Memo to Bush: Take Up Putin's Offer

Russian President Vladimir Putin tried one of those judo moves that he was trained to use as a black belt--turning Russian weakness into a strength by throwing an unsuspecting partner on his back with an offer of a joint US-Russian missile base in Azerbaijan at the G8 Summit.

Putin's offer is one way to turn American-Russian conflicts into a "win-win" situation. Bush might immediately accept the offer in principle--with details to be hammered out over time.

Putin has put forward a serious deterrent to Iran, as well as any other potential Islamist states or terrorist non-governmental organizations threatening the West. If accepted by Bush, Russia resumes a traditional role as a buffer in the Clash of Civilizations--familiar position for a nation that defeated both Hitler and Napoleon in alliances with the West. Finally, it moves the ball forward on other possible US-Russian joint projects, including, eventually, American participation in Russian pipelines as full partner--rather than competitor. This would mark an end to the "Great Game" played since the collapse of the USSR, and the beginning of a real Alliance of Civilizations, as well as a business partnership that could be rewarding for both America and Russia.

Plus, it has the added advantage of letting Europe know that the US will not be played off against Russia while the EU trades with Iran and other enemies of the USA. Making the EU and Russia equal partners with the US would mark the first step in crushing Osama Bin Laden and his Islamist extremist supporters around the world. The message would be received quite swiftly among American adversaries--it might even lead to peace in Iraq by September. As I learned at Moscow State University, Saddam Hussein's Baathists were educated in Moscow, as was Palestinian president Abbas.

So President Bush, let's talk Texan. The question facing you right now is simply: "Is George W. Bush man enough to say 'Yes' to Putin?"

Will Putin Win Winter Olympics Bid for 2014?

Wonder if Bush I & II made a deal to offer Putin support in Russia's Olympics bid at the Kennebunkport "Lobster Summit"? In any case, the Russian delegation sounded very confident in Guatemala shortly afterwards, according to this account in The Guardian (UK):

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) will decide the winning bid on Wednesday in the Guatemalan capital, with Austria's Salzburg and South Korea's Pyeongchang also in the running.

"Russia has contributed a lot to Olympism and the growth of winter sports," Putin told reporters after meeting Guatemalan President Oscar Berger on Tuesday. "We never had the opportunity to host a Winter Games.

"We have enough resources to fulfil the most ambitious project. We are sure we will manage our plans and realise them in the best possible way ... rooting the ideas of Olympism in our country."

Putin, who spends his summers in the Black Sea resort of Sochi, said its location and climate made it an ideal candidate.
"Sochi is a unique place. It has a mild climate, a great amount of real snow that is necessary for Winter Olympics," he said.
Bid leaders from Sochi have been banking on Putin's vocal support throughout the two-year campaign, as well as his presence during Wednesday's final presentation.

It was former British Prime Minister Tony Blair's presence two years ago that helped London win the 2012 Olympics.

"Tomorrow's speech by the President will in some way be a surprise not only for the IOC but also for us," Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Zhukov told reporters without elaborating.

Asked whether Sochi would bid again if it lost, Zhukov said: "We are going to win. Tomorrow the IOC will have no doubt left that Russia will deliver all its promises".

Larisa Alexandrovna on the Georgian-Russian War

From AtLargely.com:

Russia's attack on Georgia is illegal and immoral. On that we can all agree. But, because our voice of reason and diplomacy has long been sold off to military defense contractors, our leaders criticizing Russia is irrelevant and worse, hypocritical because we attacked Iraq, illegally. I have been trying to explain this very problem to the far-right, but it is like trying to explain the basics of math to a flea.

Here is what our beloved leader said:

U.S. President George Bush said he told Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin that the violence in the region was "unacceptable," and that Russia's response was "disproportionate."

Guess what Vladamir Putin (no matter who the Russian President is, Putin is the leader) will likely do in response to this stern warning? Putin will do whatever he wants to because the US cannot counter militarily, financially, or in any other way. We have lost the moral high ground through our total disregard for international law, treaties, and the basic decency of honoring human rights. That my friends is the exact problem with playing the "we are the greatest country in the world" game, with no serious understanding of reality.

Consider that Georgia is our ally and we can do nothing for them. That is how much power the US now has thanks to this administration. And consider too, that Putin will not stop at Georgia as he has always pined for the return of the former Soviet Union.

Kennebunkport Loves Putin

At least according to The Moscow Times:

"We've been here 30 years, and I can't think of a visit that's created this much energy," said Brian Bartley, manager of Bartley's Dockside Restaurant, which has placed a blackboard outside reading, "Kennebunkport is Putin on the Ritz," a play on Irving Berlin's 1929 hit.

