had Yeltsin to thank 
for many of its democratic freedoms, notably freedom of speech. 

However, he criticised the concentration of power in the hands of the Kremlin 
chief under the constitution adopted in 1993 after Yeltsin used tanks to 
crush a parliament-led opposition revolt. 

``It would be wrong to consider that the freedoms given by Yeltsin are with 
us forever,'' he said. 

``We have an authoritative system of power built under one person...but just 
imagine it is not Yeltsin, but (Communist Party leader Gennady) Zyuganov or 
Luzhkov,'' he said. 

Kiriyenko, 37, has set up a hotline for people to complain about the way 
Moscow is run, saying Luzhkov did not tolerate freedom of speech. But some 
analysts see this as part of a Kremlin-orchestrated campaign to discredit the 
powerful mayor. 

Luzhkov, who says he will run for president only if he regards other 
candidates as unacceptable, was re-elected mayor in 1996 with more than 90 
percent of the vote. 

A pragmatic hands-on manager credited with beautifying the city, Luzhkov, 62, 
remains popular. He has rejected Kiriyenko's charges and described him as a 
weak opponent. 

Kiriyenko said he had nothing against the mayor himself. ``He is not a bad 
manager, a strong leader in Moscow.'' 

But he said Russia had to worry about its future system of government, which 
should not be modelled on Moscow. 

He said freedom of speech was lacking in the city and the system amounted to 
``crony capitalism'' instead of fair competition. 

``We have to give Muscovites and experts a chance to air their opinions on 
what is happening,'' he said. 

``My aim is to present a programme for Moscow by autumn, a programme which 
will show how Moscow's resources can be more correctly used, how to make this 
model less corrupt,'' he said. 

``Communism is not a threat. There will be no Communism in Russia. But this 
crony, bureaucratic, corrupt capitalism which has been built in Moscow is a 
threat for the country.'' 

*******

#6
Date: Wed, 30 Jun 1999 
From: "Fritz W. Ermarth" <fwermarth@erols.com>
Subject: Memo on Impending USSR Breakup, May 1990

David: Being solely of historical interest, the attached document may
not make the cut for JRL. The attached is a memo I wrote in May 1990
for senior Bush administration officials concerned with the USSR. It
was written while I was serving as Chairman of the National Intelligence
Council and was recently declassified. Regards, FWE


Fritz W. Ermarth
Chairman, National Intelligence Council
CIA Headquarters
May 18, 1990

The Russian Revolution and the Future Russian Threat to the West

Geostrategic Woolgathering

It is understandable that Washington and other major NATO capitals want
some construct with which to forecast the future Soviet or Russian threat
to European security. This seems needed to decide and gain political
support on a whole range of vital matters: the military postures and
doctrines of the Alliance and its members; the structure and even survival
of NATO; nuclear forces and strategy; US military presence in Europe;
European security architecture beyond or after NATO. But no such construct
is at hand, and no amount of analysis or geopolitical philosophizing seems
likely to create one until the air clears on the question that occupies
most of this paper: What is going to happen with the USSR? Most past
assumptions about Soviet power and policy cannot be used with any
confidence. Simply extrapolating what we perceive as present Soviet
reality - Gorbachev, perestroika, “new thinking,” defensive doctrine,
shrinking forces - is unsatisfactory because, at best, it offers but one
alternative future among several, and a relatively unlikely one at that.

We can say a few important things with confidence; but, even then,
implications must be hedged with care. Most importantly, the familiar or
“canonical” threat is gone or rapidly going, namely a hegemonical USSR
animated by a hostile universalist ideology, present in the heart of Europe
with powerful offensive military forces. This threat will not return short
of a replay of the events of 1944-48. Nevertheless, most of the forces
embodying that threat are still in place for the moment. Both their
immediate locations and their homeland are undergoing unprecedented
turbulence. It is a situation ripe for dangerous accident, if not
deliberate aggression, until Soviet forces are completely gone from East
Europe (a point made publicly by Hungary’s President Gonz).

The new Eastern Europe is seen by all as a rich source of ethnic and
territorial conflict that could disturb the general peace. But major wars
that endanger Western security are not likely to occur over these
conflicts. The more serious danger is indirect, that interstate conflict
in Europe, along with economic and other troubles, could derail progress
toward stable democracy, affording opportunities for intervention by a
revanchist Moscow at some future time. Although East European instability
may be a legitimate argument for maintaining NATO’s strategic strength and
cohesion, it is unlikely by itself to be a very persuasive one with publics
and parliaments as time passes and contrary concerns intrude. 

