August 17, 2000    
This Date's Issues: 4461 4462

Johnson's Russia List
#4462
17 August 2000
davidjohnson@erols.com


[Note from David Johnson:
1. AP: Explosion May Have Hit Russian Sub.
2. The Independent (UK): Helen Womack, Families angered by reluctance 
to request foreign help.
3. Financial Times (UK) editorial: Kursk crisis.
4. BBC MONITORING: SUB INCIDENT BLOW ON PUTIN'S REPUTATION - POLL.
5. Washington Times: David Sands, Putin could be casualty of sub crisis.
6. The Guardian (UK): Ian Traynor, They pray. They hope. But they fear 
that their sons are dead.
7. Rodric Braithwaite: The significance of the Kursk.
8. Albert Weeks: Felgenhauer on sub cover-Up.
9. Mickey Berdy: in response to Tate Ulsaker.
10. Reuters: Russian PM says economy out of crisis, eyes prices.
11. Obshchaya Gazeta: RUSSIANS WEARY OF CHECHEN WAR...
(Yuri LEVADA on poll)
12. Federal News Service: August 15 PRESS CONFERENCE WITH STATE
DUMA DEPUTY SERGEI KOVALYOV on "the political evolution of Russia 
and the most pressing problems."] 


*******


#1
Explosion May Have Hit Russian Sub
August 17, 2000
By BARRY RENFREW

MOSCOW (AP) - Underwater rescue capsules fighting to reach 118 seamen
trapped on a Russian nuclear submarine failed again Thursday as new
evidence suggested a massive explosion shattered large areas of the vessel
and many sailors had no time to escape. 


Navy officials said there were no signs of life on the vessel, but some of
the crew could still be alive. Rescue capsules trying to link up with the
submarine for the past three days were again driven back Thursday by racing
currents and swirling sand in the inky darkness on the sea bottom. 


Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov said Thursday the situation was ``close to
catastrophic,'' according to Russian news reports. 


British and Norwegian rescue teams heading for the scene by ship were not
expected to arrive until Saturday, raising fears they would be too late.
The navy has given contradictory estimates of how long the Kursk's oxygen
could last, but some officers say air generators may have been destroyed
when the submarine slammed into the sea bed last Saturday. 


Top navy and government officials met Thursday to review the rescue effort
and study new approaches, but officials gave no details. The committee
would consider how to use a British mini-submarine being rushed to the
scene, Russian news agencies reported. 


Film of the submarine being studied Thursday showed massive damage reaching
from the front to the conning tower that would have sent the vessel
crashing to the bottom in seconds, navy officials said. The control room
where most of the crew work is below the tower, suggesting many sailors had
no time to escape when the submarine went down. 


``The accident happened so quickly we can say it was like a flash,'' said
navy spokesman Capt. Igor Dygalo. 


U.S. submarines monitoring Russian navy exercises when the Kursk was lost
detected two explosions at the time, according to Russian press reports.
The second explosion was much larger than the first, the reports said. 


The Russian navy refused to confirm the reports, but officers have said an
explosion in the torpedo compartment at the front of the submarine
apparently caused the Kursk to sink. A likely scenario was that one torpedo
exploded, setting off a much bigger explosion in the compartment which is
packed with torpedoes. 


The Kursk can carry up to 28 torpedoes and anti-submarine missiles, each
with warheads weighing up to 1,000 pounds. An explosion involving even a
few torpedoes would have caused catastrophic damage, officers said. 


The damage apparently included the submarine's internal escape capsule
located in the conning tower, making it impossible to use, Dygalo said. 


Defense Minister Igor Sergeyev said authorities were still investigating
the possibility of a collision. 


After insisting for days that Western aid was not needed, the Russian
government asked Britain and Norway to for help. Two Norwegian ships on
Thursday were taking divers and the British mini-submarine to the rescue
area. 


The Russian turnabout apparently came after President Vladimir Putin spoke
with President Clinton on Wednesday and ordered his Navy to seek help. 


Russian officials refused to say Thursday why the British mini-sub was not
flown to a Russian airfield closer to the rescue site. A Russian plane
transported the mini-sub from Britain to Norway. 


But British and Norwegian officials rejected suggestions that Russia was
not eager for Western help. Britain's Defense Ministry said ``the Norway
option provided the quickest and safest way of getting our equipment to the
scene.'' 


The navy Thursday raised the number aboard the Kursk to 118 from 116
without explanation. 


The rescue capsules are trying to latch onto one of the Kursk's hatches.
The effort was being frustrated by the strong currents and almost zero
visibility. 


Four Russian rescue capsules were taking turns to try to reach the Kursk,
each spending up to five hours submerged. The navy angrily denied Russian
press reports that the rescue crews were failing because they were poorly
trained. 


Success of the rescue operation is dependent not only on latching on to a
hatch but also on whether any survivors can open it from inside. Submarine
hatches can only be opened from the inside to prevent intruders. 


*******


#2
The Independent (UK)
17 August 2000
Families angered by reluctance to request foreign help 
Race to save the Kursk: As the stricken submarine's air supplies run low,
conscripts and top brass alike are staring death in the face 
By Helen Womack in Moscow 


Russia held its collective breath yesterday, waiting and praying that the
nation would be spared another humiliating tragedy and that at least some
of the sailors trapped on the Kursk submarine would be brought safely from
the bottom of the Barents Sea. 


The 118 men on the Kursk are a mixture of the lowliest conscripts and some
of the top brass from the Northern Fleet, who were using the vessel as a
headquarters for what should have been morale-boosting manoeuvres. Decades
of communism failed to make them equal, but rank counted for nothing as the
hours passed, their oxygen supplies ran low and they stared death in the
face. 


Ordinary Russians only learned yesterday that Britain was sending a
mini-submarine to help more than 20 Russian surface vessels and underwater
craft involved in the rescue operation. And when it sinks in that Western
aid could have been involved at a much earlier stage, the leadership's
reflexive decision to put national pride before human lives can be expected
to trigger a wave of popular anger. 


