April 7, 2000    
This Date's Issues: 4232 • 4233 •  4234

Johnson's Russia List
#4234
7 April 2000
davidjohnson@erols.com

[Note from David Johnson:
1. Reuters: Russia says Council of Europe mired in Cold War.
2. Itar-Tass: West Employs Double Standard for Russia- Patriarch.
3. AP: American Held in Moscow Identified. (Edmond Pope)
4. Izvestia: Yelena Yakovleva, FIVE FEARS FOR RUSSIA.
5. Rossiyskaya Gazeta: Roy Medvedev, Did Putin Have A Mask?
(Putin Career, Character Assessed)] 

*******

#1
Russia says Council of Europe mired in Cold War
By Ron Popeski

MOSCOW, April 7 (Reuters) - Russia said on Friday a Council of Europe 
denunciation of Russia's conduct in Chechnya, the West's strongest rebuke yet 
of Moscow, was adopted by parliamentarians mired in a Cold War mentality. 

President-elect Vladimir Putin, chief architect of Moscow's six-month 
Chechnya campaign, was briefed on events in the rebel region by ministers and 
was scheduled to meet a European Union delegation to discuss the conflict and 
bilateral ties. 

Politicians of virtually all persuasions blasted the vote by the Council of 
Europe's parliamentary assembly to suspend Russia from the human rights body 
unless it made progress on holding talks with Chechen rebels and improving 
its rights record. 

``The assembly fell into line with those deputies who appear from their 
statements and actions to continue to live and think by 'Cold War' 
stereotypes and double standards,'' the Foreign Ministry said in a statement. 

It said Russia felt ``bewilderment and deep regret'' at the vote. Russia's 
delegation walked out of the assembly in the French city Strasbourg after its 
voting powers were suspended. 

Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov made almost identical comments to the envoys of 
the EU -- a separate organisation from the Council of Europe. 

Putin was due later to see the delegation, made up of foreign policy chief 
Javier Solana and Foreign Minister Jaime Gama of Portugal, current holder of 
the rotating EU presidency. 

PUTIN MEETS TOP OFFICIALS ON CHECHNYA 

Putin earlier met two deputy prime ministers -- Nikolai Koshman, government 
representative in Chechnya, and Sergei Shoigu, the emergencies minister who 
deals with more than 200,000 refugees who have fled the fighting in the 
region. 

Koshman told reporters there had been no discussion of the Council of 
Europe's decision. It had been decided, he said, not to introduce direct 
presidential rule, an option for the region discussed by Putin and others in 
recent weeks. 

He said the West should leave Russia to solve its problems. 

``We know better than anyone else how to deal with this,'' Itar-Tass news 
agency quoted him as saying. ``If anyone tries to come here and impose on us 
their way of resolving matters it will be very dangerous.'' 

The speaker of Russia's Duma or lower house of parliament, Gennady Seleznyov, 
issued a fresh condemnation of the Council of Europe vote as a ``fateful 
mistake.'' 

``They don't understand what is happening in Russia and are in essence 
defending terrorists,'' he said in televised comments. 

Russian Orthodox Patriarch Alexiy II said the West ``has to get over its 
double standards in dealing with Russia.'' Quoted by Tass, he said the vote 
was like the West's refusal last year to heed Russian protests against NATO 
bombing of Yugoslavia. 

RUSSIAN WARPLANES LAUNCH NEW STRIKES 

Reports from the region said Russian warplanes had launched fresh strikes 
against rebel positions in Chechnya's mountains. Russia says it controls the 
region, but has suffered mounting casualties in guerrilla-style attacks in 
recent weeks. 

Russian media speculated over whether Moscow's further response to the vote 
would be measured, taking into account the limited power of the Council of 
Europe, or defiant, given strong public support for the Chechnya campaign. 

The daily newspaper Sevodnya suggested Russia could take retaliatory measures 
such as closing Chechnya to foreign observers and refusing to ratify a 
convention to abolish the death penalty. 

``Europe has used up its chance to influence the situation in the North 
Caucasus,'' it said. ``The main thing is for both sides to avoid taking the 
confrontation towards an 'Iron Curtain'.'' 

The Council vote gave more urgency to the EU talks, expected to focus on 
Chechnya as well as improving relations between the trade bloc and Moscow. 

The suspension of Russia can only be approved by the governments of the 
41-nation body, which is not part of the EU. 

Officials in Strasbourg, where the Council is based, said member states were 
unlikely to back the assembly's recommendation when they reported back to the 
chamber in June. 

*******

#2
West Employs Double Standard for Russia- Patriarch.

MOSCOW, April 7 (Itar-Tass) - The West is biased towards Russia, Patriarch 
Alexy II, head of the Russian Orthodox Church, said in(his comment on 
Thursday's resolution of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe 
(PACE) which motioned Russia's suspension at the Council because of its 
military campaign in Chechnya. 

"A double standard is used by the West towards Russia," he told reporters on 
Friday. 

"What is being done towards our country now repeats uhe Yugoslav events of a 
year ago," Alexy II. 

He said as of Western delegates who visited Russia to look for human right 
abuses that "what they do not want to hear and see they do not hear and see, 
speaking only of what corresponds to their pre-set position". 