Bartley's mother, Dorothy, who owns the restaurant, eagerly showed off a collection of photographs and signed memorabilia from past presidential visits. For Putin's stay she ordered several bottles of the Russian vodka Imperia, which she said customers have called "very smooth."

Up the street, souvenir shop Saxony Imports placed a special order for miniature Russian flags for the visit. Several Russians had already been in the store buying magnets, T-shirts and postcards, employee Heather McVane said.
Local artist Kathryn Morris Trainor even created an impressionistic painting called "Friendly Flags," showing the two countries' flags matted side by side above a plaque commemorating the weekend talks. She said she hoped to give it to Walker's Point or perhaps even send it home with Putin.

Tourists, too, seemed caught up in the excitement. One couple stood along the road overlooking Walker's Point as their young son leaned over a fence to peer through binoculars at the compound. "We heard Putin was coming, but really our son made us come," said his mother, gesturing to a Bush action figure lying in their car's back seat. "He's a big fan," she added.

Transcript of President Putin's Interview with G8 Journalists

From Kremlin.ru:

VLADIMIR PUTIN: Let us not be hypocritical about democratic freedoms and human rights. I already said that I have a copy of Amnesty International’s report including on the United States. There is probably no need to repeat this so as not to offend anyone. If you wish, I shall now report how the United States does in all this. We have an expression that is perhaps difficult to translate but it means that one can always have plenty to say about others. Amnesty International has concluded that the United States is now the principal violator of human rights and freedoms worldwide. I have the quote here, I can show you. And there is argumentation behind it.

There are similar claims about Great Britain, France or the Federal Republic of Germany. The same could be said of Russia. But let us not forget that other countries in the G8 have not experienced the dramatic transformations that the Russian Federation has undergone. They have not experienced a civil war, which we, in fact, had in the Caucasus.

And yet we have preserved many of the so-called common values even better than some other G8 countries. Despite serious conflicts in the Caucasus, we have not abandoned our moratorium on the death penalty. And, as we know, in some G8 countries this penalty is applied quite consistently and strictly enforced.

So I think that such discussions are certainly possible, but I am sure they have no serious justification.

Let me say again that, as far as I know, the German presidency of the G8 wants to formulate rules for dealing with some of the major economies of the world on an ongoing basis. I have already listed these countries and we certainly support our German partners. I think this initiative is absolutely valid.

THE GLOBE AND MAIL: A follow-up question. You talked about the problems of a unipolar world. Have you considered the possibility of creating some kind of alliance, some formal relations between countries, which could be seen as an alternative pole in the system of international relations?

VLADIMIR PUTIN: I think it would be a dead end, the wrong way to go about development. We advocate a multipolar world. We believe that it should be diverse and respect the interests of the overwhelming majority of the international community. We must create these rules and learn to respect these rules.

DER SPIEGEL: Mr President, former Federal Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder called you a ‘pure democrat’. Do you consider yourself such?

VLADIMIR PUTIN: (laughs) Am I a ‘pure democrat’? Of course I am, absolutely. But do you know what the problem is? Not even a problem but a real tragedy? The problem is that I’m all alone, the only one of my kind in the whole wide world. Just look at what’s happening in North America, it’s simply awful: torture, homeless people, Guantanamo, people detained without trial and investigation. Just look at what’s happening in Europe: harsh treatment of demonstrators, rubber bullets and tear gas used first in one capital then in another, demonstrators killed on the streets. That’s not even to mention the post-Soviet area. Only the guys in Ukraine still gave hope, but they’ve completely discredited themselves now and things are moving towards total tyranny there; complete violation of the Constitution and the law and so on. There is no one to talk to since Mahatma Gandhi died.

DER SPIEGEL: And your country is not moving at all back towards a totalitarian regime?

VLADIMIR PUTIN: There is no truth in that. Do not believe what you hear.

Weekly Standard: Putin Knew About Saddam -9/11 Connection

Dan Darling's story can be found here:

IN JULY 2004, DURING THE COURSE of a little-publicized event while on a visit to Kazakhstan, Russian President Vladimir Putin made some unusual remarks:

I can confirm that after the events of September 11, 2001, and up to the military operation in Iraq, Russian special services and Russian intelligence several times received . . . information that official organs of Saddam's regime were preparing terrorist acts on the territory of the United States and beyond its borders, at U.S. military and civilian locations.

