Sixth Seventh times' a charm. So much for Russia's sparkling new nuclear arsenal -- the Bulava was purportedly Putin's baby.

For the uninitiated, this is not an optimal missile trajectory.

They point those things at us, so I'll hoist a beer to this epic snafu. Credit to the Ruskies though, they're a determined bunch. Obama would've axed the program if a nut came loose during down-stage assembly.

If the Obama administration is so insistent on "reseting" Cold War relations, why are they using an outmoded Cold War paradigm for nuclear arms reductions? The major allied nuclear powers -- Great Britain, France, the United States -- have all steadily reduced both nuclear stockpiles and delivery systems since the end of the Cold War. However, countries aligned against the West -- North Korea, Syria, Iran, Russia, and China -- have been steadily investing in their strategic arsenals for the past 20 years.

There are two types of nuclear non-proliferation, vertical and horizontal. Vertical non-pro deals in limiting internal development of strategic arsenals, to include new nuclear bomb and delivery system designs. Horizontal refers to the transfer of strategic technologies to aspiring nuclear powers, an act proscribed by the Non-Proliferation Treaty. Yet most of the nations aligned against Western interests rely or have relied on horizontal assistance from the Russians to develop their strategic arsenals. The North Korean No-Dong and Iranian Shahab class missiles are modified Russian SCUDs. The Iranian Bushehr reactor was built by the Russians and is guarded by advanced Russian surface to air missiles. The North Korean reactor at Yongbyon, which provided the fissible material for the regime's nuclear weapons test, was initially built with assistance from the USSR. The same reactor design was identified last year in Syria, just before the Israelis bombed the facility.

So why are we still locked into the vertical non-proliferation model with the Russians? All proliferation roads appear to lead to Moscow, as they've successfully bent the language of both START and the NPT for decades. Simply offering up European missile defense, prompt global strike, and a sizable percentage of our already aging nuclear inventory without aggressively hardening the horizontal proliferation language in the new treaty would be dangerously naive -- and serves only to degrade our strategic strength and embolden our enemies.

The AP reports:

Russia is working to develop anti-satellite weapons to match efforts by other nations, a deputy defense minister was quoted as saying Thursday.

Gen. Valentin Popovkin said Russia continues to oppose a space arms race but will respond to moves made by other countries, according to Russian news reports.

"We can't sit back and quietly watch others doing that, such work is being conducted in Russia," Popovkin was quoted as saying.

Popovkin plays the classic Russian game here, in that he publicly pretends as if he's opposed to the weaponization of space, but is -- regrettably -- forced to inject his forces into to the final frontier because of Western aggression. The same old song-and-dance has been played out since the early days of the space race, with both sides seeking to protect communication and spy satellites with offensive counterspace weapons.

The Russians, for their part, have been toying around with hunter-killer satellites, space lasers, and fighter released anti-satellite missiles since the days of Khrushchev. In the mid-1970s, Ivan spun himself up into such a paranoid frenzy over the Space Shuttle (which Breshnev was convinced was a space bomber), that they blew a kingly share of resources modifying the Tsyklon-2 ICBM to reach higher altitudes (no doubt the "nuke the space shuttle" plan was one of the more surreal plots from the Cold War era).

So despite half-hearted PR claims that they are "reluctantly" entering the space arena, the truth is they've been there all along.

From today's Times:

For domestic audiences, among the biggest news [in Russian President Dmitri Medvedev's recent televised speech] was the proposed extension of the president’s term by two years. After Mr. Medvedev made his speech, Kremlin spokesmen told the Interfax news agency that the change to Russia’s Constitution would not require a vote, and that it would not apply to incumbent politicians.

Political observers were left to puzzle it out: Why would Mr. Medvedev push for a reform that would have no relevance for another eight years? The obvious answer, Mr. Rahr said, is that Mr. Putin is planning a quick return to his old job.

“Otherwise, it makes no sense,” he said.

Let's hope President-elect Obama realizes that one of the central challenges of his presidency will be dealing with a resurgent, aggressive Russian tyranny.

Vice-president-elect Joe Biden famously told a group of Seattle donors that the world would "test" Barack Obama within six months of his winning the presidency.

Try less than 24 hours.

Andy McCarthy argues that the "president must withdraw the U.S.-Russia civil-nuclear cooperation agreement, submitted in all its naïveté to an appropriately hostile Congress back in May."

In small compass, Russia tells the sorry story of Secretary Condoleezza Rice’s Carteresque turn at the State Department. The President Bush of the first term — you remember, the guy who announced the Bush Doctrine, smashed al-Qaeda, isolated Arafat’s nascent terror state, ousted Saddam, inspired Qaddafi to forfeit his nukes, squeezed Kim Jong Il — strongly condemned Russia’s facilitation of the Bushehr nuclear facility in Iran. With good reason. Purportedly dedicated to peaceful civilian energy development, Bushehr gives the oil-rich Khomeinists all the cover they need to build atomic weapons.

Let’s consider for a moment only the low enriched uranium Russia delivers to Bushehr every 12 to 18 months. In June, Henry Sokolski, executive director of the Nonproliferation Policy Education Center, told a House committee that, at the start of the fueling cycle, Iran could divert the fresh uranium to feed its centrifuge enrichment plant. If they did, they’d have “a bomb’s worth of weapon uranium” within about eight weeks. Alternatively, if Iran waited until refueling is next due in 2010, it could seize the spent fuel and “gain access to 30 crude bombs worth of near-weapons grade plutonium to make plutonium weapons.”

Would the Russians really tolerate such a thing right across the Caspian Sea? At the right price, Putin would tolerate anything.

On the homepage, Charlie Szrom calls for an Eastern European security alliance, and Stuart Koehl writes that we need to arm the Georgians.

Normally I enjoy Fred Kaplan's columns. But here, we part ways:

Bush pressed the other NATO powers to place Georgia's application for membership on the fast track. The Europeans rejected the idea, understanding the geo-strategic implications of pushing NATO's boundaries right up to Russia's border. If the Europeans had let Bush have his way, we would now be obligated by treaty to send troops in Georgia's defense. That is to say, we would now be in a shooting war with the Russians. Those who might oppose entering such a war would be accused of "weakening our credibility" and "destroying the unity of the Western alliance."

First, NATO has directly bordered Russia since 2004 when we swore in the Baltic member states. And I suspect that the people of Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia are all breathing a heavy sigh of relief as they watch events unfold in Georgia.

Second, had Georgia been granted membership earlier this year, this invasion would have been over before it started. I've heard insinuations like Kaplan's all weekend, that had NATO accepted Georgia, we'd be embroiled in a localized war with the Russian army per our treaty obligations. But that doesn't factor in the enormous deterrent factor in having the United States in a direct alliance with the Georgians. Putin is ruthless, but he's no dummy. Ivan knows that while U.S. ground forces may be heavily committed in Iraq and Afghanistan, we still have plenty of fighters, bombers, ships, and subs at our disposal -- weapon systems that were originally designed to kill Russians. With the Sixth Fleet and Incirlik Air Base in such close proximity to the fighting, it's highly doubtful that Ivan would have risked kicking that hornet's nest for two tiny breakaway republics. And that's not even acknowledging the real elephant in the room: both the United States' and Russia's strategic forces.

This is a strange case that Kaplan is making. President Bush is guilty of nothing more than supporting Georgia's desire to join the community of free and democratic societies. That support, apparently, is such an unforgivable sin that it absolves Russia of responsibility for their invasion, and places blame for the conflict directly on our shoulders.

No one wants war with Russia. But that doesn't mean that the gods of totalitarianism deserve to have the aspirations of free nations sacrificed to them on an altar of appeasement.

Earlier this year, President Bush strongly advocated Georgian assimilation into the NATO alliance. European diplomats, fearing--well, exactly what's going down in the Caucasus right now--voted down the fiercely pro-American nation's request to join the Western powers.

Let this be another lesson in how Chamberlain-esqe conflict aversion turns minor squabbles into all out war. Had NATO followed President Bush's advice and brought Georgia on board, this whole affair may have been avoided. Now, like so many other Russian dissidents that have felt Putin's wrath, Georgia is paying the price for its pro-western ambitions.