The real problem boils down to the Soviet Union or Russia or whatever it
turns out to be: What will be the threat, particularly the military
threat, to Europe emanating therefrom?

A reasonable view must embrace a breathtakingly wide spectrum of
possibilities. At one extreme of unpleasantness, one can readily imagine
an authoritarian, chauvinist, and revanchist Russia threatening weak
democratic states in East Europe and the Baltics who look to the “new
European security architecture” - which means the powerful Atlantic
democracies, i.e., NATO - for protection. Perhaps such a revanchist Russia
could find allies in new (old?) crypto-fascist regimes on East Europe, much
as Nazi Germany did.

At the opposite extreme of pleasantness, one can imagine a confraternity of
stable democratic states, including Russia, whose major security
responsibility is to manage local squabbles and to deter external threats
(e.g., from China or some future Islamic Federation in South Asia?), a kind
of IISS with armies, but no rogue members with disruptive power and
ambition. (Recalling the League of Nations, Henry Kissinger rightly notes
that a collective security system without enemies tends to fail when one of
its members becomes an enemy to other members). If realists find this too
farfetched, they must account for the fact that this is what everybody
professes to be for ultimately, under labels such as “common European
house” and “new European security architecture.”

None of these or other possible constructs can be fixed upon as most likely
or excluded as too unlikely for planning purposes on time horizons relevant
to such questions as whether to preserve, alter, build upon, or replace
NATO. Such speculations do, however, sharpen appreciation as to the key
question: What will be the nature of the future Russian state?
Especially, will it be democratic or authoritarian? As in the past, that
nature more than anything will determine the power and aspirations of the
Russian state, and the degree to which it threatens the West.

Our statecraft must recognize, as do most Soviet leaders and citizens, that
this is the question on history’s agenda. But neither we nor they can
answer it now, nor foretell in what manner and when it will be answered.
Because we have little else to turn to, historical lessons should be
consulted: Russia has always come out of the revolutionary phases as it
was before, autocratic, xenophobic, and backward, but powerful enough to
threaten the neighborhood. Yet historical lessons are for opening, not
closing, minds, and open-mindedness reveals brighter prospects today than
in the past, especially if one looks outside rather than inside the
Kremlin’s walls.

The Second Russian Revolution

Gorbachev is undoubtedly correct when he says, as he has recently, that
Russia is undergoing a second revolution. Although he hopes understandably
that it won’t come to this, revolutions, by definition, sweep away whole
political and often social orders, creating new ones. One may argue over
exactly what stage in the revolutionary process the USSR finds itself, but
the process is clearly underway. The result will be, as the term
revolution signifies, the removal of the present Soviet regime and probably
the replacement of the present Soviet Union with some new
political-territorial configuration.

The Soviet economy is now shrinking absolutely, and its ability to deliver
well-being to all but the most privileged is shrinking rapidly. No reforms
or reallocations will turn this around in the short run. All reform moves
will, in fact, exacerbate the trend, and those most needed for long-term
recovery will be most severe in the short run. Moreover, the economy is
“balkanizing” into regional cells with important political as well as
economic effects. Widespread interlocking strikes are almost a certainty
this year.

Despite Gorbachev’s new presidential powers, central political authority is
rapidly eroding as is the power of traditional party heirarchs in all
regions. The CPSU is splitting and shrinking; no serious observers outside
the leadership give it much of a future. Making things worse, while losing
its active power, the old authority structure still has the power to block
or disrupt positive adaptation to the new situation by the center or new
local authorities.

Both of the above are rapidly accelerating social disorder and insecurity,
e.g., crime. All this has generated deep fears in the populace, e.g.,
widespread talk of coups, impending civil war, “technogenic” disasters like
Chernobyl, etc.

In varying degrees, all the non-Russian colonies of the empire house
growing nationalist separatism. Central Asia is running behind the
Baltics, Transcaucasia, and the Ukraine, but on the same track. Even
Russians, especially in Siberia, are increasingly bent on escaping Moscow’s
authority.