"They have been messing about up there in the Arctic since the weekend
instead of at least trying to find out whether Western systems would be
compatible with ours," said one disgusted Muscovite, who gave only his
first name, Viktor. A retired professor rang a radio phone-in show and
demanded: "What gestures do we (the people) need to make, to whom must we
appeal, to get them (the authorities) to accept help?" The independent
daily Segodnya commented: "Admirals for some reason think that even if one
Russian sailor is saved from a Russian submarine with outside help, it will
certainly end in a political catastrophe." Yet, these are not the days of
the Cold War when Moscow would sacrifice any number of men in order to
safeguard its secrets. Belatedly, it did appear to accept Britain's help
and yesterday was not a time for recriminations. 


Distraught relatives of the 118 men on board the stricken submarine were
travelling up to the Arctic base of Severomorsk or ringing telephone hot
lines for the latest information. The rest of the nation, still in shock
after a deadly terrorist bomb in the heart of Moscow only a week ago, was
glued to the television, mentally swinging between hope and fear. 


At the other end of the country, in the Black Sea resort of Sochi,
President Vladimir Putin was receiving regular reports on the rescue
operation while continuing his working holiday. He admitted that the
situation was "critical" but assured Russians that everything was being
done to try to save the crew. The Kremlin leader himself could have been in
the situation of the sailors, as he recently spent a night at sea in a
Northern Fleet submarine . 


Serving on submarines runs in Russian families and several of the relatives
interviewed on television were veteran sub-mariners whose sons had followed
the same career path. 


One such man, heading for Severomorsk, said he knew from his own experience
that his son had probably no more than a 10 per cent chance ofsurvival but
he refused to give up hope. 


In St Petersburg, an amateur diving club had helped Lyudmila Milyutina to
obtain one of the scarce air tickets to fly up to the Arctic to find out
about her son, Andrei. "He looks so small, so thin," she wept, pouring over
his photograph. "We have to hope for the best," said her husband. "It is
all we can do for him." 


The central Russian city of Kursk, after which the 14,000-tonne submarine
was named, was especially anxious as six of its young men were thought to
be enduring the nightmare in the dark, increasingly airless vessel. For
youths obliged to give two years' military service to the Motherland, a
posting to the Northern Fleet was regarded as prestigious, infinitely
preferable to being sent to Chechnya. 


One young man from Kursk, Dmitry Staroseltsev, 20, had written to his
mother saying he was "thrilled" because he had been among the "lucky" ones
chosen after basic training to go to sea instead of doing menial duties at
base. "His last letter was so joyful," said his mother, Valentina. "He
said, 'Mama, there's a great crew on board here, a group of lads from
Kursk. We're like one big family.'" Mrs. Staroseltseva was proud of him and
uncritical of the authorities. 


But another Kursk mother, Anna Kubokova, expressed anger as well as anguish
because the local military recruitment office was unable to tell her
whether her son was on the submarine or not. The hot line, available only
to relatives, might have helped. Those travelling up to Severomorsk were
being accommodated on a special white cruise ship, where psychologists were
helping them to deal with the agonising wait and their worst fears. 


The names of the unfortunate men were not being released to the public. 


Precisely which senior officers were on board was unclear, but the
commander of the submarine was Gennady Lyachin, 45, who has served in the
Northern Fleet since 1978. 


Compared with the official silences of Soviet times, when accidents were
hushed up, the navy's briefings to journalists were helpful, though full
details will only emerge after it is clear whether the rescue has succeeded
or failed. 


Reporting from the city of Murmansk, as near as the press could get to the
scene of the accident, Arkady Mamontov of Russia's second RTR channel,
quoted naval officers as saying that their colleagues would be suffering in
a cold, claustrophobic hell. The temperature of the churning, iron-grey sea
above was 9C but inside the vessel, it was only 4C. 


In normal circumstances, the officers would have better quarters than the
men, but the accident should have thrown them all together. In
post-communist times, officers have sacrificed themselves alongside their
men, as for example in a recent, costly battle in Chechnya. 


Although the deputy Prime Minister, Ilya Khlebanov, said yesterday there
was no "sign of life" from the submarine -- perhaps because the sailors
were conserving their energy -- they had been using an alphabet of knocks
to send messages to their rescuers. 


On Tuesday, the trapped submariners had knocked out an SOS and the message:
"We are still alive. Save us." 


According to the RTR reporter, they would be able to hear the efforts of
the rescuers around them. 


"But will the rescuers reach them in time? asked RTR's anchorwoman. 


The reporter replied: "I'm afraid only God knows that." 


*******


#3
Financial Times (UK)
17 August 2000
Editorial 
Kursk crisis


In the old days, the Soviet Union left its naval accidents to foreigners to
reveal. Now the Russian authorities are giving enough information for their
people and the outside world to share in some of the trauma of the crippled
Kursk submarine and the fate of its 116 sailors in peril below the Barents
Sea. 


But they are still not telling the full story. This has compounded the
anguish of the Russian sailors' relatives and complicated the provision of
outside help. Nor has Vladimir Putin, president, given the impression of
pulling out all the stops in the rescue. Far from living up to the western
image of "hands on" leadership that he has cultivated, he is sitting out
the crisis thousands of miles away holidaying on the Black Sea. 


There is no guarantee that Mr Putin would have been able to reduce the
muddle if he had taken more visible control of the rescue operation. But
political leaders with a democratic mandate cannot afford to stay in the
background: they have to show they are earning their keep every day. 


Confusion about the timing and precise nature of the accident and the
submarine's plight may have been inevitable in the circumstances. Less
forgiveable was the delay in telling sailors' families whether they had
relatives in the Kursk, and the complacency in initially refusing all
foreign offers of help, despite evidence that most Russians wanted to
accept outside aid. Only after Britain yesterday started to airlift a
rescue mini-submarine to nearby Norway did Moscow request its use. 