Russia's numerical and technological advantages aside, this is an odd play for Ivan. The Georgian Armed Forces, though small, are competent and skilled in the art of war. Although Georgian ground forces are a measly 18,000, that hasn't stopped the South Carolina sized nation from sending a full 2,000 troops to Iraq, making them the third largest Coalition partner in theater (that number will shrink over the next few days, for obvious reasons).

So not only are the Georgians fierce fighters, they're fighting on their home turf against a Russian enemy that is restricted to a single supply line over the Caucasus mountains--one that will be closed within months as winter weather sets in. Unless Russia manages to capture a major Georgian port or secure enough airfields to keep their logistics lines open, Georgia has an excellent chance of isolating and decimating the (growing) Russian forces in South Ossetia.

Julia Latynina’s acid commentary on the reign of President (and now prime minister) Vladimir Putin has been one of the glories of the Russian press in recent years. She finally got a piece in the Washington Post on Sunday and it is a blistering indictment of how Russia has become a criminal state.

Under Putin, the Russian businessman has been transformed into game being hunted by people in epaulets. Who was the first victim of this hunt? Oil company executive Mikhail Khodorkovsky, who was sentenced to eight years in prison for tax evasion in 2005, and his company, Yukos, which the government dismantled and sold off after his arrest. Who was the hunter? Then-president Putin.

In the 1990s (the era that the crowd supporting Putin claim was so unruly and unlawful) I used to sit around the kitchen table of a Moscow apartment with friends, and when we heard gunfire outside--a common occurrence back then--someone would joke “oh well, one less banker.” Yes, there was murder and criminality then, but it was largely unorganized and often a savage mechanism in which two unsavory parties tried to solve a business dispute.

Today murder and criminality in Russia are once again a state-sponsored monopoly. If you are one of the inner circle you can--literally--get away with murder. It is a brutal and repressive regime that gets uglier with each passing day. Latynina's take is worth a close read.

In anticipation of the first May Day Parade since the Soviet-era, a panel of U.S. and Russian defense experts has an important message for Ivan: you're weak.

A panel of U.S. and Russian defense experts yesterday painted a deeply pessimistic portrait of the state of Russia's military and defense industries, plagued by collapsing morale, inferior arms, a decaying industrial base, and deep divisions among top-level civilian and career military officials over the future.

"When you read about new deployments or overflights of U.S. ships, I believe there's quite a lot less here than meets the eye," said Eugene B. Rumer, a senior research fellow at the National Defense University's Institute for National Strategic Studies....

"This is a military in crisis; there's no other way to describe it," said Stephen Blank, a security expert at the U.S. Army War College. "And it's a crisis 17 years in the making."

And apparently the generals are in even worse shape:

Russian generals will soon have a stylish new uniform designed by a top fashion designer but the question is -- will they fit?

More than 30 percent of the army's elite officers are overweight and 25 percent failed a fitness test, army spokesman Vyacheslav Sedov told AFP on Wednesday.

Still, their defense-aviation industry is booming and the Ruskies are upping their defense budget some 20 percent with a little help from record energy prices, so I'm not quite convinced that their military is so hollow. But if the 2008 Russian military is in "crisis," I can't even think of a word to describe their military in the 1990s. A travesty, perhaps?

With no apparent irony, the regional governor of Lenin’s hometown is pushing English to better market the city to foreign companies and tourists:

Before the fall of the Soviet Union, people would often make pilgrimages to Ulyanovsk, the city about 600 miles east of Moscow that birthed Lenin. These days, the Lenin museum struggles while the city tries to lure foreign investment with an unusual plan.

The Moscow Times reported that the regional governor, Sergey Morozov, has ordered all high level government officials to learn English so they can do a better job of selling the region to foreign companies. The officials will have to take an exam to show their proficiency. And keep taking it, until they pass….

The governor described the situation with an old Russian saying, “We are like dogs, we understand everything, but we can’t say anything.” According to an aide, the governor will share his subordinates’ pain and take lessons, because his English “is not so good.”

Is Lenin rolling over in his grave? Actually, the answer is no, because his mummified corpse has not yet been buried.

Kiev
Question: Which newly-elected chief executive is a recently-converted fanatical fan of the Apple iPhone?

Answer: Dmitri Medvedev, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s hand-picked successor who was elected last night in a race that was virtually uncontested. An article in the Washington Post today about the new Russian President-elect describes the popular Apple gadget as his "latest passion."

What makes the use of the iPhone by Medvedev slighty curious is that the iPhone is not legally available on the Russian market. But that has not stopped thousands of them from being sold in Russia and Ukraine. The price for these "unlocked" iPhones that have been bootlegged from one the iPhones service provider partners (US: AT&T, UK: O2, Germany: T-Mobile D, France: Orange) can be from $750 to $1,000--more than twice the price to acquire it legally through one of Apple’s official service provider partners.

Anyone who knows anything about the mentality of the "new Russians"--the recently ultra-wealthy with usually far more money than sense--knows of their obsession with acquiring the latest and most expensive of any luxury item. Surprisingly, many have passed up the €20,000 or more lluxury model Vertu mobile phones for the comparably cheap iPhone, despite the fact that many Russians believe the more expensive something is the better it has to be. Russia and Ukraine are awash in these contraband phones.

The iPhone is only supposed to be legally available this year in Russia, but it has already achieved what has been called "cult status" in Russia and is used by several high-profile Kremlin officials who have acquired them through contraband channels. Dmitri Peskov, who is the press-secretary of Russian president Vladimir Putin, is reportedly a huge Apple fan. The iPhone is described as "his favorite toy."

We do not know how these Kremlin heavyweights got their hands on a phone that is not supposed to exist in Russia, but we do know one thing. Peskov and others do not use their iPhones to ring up Putin. "The President never calls itself" he said. Now that Medvedev will be president and Putin will only be the prime minister it remains to be seen if this too may change.

This is the first and probably the last time the WWS will delve into the world of fashion, but over the past 48 hours I've stumbled across two opposing points of view on the current fashion situation in Russia. First, Radar reports on a fashion show held in an underground nuclear bunker in Moscow:

Two thousand of the city's fashion throng crowded into the gritty hideout, where it was said that Communist chiefs could have survived for three months in the event of a nuclear holocaust. One of the group's designers, Maxim Kushnaryov, said the choice of location was "a political statement," and served to "show our opposition to the whole fashion scene in Russia."

I don't really know what that means, but I gather the guy isn't a huge fan. Then, at FP Passport, Blake Hounshell notes this comment by Donatella Versace:

Gone is the tendency towards ostentation and “bling”. Instead, today’s Russian women are in search of something more sophisticated. At a cocktail party I held at my Moscow store, I was greeted by many extremely well-dressed customers; but two stood out. They had a great freshness and confidence, and were dressed in a modern and understated way. It turned out that they were the granddaughters of Mikhail Gorbachev.

Make of that what you will. I need to go read some Defense News and try to restore the testosterone levels.

Update: Sonny Bunch says we shouldn't be doing fashion here unless it's accompanied by pictures of models. I couldn't agree more. Picture of Russian model added.

Eighteen years after its maiden flight, Russia is starting full production of the Su-34.

Russia's Air Force will receive at least five advanced Su-34 fighter bombers in 2008, the Sukhoi plane maker said on Monday.

Russia has started this year the full-scale production of the Su-34 Fullback fighter bomber at a Novosibirsk-based aircraft-manufacturing plant, a subsidiary of the Sukhoi Aircraft Holding.

"In 2008, our plant will increase its production capacity by 15-20% and will manufacture at least five Su-34 aircraft, while modernizing 20 Su-24 Fencer planes," said Alexander Kalashnikov, deputy general director of the Novosibirsk plant.

Experts said the new bomber has the potential to become the top plane in its class for many years to come. A total of 70 aircraft will be purchased by 2015 to replace around 300 Su-24s, which are currently undergoing modernization to prolong their service life.