The patriarch said the human rIghts crusaders "accuse the Russian army of all 
sins and crimes, at the same time obviating with attention the heinous deeds 
of militants, when they do immoral business on hostages, torture and kill 
captives, assault the civilian population, as it was in Dagestan, stage 
blasts of residential houses". 

The policy of connivance with terrorists was continued at the Strasbourc 
session of the PACE, Alexy said. He cited as example the assault by 
Chechnya's emissary on the Russian delegation's member at the session. 

"The West needs to overcome such a double standard towards out country," 
Alexy said. 

*******

#3
American Held in Moscow Identified
April 7, 2000
By NICK WADHAMS

MOSCOW (AP) - An American businessman being held in a Russian prison on
charges of espionage is a retired U.S. Navy captain named Edmond Pope, an
official at the U.S. Embassy in Moscow confirmed today. 

``We've been in touch with the family and we're following his case
closely,'' said the official, who spoke under condition of anonymity. 

The Russian Federal Security Service announced Wednesday that it had
arrested an American citizen on charges that he developed contacts with
Russian scientists to steal state secrets. It said a Russian contact had
also been arrested. 

A spokesman for the service still refused to say today whether Pope was the
American they detained. 

No formal charges have been filed against Pope, but he is being
investigated under a section of the Russian criminal code dealing with
espionage, the U.S. official said. A Russian lawyer has been appointed for
Pope, who was in Russia on business when he was arrested. 

Pope, a former Navy captain, worked from 1994-97 with Pennsylvania State
University's Applied Research Laboratory, which does research projects for
the U.S. Navy. 

Pope was an ``assistant for foreign technology'' who developed contacts
between Russian and American research institutes and worked on converting
technology for commercial uses, a statement from Penn State said. 

He left in 1997 to found a Pennsylvania-based company called CERF
Technologies International, which ``has commercial contacts with
organizations in Russia,'' according to the statement. 

The laboratory still maintains contact with Pope for ``his liaison
assistance for ongoing research collaboration with Russian universities and
institutes,'' the statement said. 

Pope was identified in articles in the journal Penn State Agriculture as a
``foreign technology specialist'' who had obtained a lightweight, highly
sensitive spectrometer from a Russian scientist and as affiliated with the
Office of Naval Research, which has awarded contracts to the Applied
Research Laboratory in the past. 

The FSB said the American cultivated contacts with Russian scientists and a
search revealed he had ``technical drawings of various equipment.'' The
Russian NTV television station said he was interested in Russian submarine
technology. 

It wasn't clear how the case would affect U.S.-Russia relations, which have
been strained in recent months by a spate of spying arrests, as well as
disagreements over the NATO campaign in Yugoslavia and Russia's military
action in Chechnya. 

A U.S. diplomat was expelled from Russia last year after being briefly
detained by the FSB. Washington then expelled a Russian diplomat, allegedly
for picking up transmissions from a bugging device discovered at the U.S.
State Department. 

*******

#4
Izvestia
March 7, 2000
[translation from RIA Novosti for personal use only]
FIVE FEARS FOR RUSSIA
By Yelena YAKOVLEVA

According to sociologists, at the moment of elections, "we 
have two feelings" - these are hopes and fears. If the 
situation concerning hopes is more or less clear, the one 
concerning fears is quite complex. The Public Opinion 
Foundation, which conducted polls on this subject, recently 
drew up a kind of classification of Russians' concerns and 
fears.

There is no one, dominating concern shared by most people 
in Russia. One can see this as a public split or at least 
stratification.
The concerns revealed during the polls are mainly concerns 
for Russia, not for one self. 
Sociologists Svetlana Klimova and Yelena Petrenko single 
out five groups (types of those who fear). The largest group is 
made up of people who fear an economic crisis which is 
weakening Russia and a loss of cultural traditions. They make 
up 41% of the respondents. Sociologists tentatively called them 
"state independence champions." They are not quite educated and 
already not young, live in district centres, not poor but not 
well-off.
They speak about their personal problems more rarely than 
others, but evidently because they are not accustomed to 
complaining, not because they have no such problems. They look 
self-restrained and sober-minded and when asked about natural 
calamities, they say they fear not so much space catastrophes 
as the extinctions of animals in the woods. 
The second largest group - those "learning to live" (22%) 
- fears most of all a civil war, a growth in crime rates and a 
reduction in birth rates. Most often these are young people 
from small towns and settlements. Their fears are quite 
justified:
they are just going to serve in the army or have just been 
demobbed, they need to gain a position in society, give birth 
to children and bring them up. They do not refer themselves to 
poor people, they study and work up, engage in small businesses 
but it seems that these activities do not quite correspond to 
their dream. They are not concerned about what they cannot feel 
in everyday routine. Their fears are linked to the striving to 
achieve material wellbeing and give birth to children. In their 
opinion, it is authorities and criminals that do not let them 
do this. 
The are also "interethnic peace supporters" (15%). These 
are the residents of big cities, regional and republican 
centres who fear interethnic conflicts most. They are more 
educated, are typical middle-class Russians, according to their 
incomes, and are of the most active age. No specific features 
of their personal problems have been noted. 
A group of "those trying to survive" makes up 14% of the 
polled. They are united by the fear of hunger, unemployment and 
poverty. These are rural dwellers, more often women than men, 
as a rule.
The people forming this group say three times more often 
than the rest that their main source of incomes is their 
personal land plot. In monetary terms, they have no incomes at 
all or these are minimal amounts, like 200 rubles a month.
The greatest fears in their private life are lack of 
money, fear for children and grand-children and a threat of the 
loss of job. They are least of all concerned about a 
possibility of realising themselves.
"Antifascists" make up the smallest group of those fearing 
(7%). They consider fascism the most serious threat to Russia.
These are primarily Muscovites, at least there are two times 
more antifascists in the capital than the rest of Russia. These 
are highly-educated people who work in science, culture and 
health services, hold executive posts and engage in business, 
as a rule.
"Antifascists'" personal concerns are insufficient 
self-realisation and bad relations in the family. They are 
worried by their unprotectedness before authorities and the 
intrigues of ill-wishers and those who envy them. However, they 
have much less problems with money than an average Russian. 
As to the admission of the fears of others as justified 
and legitimate, the smallest group proved the most categoric. 
"Antifascists" deny the fear of unemployment and hunger more 
emphatically than "those who are trying to survive" deny the 
danger of fascism, something that, in the opinion of 
sociologists, makes one suspect Moscow intellectuals of social 
autism. 
That all these groups have practically no unjustified 
fears or fears that can be ignored, that is neurotic fears, 
causes optimism. 
Still, we have no public neurosis. 