Mikhail Gorbachev claimed to change Russia's traditional reticence with his
policy of glasnost or openness, but kept silent when the Chernobyl reactor
melted down. Mr Putin himself was trained as an enemy of glasnost, even
regarding conditions in the Kursk's home fleet. 


When he was head of the FSB security service, he was instrumental in
pressing treason charges against a former Russian captain who had the
audacity to give a Norwegian environmental group details of nuclear
radiation leaks from northern fleet submarines. 


It is easy to guess at Mr Putin's motives for a certain immobility in this
crisis. He says he wants stronger armed forces, and may use the Kursk
accident to put more money into the navy. But by muscling in on the crisis
he might have upset the military who already feel underappreciated. If the
worst happens, the president may also be content to have stayed out of the
limelight. 


However, the president is wrong if he thinks he has the luxury of
exercising power in remote Soviet style. If Russia is enough of a democracy
to inform its people of big mishaps, then its people will want to see their
leaders taking resolute action. 


*******
#4
BBC MONITORING
SUB INCIDENT BLOW ON PUTIN'S REPUTATION - POLL
Text of report by Russian news agency Ekho Moskvy on 16th August 


[No dateline as received] Most participants of the phone poll conducted by
Ekho Moskvy radio believe that the situation with Kursk submarine is a blow
on the reputation of Vladimir Putin as a supreme commander of the Russian
armed forces. 


This opinion was voiced by 76 per cent of those taking part in the poll,
while 24 per cent of them said the submarine incident will not damage
Putin's reputation. 


The poll lasted for five minutes. Ekho Moskvy received 3270 phone calls. 


*******


#5
Washington Times
August 17, 2000
Putin could be casualty of sub crisis 
By David Sands


The crippled Russian submarine at the bottom of the Barents Sea could 
cause major collateral damage to the reputation of Russian President Vladimir 
Putin.
Mr. Putin, vacationing at the Black Sea resort of Sochi throughout the 
six-day drama, has been an oddly passive player in the first big crisis of 
his administration, even as the Russian press has taken harsh swipes at the 
military command that has been one of his key power bases.
The failure so far to rescue the 118 trapped crewmen in the 
nuclear-powered Kursk submarine, the Russian military's tight-lipped and 
contradictory response to the crisis, and the Kremlin's own confused signals 
"may bring long-term damage to Putin's popularity," said Ariel Cohen, an 
expert on Russian politics at the Heritage Foundation.
"This was the man who was supposed to get things done, and he's been 
barely seen," said Mr. Cohen.
Richard Scott, naval editor of the London-based Jane's Defense Weekly, 
said: "In political terms, it's extremely embarrassing for [Mr. Putin] now. 
The submarine accident demonstrates a clear need for a sweeping reform to 
restructure the [military]."
Remaining in Sochi as the world watched the rescue drama unfold, Mr. 
Putin waited until yesterday to make his first public comments on the sub 
disaster.
The situation is "serious, I would say critical," said Mr. Putin, who 
was apparently not informed of the submarine's troubles until Monday — two 
days after radio contact with the vessel was lost during a major Russian 
Northern Sea fleet exercise.
But Mr. Putin, echoing the official line of top Russian naval officers, 
also told reporters at first that Russia "had all the necessary equipment" to 
rescue the crew.
Only hours later, he approved an order to accept British and Norwegian 
help in trying to save the crew.
Mr. Putin and President Clinton discussed the submarine's plight during 
a 25-minute telephone call yesterday. White House National Security Council 
spokesman David Stockwell said Mr. Clinton offered U.S. military help, but 
Mr. Putin did not take him up on the offer.
The confusing and contradictory stories put out by Russian military 
officials since the sub went down have become a target of increasingly 
outspoken criticism in the Russian press and abroad, with some charging that 
the Russians had waited far too long before swallowing their pride and 
admitting defeat.
The New Izvestia newspaper said: "If it was a NATO sub, it would have 
been saved by now."
The time and the cause of the accident, the need for Western assistance, 
even the number of crewmen trapped at the bottom of the sea all have been 
revised as the Russian military has dribbled out information on the disaster.
Norway, off whose coast the crippled nuclear sub now rests, also 
expressed dismay that Moscow only officially informed the nation of the 
accident Tuesday, three days after it occurred.
The Heritage Foundation's Mr. Cohen said Mr. Putin bears some 
responsibility for the culture of fear that has gripped top Russian military 
officials in responding to the submarine crisis.
Line officers are demanding written orders before attempting new rescue 
efforts, he said, apparently afraid of a purge should the attempts fail.
Gleb Pavlovsky, Mr. Putin's top political adviser, said a dramatic 
intervention by the president to direct the rescue effort could do more harm 
than good.
In an extended political honeymoon since taking office in May, Mr. Putin 
impressively has consolidated his power, embarked on an aggressive round of 
foreign summits, and pushed much of his domestic-reform agenda through the 
legislature.
But the submarine crisis capped a week of embarrassing reverses.
A terrorist bombing rocked a busy square just blocks from Mr. Putin's 
Kremlin office last week, killing 12. The still-unsolved attack tarnished the 
president's reputation as the man who curbed terrorism with his aggressive 
prosecution of the war in Chechnya.
And North Korean leader Kim Jong-il shocked Moscow over the weekend by 
saying a proposal he made to Mr. Putin last month to junk Pyongyang's nuclear 
missile program was actually a joke.
Mr. Putin, hoping to use the "offer" to undercut U.S. plan for a 
national missile defense system, touted the idea as a major breakthrough at 
the Group of Eight summit in Okinawa, Japan, forcing U.S. and Western 
diplomats to scramble to figure out what Mr. Kim had proposed.