I doubt NATO is losing sleep over this announcement--the Su-34 celebrated her maiden flight back when Gorbachev was still in power. Though, in fairness, the aircraft does impress on the air show circuit. Check out the Fullback's freaky aerial acrobatics routine:

After the MiG-29 and F-15s entered full production, the United States and Soviet Union each went down separate fighter development paths. The United States focused on stealth technology and radar, while the Soviets went for maneuverability (as demonstrated above). In the end, all that fancy flying is nice, but doesn't really match up well against an invisible F-22 Raptor. The asking price isn't bad though. At $36 million an airframe, Russia shouldn't have any trouble with exports.

Next up from Sukhoi, creepy looking X-29 knockoffs.

If you haven't already checked out the Holiday Reading suggestions from the staff at THE WEEKLY STANDARD, take a look. The boss, sticking with his selection from 2004, wrote:

Anything by P. G. Wodehouse.
Anything by Leo Strauss.
Anything by Donald Westlake.

Then we see this over at the Corner:

It seems that the latest Moscow literary fashion is P.G. Wodehouse.

According to here, his books were banned by Stalin in 1929--and to be fair, there is a Stakhanovite quota of deviationism in them--and permitted again only as late as 1989. Today, in addition to his books being translated and widely read again, there is a P.G. Wodehouse society that puts on plays based on them. (There are at least two Drones Clubs in existence--one in London, the other in New York.) One of his admirers says that, if you've had the experience of living in the Russia of the last century, the "English heaven" of Wodehouse's books is irresistible.

I will now have to check with Iain Sproat--the former Tory MP who helped clear Wodehouse's name of the taint of collaborationism--on the evidence for a related story. Sproat has long maintained that an early Wodehouse short story was on Tolstoy's bedside table the night he died. From one heaven to another, I suppose.

It's obvious that Ivan's been paying attention to what we post here at the STANDARD. Next up: Donald Westlake in Russian!

Monday saw the endorsement of a presidential candidate that has ended months of handicapping the chances for various rivals, maneuverings, and back-room politicking. It is a choice that is likely to have far-reaching consequences for most of the world, and its implications may have the current White House occupants debating endlessly on how to respond.

Despite what one might think, this is not Oprah Winfrey’s coming out as the Cheerleader-in-Chief for Illinois Sen. Barak Obama, although the cacophony of that event blaring out of American television sets made it hard for one to notice this much more significant event. The endorsement was the decision of Russian President Vladimir Putin to designate First Deputy PM Dmitri Medvedev as his chosen candidate to succeed him when the country elects a new president in March 2008.

Unlike the still to be quantified impact of Oprah’s support for Obama, Putin’s endorsement of Medvedev does everything but guarantee that he will be the next man to occupy the president’s office in the Kremlin. The spin to be put on this by the Kremlin spin doctors is that--despite the fact that the Russian electorate will have next to nothing to say about who is their next president--this is "democracy in action" and that this is an "orderly, legal transfer of power."

Orderly it will be. Medvedev made it clear that he wishes to see an almost seamless transition from one president to the other because Russia needs "to ensure the continuity of the course of the past eight years." In other words, meet the new boss--same as the old boss.

But whether there will be a true transfer of power from one man to the other is far less certain.

Over the last year there have been endless predictions about which of several scenarios Putin would employ in order to essentially stay in power and run the country from a position other than that of Russian president. Medvedev made it clear that the path chosen now is the one that was considered the most likely by many observers. Putin will now become the Russian Prime Minister, a position that unlike the presidency has no term limits.

"I consider it of fundamental importance for our country to retain Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin in the most important position in the executive branch, the post of prime minister of the Russian Federation," said Medvedev. "I ask him to give his consent, in principle, to head the Russian government after a new Russian president is elected."

This in no way means that Putin will now be second banana to his long-time political ally. The 42-year old Medvedev has known the Russia President since the two worked together in the St. Petersburg city government in the beginning of the 1990s, and it is almost certain that he will continue to be the junior partner in their relationship--making him, as one Moscow colleague said, "a president who has all of the constitutional authority of the Queen of United Kingdom."

Informed speculation is that one of the first tasks taken on by the Russian parliament that was elected at the beginning of December when its first session opens is to shift many of the powers and responsibilities of the office of the President to the Prime Minister while Putin is still president. Currently, the "power ministries"--defense, foreign affairs, internal affairs, the heads of the intelligence services--all report to the president. It is now expected that they will be made answerable to the PM.

But the true sign that Russia is a state still ruled by Putin is "when and how this nuclear suitcase will be transferred to him," said a Moscow political analyst. "These nuclear codes are the true symbol of power--like the royal scepter with a jeweled orb on its top that was held by kings and emperors in ancient times. When this happens we can truly say that the power of the state has been realigned. I do not think Mr. Putin will spend more than several hours without this ‘royal scepter and orb’ of nuclear power in his hands when he changes jobs."

I see John Noonan beat me to the punch on this one. I was going to leave aside the technology issues and focus instead on a range of institutional and social issues that make such a reform of the Russian military problematic:

1. Culture of corruption and distrust: Modern warfare requires absolute honesty in the exchange of information between commanders and subordinates. In a culture where everyone lies, and nobody brings bad news to the boss, failure, at least at the tactical level, is almost guaranteed.

2. Lack of initiative: In modern warfare, initiative devolves to the small unit level. In Iraq and Afghanistan, squad and platoon leaders are fulfilling roles formerly belonging to company and battalion commanders. Battalion commanders are filling the role formerly filled by brigade and division commanders, The amount of responsibility given to junior officers, NCOs, and even enlisted men is much greater than in the past. Russian society, with its top-down command orientation is not suited to a bottom-up, entrepreneurial style of warfare.

3. Poor small unit cohesion: Combat power, as Martin van Creveld noted in his book of that name, derives not only from the expertise and competence of commanders, but from the cohesion and solidarity of troops within the "primary group" (squad and platoon, occasionally company). Men may sign up for ideology, but they fight for their comrades and the fear of looking bad in their eyes. During the Soviet era, the Russians almost totally ignored small unit cohesion and kept men in line through external coercion (political officers, KGB informants, punishment battalions). Absent the coercive force of the Soviet state, Russian units have (with the exception of elite airborne, air assault, and Spetznaz troops) shown remarkably little will to fight, whether in Afghanistan or Chechya--which is why the Russians needed to rely on massive (and ultimately counterproductive) firepower tactics to win battles.

4. Lack of Experienced NCOs: One way in which armies develop unit cohesion is through the mediating influence of the non-commissioned officer, who acts as father figure to the men, representing their interests and providing a buffer between them and the officer corps.

The Soviet army never really developed an NCO corps in our sense of the word. Rather, corporals and sergeants were selected from the incoming crop of conscripts; having none of the moral authority that comes from years of service, these NCOs controlled their men through brute force (beatings are a fact of life in the Russian army, where suicide among conscripts is rampant). Having little in the way of experience or training, they are not allowed to exercise any tactical initiative. Instead, the Russian army is officer-led, and units are typically articulated one level higher than in Western armies (i.e., jobs done by a squad in the West are done by platoons in the Russian army). Developing a real NCO corps from scratch is extremely difficult, especially given the top-down nature of Russian society.

Past attempts to build an NCO corps have foundered on this insurmountable obstacle.

Are the Ruskies reading from the book of Rumsfeld? Russian Army Chief of Staff Yuri Baluyevsky says da.

In a press conference last week, Baluyevsky said that:

Russia's Armed Forces, like all militaries in the world, would be putting an emphasis on quality, not quantity.

"It will be a leaner but meaner, well trained and equipped, and professional force," the general said....

"As for the modern Russian Army, it is not the Army that we have inherited from the collapsed Soviet Union in the early 90's," Baluyevsky added. "Today it's a totally new Army. As for the number of men, in the Soviet times the Army had more than 4 million servicemen and now it is a bit over 1 million. As you may notice, it has shrunk by 3 million."

Nice of him to do the math for us, I almost got out my calculator.

In Russia's case, you can certainly make the argument that they're in bad need of upgraded training and tactics, despite the fact that their improvement from the First Chechen War to the Second Chechen War was extraordinary. The bar was set pretty low after Ivan took an Afghanistan-esque whupping in the first war, but I digress...