In the Russian heartland, this crisis is having a polarizing effect in
popular politics. On one hand, the dominant effect over the past year has
been the growth of support for genuinely democratic forces, such as
Democratic Russia and the Democratic Platform of communist reformers. On
the other hand, this has energized the opposing force of Russian
nationalist authoritarians, powerful institutionally but less popular.
Many in the nomenklatura ally with this conservative force in hopes of
ending perestroika and protecting their power and privilege. At present
Gorbachev appears to be simultaneously appeasing this force and
(misleadingly) holding it out as the most likely alternative should he
fall, hoping thereby to recover support from real democrats and to prevent
losing it in the West.

Certainly the most promising political phenomenon on this landscape is the
growing electoral appeal of the real democratic forces, especially and most
surprisingly among the workers of major Russian cities. The capture of
Moscow and Leningrad city governments by these insurgents is the dramatic
example of a spreading phenomenon. Its strength, so far, holds out the
prospect that the second Russian revolution can have a democratic outcome.

How this brew will yield some lasting political outcome is now as
impossible to predict as the outcome itself. The struggle is increasingly
polarized between the democrats and the republic separatists, on one side,
and the authoritarian Russian nationalists on the other. But the political
scene remains highly varied and fractured. The democrats have no other
source of support than the populace. The authoritarians have more support
among the military high command., some elements of the KGB, and the party
apparatus, giving them the option of a putsch, but a very risky one.
Should the democrats fail to get power or govern effectively, or economic
collapse occur, the authoritarians could gain authentic popular support.

In the most desirable scenario, the democrats would gradually win national
power in Russia from the localities upwards; and Gorbachev, perhaps after
disposing of the CPSU at the next congress, would give up his balancing act
and join them. In a pattern rather like that seen in Poland, a popularly
elected government would come to power, and Gorbachev might preside,
perhaps marginally as did Jaruzielski in Poland. Other scenarios are all
distinctly nastier. Deepening chaos without a clear victory for the
democratic forces increases the likelihood that Russian nationalist
authoritarians will ultimately prevail. Should the latter seek to
short-circuit the process through a military putsch, they might succeed in
creating a transient regime reminiscent of Pinochet in Chile. But an
equally likely result would be a social uprising against them and,
possibly, widespread civil war.

Although it cannot be excluded entirely, one scenario is very unlikely.
That is the orderly progress of perestroika with Gorbachev at the helm of
(finally) successful political and economic reforms of the sort he
currently articulates. His authority appears too weak and his policies too
incoherent or misguided. But he’s changed course sharply in the past and
could do so again.

The real issue is not Gorbachev but the strength and promise of the
democratic forces. They are greater than ever expected for a lot of
reasons, the most important one being quite simple. After 70 years of
misrule by a self-appointed “vanguard,” people want self-government.
Education, modern communications, and painful negative example have taught
them something about what self-government is. They identify democracy with
what they poignantly call a “normal society.” They are less ready to
embrace the values of democratic economics, i.e., markets and private
property, that go with democratic politics in a “normal society.” But they
are capable of learning if they get the chance. In a way, the capacity of
the Russian people to exercise the democratic politics they are rapidly
learning, and then to learn and exercise democratic economics, is the
central uncertainty about the Russian state at the end of the 20th Century,
as it was at the beginning when promising developments were destroyed by
war and the Bolsheviks.

Military Power and the Future Russian State

Since it emerged in early-modern times, the unified Russian state has been
identified with a large peacetime military establishment. The army not
only served to consolidate the state/empire, it was a central legitimizing
symbol of the state itself. This continued under Communism. Because
victory in World War II was the major achievement that somehow legitimized
the Stalinist system, the Soviet army became, much more than the CPSU, the
Soviet institution that enjoyed authentic popular support and therefore
legitimized the state. This contributed to the militarization of Soviet
policies and political culture in the post-war years. The army’s
modernization so as to be competitive with armies of neighboring countries
was always a central goal during periods of political and economic reform
throughout Russian history. Stalin embarked on force-draft
industrialization in large part to create military strength. Gorbachev
launched his assault on the Stalinist system in large part to revive the
economic and technological base for that strength.

Today, however, this knot of identity among Russian statehood, modernity,
and the army are under severe challenge that leaves the future of this
tradition nearly as uncertain as that of the regime. First, the Gorbachev
leadership has admitted and, exploiting glasnost, the democratic forces
have amplified the truth that the overwhelming priority of military force
building after World War II - called the “hypertrophy of militarism” - was
a central cause of the crisis besetting the system today, not only
crippling healthy economic development but contributing greatly to the
estrangement of the USSR from the advanced industrial world. Second,
glasnost has unmasked how greatly the army harbored the corruption, waste,
and irrationality that characterized the “stagnation” of the Brezhnev
years. To many in the USSR today, the army equates to a deserved defeat in
Afghanistan and brutal conditions for young conscripts. All this has
profoundly undermined the army as the object of patriotic loyalty. This
has, in turn, deeply outraged and divided the Soviet officer corps.