******

#5
Putin Career, Character Assessed 

Rossiyskaya Gazeta
April 5, 2000
[translation for personal use only]
Article by Roy Medvedev: "Did Putin Have A Mask?" 

Some observers are surprised today not so much by 
Putin as by the people's choice. "It can be stated with confidence," 
the newspapers write, "that it would be far more accurate to apply the 
adjective 'unknown' to the mentality of the country which Putin will have 
to run for at least the next four years than to him personally." Those 
who wish Putin ill have even written about the "secret recesses of the 
public subconscious," about the "dark instincts of the mob," about the 
people's "complacency" and "obedience," and so forth. But this is the 
wrong way to explain the Putin phenomenon. 
For radical national patriots V. Putin was hated clearly because he 
acted and won the sympathies of Russian voters primarily as a patriot and 
a Russian man who found it hard to watch Russia's humiliation and 
poverty. But all this, the newspaper Zavtra is convinced, was no more 
than a mask which Putin would like to use to deceive true Russian 
patriots. 
Some Western analysts have claimed that "Putin's giddy rise out of 
nowhere to the political heights was orchestrated by some sort of 
alliance between the Army generals and the security forces." Even more 
often you can encounter claims that Putin was brought to the fore by 
"highly successful financiers" or "oligarchs" -- primarily Berezovskiy 
and Chubays. 
"Who could have imagined," a Yabloko activist exclaimed in the press, 
"that the people's idol in 2000 would be a former KGB colonel who gave 
his best years to the Lubyanka!" Even Gennadiy Zyuganov considered it 
possible to join in this chorus of censure, calling on Russia's voters to 
"vote not for the KGB but for the CPSU." 
Vladimir Putin won the 26 March presidential election in Russia on 
the first round. He defeated 10 rivals, winning 52.6 percent of the 
vote. Those were the preliminary results, and today the Central 
Electoral Commission will announce the official results. 
The Communist Party of the Russian Federation's [CPRF] Gennadiy 
Zyuganov won the support of more than 29 percent of voters -- less than 
he obtained in the 1996 presidential election, but not by much. 
Grigoriy Yavlinskiy won less than 6 percent of the vote, and he is 
clearly disappointed -- he had expected more and had conducted a very 
aggressive election campaign. But even in the 1996 election Yavlinskiy 
had 7.4 percent of the vote. Vladimir Zhirinovskiy won around 3 percent 
of the vote 26 March, which was less than in the State Duma elections 
three months ago. Aman Tuleyev won 3.4 percent of the vote. For him 
this was a very good result, these were mainly votes from workers in 
Siberia, where Tuleyev had challenged not Putin but Zyuganov. 
The other six candidates put together won around 7 percent, and 
around 2 percent of voters voted "none of the above." Despite fears to 
the contrary, almost 70 percent of all voters took part in the election. 