Lighter and leaner is the new hotness in today's global defense establishment. The problem is, while many nations have some force multiplying technology that allows for a reduced military, few are advanced enough to sync up geographically dispersed units into a single fighting force. That's a type of synergy that only the U.S. military enjoys, where pilots drop bombs on targets in Iraq while sitting in an air-conditioned trailer outside Las Vegas and forward air controllers call in B-52s from Guam to drop iron on Tangos in Afghanistan.

Russia has some technological standouts. They make superb fighters, tanks, and SAMs, but they can't tie it all together. Glonass, the Russian GPS constellation, sucks, their comm sats are relics of the Cold War, and they seem more interested in supporting the grunt with indiscriminate artillery bursts than precision air strikes. They want leaner and meaner, but so far have only accomplished the "leaner" end of their transformation.

No doubt Ivan will one day develop a capable net-centric approach to warfighting. But, as the success of the surge is creating a movement to undo 16 years of U.S. defense cuts, by the time Russian catches up, warfare may have already evolved to the point where the lean, mean fighting machine is obsolete.

Russian President Vladimir Putin’s surprise decision on Wednesday to replace his current prime minister, Mikhail Fradkov, with a loyal and low-profile ally, Victor Zubkov, has fueled intense speculation in the German media. Commentators wonder what the former KGB spy is really up to when it comes to sorting out his own political future, which, in principle, will come to a temporary end in March 2008. As the centrist weekly Die Zeit put it, the latest power shuffle in Moscow creates, in essence, "an amusing guessing game for political scientists." The fact that Victor Zubkov hinted yesterday that he might run for president ("If I achieve something in the post of premier, then it’s not excluded that this could happen") has bolstered those analyst who believe that the man who will turn 66 tomorrow could briefly serve as Russia’s head of state next year before turning the top job back to 54-year-old Vladimir Putin; a rather creative solution that allows the current president to circumvent the existing constitutional two-term limit.

It is a testimony to Russia’s resurgence and growing international clout--driven not only by record-high commodity and energy prices but also by the perception of a corresponding decline in U.S. power, influence, and prestige--that Moscow’s behind-the-scenes power politics are now commanding much more interest around the world than during the previous surprise power shake-up on December 31, 1999, when ailing Russian leader Boris Yeltsin resigned abruptly during the Christmas holidays to appoint Vladimir Putin as acting president. At this point, it is likely only Vladimir Putin himself knows who will be in charge of Russia beyond March 2008. Riding on domestic approval ratings in the 70-percent-range, and with virtually no political opposition at home, Putin is in a unique situation to leave his stamp on Russian foreign and domestic policy for years to come.

Russia's new prime minister, Viktor Zubkov.

"Lenin skazal nado delitsya," was a favorite saying that mothers would tell young children during Soviet times. "Lenin said we must divide amongst one another," was what the phrase meant--the use of the verb delitsya--attempting to inculcate youth with the values of sharing and a collective mentality.

This verb has definite negative connotations when used in reference to the political arena in Russia. It usually occurs in conversations related to the theories about which personalities in the cabal around President Vladimir Putinchet will receive what positions--how the political power will be divvyed up after March 2008 when the former secret policeman is supposed to leave office.

The main question as to who would be his successor became a bit clearer today when Putin dissolved the entire government. According to the Russian constitution, the president has two weeks to name a new PM and form a new government. Paradoxically, this move now takes place more than a month before--rather than after--the Russian parliamentary elections, proving once again that the election results and the nation’s legislative branch are both irrelevant in determining national policy.

Putin was widely expected to name his long-time KGB associate, First Deputy PM Sergei Ivanov, as the next prime minister, which would have officially positioned Ivanov as the man who will take over as president next year. Ivanov’s accession had been widely anticipated. His only other real competitor has been Dmitri Medvedev--who is also the only other first deputy prime minister and a former head of the Presidential Administration--but Ivanov’s appearances at public events, on television, and at Putin’s side have eclipsed that of his supposed rival.

One of the recent high-profile public appearances of Ivanov and Putin took place at last month’s Moscow Air Show (MAKS) during the opening of the exposition. The two were side-by-side in the sweltering heat on one of the hottest days of the year in Moscow as Ivanov gave the president a guided tour of the exhibit--stopping at the stands of some of the more important aerospace and defense enterprises.

None of which is a major surprise. Ivanov has made his stewardship of the defense industrial sector the theme of many of his televised, staged public events. All the while he has tried to convey to the Russian public that an upsurge in the activity of the defense sector--more sales abroad, more new weapons, more funding for military procurement--is the locomotive of technology that will pull Russia out ahead of the rest of the world and into a space-age future.

In a season five episode of The Simpsons titled "Deep Space Homer," the head of America’s most famous cartoon family is selected to fly on the space shuttle as part of a NASA plan to increase public interest in launches that have become "boring." In this episode, coverage of shuttle launches has become so unpopular that they have even been beaten out in the Nielsen ratings by "A Connie Chung Christmas." NASA decides to send an "average shmoe" into space as a publicity stunt.

During the pre-launch press conference the following exchange takes place:

REPORTER: Uh, question for the barbeque chef. Don't you think there is an inherent danger in sending underqualified civilians into space?

HOMER: I'll field this one. The only danger is if they send us to that terrible Planet of the Apes. Wait a minute...Statue of Liberty...that was our planet! [anguished speaking style like Charlton Heston] You maniacs! You blew it up! Damn you! Damn you all to hell!

Reading the Russian press this week, you would be hard pressed not to think that Homer was right to be confused about what divides the world between Hollywood and reality. Life, as it turns out, truly does imitate art at times.

Those who recall the second installment of the Planet of the Apes franchise, Beneath the Planet of the Apes, know the synopsis. (If they are like me they are more likely to recall Kim Hunter in that loincloth bikini before anything else.) Another astronaut played by James Franciscus arrives in the same type of spaceship as in the first film in order to rescue Heston's character. He encounters the same time-space distortions that sent the first mission thousands of years into the future and--unknowingly--crash lands back on earth in a post-nuclear holocaust world that is ruled by apes.

Franciscus discovers an underground civilisation that represents the remnants of humanity. The humans who are survivors of a nuclear war have highly developed mental powers, but they also participate in religious ceremonies--complete with pipe organ music and dissonant versions of traditional Christian hymns--in which they worship a deadly lethal nuclear missile with a cobalt-encased, "dirty" warhead as "an instrument of their God."

PR and other press relations officials in the Russian Ministry of Defense must have never seen the film or they would have headed off this week’s event at Moscow’s Cathedral of Christ the Savior. It was there that the Russian Orthodox Church gave its blessing to the MoD’s 12th Main Directorate, the highly secretive agency responsible for the storage, maintenance, and safeguarding of Russia’s nuclear arsenal.

The occasion was the 60th anniversary of the organization's founding by Josef Stalin. The Georgian-born dictator, frightened by America's demonstrated use of nuclear weapons against Japan, was determined to have a nuclear capability for the USSR to threaten the West with as soon as possible and created the special unit in order to try and speed development.

Last week's religious ceremony was conducted by Bishop Amvrosy of Bronnitsy and saw some 200 uniformed members of this special service unit cross themselves in the tradition of the Orthodox Church. The bishop then ended the service by reading a congratulatory message from church’s supreme leader, Patriarch Aleksei II.

"I congratulate you on this memorable anniversary," he read from the Patriarch’s message, "and I raise prayers to God and to the venerable Serafim of Sarov that the nuclear weapons created by you and entrusted to you will always be in God's hands, and will only be weapons of deterrence and retaliation." The text of the Patriarch’s blessing was also printed in the Tuesday Krasnaya Zvezda, the MoD and armed forces’ official newspaper, which means it has official government--as well as church--approval.

(Serafim of Sarov--a hermit and holy man who died in the nineteenth century and was canonised in 1903--is the semi-official patron saint of the 12th Directorate. The connection to the nuclear weapons directorate is that the city that used to bear his name was renamed Arzamas-16 during the Soviet years, the same city that later became the birthplace of the USSR’s atomic bomb.)