Putin's remarks were little noticed by the American press, coming as they did so soon after the release of the 9/11 Commission's report. Moreover, despite his strong opposition to the war in Iraq, Putin was unabashedly in favor of Bush's reelection, having earlier criticized Senator Kerry for supporting unilateral action against Serbia while opposing it with regard to Iraq. Putin went so far as to claim in October 2004 that "The goal of international terrorism is to prevent the election of President Bush to a second term."

A Kasparov v. Putin Match

Now this is interesting news from Russia, from a headline in the Telegraph: Kasparov quits chess to challenge Putin. And here's the lead: "Garry Kasparov, the world's leading chess player, is to give up competitive chess and devote his time to Russian politics in an attempt to bring down the increasingly despotic regime of President Vladimir Putin."

Remember this: chess is the national game of the former Soviet Union (the current world champion is a native of Uzbekistan). When I taught in Moscow and Tashkent, I learned that Russians treat chess the way Americans view poker. (One might see the end of the Soviet Union as checkmate by the USA). There is a wonderful silent Soviet film, by Vsevolod Pudovkin, called Chess Fever, that gives a sense of the grip of this game on the Russian public--then and now (chess matches are still televised as sport).

How a Kasparov-Putin match will play out, we can't predict, but it is indeed interesting news, and a fair match (Putin is no dummy).

Putin Goes To China

From Mosnews:

Russian President Vladimir Putin, accused in the West of backtracking on democracy, turns East this week, the Reuters news agency reports. Putin will visit China which many in the Kremlin camp see as a model of an economically-successful autocracy. Some Chinese analysts also see Putin’s trip, starting on Thursday on the heels of one by French President Jacques Chirac, as a sign that China’s new leader Hu Jintao is seeking stronger ties with Europe and Russia to balance those with Washington. Putin’s three-day trip comes a month after he proposed to nominate rather than elect regional governors and change the rules of parliamentary polls —- moves, criticised in the West, that would strengthen his already tight grip on Russia. “In the eyes of foreign investors, the centralisation of political power can make Russia much more similar to China, which has the best investment climate among developing countries,” the business daily Vedomosti wrote."

Putin Criticizes American Support for Chechen Terrorists

In a Moscow talk, Vladimir Putin lashed out at US support for Chechen terrorism:

"Speaking to western policy experts and journalists just days after hundreds of children died in the Beslan school siege, the Russian president said mid-level officials in the U.S. government were supporting Chechen separatists, whom he compared to al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, CNN reported. "You find it possible to set some limitations in your dealings with these bastards, so why should we talk to people who are child-killers?" Reuters quoted Putin as saying. The president said that each time Russia complained to the Bush administration about meetings held between U.S. officials and Chechen separatist representatives, the U.S. response has been "we'lll get back to you" or "we reserve the right to talk with anyone we want," CNN quoted him as saying. Putin blamed what he called a 'Cold War mentality' on the part of some U.S. officials, but likened their demands that Russia negotiate with the Chechen separatists to the U.S. talking to al Qaeda."

Putin is right, on this point at least. There are a lot of Chechen supporters in America, not just in the mid-level offices of the State Department. I saw Richard Holbrooke and Zbignew Brzezinski attacking Russia on behalf of the Chechens at a Library of Congress symposium a few months ago. The only one who appeared to have any sympathy for Russia's dilemmas was James Billington. And anti-Russian views domintate the major media, as well. For example, the New York Times editorial on the day after the school massacre in Beslan blamed Russia, not the terrorists, for the killings. Despite Peter Baker's superb reporting from Beslan, editorials and op-eds in the Washington Post have tended to be anti-Russian. As has NPR, which made the Chechen terrorists sound like they were in a guerrilla insurgency against a military target. I still haven't seen a major newspaper investigation that clearly connects the Chechen terrorism to 9/11--despite a great deal of evidence that both fronts are part of a worldwide jihad against the West (see the link below about Mohammed Atta being on his way to Chechnya before he decided to attack the World Trade Center). It is pretty clear that the terrorists see Russia, the US, the UK, and Israel in much the same way that the Nazis saw the Allies during World War II (of course, these countries are allies from World War II). Most experts in Washington think-tanks also hew to an anti-Russian line. In fact, evenhanded analysis of the Chechen conflict from people like Leon Aron at the American Enterprise Institute (scroll down for the link),is a rarity as far as I am aware. Aron, a biographer of Yeltsin, appears to be alone even in Republican policy circles right now. Of course, blogs like Winds of Change and Little Green Footballs have connected the dots between the Chechen terrorists and those who attacked the US.

Coppola Gets His Russian Oscar

Last night I saw Francis again. This time I watched from bed as he received his "Golden Eagle," Russia's Academy Award. It was well past midnight, and for some reason, I hadn't been invited to the ceremony held on a converted soundstage at Mosfilm Studios. Since it was minus 12 degrees and snowing heavily, I'm not insulted. Bed was warmer and more convenient.