The People's Choice

Thus, the Russian population has clearly expressed its will. The 
attempts to present the election as "uncontested" or as a choice "with 
your eyes closed" were unfounded. All Putin's main rivals have been 
taking part in the country's political life for at least 10 years. V. 
Zhirinovskiy and A. Tuleyev ran in the first Russian presidential 
election in 1991, while G. Zyuganov and G. Yavlinskiy were among 
Yeltsin's main rivals in 1996. The 26 March election showed that V. 
Zhirinovskiy's political capital is already exhausted, while G. 
Yavlinskiy's is slowly depleting. 
V. Putin's victory came as no surprise to political observers. Even 
in the most unfavorable forecasts for him it was a question merely of his 
possibly getting 45-49 percent of the vote, making it necessary to hold a 
second round in which Putin could have won 65-70 percent of the vote. 
Some of Putin's supporters even considered this kind of outcome to the 
election preferable, although, of course, victory on the first round when 
there are 11 contenders is weightier both politically and psychologically 
if you bear in mind that even a year ago few of us either knew or had 
even heard of Putin, who appeared on the Russian political scene so 
unexpectedly. 
Now almost nobody talks about Putin as a "blank sheet of paper," a 
"black box," or a "dark horse." Over the past few months the 
newspapers, magazines, and TV have written and talked about Putin so much 
and in such detail that we now know more about him than about the other 
contenders. And the main thing is that we have been able over the past 
few months to observe Putin's energetic work both in the post of premier 
and in the post of acting president -- work which has received the 
approval and backing of the majority of Russia's citizens. 
The Russian people have been through so many trials and illusions 
over the past 10 years and acquired such great historical experience that 
it is indeed, as V. Putin himself said in his last pre-election address 
to the Russian people, "hard to twist them around your little finger." 
Putin's influence on Russia's sociopolitical life has been so 
significant, and itself generates such great interest, that it is 
becoming an important subject for study in its own right. 
For many years the subject of elections has been the main subject 
for political journalism, forecasting, sociological research, or 
speculation. This was determined not only by the country's 
Constitution, but also by the fundamental importance of the institution 
of the presidency in the new Russia. At a time when the democratic 
system, civil society, and a system of mature political parties has not 
yet become established in our country, it is the president who can and 
must be the guarantor of democratic stability. 
The huge powers wielded by the president in Russia were not a whim of 
Yeltsin's or of the architects of the Constitution, they are a necessity. 
Hence the interest in the 26 March election. The turnaround in 
Russia's life which we have witnessed for the past eight months, and the 
support that the country's population has given to V. Putin are due to 
many conditions and causes. Nobody will dispute, however, that the 
Chechnya factor and the military operation carried out there are among 
the main ones. 