"These weapons guarantee and will continue to guarantee the peaceful existence of our people, our children and our grandchildren" was the official statement by the chief of the Russian General Staff, General Yury Baluyevsky. One officer who attended the service told the Moscow Times that the 12th Directorate had been in close contact with the church in the past few years and that it was common for priests to give blessings to individual units.

"But this is the first time that [a blessing] has taken place here," said one officer. "Here" meaning the famous cathedral on the banks of the Moscow River that has come to symbolize in many people’s minds the union between the traditions of old, pre-Soviet Russia--Orthodoxy, strong centralized government rule--and the government of the new "sovereign democracy" that is Russia.

Providing the troops that have the capacity to destroy life as we know it with such a very public religious commemoration seems like a strange role for a religious institution. But very little in Russia conforms to conventional wisdom these days. Perhaps we can all take solace in the fact that so far no one is yet blessing the bomb in Moscow--just the people responsible for handling them.

I don't know how I missed this story, now almost a week old, but it is priceless:

MOSCOW (Reuters) - A wealthy Russian tried to buy a U.S. B-52 bomber from a group of shocked American pilots at an airshow near Moscow, a Russian newspaper reported Friday.

The unidentified Russian, wearing sunglasses and surrounded by bodyguards, approached the U.S. delegation and asked to buy the bomber, the Komsomolskaya Pravda newspaper said.

An astounded member of the U.S. delegation said the bomber was not for sale but that it would cost at least $500 million if it were to be sold on the spot.

"That is no problem. It is such a cool machine," the Russian was quoted as saying by the newspaper, which said its reporter overheard the conversation. The bomber was not sold.

The Russians have definitely developed a firm grasp of capitalism. Democracy--not so much.

Via Ace HQ. And in case you missed yesterday's extremely popular link to some of the best photography from the Moscow air show, here it is again

The very embodiment of a newly resurgent Russia is seen here on a fishing trip to Siberia's Yenisei River. He didn't catch any fish, but the mere sight of President Putin with his top off has provoked some deep psychoanalysis from the Times:

As Putin’s careful release of the pictures of his own taut form demonstrate, the deployment of male nudity is, above all, a power play. On one level Vlad is showing us all that he’s a remarkably fit man for his age (54) and that, unlike in the decadent West, Russia’s leaders remain the physical embodiment of their nation’s vigour – classical champions in the manner of those Roman emperors who would renew their mandate to rule on the battlefield or even in the gladiatorial ring. His bare-chested peacockery is, in that respect, in line with the broader cult of Putin as his nation’s silverback – the leader of the band.

And while it’s becoming rarer, the assertion of prime physical vigour through summertime displays of shirtless masculinity has been a trick in several leaders’ repertoires. From Mussolini, to Jack and Bobby Kennedy, baring your torso for a publicity shot was just another way of demonstrating a break from the failed and flabby Old Gang and the arrival of New Hope.

Ah yes, flabby New Hope:

Most of us remember the joke from the famous Robin Williams film Good Morning, Vietnam.

"Here’s Airman Adrian Cronauer with a little riddle for you. What's the difference between the army and the cub scouts? Ahhhnnn. Cub scouts don't have heavy artillery."

Su-27s fly in formation above the Nashi campgrounds at Lake Seliger.

The latest incarnation of the scouts in Russia does not have its own artillery--not yet, anyway--but they did have several Russian Air Force (VVS) jets at their disposal this past week. A flight of six Sukhoi Su-27 fighters--part of the VVS’s demonstration team--performed Tuesday for thousands of members of the youth group Nashi. The occasion was the group’s annual summer outdoor camp at Lake Seliger, a site some 350 kilometers from Moscow.

The Nashi summer camp has now been turned into campaign stop and political pulpit for major figures in the Russian government--hence the willingness of the powers-that-be in the Kremlin to spend the hundreds of thousands of dollars it cost to put on the Su-27 aerial display for the event.

The six aircraft had to fly a full three hours to reach the site of the Nashi camp, put on a one-hour show and then return to their base at Lipetsk. VVS officials would not provide any cost figures for the show they put on, but one of Russia’s most well-known test pilots, Magomed Tolboyev, told Obshaya Gazeta in Moscow that it would cost at least $216,000. This is based on a figure of $12,000 per flight hour to operate the Su-27, which consumes 5 to 6 tons of aviation fuel per hour. Aviation fuel costs about 20,000 roubles ($790) per ton, and this does not include the additional expense of airport landing and takeoff fees and air traffic control charges.

Nashi has been equated by some Russian political spokesmen with this country's Boy Scouts, but the history of the organization suggests that it is every bit the captive youth brigade of the regime in power, just as youth movements were vehicles for political indoctrination during the Soviet period.

Russia is one of the few nations where the scouting movement has never been allowed to establish a branch, having been banished in the early 1900s. During the Soviet era, the equivalent of the Boy and Girl Scouts was the Komsomol. Komsomol was the acronym for the Vsesoyuzny Leninskiy Kommunisticheskiy Soyuz Molodyozhi or VLKSM, which was known in the west as the All-Union Leninist Young Communist League, or "YCL" for short.

The YCL was a propaganda organ of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, and was the boot camp on the path to success for those wanting to climb to the top of the political pyramid in the old USSR. Those wanting to become members of the Party had to generally spend a good portion of their youth in the Komsomol--spending hours performing official, unpaid "patriotic activities," such as putting up banners and posters before major holidays, in order to demonstrate their worthiness to become card-carrying Communist party officials.

Since the fall of the USSR and the end of the need for the pervasive indoctrination that goes along with a communist-style dictatorship, the Komsomol has faded into obscurity. It has, however, been somewhat replaced by the Nashi.

Nashi takes its name from the full title of the organisation, Molodezhnoye Dvizheniye, which translates as Youth Movement "Ours!" It was officially created in reaction to the spontaneous and widespread youth movement that took root in Ukraine during the 2004-2006 Orange Revolution, and which brought a pro-western president, Viktor Yushchenko, to power in Kiev at the expense of the candidate backed by Putin, Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovich.

KGB officers like Vladimir Putin, even when they become presidents, are about controlling events and making sure that political currents do not spin off and develop a momentum of their own. Unpredictability is bad, and solid, reliable support by the public is good. Nashi was created in order to make sure that there would be no repeat of the Ukrainian experience in Russia, and if there was any large-scale youth movement in Russia, that it would be slavishly pro-Putin.

Nashi is more than steadfast in its support of President Putin, but at the same time the group denies that it receives any Kremlin funding. However its finances are opaque at best, and the organization was originally put together by Vladislav Surkov, the deputy head of the presidential administration, and a man with more slush funds at his disposal than a U.S. labor union boss.

President Bush will entertain his Russian counterpart at Kennebunkport this weekend, and they have a lot to talk about. Putin is fresh off a meeting with Hugo Chavez--a good customer for conventional arms who's kicking the tires on an Iran-style nuclear program. And while Putin's Russia has become more cooperative in recent years in non-proliferation efforts, Chavez might be hoping to convince Putin that his oil money is just as good as Iran's.

The main building of Iran's Bushehr nuclear power plant,
which was built with Russian technology and expertise.

Somewhere between the 'frank exchanges of views,' Putin and Bush might find time to highlight an agreement on nuclear cooperation that the two nations will soon sign:

Such an agreement marks a significant change in US policy. Under the Clinton administration, most nuclear cooperation with Russia was prohibited because of Moscow's pivotal role in building Iran's $US800 million ($NZ1.067 billion) nuclear power plant at Bushehr.

But Bush administration officials, arguing Russia has increasingly co-operated on Iran and other non-proliferation issues, reversed that...

The American Council on Global Nuclear Competitiveness, which represents nuclear and energy experts, has backed a nuclear cooperation agreement with Russia.

The council says the accord would help the United States gain access to Russia's fast-spectrum reactor technology while providing Russia with the opportunity to learn from America's extensive fast reactor experience.

Presidents Bush and Putin set this agreement as a goal when they met at the G-8 in July, 2006. With the renewed attention to nuclear power in Washington, such an accord could go a long way to helping the United States catch up on fast reactor technology--an area where our long absence from 'the nuclear game' has left us far behind. Without a '123 agreement,' only the most limited of exchanges are possible; that's the reason nuclear power proponents rate this deal a priority.