Like the Oscars, the seemingly endless Golden Eagle show ran way past midnight and had a lot of ads. It wasn't as tacky as Hollywood, and not as exciting--considering the Oscars are boring to begin with.

There were tributes to old troupers, honorary awards, sentimentality, a rapper instead of Robin Williams and a rock band that seemed to be called "Uma Thurman" (is this legal? Uma, call your agent!) playing theme songs of nominated films. The role that used to be played by Jack Valenti was taken by Nikita Mihailov, the famous Russian film director. In addition to heading the Russian Academy, he sort of hosted the show, and appeared with a clipboard at various moments to hurry the presenters along, to sing a song with a Caucasian chorus in tribute to an old actor, and to fuss at Francis when he forgot his stage directions. Mihalov's stage act at the Golden Eagle ceremony sort of reminded me of the fussy bureaucrat's in Eldar Ryazanov's Carnival Night.

For those of our readers who follow Russian cinema news, the winner for best picture was "72 Meters," a dramatization of the Kursk submarine disaster that looked a little like "The Perfect Storm" meets "Titanic." The other big winner, sweeping the other appeared to "Svoi," a WWII melodrama. Best actor prize went to a Russian version of Leonardo de Caprio, named Bezrukov.

Surprisingly, considering Sofia Coppola had worked on the picture, Bill Murray's "Lost in Translation" lost the best foreign film prize to Mel Gibson's "The Passion of Christ." When "The Passion" was announced, they cut to Francis for a reaction shot. He looked a little cross.

As the show dragged on, the cameras cut to Francis for other reaction shots. At one point it looked like he was leaning over talking to someone, looking at his watch, and asking, "How much longer is this going to go on?"

Francis had to wait for Italian composer Ennico Morricone, who won his own a special award--the Italian composer did the score for "72 Meters" and presented a prize for best sound recording. Morricone's speech was tearful, noting that he had been afraid that his plane wouldn't make it to landing because of the blizzard in Moscow, and he was happy to have made it alive to the ceremony. That seemed heartfelt, since the snow is very heavy here right now, it's the third day.

Francis also had to wait for some TV awards, including best TV mini-series, as well as best TV series, two different categories (in the USA, we keep TV and movies separate).

After hours had gone by, Francis at last made his way to the stage to get his own Golden Eagle. Channel One showed a montage of clips from his films, beginning with the Ride of the Valkyries montage from Apocalypse Now. Seeing it on Russian TV, the famous "Kuleshov Effect" kicked in to reveal Francis' message: that Americans are Nazis.

No wonder the Russians liked it!

Then some clips from Rumblefish, incomprehensible, and Godfathers I & II. Those evil Americans again! A country run by the Mafia.

Uh, oh, I'm beginning to see why the transition to capitalism here may have gotten mixed up.

Of course, when Francis was introduced, it was officially all about his artistry. Francis buttoned his jacket, straightened his coat, and proceeded to the stage. He was wearing a bow tie, which was a nice touch. Then he gave a short speech in which he got his good friend Nikita Mihalov's name wrong (the translator fixed it), paid tribute to the Soviet Union as well as Russia, and personally thanked Vladimir Putin (the translator skipped those items, just saying thank you to the Russian Academy).

Indeed, Francis had a personal audience with Putin, who congratulated Francis on winning the Golden Eagle--before Francis had received it. So maybe Francis knew what he was doing.

Francis told Putin he looked younger in person, and congratulated him on his speech at Auschwitz. Putin in turn complimented Francis on his show-biz family (perhaps Putin thinks Coppola heads a Russian-style "clan"?) and basically asked Francis to make movies in Russia.

Very flattering Francis, I'm sure, despite the sting of Mel Gibson beating out your daughter Sofia.

Still, one wonders, would Francis warmly thank President Nixon for his "Godfather" Oscar? After all, Patton, which Francis wrote, was Nixon's favorite movie.

Somehow, Francis, I don't think so...

Is Donald Trump America's Boris Yeltsin?

Some three weeks before Election Day, with polls essentially tied due to the margin of error,  the "Russia Card" has become a major campaign issue, with Hillary Clinton accusing Donald Trump of having Kremlin support -- both overt and covert. 

Clinton raised specter of Russian influence on Trump's campaign in the first debate, when she declared: 

"I was so shocked when Donald publicly invited Putin to hack into Americans. That is just unacceptable."