The Soviet military is already involved in necessarily repressive
operations to contain current revolutionary developments. This involvement
will almost inevitably grow; and the military leadership is understandably
fearful that this will further undermine its popular support, even though
it favors defense of central authority and public order. It resents being
thrust into this caldron by an adventurous, indecisive political leadership.

Should the Soviet military be drawn into a putsch against Gorbachev, or by
Gorbachev into one against his radical opposition, or by its own leaders to
preserve the state from chaos, this crisis of legitimacy among army, state,
and society could escalate sharply, perhaps fatally. Such a putsch could
unleash a wider uprising. The military could be engaged against striking
workers in the Russian heartland even this year. Military involvement in
suppressing unrest might succeed, but as likely would produce mutinies and
fracturing. One can imagine an outcome in which the traditional identity
of army and state is permanently destroyed in Russia. Less likely, but not
inconceivable, military intervention against pervasive chaos with the
support of popular sentiment, either democratic or
nationalist/authoritarian, could create a new tradition, similar to that in
Turkey, wherein the army is the ultimate foundation and guarantor of the
new Russian state.

The internal revolutionary dynamic that defines the new Russian state,
although highly unpredictable, will probably be dominant in defining the
relationship of that state to its military establishment. But external
factors will also be important, perhaps in contradictory ways. When Russia
emerges from the current travail, whom will it see as its enemies? How
strong or threatening will they appear to be? Powerful threat perceptions
will encourage reversion to paranoid xenophobia inflating the state’s
perceived military needs. The role of foreign states, especially
neighbors, in the revolutionary process itself will be a factor in shaping
those perceptions, as it was in 1918-22. But the outcome of that process
will be critical. Had the Bolsheviks failed to seize and hold power,
Allied intervention in Russia early in this century might be remembered
more fondly. And, of course, the geography and intensity of threat
perceptions of a post-communist Russian state will be influenced by what
happens to the non-Russian colonies, how their new status was achieved, and
how the new Russian state accommodates them.

The future Russian state could face potential or pressing security problems
from several sides: Europe, including a united Germany and democratizing
East Europe; Islamic South Asia, with involvement of Iran and especially
Turkey in the affairs of its Central Asian colonies; China, undergoing
revolutionary developments of its own; and Japan, growing in economic and
possibly military power. Whether these regions are perceived by Russia to
be genuinely threatening (or inviting of Russia’s own interventionist
ambitions) will be influenced very much by developments internal to them.
China will probably be the most severe challenge over the long run because
of its inherent strength, nuclear power, and instability. Islamic South
Asia will be a problem for Russia, but a lesser threat because of its
geopolitical fragmentation and backwardness. Europe will probably be
perceived as least threatening because of its evolving democratic nature,
anti-militarism, and likely helpfulness in easing Russian economic problems
… unless the new Russian state is a revanchist, chauvinist autocracy, in
which case democratic Europe could be seen as a major enemy.

Whatever the geopolitical setting and the internal outcome of the second
Russian revolution, it is likely that a unified Russian state will survive
(or reemerge) and that it will have the ability and desire to sustain a
powerful military establishment, with a formidable nuclear arsenal. How
powerful and how hostile to the West that state proves to be will depend
mostly on its nature, democratic or authoritarian.

The Variable of Democracy

Why should the variable of democracy in future Russia be so powerful a
consideration in our perceptions of the threats it may pose to the West?
This should be self-evident to democratic societies. The Cold War, indeed
most of the great conflicts of the 20th Century, have been about democracy.
Yet the matter must be treated explicitly because its future is both
crucial and uncertain, and also because much of Western opinion has a
muddled view of it, underestimating the potential for and misidentifying
the strongest sources of real democracy in Russia.

The old truths are still true. Democracy tends strongly, if not
automatically and absolutely, to make states less threatening to other
states, especially if the other states are also democratic. This is not
because of the nobility of democratic souls but because of the limitations
that democratic societies put on the state as the repository of coercive,
armed might. They do this for their own prosperity and protection and to
keep themselves out of needless trouble with their neighbors. As the
history of our country shows, democracies can go to war and spend whole
GNPs on military power, but the cause has to be and remain persuasive to a
lot of people under very critical scrutiny. That there are dangerous
departures from this dominant tendency, e.g., current tensions between
“democratic” Pakistan and India, does not deprive it of its persuasiveness
as a major contributor to peace.