But backers also stress the value of the accord to non-proliferation efforts. They argue that Russia has made great strides and is working as an ally on Iran's program. Part of the reason is that the U.S. held out this treaty as an incentive. If it goes into effect, Russia can become a repository of spent fuel from Taiwan and South Korea. That might reduce the amount of spent fuel available for reprocessing and use in nuclear weapons, and provide Russia with a new source of revenues, and one dependent on its 'good behavior' in the counter-proliferation world.

Congress may yet prove a stumbling block, though. The US-Russia agreement can be blocked by a joint resolution of both Houses. And more directly, such an agreement could be specifically barred by the terms of the Iran Counter-Proliferation Act, which I wrote about here just a few days ago. That legislation would preclude bilateral cooperation agreements "with Russia or with any other countries assisting Iran's nuclear or missile or advanced conventional weapons programmes."

Congress will get 90 days to assess the agreement after it's signed. So once Bush wraps up his frank discussions with Putin, he may have to start a new round with Capitol Hill.

The man in charge

Although Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice’s visit to Moscow on Tuesday resulted in a cordial agreement to "tone down the rhetoric," the relations between Russia and the United States remains relatively tense.

Some astute analysts have pointed out, however, that the current rhetoric of confrontation may stem largely from domestic conditions in Russia, namely the high-stakes "succession games" now being played out in the Kremlin. Writing for the Wall Street Journal on Tuesday, Leon Aron, the director of Russian Studies at AEI, argued that

While Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is in Moscow for talks, she might see for herself the reason for the increasingly tense relations between the two countries, and the increasingly harsh climate inside: the jitters that next year's presidential succession is already generating in the Kremlin. . . . The erosion or outright eradication of what might be called shock-absorbers of democracy that endow the process and the result of a transition with legitimacy…has ushered in uncertainty and risk.

Perhaps with this conundrum in mind, the Russia weekly Kommersant-Vlast’ has released a series of fascinating transcripts that shed some light on the inner workings of the Kremlin. Mockingly titled “The Self-Manual of the [Ruling] Apparatus” and interspersed with sardonic “administrative instructions," the article presents 33 instances of President Putin’s interaction with members of his “vertical of power."

One preferred method of keeping underlings in line, according to the Russian weekly, is "the Loyalty Test:"

Subordinates must be concise and uncritical. Loyalty of the subordinate is easy to test, for instance, by misstating his [family] name or the patronymic. The main purpose of this exercise is to carefully gauge his reaction. The most loyal subordinate will pretend that he has not noticed the error. Conclusion: subordinates must respond to the names that are assigned by their superiors.

The paper gives numerous examples in which Putin appears to intentionally misstate the names of his subordinates. At a meeting on June 15, 2004, Putin addresses his foreign minister Sergei Viktorovich Lavrov:

PUTIN: "Sergei Leonidovich, you will take part in the next meeting of the foreign ministers of the Organization of the Islamic Conference. Which issues will be addressed?"

LAVROV: "A wide variety of questions: the situation in the Middle East, the situation in Iraq, Afghanistan, Cyprus, other regions…"

And again on December 20, 2004, Putin addresses Lavrov by a different name:

PUTIN: "Sergei Dmitrievich, today we will begin international consultations with our German partners. What is our level of readiness and what main issues will we discuss?"

LAVROV: "We have conducted thorough preparations, in consultation with all government agencies. The talks promise to be highly productive…"

The recent debate over the tightening of regulations pertaining to military blogs has reverberated in the mass media and the govenrment. According to the April 19 Army Regulation 530-1, the restriction on OPSEC content “includes, but is not limited to letters, resumes, articles for publication, electronic mail (e-mail), Web site postings, web log (blog) postings, discussion in Internet information forums, discussion in Internet message boards or other forms of dissemination or documentation." Christopher Griffin, the associate editor of Armed Forces Journal, has recently pointed out a brewing First Amendment conflict between milbloggers, their commanders, and the media--a dispute that may lie at the root of the newest policy.

Strangely enough, it has now become an issue of concern for the Russian media as well. Yesterday, Izvestiya printed a provocative article, titled “I am Tired . . . I Cannot Do This Any Longer," where the paper (one of the largest in circulation in Russia) presents a compilation of Russian-language blog entries by an American who is currently serving in Iraq. The article leads with this “breaking news," stating that “From now on, [American] military staff and officers--under the threat of punishment--are banned from publishing in their blogs (online journals) news that sullies the image of the US Armed Forces."

Apparently, having had the fortune of locating such a journal in the Russian blogosphere, Izvestiya reporter Dmitry Sokolov-Mitrich directly copy and pasted around a dozen entries from the American soldier’s blog. The entries, presented in chronological order, are clearly meant to reflect the sense of desperation and discontent among the Army’s ranks: according to Izvestiya’s compilation, the U.S. soldier in question decries sanitary conditions, frequent explosions near the base, petty conflicts among military personnel, and expresses a sense of personal frustration. In the conclusion of the article, another Izvestiya contributor, Petr Inozemtsev, adds that “American soldiers in Iraq face morale and physiological-related issues" and concludes with the observation (attributed to Russian news agency ITAR-TASS) that “only 47 % of [US] Army soldiers and 38% of Marines agree that the local population must be treated with respect."

Besides the issue of dubious journalistic ethics--Izvestiya also printed the soldier’s name, rank, and even a photo--and propagandistic intent, the publication of such articles must now raise another concern for Army brass: “The Army of One” is decidedly not “The Army of One Language."

Yesterday, the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs released a statement strongly condemning an article in Foreign Affairs magazine by former Ukrainian prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko. The statement called the article an “anti-Russian manifesto” and “an attempt to once again draw dividing lines in Europe." The ministry spokesman noted that “usually, we do not comment on articles in the foreign media” (except, of course, for the New York Times last month), but firmly asserted that this “cowardly” and “written-to-order” piece--purportedly titled “Containing Russia”--only “reinforces President Putin’s call for an open and honest dialogue [made during] his Munich speech."

In light of the current constitutional crisis in Ukraine, it's not surprising that an openly anti-Putin Tymoshenko would prompt such a response. Yet, a reader who might question the Kremlin’s judgment is faced with a much more mundane concern: where can one read this modern-day Fulton address in its entirety? The new issue of Foreign Affairs is not due for at least another week; for now, the Russian media has the only “scoop." Yesterday’s RIA Novosti reports:

in her article, Tymoshenko, a strong opponent of the alleged new Russian expansionism, outlines a fresh concept of containing Russia on the world arena, drawing obvious parallels with the 1940s doctrine developed by U.S. diplomat George Kennan, reputedly the chief ideologist of the Cold War.

Curious, I contacted Foreign Affairs, and was told that “unfortunately, a news organization got a hold of the article in advance of publication and referenced it despite a strict embargo. The article is, however, being released to the press tomorrow.”

While I am still waiting for my copy of Tymoshenko’s Cold War manifesto to arrive in the mail, I cannot help but wonder whether entry into the World Trade Organization is appropriate for Russia at this time. According to the Coalition of Intellectual Property Rights (CIRP),

Despite positive developments by Russia to bring its IP legislation on copyrights, trademarks and patents into compliance with WTO and Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) requirements, there are still significant legislative deficiencies and insufficient enforcement practices.

Regardless of political views, shouldn’t “enforcement practices” begin with the Kremlin, the citadel of Russian democracy and the rule of law?

Update: Foreign Affairs has now posted the article in question, which can be viewed here.

Russia is a strange place. On Saturday, a vocal Russian opposition held a rally in Moscow led by Gary Kasparov, who became the youngest every world champion chess player in 1985 but retired from the game in 2005 to devote himself to political activism. Kasparov was arrested as soon as he arrived, but according to the Guardian the 2,000 strong demonstration was without precedented in the seven years since Putin came to power. Here's how the paper described the scene:

Ranged against them were 9,000 riot police wielding truncheons and the might of the Russian state. And yet for one moment yesterday the demonstrators got the better of their opponents. After surging down the Boulevard Ring, the protesters began a defiant chant: 'Russia without Putin: Russia without Putin.' The sun burst on to a freezing Moscow morning. There was, it seemed, a whiff of revolution in the air.