******* 


#6
The Guardian (UK)
17 August 2000
They pray. They hope. But they fear that their sons are dead 
Ian Traynor in Moscow 


Nineteen years a navy wife, stoically inured to the hardships of life in
the Russian far north, Galina Belogunya came close to breaking point
yesterday as she endured the endless wait to learn if her officer husband,
Viktor, was alive. 


A captain and engineer on board the stricken Kursk submarine at the bottom
of the Arctic, Viktor would be able to cope, his wife was sure. 


"He knows everything, he can do anything. He won't lose it. He'll do
everything possible. I just know it." 


Along with other relatives of crew members - Moscow yesterday raised the
number on board to 118 from 116 - Mrs Belogunya waited for the fifth day at
the submarine's base of Vidyayeva in a northern Russian fjord and vented
her frustration on the navy superiors she said could not give a fig for the
lives of the seamen. 


"For days the bosses in Moscow have been fighting to save their ship," said
Mrs Belogunya bitterly. "They'd rather save their valuable material than
human lives. We're not getting any information, only rumours. Yesterday the
garrison commanders asked us, the relatives of the crew, to come to the
base at Vidyayevo. But they told us nothing, just a repetition of the TV
news. We get the impression that information is closed for the wives and
even for the officers here." 


For the relatives waiting to learn the fates of their fathers, brothers,
and sons on the stricken Kursk submarine, the agony is unbearable, the
anger seething. The trapped seamen passed the 100-hour mark on the Arctic
seabed yesterday. 


Viktor Kuznetsov, a warrant officer on the submarine since it was launched
six years ago, is from the southern town of Kursk after which the vessel
was named. His mother Olga has spent the past two days weeping and praying
before the Orthodox icon that customarily takes up a corner of a Russian
living room. 


"Last night the icon fell from the wall," she said. "It's an omen. I'll
never see my son again." 


Lyudmila Milutina, whose son is a captain on board the Kursk, wept on
Russian television to curse the lack of information being given to
relatives. "We keep phoning the other families in Vidyayeva to try to find
out something," she said in St Petersburg. "They were called together at
seven in the evening, but they were told nothing. They know nothing and we
know nothing." 


Friends clubbed together to buy her a ticket to Murmansk and she is to fly
there today. 


The anger and frustration spell trouble for President Vladimir Putin. For
the first time in the five-day crisis in the far north, the political
backlash set in yesterday. 


While Mrs Belogunya waited in the Arctic, Mr Putin and the Kremlin elite
were 1,800 miles away at the other end of the country in Russia's sunshine
belt on the Black Sea. 


The influential Moscow newspaper Nezavisimaya Gazeta went on the attack
against Mr Putin, drawing parallels be tween the Kursk crisis and the
Chernobyl disaster of 1996, suggesting that Mr Putin's early promise could
fade as did Mikhail Gorbachev's in the years that followed the Chernobyl
explosion. 


"The commander-in-chief," said the paper on its front page, should give "a
clear and unequivocal order to the generals and admirals to save the people
on the Kursk at any price, even at the price of the ireversible loss of the
boat. If the crew is not saved, the tragic accident on the nuclear
submarine could be critical to public opinion in Russia and across the
world. The beginning of the Putin era could turn out to be comparable to
the early years of Mikhail Gorbachev's rule." 


But a suntanned Mr Putin, on holiday in Sochi, delivering his first
statement on the crisis only yesterday, defended the rescue effort and
indicated that little could be done. 


"All the necessary and possible actions to save the crew and boat were
taken from the very start, immediately it was known that something had
happened," said Mr Putin. "When I ask if anything else could be done to
save the crew, our experts say they have all the equipment they need.
Unfortunately, it's devilishly bad luck, the weather's very bad." 


Mrs Belogunya's indictment of the authorities' slow response to the
emergency and the lack of glasnost in dealing with the relatives was echoed
by other relatives, many of whom have been confined to a navy hospital
ship, the Svir, in the northern port of Severomorsk and are being shielded
from the media. 


Far from the Arctic drama, in the southern town of Kursk distraught
relatives of crew members wept, prayed, and scrambled for information about
their loved ones. 


Anna Kubikova was at her wits' end trying and failing to get information on
whether her son was on board. "These are all our children and we're very
afraid," she said. "I asked the town recruiting office whether my son was
on the boat or on shore. I didn't get an answer." 


"The entire town is in a state of shock," said Aleksei Smirnin of the local
television station in Kursk. 


Russian submarines are customarily named after Russian towns and close
bonds develop between the town and the crew. Seven conscripts from Kursk
aged between 17 and 20 joined the crew last autumn. There are also crew
members from the northern ports of Murmansk and Arkhangelsk, and from the
Baltic port of Kaliningrad. 


Yesterday morning relatives of the crew members in Kursk attended church
services in the town to pray for their survival. Mr Smirnin described how
closely the town identifies with the submarine. 


"That boat means everything to the city - from crew recruitment to making
shirts, uniforms and socks, supplying equipment, televisions, everything
the sailors and the officers' families need for living at their base. The
submarine's sailors come on holiday here and every two months a convoy of
cars sets off for the north loaded with supplies." 


Valentina Lyachina, the wife of the stricken submarine's commander, was
being inundated with queries and pleas for help from the families. Mr
Smirnin spoke to her yesterday. "You can imagine what kind of state she's
in," he said. 


Yuriy Yevdokimov, governor of Murmansk region, said dealing with the
relatives was "the most dangerous and most difficult thing for us right now". 


In Kursk, local activists are organising social workers and psychologists
to treat the families of the men in the sunken submarine. 


It was only yesterday that the authorities established a helpline for the
relatives and the tardiness of such responses as well as the rescue effort
and the delays in seeking western assistance is drawing much hostile
comment in the Moscow media, on radio phone-ins, in opinion polls, and from
experts. 


"They told us that the crew evacuation attempt began yesterday," said Mrs
Belogunya. "What were they doing before that?" 


The chief designer of the Russian rescue craft being used yesterday said
the mini-submarines had been idle for years. 