She went on to suggest Trump had business ties to Russia, then returned to the issue in the second debate:  

"...our intelligence community just came out and said in the last few days that the Kremlin, meaning Putin and the Russian government, are directing the attacks, the hacking on American accounts to influence our election. And WikiLeaks is part of that, as are other sites where the Russians hack information, we don’t even know if it’s accurate information, and then they put it out. We have never in the history of our country been in a situation where an adversary, a foreign power, is working so hard to influence the outcome of the election. And believe me, they’re not doing it to get me elected. They’re doing it to try to influence the election for Donald Trump."

Recent reports of attacks on Wikileaks have raised the specter of an escalation of "cyber-warfare" between Russia and the United States in the closing weeks of the Presidential campaign, as well as the possibility of more dangerous military confrontations in the Middle East and Europe.

It is likely that Russians would prefer a President Trump to a President Clinton. However, it is more than likely that Russian support for Trump is not based on personal business connections between Putin and Trump, but rather based upon rational calculations of their national interest. 

A precedent may be found in American influence in Russian elections of the 1990s, when Clinton administration support for reformer Boris Yeltsin may have proven decisive in his victory over the Communist Party in the 1993 Constitutional Crisis. At that time, armed factions fought pitched battles in the center of Moscow, circumstances which make our current election season look like a church picnic. Hundreds, if not thousands, were killed in Yeltsin's military assault to re-take the Russian "White House," then in the hands of his Communist opponents. Without American aid, Yeltsin may very well have been overthrown.

So, while we may not remember, it is likely Russia is taking a page from America's playbook by backing a maverick reformer in a stiff confrontation with an entrenched political establishment.

In addition, there are some obvious personal parallels between Yeltsin and Trump.

First, both are successful construction executives: Yeltsin was trained as a civil engineer in Sverdlovsk, and oversaw "crash construction" of multiple high-rise apartment complexes; Trump took over his father's company and erected his own high-rise buildings.

Second, both are considered "crude" and provincial personalities: Yeltsin was "Siberian" and known for his love of drink; while Trump came from Queens and is known for his love of the ladies.

Third, both rose through the establishment they eventually came to challenge: Yeltsin had been a Communist Party official and governor; Trump had been a big Democratic donor who even invited Hillary Clinton to his wedding. Both subsequently soured on the "insiders" and became "traitors to their class."

Fourth, both are strong anti-Communists: Yeltsin confronted the Communist Party in the 1991 coup attempt and again in the 1993 Constitutional crisis; Trump's lawyer was McCarthy sidekick Roy Cohn and he has continually attacked "Political Correctness."

No wonder that a Russian President picked by Boris Yeltsin himself would throw his support to an anti-Communist, crude, provincial, construction tycoon taking on an entrenched establishment, over a competing candidate backed by the Communist Party.

For, although little reported in the US, no doubt the Russian President is well aware that John Bachtell, national chair of Communist Party, USA endorsed Hillary Clinton for President. He declared that "Trump is a danger to the whole world..." and so Communists must work with the Democratic Party for a Clinton victory, because: "Any substantive change in domestic and foreign policy begins by blocking Trump from the presidency and breaking the GOP majorities in Congress."

So, in this year's US Presidential election, Vladimir Putin is backing the anti-Communist in the race by supporting Donald Trump--just as Bill Clinton did in the 1990s, when he supported Boris Yeltsin in Russia. Turnabout is fair play, indeed.

Of course, we now know that history was on his side, because Yeltsin won, and Putin is in Moscow.

However, whether Donald Trump is on the right side of history, is yet to be determined...

Putin: "Russia should continue its civilising mission..."

In his address to the nation, (online at http://www.kremlin.ru), Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin made a moral and intellectual case for Russia's equal partnership with the USA in the global war on terror, reminding the world of Allied victory in WWII (and silently contrasting that unconditional victory with the current uncomfortable stalemate Bush and the West currently faces in Iraq and against Al Qaeda).

Putin quoted from three Russian authors: Ivan Ilyin, Sergei Witte, and Lev Petrazhitsky. Kremlinologists might take note of the significance of these citations. All the authors are well-known to Russian intellectuals.

Ilyin is a renowned exiled Slavophile philosopher. Dmitri Trenin has an interesting study of Russian Pan-Slavism and territorial expansion on the Moscow Carnegie Center Website that discusses Ilyin's idea of Russia as a "living organism" that must grow or die. Ilyin is apparently popular today with a number of different political tendencies, ranging from Zhirinovsky's nationalists, to Zuganov's communists, to Russian liberals.