A democratic Russia is far more likely than an autocratic one to manifest
these tendencies, if perhaps only gradually and haltingly. It would be
very unlikely to sustain the kind of arsenal economic performance witnessed
in the post-war period of strategic buildup even after recovering economic
health, unless faced with a compelling need that withstood constant public
scrutiny. A democratic Russia would wrestle with powerful nationalist and
xenophobic, even imperialistic sentiments, but marshaling military power to
express them would have to overcome the pervasive desire of people to live
normally, which, on the whole, includes living fairly with neighbors. A
democratic Russia would insist on much more humane conditions for its
service men, which means a smaller military and in time probably a
volunteer military. Such a Russia would argue constantly and publicly with
itself about real military needs and the costs of meeting them. It would
in time recover the ability to bear those costs, perhaps better than an
autocratic Russia, but be ever less willing to bear them. All these
arguments apply equally to those many other dimensions of “the threat,”
e.g., intelligence and subversion activities, foreign adventures, etc.

Nevertheless, if and when economic and social health were recovered, a
democratic Russia would share with its autocratic counterpart a desire to
be an equal to the other superpower or powers, whatever that may come to
mean in the years ahead. That such equality must include dimensions of
power other than and competitive with the demands of military power is
clear to most educated Russians now.

All this says that the future of our Russian threat is being decided in the
struggle of Russia’s democratic forces. To the extent Gorbachev and his
policies aid them, they serve our security interests. Although Gorbachev
merits historic credit for unleashing these forces on the Soviet scene, his
record of supporting them has been ambiguous, especially lately. The
democratic forces have shown remarkable strength. They hold the
possibility of a transformation in Russia as sweeping as those seen in East
Europe. But their success is far from assured.

Concluding Reflections

What conclusions can be drawn from these speculations?

Russia is headed for a revolution that will replace the current regime.
Orderly evolution of the present regime into some condition foreshadowed by
its current policies is no more than, say, 20% likely.

This revolution will be marked by chaos and violence because it already is
so marked, and this seems likely to continue. Massive violence and civil
war are not inevitable, however. A relatively peaceful revolution (i.e.,
better than Romania’s experience) is possible. The faster the democratic
forces rise to power - with or without Gorbachev’s leadership - the more
likely that civil war will be avoided. Extended chaos or repressive
intervention by authoritarian forces makes civil war and an authoritarian
outcome more likely, but not certain.

A unified Russian state will emerge from this revolution. The more
democratic it is, the more likely it will be able to retain confederal
relations with parts of the present empire (Ukraine, Byelorussia, parts of
Central Asia) and accommodate the departure of others (Baltics,
Transcaucasia, perhaps Western Ukraine). The more authoritarian it is, and
based purely on Russian nationalism and the claims of order, the more
likely that non-Russian parts will leave the empire.

The process of revolution is likely to last at least a decade. The shape
and economic health of the new Russian state will then begin to emerge. It
will recover its ability and desire to maintain a competitive military
posture, including strategic nuclear power, against whomever it perceives
to be its enemies in the neighborhood and to balance off, to some degree,
the military strength of other large powers, including the US.

How great Russian military power is, how it is configured, and how it is
aimed against the values and security of the West depend most critically on
the variable of democracy versus nationalist authoritarianism in Russia.
Democracy tends to mean a less threatening Russia, cooperating in Western
collective security; authoritarian Russia means hostility to the West,
although “détente-like” relations would come and go.

Although authoritarianism would mean more hostility to the West, it would
probably means less capability to generate truly competitive countervailing
military strength because authoritarianism probably would brake social,
economic, and technological modernization. Democracy will, in the long
run, mean more Russian capability but less hostility to mobilize it. A
middling formula that must concern us, however, might be seen in a
corporatist Russian authoritarianism, somewhat along the lines of
Mussolini’s Italy.

With or without NATO, the future security architecture of Europe will tend
to be for democracies and against non-democracies. Democratic Russia could
be integrated into it. Authoritarian Russia would inevitably be its enemy.

A European security architecture that is strong and explicitly designed for
democracies would be among the most powerful external factors to help the
democratic forces in Russia.