The Chechnya Problem 

There is no need to set out in sequence the course of events in the 
North Caucasus in summer and fall 1999. The situation there began to 
deteriorate in the spring, and the government's conciliatory stance on 
the terrorists' aggressive action merely added fuel to a fire of war that 
was ready to flare up. 
Yes, of course, the attack on Dagestan by armed Wahhabite detachments 
from Chechnya was an adventure, but a very dangerous one, and therefore 
retaliatory action had to follow immediately. The new premier, V. 
Putin, whom Yeltsin had charged with solving all the problems associated 
with the aggression against Russia, quickly took charge of the operation. 
Without resolving purely military problems, Putin skillfully and 
effectively resolved all the political, economic, personnel, and 
financial problems that arose. On his personal instructions the pay of 
officers and men in a real combat situation was substantially increased. 
By late August the Khattab and Basayev gunmen, suffering large losses, 
withdrew to Chechnya, but Russian forces -- and their group had risen to 
10,000 men -- did not pursue the enemy onto his territory. 
The most important decision which Putin made among all the others 
during this period was the decision to destroy the reinforced area 
created by Wahhabite Dagestanis in the Kadar zone, which was to have been 
a springboard from which the Islamic fanatics would have headed for the 
Caspian. The fighting in Dagestan was not yet over when three apartment 
blocks were bombed in Moscow and Volgodonsk and hundreds of civilians 
were killed as they slept. The trail of these atrocities led to the 
Wahhabite camps in Chechnya, and although the investigation could have 
been protracted, the population's outrage and fear required retaliatory 
action. Putin ordered rail and air links with Chechnya to be cut, and 
then also cut off gas and electricity supplies to the rebel territory. 
Air strikes started to be delivered against Severnyy Airport, gunman 
military bases, concentrations, and camps, communications centers, fuel 
dumps, bridges, and roads. A major military group started taking shape 
on Chechnya's borders, and the logistical and entire military 
infrastructure was put in place. There was no rush, but there was a 
mounting resolve to use force to put an end to the power of terrorists in 
Russia. 
It is known that in 1994 there was a conviction among the Russian 
military leadership headed by General Pavel Grachev that it would be very 
easy to impose Russian constitutional order in Chechnya with the Army's 
help. Grachev seriously believed that a few days and a few airborne 
regiments would be sufficient. The entire military operation in 
Chechnya, the plans for which Grachev reported to the Russian Security 
Council, was scheduled to last a month, of which three or four days were 
set aside for routing the Dudayevites in Groznyy. But, following the 
Russian Army's defeats and heavy losses in 1995-1996, a conviction 
prevailed in political circles and among some of Russia's military 
leaders that any large-scale operation in Chechnya was doomed to failure. 
The Chechen terrorists and gunmen seemed invincible to certain Moscow 
politicians. And although the number of Russian citizens captured by 
the bandits was close to 2,000, they continued to be ransomed or 
exchanged, giving the slave-traders a sense of impunity and omnipotence. 
Grigoriy Yavlinskiy spoke out decisively against a massive military 
operation. Yuriy Luzhkov and Yevgeniy Primakov called for "balance" and 
caution, proposing that we restrict ourselves to "special operations" and 
the creation of a "cordon sanitaire" around Chechnya. The theory put 
about by Movladi Udugov about the involvement of the Russian special 
services in both the Basayev attack on Dagestan and the apartment 
bombings in Moscow started to appear in the Russian press. 
The cost of the decision which Putin made in advocating the complete 
elimination of the bandit and terrorist enclave in Chechnya was high. A 
second defeat for federal forces in Chechnya could have finally 
undermined the prestige of the Army and the Russian state. I do not 
think that Putin had time to carefully study all the lessons of the first 
war in Chechnya, all the complex and contradictory aspects of relations 
between Russia and Chechnya in the 19th and 20th centuries, or the 
numerous analyses and recommendations on this score. So the risk of 
failure was high, but justified. And, as it turned out, the premier's 
decision was not just correct, it can be called momentous. 
Details of the operation were worked out at headquarters, but the 
main questions of strategy and tactics were decided at operational 
meetings which Putin held with the power ministers and invited guests. 
The military were instructed "not to spare any shells" but to conduct an 
operation with minimum losses. Contrary to the rumors about Yeltsin's 
dissatisfaction with the increase in Putin's authority, the president did 
not limit but expanded Putin's powers in a number of his edicts and 
directives. As one analysis note said, "the power structures have been 
entrusted to the premier." It was Putin who received the reports from 
Chief of the General Staff Anatoliy Kvashnin and Defense Minister Igor 
Sergeyev. 
Putin flew to Dagestan and later to Mozdok, where the headquarters of 
the united military group, including all branches of service and combat 
arms, was located. This intensive work by the premier and all the 
structures subordinate to him ensured the success of the large-scale 
military operation in Chechnya that began in October. In turn, the 
military operation's success led to a rapid increase in the popularity of 
V. Putin, whose presidential ratings of 30-35 percent in November were 
assessed by sociologists even then as fantastic and "out of sight." But 