'We don't agree, we don't agree,' the protesters chanted, waving flags and blocking the boulevard. 'This is our city', 'Revolution', 'Down with KGB informers'. A man held up a placard: 'I don't believe in Putin.' Others called for Russia's President to resign and go skiing.

The response from Putin? On Sunday, "Russian President Vladimir Putin rolled out the red carpet for Belgian actor Jean-Claude Van Damme and a score of grizzled martial arts fighters in Saint Petersburg, state-run television reported."

Putin treated the fighters to tea and cakes at the chandelier-lined hall of the Konstantinovsky palace following a mixed martial arts contest.

Dubbed "Russia versus America", Saturday's contest was won by Russian champion Fedor Yemelyanenko who defeated US rival Matt "The Law" Lindland.

Television footage showed judo enthusiast Putin, dressed entirely in black and with no tie, greeting martial arts films veteran Van Damme in the sports hall.

Update: For those unfamiliar with Garry Kasparov’s writing, here is an outstanding article he co-authored five years ago on how the Soviet legacy continues to haunt Putin’s Russia.

And here is an interview he gave to the Wall Street Journal this past January.
(HT DC)

Vladimir Putin and Jean-Claude Van Damme.
AFP Vladimir Rodionov

Boris Berezovsky says he's planning the overthrow of Vladimir Putin:

"We need to use force to change this regime," Berezovsky, who has received asylum in Britain, told the Guardian newspaper.

"It isn't possible to change this regime through democratic means. There can be no change without force, pressure."

Asked if he was fomenting a revolution, he said: "You are absolutely correct."

Berezovsky, a vocal critic of Putin, said he was in contact with members of Russia's political elite.

He said these people -- who he did not name because, he said, that would endanger their lives -- shared his opinion that Putin was eroding democratic reforms, centralizing power and infringing Russia's constitution, according to the Guardian.

"There is no chance of regime change through democratic elections," Berezovsky said.

"If one part of the political elite disagrees with another part of the political elite -- that is the only way in Russia to change the regime. I try to move that."

It's worth remembering that before he became a target of persecution by the Putin regime, Berezovsky was a well-connected thug with an alleged history of violence and assassination. He has political connections, influence, and a whole lot of money. At the same time, Wikipedia claims this isn't the first time he has promised an overthrow of Putin. It brings to mind the old maxim about the dog that barks.

President Putin speaks often with his American counterpart, and the Kremlin's press service reports that the two leaders conducted yet another round of discussions yesterday regarding "cooperation…on current international issues.” Those issues included last week's U.N. Security Council resolution on Iran, the status of Kosovo, and American plans to deploy a missile defense system in Central Europe. As pointed out by the Kremlin, "the conversation took place at the initiative of the United States.”

The Russian media has largely interpreted President Bush's "initiative" as an act of gratitude after the United States was able to shore up Russian support for Resolution 1747, which stipulated "the international community's profound concerns over Iran's nuclear program.” But some Russian journalists seem to see an upside in a confrontation between the United States and Iran. Prominent journalist Mikhail Leontiev (who has been described as "the most unabashed champion of the Kremlin") asserts that "in principle, [Russia] is interested in drawing the Americans into the Iranian adventure. If the [U.S.] has gone mad, let them be punished." And today's Nezavisimaya Gazeta offers a more calculating analysis, pointing out that U.S. military action would disrupt Iranian oil deliveries through the Straits of Hormuz--the resulting rise in oil prices will "bring Russia tens of billions” the paper said.

The Putin-Bush "telephone diplomacy,” however, failed to resolve other outstanding disagreements. During yesterday's conversation, the Russian leader held his ground on Kosovo, noting that "Russia reaffirm[s] its position of principle that nothing should be imposed on either side." In an interview today with Rossiyskaya Gazeta, Deputy Foreign Minister Vladimir Titov echoed the president's sentiment, describing the Ahtisaari report, which was presented to the U.N. on Monday and recommended independence for Kosovo, as a "discussion process deliberately led to a dead end." Titov added: "Separatism, rewarded in Kosovo, will receive a strong impulse in other parts of the world.” In an interview yesterday with Rosbalt, Serbian Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica agreed: "Kosovo cannot be independent--and if someone tries to take it away from us by violating international law, Serbia will never consent to this."

Marine General Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has wrapped up a four-day visit to China that included jaunts to the Nanjing Military Region and the Shenyang Military Region, where he examined an Su-27 fighter bomber and observed Chinese land-combat exercises.

During a press conference at the American Embassy in Beijing on Friday, Pace said that he had held “good, open, candid and calm” talks with his Chinese counterpart, General Liang Guanglie, Defense Minister Cao Gangchuan, and General Guo Boxiong, vice chairman of the Central Military Commission. Pace suggested that a hot line between the two militaries could be helpful, and said he had agreed to study a Chinese proposal to send cadets to West Point and to conduct joint humanitarian and rescue-at-sea exercises.

Pace said he had urged his Chinese counterparts to be more transparent about the country’s military intentions:

I used the example of the anti-satellite test as how sometimes the international community can be confused, because it was a surprise, and it wasn’t clear what their intent was. And when things are not clear, and there are surprises, then it tends to confuse people and raise suspicions.

Pace noted further that his host had given him no details on the test, nor did they explain to him their intentions in conducting it.

On China’s declared military budget, which will increase by 17.8 percent to almost $45 billion this year, Pace had this to say:

It is important to know not only how much of a nation’s resources are being put into the budget, but what is that money buying, what is the intent of that buying.

This portion of Pace’s message seems to have been lost in translation by the Chinese media, which failed to include the above-quoted remarks in their coverage of the press conference.

The popular Russian weekly Vlast has published a lengthy account of how President Putin spent his time over the last year. It seems Putin has been burning up the Kremlin's anytime minutes chatting with President Bush. Putin spoke with Bush eight times over the last year, more often than he spoke with any other head of state. However, the surname most frequently repeated by Putin in public was not Bush, but Merkel. Other than Russia, Germany was also the country most frequently mentioned by the Russian president.

More worrisome is the frequency with which Putin speaks to, visits, and hosts the world's despots. There were only three countries that Putin visited more than once: Belarus, China, and Finland. And the foreigner he met most often with over the past year was Belorussian strong man Alexander Lukashenko. While the rest of Europe has been working to isolate the continent's "last dictator," Putin has been a stalwart supporter, receiving Lukashenko at the Kremlin on three occasions, for a total of five meetings between the two in the last year.

Vlast also dissects public opinion of the Russian president, showing 59 percent of Russians support a third term, even though Putin is currently barred from seeking one by the Russian constitution. The president's current approval rating stands at a whopping 81 percent, up six points from the same time last year. Beneath that impressive number though, there does seem to be some Putin-fatigue.

Although he managed to keep his popularity fairly steady and even saw it grow slightly in 2005-2006, the same respondents who said that they approved of him personally reported being disillusioned with the results of his activities in office and said that they have few hopes for improvement in the future.

Usually, when leaders encounter such depressing statistics, they either try to play for a few points by tinkering with social programs and perks or they try to pep things up by declaring a campaign against some real or perceived common enemy. The Russian authorities, who had already launched a series of projects to support ordinary citizens and to chase out unwanted immigrants, turned out to be both luckier and shrewder than others in their predicament. According to data from the Levada Center, the president's popularity rating rose over the last year from 75% to 81%, but even that was nothing compared to the findings by the social research center VTsIOM, which show that Russians have discovered changes for the better in almost all areas of their lives. It is impossible not to lay a large part of the responsibility for this amazing turnaround at the feet of Mr. Putin: in particular, the perception among ordinary Russians of Russia's position on the world stage has improved not only thanks to high gas and oil prices but also as a result of the Russian leadership's harsh rhetoric and a series of trading spats with Russia's neighbors. In addition, the country's calm outlook on the situation in Chechnya is due not only the death last summer of the Chechen rebel warlord Shamil Basayev but also to the Kremlin's engineering of a peaceful transfer of power from Alu Alkhanov to Ramzan Kadyrov. Under these circumstances, not even a spate of high-profile murders has been able to dampen the optimistic outlook of most Russians, who are now feeling safe and relatively free of pessimism for the first time in a long while.