"The lack of training could have a big impact," said Anatoliy Ivanzhin. "We
asked for money to build new ones two years ago but we didn't get it." 


The daily newspaper Segodnya painted a picture of careerist cowardice and
bungling at navy headquarters in Moscow. 


It said that the deputy prime minister, Ilya Klebanov, had ruled out
accepting offers of foreign help on Tuesday "right when it was clear that
the crisis was becoming a catastrophe". 


"It's no secret that the Russian military likes to pretend that everything
is OK," said Vladimir Lukin, a deputy speaker of parliament. 


The newspaper quoted senior navy sources revealing that admirals and
officers were frightened of taking decisions for fear of being fired. 


"Not a single official in his right mind would even hint at the need for
such [foreign] help. Only the president can decide about help from Nato," a
navy officer was quoted as saying. "Nobody wants to take responsibility.
Subordinates are demanding written instructions from their bosses for all
technical decisions on the Kursk." 


"Russia is suffering as a big naval power. But it will suffer more if the
operation to save the Kursk ends in failure," the paper said. "For some
reason the admirals think everything will end in political catastrophe if a
single Russian sailor is rescued from a Russian submarine with foreign help." 


Mrs Belogunya said the mothers and wives in Vidyayeva were living on
medicines. "They just tell us to be patient. But we're being patient. But
whenever you turn on the TV, it all starts again. We just can't watch the
news anymore and hear how our men are dying." 


*******


#7
From: "Rodric Braithwaite" <rqb@netcomuk.co.uk>
Subject: The significance of the Kursk
Date: Thu, 17 Aug 2000 


David, A quotation from one of the commentaries on Kursk in your latest
list: "No matter what the cause of the sinking of the Akula Class
submarine Kurst, the accident was another signal of major corrosion over
more than a decade in an armed forces which is now but a shadow of itself
before the Soviet Union collapsed." Even the most stable and advanced
societies and their navies suffer technological disasters: Thresher and
Scorpion, not to mention the near misses. The Royal Navy has come near to
disaster on a number of occasions too. THings can go badly wrong in other
hostile environments as well - Challenger. This is not to say that all
the political comment surrounding Kursk is wrong. Merely that a bit of
"There but for the grace of God..." is in order. Rodric 


******


#8
Date: Thu, 17 Aug 2000 
From: Albert Weeks <AWeeks1@compuserve.com>
Subject: Felgenhauer on sub cover-Up


In reading Felgengauer in Moscow Times on the 
Kursk disaster and tragedy (JRL #4461), I could not help
recalling as a Soviet specialist how much Soviet "sources"
lied and withheld facts during the '70s and '80s, as per
the Chernobyl reactor accident on Gorbachev's watch
or the deceit over anti-missile defense (as at Krasnoyarsk).
It reminds me of those in the West who took at face value 
various minimized Soviet military statistics, bean counts, and
(mis)statements about their "purely defensive" military 
strategy--and of the Soviet officials and journalists who 
routinely misled their Western counterparts.
The respected Gospodin Felgengauer is one of those 
post-Soviet phenomena that is certainly welcome on the 
information scene.


******
#9
From: "Mickey Berdy" <maberdy@glasnet.ru>
Subject: in response to Tate Ulsaker
Date: Thu, 17 Aug 2000 


I read Tate Ulsaker's contribution a couple of times and I'm afraid I still
don't get it. Does he mean to say that his friends have not been
traumatized by the bombing? Perhaps not, but mine certainly have. There
have been frantic phone calls to check on one another's safety and long
discussions of who is to blame. One friend no longer uses the metro;
another won't use underpasses.


The bombing on Pushkin Square, the endless news reports on what seem to
surely be a doomed submarine crew, the accidental death of a popular actor,
the continuing war in Chechnya, the clamp down on businessmen and the mass
media, the militia patrols and document checks - all against a backdrop of
rain virtually every day in Moscow. Perhaps we're not all living in fear
and despair, but it is not a happy summer.


******


#10
Russian PM says economy out of crisis, eyes prices
By Julie Tolkacheva

MOSCOW, Aug 17 (Reuters) - Russia has overcome the consequences of the 1998 
economic crisis, but high inflation is worrying the government, local news 
agencies quoted Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov as saying on Thursday. 


Speaking at a cabinet meeting on the second anniversary of Russia's 1998 
meltdown, Kasyanov said: ``Remembering today what happened on August 17, 
1998, we can say that the consequences of the hardest and most dramatic 
crisis are overcome.'' 


``There are grounds to think that the economic situation in the country can 
soon be improved further,'' Interfax quoted Kasyanov as saying. RIA quoted 
him as characterising the economy as ``very stable.'' 


Russia's economy has improved significantly since 1998, benefiting from 
rouble devaluation and high world commodities prices. Industrial output rose 
10 percent in the first six months of 2000, and gross domestic product 
climbed 7.3 percent. 


Kasyanov reiterated his forecast that GDP would grow more than five percent 
this year, the agencies reported. 


RIA quoted Kasyanov as saying that investment in industry had risen 14 
percent in the first half of the year. 


But he said Russia's healthy balance of payments surplus, which amounted to 
about $30 billion in the first six months of 2000, had the effect of 
increasing the money supply too much. The central bank buys export earnings 
with printed roubles. 


INFLATION A CONCERN 


``The economy cannot take in the growing money supply, partially because of a 
lack of structural reform,'' Itar-Tass quoted Kasyanov as saying. 


He said the quickening of consumer price inflation rate in the first week of 
August, to 0.6 percent after 1.8 percent for all of July, was a cause for 
concern. 


``The government cannot help worrying about it,'' Tass quoted him as saying, 
though he added that central bank and government efforts had stabilised 
inflation. 


Tass quoted Kasyanov as saying that budget collections had improved in the 
last two years and currently amounted to 17 percent of GDP, including 15 
percent from taxes. 


Before the crisis, in 1997, revenues were 12 percent of GDP, including 10 
percent from taxes. 