*******

#7
IMF mission hails Russian successes
By Irina Demchenko

MOSCOW, June 30 (Reuters) - The head of an International Monetary Fund team 
checking on Russia's steps to meet the terms for a vital new loan was 
optimistic on Wednesday that the country's efforts would be successful. 

Russia is hoping the IMF, from which it is already the largest borrower, will 
approve the release of another $4.5 billion in aid over 18 months to help it 
beat the effects of an August 1998 crisis and cope with a debt burden of $140 
billion. 

"We see rather good success by the government and the Bank of Russia (the 
central bank) regarding the measures we have agreed on, and are ready for 
further discussions," mission head Gerard Belanger was quoted as saying by 
Itar-Tass news agency. 

A meeting with Prime Minister Sergei Stepashin, scheduled for 0800 GMT, did 
not take place. 

A spokesman for Russia's IMF envoy, Mikhail Zadornov, said the meeting had 
proved unnecessary because Russia was confident it had met all or most of the 
conditions agreed with the IMF for securing the loan. 

"All that was agreed by us (as measures to be taken) has been fulfilled and 
that which was not...will be compensated for in the budget," Zadornov's 
spokesman, Oleg Zhukov, said. 

The mission is to leave on Thursday and Russia hopes it will recommend that 
the Fund's board of directors approve the loan. 

Russia is still trying to overcome the setback dealt by the financial crisis 
which engulfed it in August last year. 

It has taken a number of steps, including passing revenue-raising laws, to 
win more IMF money although not all of the IMF's original terms for the loan 
have been met. 

Russian officials have nevertheless been optimistic that the Fund will 
release the first tranche of the aid late next month. 

Zadornov has said other ways could be found to plug the gaps left by the 
failure to win parliament's support for some revenue-raising laws, and this 
will be a part of the IMF talks. 

Russian officials hope that securing the loan will reduce the danger of 
social tensions in what is likely to be a period of political turmoil in the 
next 12 months, when parliamentary and presidential elections are due. 

Russia also needs the loan to avoid the humiliation of joining the short list 
of countries which have defaulted to the Fund. The IMF's seal of approval for 
its economic policies would ease the way in talks with other creditors. 

Russia wants to restructure some of the loans taken during the Soviet era and 
needs to hold talks with country lenders in the Paris Club and with 
commercial lenders in the London Club. 

It has already defaulted to both these groups but has kept up to pace on 
Russian eurobonds, which it has pledged to honour. 

The IMF and other lenders have urged Russia to take action to repair its 
creaking banking system. 

Newspapers, citing sources in banking circles, reported that four top banks 
were to have their licences withdrawn at the urgings of these lending 
institutions. 

The State Duma, the lower house of parliament, has already passed a law 
intended to revamp the banking system, badly damaged in last August's 
financial meltdown. 

*******

RFE/RL NEWSLINE Vol. 3, No. 127, Part I, 30 June 1999

ZHIRINOVSKII SAYS RUSSIA NEEDS TO BECOME A NATO MEMBER.
Liberal Democratic Party of Russia leader Vladimir
Zhirinovskii told senior researchers at the Moscow State
University on 29 June that NATO should "be forced to extend
its membership to Russia" and include Russians in its
military command, Interfax reported. NATO "must hear the
breath of Russian soldiers," he commented. Zhirinovskii also
proposed sending 10,000 Russian peacekeepers to Kosova rather
than the planned 3,600, arguing that "Serbia will pay for the
Russian army to stay on its territory and guarantee a
peaceful life to its population." Referring to next year's
Russian presidential elections he said voters "will have to
choose between democracy and dictatorship, that [means]
between dirt and blood." FS

CHINA QUIETLY EXPANDING INTO RUSSIA? Scholars attending a
roundtable in Vladivostok on 28 June about the problems of
the Chinese emigrants to Russia concluded that the emigrant
Chinese population will constitute the second-largest
national Diaspora in Russia in the 21st century, Interfax-
Eurasia reported. Currently, around 2.5 million Chinese
reside within Russia's borders. In the opinion of the
scholars, none of whom was identified by name, China is
"quietly expanding into our country" because of the absence
of a well-thought-out migration policy. The next day, the
Russian Statistics Agency reported that the population of
Russia shrank by 265,800 or 0.18 percent during the first
four months of the year and totaled 146.1 million as of 1
May. That decline was considerably steeper than the 159,700
dip recorded during the same period last year. JAC


*******