Count Witte was a brilliant yet tragic modernizer who built the Trans-Siberian Railway and negotiated the end of the Russo-Japanese War at the Portsmouth, NH peace conference sponsored by President Teddy Roosevelt. Appointed by Alexander III, after a number of ups and downs, this advocate of a parliamentary democracy was eventually moved aside by Nicholas II in 1906. The failed 1905 Revolution was his undoing.

Finally,Lev Petrazhitsky was mentor to Mikhail Reisner, a leading theorist of Soviet law, according to Sergei Golunsky & Mikhail Strogovich, in "The Theory of State and Law," He was an idealist, who believed " . . . law is only a psychic phenomenon. . . It exists only as spiritual experience -- emotions -- in the psyche of human beings. Legal norms themselves, statutes, etc., have no real existence; they are merely figments of imagination, fantastic notions, 'phantasmata' in Petrazhitsky's terminology".

Apparently Putin is calling upon both Russian and Soviet traditions here, to build a base for his own vision of Russian society--a democracy that still will be uniquely Russian--in a Russia that is tied closely to Europe and the West, splitting the difference between Tsarist and Soviet eras.

Some excerpts:

Very soon, on May 9, we shall celebrate the 60th anniversary of victory. This day can deservedly be called the day of civilisation’s triumph over fascism. Our common victory enabled us to defend the principles of freedom, independence and equality between all peoples and nations.

It is clear for us that this victory was not achieved through arms alone but was won also through the strong spirit of all the peoples who were united at that time within a single state. Their unity emerged victorious over inhumanity, genocide and the ambitions of one nation to impose its will on others.

But the terrible lessons of the past also define imperatives for the present. And Russia, bound to the former Soviet republics – now independent countries – through a common history, and through the Russian language and the great culture that we share, cannot ignore the general desire for freedom.

Today, with independent countries now formed and developing in the post-Soviet area, we want to work together to correspond to humanistic values, open up broad possibilities for personal and collective success, achieve for ourselves the standards of civilisation we have worked hard for – standards that would enable us to build a common economic, humanitarian and legal space.

We will stand up for Russia’s foreign political interests, but we also want our closest neighbours to develop their economies and strengthen their international authority. We would like to achieve synchronisation of the pace and parameters of reform processes underway in Russia and the other members of the Commonwealth of Independent States. We are ready to draw on the genuinely useful experience of our neighbours and also to share with them our own ideas and the results of our work.

Our objectives on the international stage are very clear – to ensure the security of our borders and create favourable external conditions for the resolution of our domestic problems. We are not inventing anything new and we seek to make use of all that European civilisation and world history has accumulated.

Also certain is that Russia should continue its civilising mission on the Eurasian continent. This mission consists in ensuring that democratic values, combined with national interests, enrich and strengthen our historic community.

We consider international support for the respect of the rights of Russians abroad an issue of major importance, one that cannot be the subject of political and diplomatic bargaining. We hope that the new members of NATO and the European Union in the post-Soviet area will show their respect for human rights, including the rights of ethnic minorities, through their actions.

Countries that do not respect and cannot guarantee human rights themselves do not have the right to demand that others respect these same rights.

Let's see how Bush answers Putin's offer on May 9th.

Israel Turns to Russia, France for Help...

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has made a quick visit to Moscow and is heading to Paris to shore up support, according to the Jerusalem Post:

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert traveled to Paris Sunday for talks that will focus on Iran, carrying in his pocket what he said was a guarantee from Russian President Vladimir Putin that Russia would not "put Israel in a place where it could be threatened."

Olmert's trip to France comes just three days after his lightning visit to Russia and a three-hour meeting with Putin.

Olmert told reporters en route to Paris that his meetings in Russia were "serious and important." He said he talked extensively with Putin about the Iranian issue and was "satisfied" with what he heard.

Olmert's snap visit to Russia came after Putin questioned in Teheran whether Iran was developing nuclear weapons and warned the West against attacking Iran.

Russian Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Alexander Saltanov and Moscow's envoy to the Quartet Sergei Yakovlev arrived in Jerusalem on Sunday for two days of talks. The talks are to concentrate on the Palestinian track, but are also expected to deal somewhat with the Iranian nuclear issue.

The two met on Sunday with Foreign Ministry Director-General Aharon Abramovitch, and are set to meet Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and Defense Minister Ehud Barak on Monday. Israel is expected to impress upon the two the importance of continuing to isolate Hamas.

According to the Foreign Ministry, the visit was planned some four weeks ago as part of a regional tour that will also take the pair to the PA, Egypt and Jordan. The purpose of the visit, according to the officials, is to hear from the sides their positions in the run-up to the proposed Mideast meeting later this year in Annapolis.

Perhaps the road to Middle East peace runs not through Baghdad, as President Bush once argued, but through Moscow and Paris?