``This means the improvement is happening on the back of better tax 
collection,'' Kasyanov said. 


Kasyanov also noted that Russia was spending three percent of GDP to service 
foreign debt, compared to 4.6 percent in 1997, Prime-Tass news agency said. 


The Finance Ministry plans to finally finish taking bids to exchange London 
Club commercial debt for new Eurobonds, a milestone in restructuring 
post-Soviet debt. 


``We can say that the situation is improving significantly,'' RIA quoted 
Kasyanov as commenting on the debt deal. 


It also quoted Deputy Prime Minister Alexei Kudrin as saying the Finance 
Ministry would pass a draft 2001 budget to the government on Thursday. 


``The budget is most difficult, but the government hopes for mutual 
understanding from the State Duma (lower house of parliament) and the 
Federation Council (upper chamber),'' RIA quoted Kasyanov as saying. 


*******


#11
Obshchaya Gazeta
No. 33
[translation from RIA Novosti for personal use only]
RUSSIANS WEARY OF CHECHEN WAR...
A year ago the second Chechen war broke out. What is the 
Russians' current attitude to it? Has there been a change in it 
over the year? Results of a public opinion poll carried out at 
the end of July are commented on by Professor Yuri LEVADA, 
VTsIOM director 

It can be safely said that assessments are beginning to 
change. 
It is common knowledge what drastic changes in the 
evaluation of the military Chechen campaign took place last 
autumn. In the spring of 1999, when parliamentarians tried to 
impeach Boris Yeltsin, the "Chechen" charge (unleashing 
hostilities at the end of 1994) was the most weighty accusation 
against him. In the Duma it gained just under half the votes 
and in popular opinion, 72 per cent. Most considered Yeltsin 
and his entourage to be more guilty of unleashing the war than 
all Chechens taken together. And a mere half-year later public 
sentiments suffered a sudden reverse: a new war started by 
Putin got strong and massive backing. And the same people who 
blamed Yeltsin for the war began admiring Putin for the 
resolute beginning of a comparable but only more ruthless 
campaign.
Occasionally, it is true, with a queer reservation: the first 
campaign was harmful and criminal; the second, if not entirely 
propitious, is at least inevitable. 
Most people readily took up the official formula: this is 
an anti-terrorist operation, a struggle against bandits. And 
although official information is little believed, nevertheless 
there being no other alternative explanations the ready-made 
formula lingers in the mind. 
Until recently most of the population have taken rather a 
detached view of the Chechen campaign. Only near and dear ones 
of those killed and wounded endured the war as a highly 
personal problem. The rest, as a spectacle from a range of 
events reported by television. So, despite a fairly combative 
general mood, not more than 15 per cent of Russia's residents 
(as reported in March of this year) were themselves ready to go 
to the war or send their close relatives there. 70 per cent 
were not going to do that. Also associated with this detached 
and "spectacular" attitude to the events is the fact that heavy 
losses have until recently had a fairly slight effect on public 
opinion. As is known, another reason why this country is not 
used to counting up its losses is that the value of a life, 
including the soldier's, is different from that in the US and 
Europe. But when losses of federal forces (killed and wounded) 
reached 10,000, this factor, combined with public fatigue and a 
sense of futility and folly, also began to work. 
While in the spring of this year most people were 
convinced that it is necessary to fight until a victorious end 
even if a federal offensive is fraught with heavy losses, early 
this summer the number of advocates of continued hostilities 
equalled the number of those advocating talks. In July the 
situation became more definite still: in the event of heavy 
losses a changeover from war to peace was supported by 52 per 
cent of those polled - nearly one and a half times more than 
champions of battling till a victorious end at any price. 
When we asked those interviewed to rate in general the 
military campaign in Chechnya in 1999-2000, considering both 
gains and losses, it emerged that only 16 per cent regard this 
operation as more or less successful, while an overwhelming 
majority - 79 per cent - as unsuccessful. 
Hence marked changes in the evaluation of President 
Putin's moves. 
In the opening months of Putin's advent to power (as prime 
minister) the most successful of his undertakings, in popular 
view, was the Chechen campaign. This factor is known to have 
played an important role in mobilising massive support for the 
new leader. This opinion persisted for a fairly long time, but 
now it is clearly changing. 
Today public opinion views the action against Chechnya 
(this refers to both military operations and to still 
inarticulate attempts at political settlement) as a major 
setback of all the President's undertakings. At the end of 
July, 44 per cent (against 48) found that Putin was 
successfully putting the house in order across the country, and 
29 per cent (against 65) that he is coping with the country's 
economic woes. As for Putin's moves to defeat the militants in 
Chechnya within a year, they were found successful by 31 per 
cent (against 67) and political settlement in Chechnya by 21 
per cent (against 70). 
It appears that the white steed on which Putin rode into 
power has stumbled. 
All these ratings are given against the background of 
massive support for the President (in July, 73 per cent 
approved his actions in general). Here there seems to be not 
only the inertia of public opinion, which finds it hard to 
alter its assessments of favourites, but also absence of choice 
on the Russian political scene. When society sees no other 
forces or other political options, mass hopes are put on the 
only one believed to be capable of saving the situation. 
Society is weary of the Chechen war - this is the opinion 
of 90 per cent of those polled. Weariness is felt in Chechnya, 
in Russia, in the army. I do not risk to pass judgement on 
politicians, but this seems to apply to them too. And this in a 
campaign in which federal forces did not suffer such 
humiliating defeats as in Grozny in August 1996. And moreover, 
with no signs in recent years of even a weak anti-war movement 
or stirrings, which cropped up in 1994-1996. The war this time 
has met with no serious resistance in Russian society, it has 
merely spent itself. Even the most died-in-the wool hawks will 
have to admit this soon. 