they were fully deserved. As the press wrote, "Putin does not just 
promise, he delivers." Here is what Valeriy Babkin, a Russian academic 
and manager, said later, explaining his success: "Putin acts firmly and 
decisively, and even in spheres which are dangerous for the popularity of 
any candidate for the presidency. Thus, he did not walk away from a 
conflict in Chechnya, but showed his true measure and began a surgical 
operation. There is no need to demonstrate that the implementation of 
the antiterrorist operation in Chechnya is not just the result of the 
supreme heroism of our officers and men, but also of carefully planned 
work to administer colossal resources and risks. This means that Putin 
has the will and the ability to run the state at turning points in its 
history." 
The argument still goes on among experts and political scientists -- 
was the federal forces' military operation in Chechnya an impulsive and 
emotional decision by Vladimir Putin and the generals around him, or did 
the authorities really have a clear vision of the possibility of gaining 
domestic political dividends from the new war? This is a strange 
argument among political cynics who are capable of seeing the main 
motives behind such an important decision as a military operation as 
lying in simple emotions or in an egotistical calculation by the 
authorities themselves. 
Emotions, of course, were of considerable importance in August and 
September 1999. There were also the calculations relating to the form 
of power. By visiting Znamenskaya Village in Chechnya's Nadterechnyy 
Rayon after its liberation and "clearance," climbing into an Su-27 
ground-attack aircraft cockpit as co-pilot, or visiting mess halls or 
wounded soldiers in hospitals, Putin did everything that any head of 
government would do under wartime conditions if they wanted to maintain 
Army morale and increase their popularity. But the main motive behind 
Putin's activity in fall 1999 was concern for the interests of the 
Russian state and Russia's multiethnic people, including the Chechen 
people. 
By late November the military operation in Chechnya had taken on its 
own dynamic, and the military machine created there was operating almost 
faultlessly. Although the fighting for Groznyy and for control of the 
mountains was still to come, Vladimir Putin could now devote more 
attention to the other problems of economic and state building in Russia. 
Summing up the results of Putin's three months in the premiership, 
Nezavisimaya Gazeta wrote: "The reason for the rapid rise in the 
premier's popularity lies not in the fact that Putin talks and acts 
tough, which goes down well with a population tired of criminal anarchy, 
thieving officials, and mismanagement, but in the sense that this 
premier, unlike previous ones, knows what must be done to remedy the 
crisis situation in the country and has a well-considered action plan. 
And he is not afraid to display independence without keeping one eye on 
the president and his entourage. Consequently, even Yeltsin's full 
support for Putin, demonstrated by the president at each meeting with the 
premier, does not bring down Russian citizens' rating of confidence in 
the latter. If we are to judge the prime minister's qualities from the 
example of his actions in the North Caucasus, the first thing you notice 
is that when Putin makes a promise he keeps it. That was the case in 
Dagestan, and that is what is happening in Chechnya." 
Since fall 1999 Putin has effectively exercised many of the duties of 
supreme commander in chief; Yeltsin did not give such powers to any of 
his previous premiers. But as of 1200 on 31 December 1999 V. Putin did 
formally become supreme commander in chief. It was no accident that his 
first order in this capacity established a number of incentives for 
officers and men taking part in the combat operations in Chechnya. Nor 
was it an accident that on the evening of 31 December Putin flew out to 
Dagestan and then went to Chechnya, spending New Year's Eve with the 
Russian military in Gudermes, presenting them with awards and gifts. 
Nor was it an accident that Putin went to Groznyy 20 March to see off an 
airborne regiment that had distinguished itself in Chechnya. The only 
thing that was not entirely ordinary was that the acting president 
arrived at Severnyy Airport near Groznyy aboard an Su-27 combat aircraft 
as co-pilot. The generals commanding the troops in Chechnya seemingly 
have no grounds for being unhappy with their supreme commander in chief. 
The prestige of the Army and people's attention toward men in uniform 
have increased markedly in the country and in society over the past few 
months. At a Kremlin reception marking Defenders of the Fatherland Day 
V. Putin made a short speech on this subject which must have touched the 
hearts of military men. But he also said: "The people only respect an 
Army that knows how to win." 
"Putin is a secret service man," the magazine Profil wrote hopefully, 
"and Army men and secret service men never let each other into their own 
circles on an informal basis." "Intelligence officer Putin," in 
Profil's opinion, "is an unknown and enigmatic individual to the 
military, since there is a substantial difference between Army and state 
security psychology." "The generals simply cannot accept Colonel 
(Reserve) Putin as their supreme commander in chief," and so forth. 
Even if there were a certain grain of truth in those arguments, today we 
can see that Putin has overcome these difficulties and acquired great 
prestige in the Army. 
At the 1996 presidential elections a considerable proportion of the 
military voted for A. Lebed, Gennadiy Zyuganov, and Vladimir 
Zhirinovskiy. But on 26 March the bulk of the military gave their 
sympathies and votes to Vladimir Putin. 