Leon Aron on Russian "Chaos"

From AEI Russian Outlook:

It is very much in the Russian and, even more so, Soviet political tradition for rulers to deprecate their predecessors. As they climb up the power ladder, the would-be Kremlin occupants must profess complete loyalty to the current leader in order to succeed. Once in power, the country's new masters bolster their authority by dissociating themselves from previous leaders. Along with the weakness of the country's political institutions, which undermines the legitimacy of the transitions, such repudiations almost inevitably result in the personalization of power, as the new occupants mold the political, social, and economic systems to their liking. Hence, Russian and--again and especially--Soviet history have often looked like a succession of very distinct personal political regimes--indeed, sometimes different states under the same name.

Thus, at first blush, there is nothing unusual in this Kremlin's castigation of the 1992-99 period, which is portrayed as an unmitigated disaster. It is described as a time of gratuitously and maliciously inflicted humiliation, of "a failed state," and, most of all, of "chaos." Advanced relentlessly, this line of argument has been largely adopted not just by many Russian commentators (who quickly recovered their Soviet skill of line-toeing), but also by some leading Western media, editorialists, and pundits. The latter are apparently untroubled by the fact that a booming economy has sprung from the alleged calamities of the preceding years, like Athena who appeared fully armed from Zeus's head.

For all its conformity to national tradition, the "chaos" propaganda campaign has several features that do not fit the usual pattern. First, President Vladimir Putin was--and continues to be--very popular, and is in no need of gaining additional legitimacy at the expense of his predecessor. In the 1990s, moreover, the breadth and intensity of public criticism of the government (in newspapers, on television, and in the parliament) were unprecedented in Russian, let alone Soviet, history. All the many warts and boils, real and imagined, of the Boris Yeltsin regime were exposed and lanced at the time. Indeed, many Russian pollsters believe that much of Putin's popularity is due simply to his not being the late Yeltsin: very sick, often inebriated, and increasingly unsteady and erratic in public. Thus, harping on the very real failures and hardships of the Yeltsin years can hardly be expected to bring the public's opinion of them any lower than it already is.

A plausible explanation is that the aim of the "chaos" mantra is much higher. As often happens in Russia, the past is invoked to shape the present and the future. In this case, the denunciations of the 1990s may, the Kremlin hopes, help manage the tense transition ahead (or the risks of Putin's decision to rewrite the constitution and run again) and, more importantly, establish the direction that Russia should take in the long run. No one disputes that in the 1990s, Russia was the freest it had ever been, save for the nine months between February and November 1917. Just as undeniable is the ideology of the first post-communist regime. As a leading Russian political analyst put it, it was based on two "simple ideas": that "personal liberty is the foundation of progress of a modern state" and that "Russia has no other way but to follow the Western model of development."

It is this ideology and this model that the current regime seems to be determined to stamp with the "chaos" cliché. If the freest Russia in history produced nothing but misery and disorder, then liberty is, in principle, bad for her. Ergo, Putin's proto-authoritarian "sovereign democracy" and the "vertical of power," in which the executive controls (or owns outright) other branches of government and key sectors of industry.

Such fateful implications make the veracity of the "chaos" claim worth exploring. Specifically, one needs to ascertain, first, whether economic liberalization and democratization bear the primary responsibility for the "chaos," and, second, whether there was anything but chaos in the 1990s.

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, 89

The Moscow Times has published a very interesting obituary of the great Russian novelist by Alexander Osipovich:

After the 2000 election of President Vladimir Putin - a former KGB agent - the two men had a three-hour meeting at Solzhenitsyn's residence. The writer praised Putin afterward. Solzhenitsyn generally supported Putin's efforts to strengthen the Russian state, although he broke with him on several issues. For instance, he fiercely criticized the revival of the old Soviet anthem in late 2000.

In early 2006, Rossia television aired a 10-part miniseries based on "The First Circle." Despite his previous disparaging of television, Solzhenitsyn helped write the script and even narrated parts of the voice-over. The miniseries starred the popular young actor Yevgeny Mironov and earned respectable ratings.

Solzhenitsyn was lauded at the highest levels of the state in his final years. Putin quoted him in his 2006 state-of-the-nation address, and on June 12, 2007, the president visited his home to give him Russia's highest award, the State Prize.

The old enemy of the state had come full circle.

I hope that we might see that Russian television adaptation of The First Circle on Masterpiece Theatre someday soon...

Bush to Declare New Cold War?