******


#12
TITLE: PRESS CONFERENCE WITH STATE DUMA DEPUTY SERGEI KOVALYOV, 
INTRODUCTORY REMARKS
(PETROVKA 26/2, 16:00, AUGUST 15, 2000)
SOURCE: FEDERAL NEWS SERVICE


Moderator: Good day, ladies and gentlemen. We begin our press
conference at the Mir Novostei press center. Today our guest is
State Duma deputy Sergei Adamovich Kovalyov. The topic of the press
conference is the political evolution of Russia and the most
pressing problems. 


Kovalyov: I very much hope that this meeting will not develop
into a lecture or a monologue, but will see some sharp exchange of
sharp questions and equally sharp answers. But I will stay a few
words for starters. 
The first sentence I would like to say deals with the nature
of this press conference. I am afraid that, as in many cases I have
had to experience, this is another attempt to achieve an aim by
means ill-designed for it. 
There will be some sharp statements and sharp questions and
sharp answers. And the reader or listener will not be aware of any
of this and will not notice this. This has been the bane of my life
over the past few years. I made myself heard to the reader and TV
audiences during the first Chechen war. That was all. 
At the same time I don't mind being a voice in the wilderness
each time I am offered the chance. Let's have another try. It's not
such a bad role, after all.
How do you identify the cause and the nature of my acute worry
over the current political evolution of Russia? You see, there is
no lack of persons who say that an attempt is underway to build an
authoritarian state. You know that one of the most influential
people in the country recently organized such a petition of which
I will say more later. 
But the worrisome political evolution of the country began
much earlier. I can tell you the exact time when it began. That
evolution began immediately after the August coup. Immediately
after 1991 coup the political elite of the country, especially its
President, a historic individual, who has made many historic steps,
Boris Nikolayevich Yeltsin chose a method of government that is now
being given finishing touches by the Lieutenant Colonel (Putin --
FNS). 
My second remark. It is obvious to me that the Lieutenant
Colonel is by no means an accidental figure. Who among those
present can explain to me convincingly that the advent of Mr. Putin
as the key figure in Russia was due to happenstance? Let us take
three recent figures, our three latest prime ministers. Who were
they? They were Yevgeny Maximovich Primakov, Sergei Vadimovich
Stepashin and Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin. The same thing was said
of each of the three: they were described as probable or highly
probable successors to our first President, Boris Nikolayevich
Yeltsin. 
And what do these three figures have in common? They all share
an important feature of their biographies. They all come from the
security services. Let me ask you, could this be an accident? And
I maintain that it could not have been an accident. It is a trend.
It is a choice, a deliberate choice. Whose choice? 
I can't list the persons who contributed to this decision and
this quest that has led to this final result. It is obvious that
our leading opposition figure today, Boris Abramovich Berezovsky,
was among the scriptwriters who made the new President. He simply
molded him. Also taking part in this process were Voloshin,
probably Surkov, and apparently also the members of the family of
the first President, though I don't know who exactly, probably
Yumashev, most probably, Tatyana Borisovna. And somebody must have
persuaded Boris Nikolayevich himself that this is the right choice.
And of course, some gifted political technologists took part
such as Gleb Olegovich Pavlovsky, whom Berezovsky so assiduously
and insulting insists on forgetting. I remember very well that the
very first time Pavlovsky appeared on the screen he was asked
whether he thought of himself as the scriptwriter or the director.
He said, actually I am the director, but, alas, I have to be a
scriptwriter. But personalities aren't all that important. Clearly,
there was a powerful team which was scouting diligently and it
found what it was looking for. Far more important, it was not just
a powerful team, it was a behind-the-scenes team. This is perhaps,
the key word that describes the political evolution of Russia
during the past nine years almost, from August 1991 and now it is
August 2000. The choice was made by Boris Nikolayevich either
consciously of intuitively. I do not know. I will explain why I am
so convinced that the direction of development was selected at that
time.
When the putsch miserably failed, the then Russian government
-- will you mind if I take off my jacket? I had to run to get here
-- I repeat when the putsch failed, the then Russian government,
you may remember that it was a two-tier parliament -- there was the
Congress of People's Deputies which involved more than 1,000 people
and there was the Supreme Soviet of about 300 people, and both of
these bodies consisted mainly of Communists. 
For example, Communists made up 87 percent of all delegates to
the Congress of People's Deputies. Can you imagine? I understand
very well that these 87 percent included different Communists.
There were useful members of the party, there were professors who
had to join the party in the interests of their laboratories, etc.
But there were also normal Communists. I mean normal party
functionaries. Perhaps not of the first echelon, but of the second
and third ones for sure. Especially in the Supreme Soviet where
there were slightly less than 87 percent of Communists, somewhere
around 70 percent. I don't remember the exact figure. But these
were dyed-in-the-wool Communists. 
When the putsch failed, all these parliamentarians voted as
many of those who had proclaimed themselves democrats could not
even dreamed about. There were no more malicious opponents of the
putschists, there were no more ardent supporters of Yeltsin's
reforms. 
Everybody understood very well that the reason for this
transformation, incredible and strange transformation -- well-known
Lyubimov -- just leaf through the verbatim reports of that time and
look at what he said. So, the reasons for this transformation are
quite obvious. The guys feared that they would be treated harshly,
just like they would treated their own opponents if the putsch had
succeeded.
At that time, many people, including myself, although I played
-- I was by far not the most energetic participant -- they asked
Boris Nikolayevich to convene the Congress of People's Deputies
immediately. Immediately. And then we will live in a new country.
We will start at last to life in a new country. We will have a
modern, civilized and legally perfect constitution, or at least a
good constitution. We will lay the foundation for new laws and,
most importantly, we will be able to provide the basis for what it
necessary in a rule-of-law state -- a transparent and open policy. 
Boris Nikolayevich thought and said, No. Time is working for
us. The Congress of People's Deputies should be prepared and this
is not the best time to convene it now. There is no need to rush
things. We are the victors. Having said this, he left to play
tennis and apparently to drink too. 
I thought for a long time afterwards how he made this choice.