Enigma to National Patriots 

The Chechnya factor alone would not be enough to bring about the 
level of political success for Vladimir Putin that has stunned many 
observers. Moreover, Putin's work over the past few months has by no 
means been accompanied by sounds of approval, and support for him as a 
presidential candidate was by no means universal. 
Quite the contrary -- he has had very many ill-wishers or even 
fervent enemies, and many of them have acted openly. It is noteworthy 
that despite the strong support from the country's population, the bulk 
of the press, newspapers, magazines, and some popular TV channels have 
been against Putin. There has often even been talk about the 
publication of various kinds of false rumors, theories, and biting 
commentaries or, conversely, about hushing up important facts and 
statements. In a number of cases we could talk about a large-scale and 
consistent, although ineffective, newspaper campaign. 
It is natural that the CPRF press has been coming out against Putin 
throughout the past few months. But the articles, readers' letters, 
commentaries, and statements from the editorial offices or CPRF 
leadership that were published in them have been so primitive and 
unconvincing that one has no desire to even quote them, let alone take 
issue with them. "Putin the anti-Communist," "Putin is doing nothing 
and will do nothing to change Yeltsin's ruinous political and economic 
policy," "Putin does not want to do battle with the oligarchs," "Putin 
will not revise the results of predatory privatization" -- those phrases 
alone could fill several pages. 
The overall thrust of all these articles was obvious -- "Putinism" 
and "Yeltsinism" were kindred if not twins. 
V. Putin is clearly hated by radical national patriots because he 
came out and won the sympathies of Russian voters primarily as a patriot 
and a Russian man who found it hard to watch Russia's humiliation and 
poverty. But all this, the newspaper Zavtra is convinced, was no more 
than a mask which Putin would like to use to deceive true Russian 
patriots. The large series of articles in that newspaper about the 
secret schemes of all those 
who drafted and implemented the project dubbed "Putin" ended with the 
article "Devilish Plan," in which the new Russian leader is accused of an 
alliance not only with the family, the West, and Masonic lodges in New 
York, but also with Satan himself, since only the devil could turn "a 
provincial-level official into a dictator." 
A considerable proportion of the Moscow city newspapers opposed 
Putin, although not so fiercely. Certain popular all-Russia newspapers 
were also very hostile in their comments on Putin's activities. But the 
fiercest and most implacable attacks on Putin came from the press linked 
to the Media Most holding company and certain Western news groups. Very 
biased criticism could be encountered, for instance, in virtually every 
issue of the magazine Itogi, published in Moscow with the support of 
Newsweek. Just before the election in March 2000 Itogi magazine asked 
indignantly how it could be that "an entirely unknown official could turn 
overnight into Russia's main politician." Anger and disenchantment on 
the same score was vented by Grigoriy Yavlinskiy in Novaya Gazeta. "Any 
other country would have been up in arms, but here you can do whatever 
you like," it wrote. Two weeks before the election a large group of 
journalists from similar newspapers and magazines with an ax to grind 
issued a statement that Russia was just one or two steps away from 
creating a "fascist-type regime" -- we read such things in Kommersant. 
Neither Vladimir Putin nor his campaign headquarters decided to 
respond to all these accusations, and it was only on the night of 26 
March that Putin talked about the "stream of lies" whipped up by the 
media, while simultaneously thanking Russian voters for their confidence 
in him. 
Surprised and angry about Putin's success, Novaya Gazeta tried to 
present the acting president as an actor who had unexpectedly found 
himself on the big political stage without knowing his part or the play 
in which he has to appear, or even realizing which of the many prompters 
he should listen to. The director Andrey Zhitinkin, on the contrary, 
was delighted with the job done by Putin's election campaign, which 
seemed to work out even the smallest details of his behavior, dress, and 
all his rejoinders, gestures, and smiles. In Zhitinkin's view, Putin's 
success in the political theater should be ascribed to his closely 
following this supreme directorial task. 
The psychologist Leonid Krol believes, however, that Putin is not 
just a talented actor but is himself the director and even the author of 
some special play of his own, as well as an entirely new and unusual 
style. "Putin moves," L. Krol wrote enthusiastically in Nezavisimaya 
Gazeta, "almost without making any movement. The rapid gait of a dancer 
and martial arts expert is crisp and fluid at the same time. The slight 
bow, the half-smile, the movement of the arm -- and in that same moment, 
like a well-oiled spring, leaning back slightly, he almost stands to 
attention and becomes serious. He easily finds within himself slightly 
different faces, different opinions dissimilar from previous ones, 
seemingly illuminating each other. There is in him...an ability to be 
unnoticed and indispensable at the same time. He has a surprising sense 
of humor, the ability to draw accurate and unexpected comparisons. He 
is a hero with an original manner, without ostentation, affectation, or 
stereotypes." 
I think that L. Krol is nearer the truth, although even he has many 
exaggerations. Ultimately, theatricality is merely part of political 
and state activity -- 80 percent of which comprises or ought to comprise 
hard everyday work, decisions, and concerns. So I am even prepared to 
agree that Vladimir Putin is not an enigma, Putin is simple and 
comprehensible, his main quality is his openness and naturalness, which 
saves him from the need to play at being anybody else. And only Russian 
observers accustomed to playing "power games" with the people could fail 
to believe this. 
But it is V. Putin's simplicity and naturalness that are bothering 
many observers. If he is so simple and comprehensible, how do you 
explain his success? "We should take a closer look if not at the figure 
of the main candidate for the top post, then at the amount of 
circumstances which are accompanying his progress toward the heights of 
power," the media advised us. "These circumstances are, to be blunt, 
sad ones. Is an isolated figure teetering on the brink? There is no 
support under him. There is no real political force to keep faith with 
him in the event of success suddenly turning sour; there is no financial 
base, no reliable (albeit inevitably corrupt) entourage. There is no 
public politician, but a kind of political soldier of fortune whose only 
reliance is on his own resources, on a clear and icy mind, on luck, and 
on the lucky star that has hitherto not let him down; it could very well 
be that it will not let him down in the future either." 
This approach is unacceptable to Western political scientists, who 
look for their own ways to unravel the "Putin phenomenon." Some Western 
analysts have claimed that "Putin's giddy rise out of nowhere to the 
political heights was orchestrated by some sort of alliance between the 
Army generals and the security forces." Even more often you can 
encounter claims that Putin was brought to the fore by "highly successful 
financiers" or "oligarchs" -- primarily Berezovskiy and Chubays, who 
allegedly managed to reach an agreement and thereby determine all the 
main events of late 1999 and early 2000. 
In essence, this is the same concept of secret financial resources, 
interests, and commitments that was developed by the newspaper Zavtra. 
Few would voice the cautious supposition that V. Putin may prove to be an 
independent political figure and that he is deliberately relying on the 
sentiments and interests of Russian society. 
Yet even the most preliminary estimates of the results of the 26 
March vote showed that Putin won greatest support among young students, 
among the military, among workers and employees, and among entrepreneurs. 