That sounds like the bottom line of Peter Baker's article about America's relations with Russia, in today's Washington Post:

Critics charge that Putin's leadership of the G-8 summit makes a mockery of the organization, and some, such as Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), have called for the United States to boycott. Like their Washington counterparts, officials in London, Paris and Berlin worry the St. Petersburg summit in July will prove an embarrassment and are conferring about how to avoid appearing to endorse Putin's leadership.

"The G-8 summit in St. Petersburg is becoming the focal point for everybody to reconsider where we are in terms of Russia," said Anders Aslund, a Russia specialist at the Institute for International Economics who was among those who briefed Cheney last month. "Is this really where we want to be? Should we change policy?" ...

...In Washington, U.S. officials are discussing ways of expressing concerns about Russian democracy in advance of the summit. Among the possibilities: a comprehensive and blunt speech by a senior official, possibly Rice, laying out more explicitly the U.S. view of Russia's direction. Or perhaps a gathering of human rights, democracy and other civil society groups either inside Russia or outside the country to showcase U.S. support for those under pressure from the Kremlin.

Aslund suggested the other seven leaders of the G-8 meet elsewhere in Europe without Putin before the summit to demonstrate concern over Russia. "The U.S. administration is thinking that it needs to do something," he said, "but it doesn't know what yet."

I'd suggest America change policy all right--to a much more clearly pro-Russian policy. Make Putin a full partner in an all-out war on Jihadi states and terrorists (including Chechens).

After all, Russia is far more democratic than the United Arab Emirates. For example:

*Russia has multiple political parties. The UAE does not permit any political parties.
*Russia has an elected President. The UAE has absolute monarchs, called "Emirs" or "Sheiks."
*Russia is a secular state, the UAE are Islamic emirates.
* No Russian citizens participated in the 9/11 attack on the World Trade Center. Two citizens of the UAE did.

And so on.

So I have to smile, when the Bush administration criticizes the President of Russia as undemocratic--while defending the Emir of Dubai...

Putin Calls for US Pullout from Iraq

According to Al Jazeera, the US has rejected Putin's suggestion.

IMHO, the Global War on Terror can't be won in an atmosphere of US-Russian confrontation. It might be better to fight alongside Putin against Islamists, than alongside Islamists against Putin.

Putin: No "Double Standards" for Terrorists

The Moscow Times report:

President Vladimir Putin offered his condolences over Thursday's bomb attacks in London and said the attacks showed that the civilized world was not united enough in fighting terrorism.

Speaking at the Group of Eight summit in Gleneagles, Scotland, Putin also said there should be no 'double standards' in assessing terrorist attacks, in an apparent reference to bomb attacks in Russia that have claimed the lives of thousands of people.

'What happened today demonstrates yet again that we are doing too little to unite our efforts in the most effective way in the battle against terrorism,' Putin said.

There must not be any 'double standards whatsoever in assessing bloody crimes similar to those carried out in London today,' he said.

Putin Blinks on Khodorkovsky

News from Moscow that Khodorkovsky's verdict will come down after V-E Day celebrations means Putin was afraid to convict him before Bush shows up--which means Bush has to give that Reaganesque speech on May 9th, linking WWII victory to Khodorkovsky's fate (Reagan got Sharansky out of jail, after he was convicted of spying): "Mr. Putin, Let Mr. Khodorkovsky go!" (Putin can collect any outstanding liabilities in civil court, Bush can add, if he likes...). It will help Russia, help business, help civil rights, and help America, too. Is Bush up to this? Ask Secretary of State Rice.

Let Khodorkovsky Go

Press coverage about the upcoming Bush-Putin summit seems a little vague. From reading the smoke signals, it is not clear at this point, for example, what Bush is asking for. Take this item on Yahoo! News:

"Bush and Putin are due to discuss issues such as combatting terrorism, signing in the Slovakian capital Bratislava an accord imposing controls on 'man-portable' air defenses, and review as well Iraq, North Korea and US support for Russia's membership in the World Trade Organisation (WTO). The two men should also hold 'frank' talks on the Yukos affair and Russian political reforms, sources said.

What's to discuss in the Yukos affair? The whole thing is chilling, many here here say Khodorkovsky will remain in jail as long as Putin is in office--maybe longer, like Dumas' "Man in the Iron Mask." What meaning could any talk of political reforms have in this environment?

Instead of "frank" private talks, Bush might just try something a little more Reaganesque. He might directly and publicly ask Putin to let Mikhail Khodorkovsky out of jail -- in the same way Reagan asked Gorbachev to tear down the Berlin Wall. The release of Khodordovsky would immediately improve the climate for American business with Russia, and signal a return to a more democratic path. Better business with Russia would help American-Russian relations, and make it easier for Russia to take other steps of mutual benefit to the two countries.