I am absolutely sure, although I have no proof, that Boris
Nikolayevich simply thought, What is it, an open policy? Have I
climbed to the top of party power with help of open policy? And who
are these guys with burning eyes who are striving to become my
advisers? Did I make my party career with them and climbed the
ladder? No. I make my career with people like Korzhakov, Lobov,
Soskovets, Petrov, Ilyushin, Grachev. You know the entire list and
you know how long Boris Nikolayevich held on to each of them.
Burbulis too, by the way.
This was his choice. I do not approve of this choice but I
understand it because each of us lives by his own experience. This
was not just the selection of the inner circle. I assure you. This
was a choice in favor of such an inner circle and it, not the
government or the Supreme Soviet, will determine political
tendencies and make key political decisions in the country. This is
a long-standing Russian tradition. The government in Russia has
never done politics. Cardinal political problems have always been
solved by the court before the revolution, then by the politburo if
not an even narrower circle around the general-secretary, and then
by Yeltsin's inner circle.
This selection of the way to run the country is the main
problem, the main trouble and the main danger that hangs over our
modern history. I repeat, this choice was made back then. What we
are seeing now is an attempt to lend efficiency to this choice. A
strong state is being built. I assure you, not a rule-of-law state,
by no means. All the words about the dictatorship of the law are
pure propaganda. Take note, a combination of words including the
word "dictatorship" was chosen as a definition of a rule-of-law
state. Law does not need dictatorship. Rule of law is by no means
a dictatorship of law. Rule of law means the equality of all before
the law, including the President, by the way, of course, in the
ideal, and established democratic procedures for the adoption of
the most important decisions.
I have thus outlined the main causes of my concern. I promised
to say a few words about the new opposition. About the Berezovsky
plus Eight opposition. Let me say these words in public. It must be
said that the text of their appeal to the extent of 80 or 90
percent consists of words under which one would not be ashamed to
put one's signature. That is so. I will say at once where I see the
exception to this. I mean these important 10 or 20 percent. These
are the contentions that, supposedly, our new President Vladimir
Vladimirovich Putin, as it always happens in Russian history, is a
good czar. He is a good czar and it is only that the officials
surrounding him are imposing on him the strong-arm methods. To use
an expression of the authors of this appeal. 
Nothing of the sort. This person was chosen, molded and
propelled to the fore with the participation of Berezovsky himself.
It was such a type that was sought. When the search is for a
reformer, a liberal, an exponent of a rule-of-law state, the search
for him is conducted anywhere but in the armed detachment of the
Party. Excuse me, please. I know very well what the KGB is. Well,
the KGB is not the place where one looks for a liberal reformer.
And they found what they were looking for. And they were looking in
the right place. Correct from their point of view. This has nothing
to do with the interests of the country, but this has what to do
with the interests of those who were conducting the search,
including Boris Abramovich.
Everything is now proceeding quite convincingly and
traditionally. Nothing original about it. Remember, the reference
that was made to the Marxist formula of the base and the
superstructure. I myself have pronounced these words some 250
times. Many, many years ago. I said that our reformers, despite all
their dislike of Marxism, are blinded by this principle. Now these
words, of course without references, appear in this opposition
appeal. The words are correct ones, but this is a continuation of
political games. 
What is the composition of this opposition group? Let us
remove three actors from it at once. What sort of a political
movement is it? Every person should do what he knows how to do and
what he can. Then comes Boris Abramovich. One of the authors of the
scenario of our modern history, one of those who created Putin. Now
take Stanislav Govorukhin. Take a look at his photograph. You will
never find a photograph of him in which his chin would be slightly
behind the forehead. He always keeps his head this way. He is a man
who headed a parliamentary commission during the first Chechen war.
He managed to draw up findings which three most decent members of
that commission refused to sign. I mean Boris Andreyevich
Zolotukhin, the younger Arbatov and Viktor Leonidovich Sheinis. His
findings were full of slander. He is a man who not only filmed The
Voroshilov Marksman. He is a man who publicly whitewashes lynching.
You can only imagine his perceptions of a rule-of-law state.
Now take Shabdurasulov. What a member of the opposition! It is
the Shabdurasulov who molded the present ORT. It is the
Shabdurasulov who helped a long list of people get their pleasure. 
We acutely need civic concern about the present trend of our
development. But this appeal, this group of people convey the
impression of a very amateurishly staged vaudeville. I do not know
what a new game Berezovsky has started. I am not convinced that the
slip of the tongue about the good and very proper intentions of the
new President is nothing more than a tactical move, that it is not
a reflection of some political strategy. I do not know. I cannot
comment on things that I do not know. But I do know one thing.
These people are not the builders of the civil society for which
they are showing so much concern.
Such is our new political reality, new political situation. A
certain influential part of the country's political elite, using
Soviet nomenklatura methods, has decided to introduce order, as
many of our journalists and political philosophers are saying, has
decided that one cannot leap from totalitarianism straight into
liberal freedom, that it is necessary to go through the stage of
authoritarianism. It decided on this and started doing this. 
For instance, they created a certain puppet. In history
puppets very often defied their puppeteers and devoured them. Such
things happened. Let us remember Napoleon, Stalin, to a certain
extent, by the way, Hitler. He was not a fully independent figure
at the beginning of his political career. Such things happened. But
our new puppet is both a symbol and a product of the system of
favoritism. This means, a system of personnel intrigues behind the
scenes, machinations behind the scenes.
And he may well gobble up the scriptwriters. And at the same
time leave the script intact. He will not destroy a system that
created him. Such things do not happen. Such things do not happen
in history. He will develop the Soviet nomenklatura system and his
methods of running the country with the help of intrigues. This is
something that we observe every day. This is happening in front of
our eyes. We see one and the same thing in all the doings of the
new Kremlin authorities.
I believe I have made a much too long opening statement. 


(Then Sergei Kovalyov answered questions).


*******


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