Intelligence Officer's Achievements

The career which Vladimir Putin has had over just one year would have 
been impossible in the Soviet Union, since progress into the hierarchy of 
Soviet power could not be particularly rapid and, in any event, not 
excluding the "Andropov phenomenon," it occurred not only via the system 
of state organs but also through party structures. Any contender for 
the top spot in the USSR had to become a member of the CPSU Central 
Committee and later the CPSU Central Committee Politburo, and obtain a 
mandate for leadership from a group of top party leaders. In this 
one-party and ideologized system of power Yeltsin could throw down a 
challenge to Gorbachev only because he had been in the party elite for 
almost 20 years and had moved during that period from being a department 
chief at the Sverdlovsk party oblast committee to first secretary of the 
Moscow party city committee and candidate member of the CPSU Central 
Committee Politburo. Otherwise nobody would have paid any attention to 
his criticism and opposition. 
But over the past 10 years in the Russian Federation all the previous 
ideological and personnel systems have been destroyed, all the principles 
have been changed, and, as a result, the possibility has emerged for the 
most unexpected and unusual careers. 
It is well known that Yeltsin's first favorite and the number two man in 
the Russian hierarchy of power in late 1990 was Gennadiy Burbulis. What 
kind of experience and political capital could this garden-variety 
lecturer in Marxism-Leninism from the Urals Institute for Raising the 
Qualifications of Nonferrous Metallurgy Engineers have had?! Yet it was 
Burbulis who formed the first "reformers'" government and drew up the 
ideology of the new "perestroyka." 
It was in this sea of not entirely worthy people that the retired 
officer Vladimir Putin started work in 1991, until Boris Yeltsin's wishes 
on the one hand, and the strong magnetic field of the people's demands 
and expectations on the other, raised him to the pinnacle of power. But 
why Putin in particular? There is no doubt that his experience of 
working at St. Petersburg City Hall and the considerable experience he 
had acquired in various positions within the Kremlin staff had an effect. 
But no less, if not no more, important were Putin's personal abilities 
and qualities and his 16 years of work in Soviet foreign intelligence. 
Many people have written about V. Putin's "intelligence work," about 
the "specific reputation of the KGB," and even about the need to forbid 
intelligence officers and diplomats, who are inclined by dint of their 
trade to engage in "clever allusions and all kinds of secrecy," from 
working to be head of state. A group of human rights campaigners headed 
by Yelena Bonner warned the world public that the election of KGB-FSB 
[Federal Security Service] Colonel V. Putin as president would inevitably 
lead to the restoration of "modernized Stalinism" in Russia. 
Putin is not the first staffer from the "organs" to have made a 
successful career within the system of Soviet or Russian state power. 
Yevgeniy Primakov headed the Soviet and Russian Foreign Intelligence 
Service for four years, four months and was very proud of his job. 
Recent Russian Premier Sergey Stepashin also worked in various FSB posts. 
Yuriy Andropov, who was head of the USSR KGB between 1967 and 1982, was 
head of the USSR for 15 months. 
But both Andropov and Primakov were politicians whom nobody had 
professionally trained for work in the special services. Sergey 
Stepashin began his military career as a police staffer. From that 
standpoint, Vladimir Putin is the first professional intelligence officer 
to have risen in his career to the post of head of state in Russia. 
Among contenders of this kind in the rest of the world we can probably 
only name Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhaq Shamir, who was not only an 
intelligence officer, but was even considered a terrorist. 
Intelligence officers are considered the elite of the officer corps 
in every country. And Putin himself has often repeated Henry 
Kissinger's phrase that "all decent people began in intelligence." A 
Soviet intelligence officer had to have two degrees and speak a foreign 
language fluently (Putin's is German). Working "on Germany," Putin had 
to know the life and specific features of the two German states in the 
minutest detail. A professional intelligence officer has to be able to 
work in isolation and feel natural and free in any environment, without 
standing out but without losing control over his own behavior and that of 
those around him either. 
A most important quality in any intelligence officer has to be 
reliability. Hence the saying "you could go with him (or not go with 
him) into intelligence work." There is no point in looking for concrete 
evidence of the nature of the missions performed by V. Putin in the 
intelligence service. A former intelligence officer who worked 
alongside Putin in Leningrad said in an interview with Komsomolskaya 
Pravda that "the area of work which Putin handled was one of the most 
responsible and difficult in the intelligence service. He worked on 
'creating' people along the lines of Kim Philby." This means that Putin 
not only worked with agents but also recruited them. In Leningrad they 
could have been tourists, students, businessmen from the FRG, or 
journalists. In Dresden they were primarily GDR citizens who were 
planning to emigrate to the FRG. But to work successfully with agents a 
career intelligence officer has to be able, apart from his many other 
qualities, to win over the most varied people, to win their sympathy, and 
not to engender hostility. This works best if it is not a game but a 
natural ability on the part of the intelligence officer. Another 
intelligence officer noted in an interview that the ability to make 
people like you is a professional quality of an intelligence officer, 
particularly one working abroad, and this skill is taught in the very 
first lessons at the Higher Intelligence School. 
An intelligence officer should be able to rapidly assess and analyze 
the information obtained, he must respond effectively and appropriately 
in the event of danger, there can be no question about the intelligence 
officer's resourcefulness and willpower. It is very important that 
intelligence officers approach their work not only as a matter of honor 
-- because not all intelligence methods may be seen as entirely honest by 
outsiders -- but as a duty. Like border guards or members of an 
antiterrorist subunit, intelligence officers are, as it were, always 
operating under combat conditions and most often anonymously. They are 
"fighters on the unseen front" or even the "cloak and dagger knights" -- 
a formula in which the use of the word "knights" is no accident. 
Needless to say, we have discussed the possibilities that 
intelligence work offers for educating individuals and the demands that 
this service makes on people. By no means everyone who enters 
intelligence work has made use of these possibilities and by no means 
everyone has responded to these demands. I am not talking about 
traitors -- of whom there have also been many in intelligence. But 
Putin, as attested by many of the people who have known him for a long 
time, proved to be very capable both as a student and as an officer of 
this elite special service. 
Aleksandr Golovkov, who knows V. Putin well, has noted not just his 
specific "closed" sense of humor, his unique charm, and even the "certain 
magic that happens not straightaway but some time later during a 
conversation." "Putin's outward appearance creates the impression of a 
polite, somewhat aloof calm. But this is just a mask to reliably 
conceal the temperament of a passionate, impressionable man who feels 
difficulties and failures keenly but who is used to keeping an iron grip 
on himself. His internal order has given Putin the reputation of a 
smart, far-sighted leader. His own discipline and desire to organize 
discipline have developed in him good organizational skills. His habit 
of many years of sensible self-control have developed in him exceptional 
restraint, although by nature Putin leans toward strong shows of emotion. 
As is proper for a tried-and-tested warrior, his impenetrably strong 
outward psychological shell goes hand in hand with instantaneous 
reactions. Putin is very cautious, since he is perfectly well aware of 
the cost of risk from his own personal experience. He does not like 
standing out -- that too was developed by a long practice of carrying out 
highly complex and delicate duties." 
I think that this is the most accurate description of Putin's 
personal qualities, and we have already seen many of them in his activity 
as premier and acting president. 
Fears are quite legitimate too, however. Vladimir Putin has never 
made any secret of his respect for Yu.V. Andropov, and there were plenty 
of grounds for that. In 1982 Andropov's advent to power was welcomed by 
almost all dissidents -- even such radical ones as Pavel Litvinov and 
Vladimir Bukovskiy. It seemed to them that as a former KGB chief 
Andropov would try to be more liberal. It did not happen. Andropov 
not only started restoring order and discipline in the country and 
eradicating corruption using very severe measures, but also increased the 
pressure on dissidents. Russia is in great need of order and stability 
today too. 
But perhaps V. Putin will succeed in combining order and legality in 
Russia with true liberalism and sensible democracy. 

******