Asked for a one word description of their attitude to Putin, only one percent of Russians answered "hostile," another one percent answered "skeptical," and 39 percent answered "respectful." Nine percent said they were "disillusioned."

Putin receives Belorussian President Alexander Lukashenko at the Kremlin in December 2006.
Photo: Dmitry Azarov

The New York Times is in trouble with the Russian authorities. On Tuesday, the newspaper reported the encouraging news that “Russia has informed Iran that it will withhold nuclear fuel . . . unless Iran suspends its uranium enrichment." Yesterday’s editorial further asserted that “The [Bush] administration needs all the friends it can get, and this is another case where quiet persuasion can go a lot further than bludgeoning." However, it now seems that “quiet persuasion” has failed to convince the Russians of much of anything.

As reported by most major Russian news networks yesterday, the Russian authorities are furious with Times’s reporting. The spokesman for the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Mikhail Kamynin, has vehemently denied that any such ultimatum was issued to Iran. Said Kamynin: “As a whole, this article and the 'leaks' on which it is based do not reflect well on a newspaper that claims to be authoritative," adding that the information provided by the Times is, in fact, “blatant disinformation." The press service of the Russian National Security Council released a similar statement noting that “the claims [by the Times] that any ultimatums were issued during the March 12 bilateral consultations with Iran, do not correspond to reality. The resolution of Iran’s nuclear problem and the completion of the Bushehr facility by Russia are not interrelated.”

Moreover, claims by Western media that Russian specialists have begun leaving Iran are also said to be part of this “disinformation campaign." Today, officials from Atomstroiexport--the Russian company charged with construction of the plant at Bushehr--likewise issued a denial, stating that any such insinuation is “groundless” and that the departures can be explained as the “rotation of specialists… which is part of a normal working process."

The editors at the Times thought Moscow could be helped "to see where its larger interests lie," but Rosbalt offers another explanation--"that the Americans, unaware of the peculiarities of Russian national business matters, simply cannot believe that the disruption in payments is the reality . . . and are searching for reasons that are easier for them to comprehend." Yesterday's editorial in RIA Novosti likewise counsels that “the heart of the conflict is financial disagreements between contractor and client. . . . Nuclear fuel is not pistachios or almonds, and the cash-and-carry logic of the Oriental bazaar does not fit in here.”

Stephen Kotkin is the director of the program in Russian and Eurasian studies at Princeton University, and while I was in attendance there, I was lucky enough to have Kotkin both as a professor and a thesis adviser. You won't find a smarter guy at Princeton, and you're not likely to find anywhere an expert who knows more about post-Soviet Russia. Kotkin is a frequent contributor to the New Republic, and, of the articles he has published there, one stands out in particular (sub.) for its deep insight into the nature of post-Soviet Russia and the ring of independent states that had emerged around it. Wrote Kotkin,

When the Soviet Union was dissolved, it was replaced by ... the Soviet Union, only with more border guards, more customs posts, more "tax" collectors, more state "inspectors"--in short, more greasy palms outstretched. Estonia stands out as the great bright spot (approaching the level of Slovenia, the star in East-Central Europe). But elsewhere around the former Soviet Union, we see a dreadful checkerboard of parasitic states and statelets, government-led extortion rackets and gangs in power, mass refugee camps, and shadow economies. Welcome to Trashcanistan.

In any case, to say I was in awe of Kotkin as a student would be an understatement, so when Kotkin talks, I listen. A friend just forwarded me this link to a speech he gave last month in Philadelphia. Here are some excerpts:

Kotkin on Russian politics:

The answer to the question of today’s talk, “Russia: toward democracy or dictatorship?” is “neither.” Russia is not a democracy, and it is not a dictatorship. Russia, like most countries of the world, has a ramshackle authoritarian system with some democratic trappings (some of which are meaningful). Russia is not in transition to or from anything. Russia is what it is. . . .

With the approaching vote at the U.N. Security Council on a set of new sanctions against Iran, Russia seems to be finally relenting in its unilateral support of Tehran’ nuclear ambitions. According to Tuesday’s announcement by the chief of the Russian Federal Atomic Agency (RosAtom) Sergei Kiriyenko, Russia is temporarily suspending the construction of the Bushehr nuclear reactor, while the timeline for completing the facility (originally planned by September 2007) is being pushed back by two months. He added, however, that “the Russian side has not changed its obligations in regard to deliveries of nuclear fuel, which will still be supplied six months prior to the launch of the [nuclear power] station."

Moscow’s warning appears concrete: Regions.ru has reported that Russian specialists have begun leaving Iran. But the essence of the disagreement between the sides seems to hinge on financial--rather than political--incentives. Last December, Kiriyenko negotiated a deal in Tehran whereby Iran would pre-pay $25 million a month for the construction effort, while Russia guaranteed delivery of 70 tons of nuclear fuel by this March. But Moscow claims that Tehran reneged on the deal only a month later. As noted by Rosbalt, on March 11, a Russian delegation from “Atomstroiexport”--the company charged with the construction of the Bushehr facility--headed to Iran to “conduct talks due to suspension of payments." Izvestiya also points out that Moscow holds all of the cards in the negotiations--since Russia took over the project in 1995, 90 percent of the equipment for the power station is Russian-made.

While Iranian officials have vehemently denied responsibility, Russian policymakers are keen to take this opportunity to make a statement to the West. Currently on a visit in Moscow, U.S. Deputy Energy Secretary Clay Sell has already praised Russia’s actions as “consistent with our common interests and common concerns." In an interview with Vesti, Mikhail Margelov, the head of the foreign policy committee of the Federation Council (Russia’s upper house), likewise reiterated that “Russia plays only by the accepted rules of the game in the nuclear sphere--the rules set by IAEA and the U.N. Security Council. No other rules, no double standards, can exist for Russia in this sphere.” Margelov went even further in an interview with Strana.ru, “Iran’s leaders…treat any negotiations on nuclear issues as a matter of national prestige--a concept they often fail to comprehend adequately."

Last week, the restive Russian republic of Chechnya got a new president, Ramzan Kadyrov. The appointment, however, did not come as a surprise: Kadyrov has been the de-facto president since the assassination of his father, former Chechen president Akhmat Kadyrov, in May 2004. And contrary to Moscow’s assertions, Alu Alkhahov’s presidential appointment in 2004 was no more than a temporary measure--the Kremlin was waiting until Kadyrov Jr. turned 30, as required by Chechen law. This February, Alkhanov moved to Moscow to serve as the deputy minister of Justice, while Kadyrov assumed the role of “acting president” of the republic. Then last week President Putin summoned Kadyrov to the Kremlin and resolved the “power vacuum” in the republic.

As reported by Izvestiya, Putin notified Kadyrov that he had “come to this decision stemming from the fact that you have done a great deal in recent years to restore Chechnya.” Kadyrov’s candidacy was nearly unanimously approved, with only one vote against, at an “emergency session” of the Chechen parliament the next day. Nezavisimaya Gazeta points out that Kadyrov’s appointment marks the first “hereditary” transfer of power in Putin’s Russia.

Russian analysts are generally united in agreement that the situation in Chechnya has “stabilized” under Kadyrov--but there remains a great deal of disagreement about the methods used and their implications for the long-term. Prominent Russian journalist Mikhail Leontiev argues that under Kadyrov’s rule, “Chechnya, notwithstanding occasional terrorist activities, [was] the most stable and manageable region in the North Caucasus.” Moskovskiy Komsomolets puts forth a stronger argument, noting that “[Without Kadyrov], there will be no order in Chechnya. Instead, we’ll have heck-knows-what: freedom--and, pardon, democracy. But here, we think that the Chechens will be better off without all of that.”

Other analysts and, particularly, human rights activists have expressed concern about Kadyrov’s former ties to the rebels (whom the current Chechen president joined at the age of 17 and drafted en masse into his own paramilitary formations and Chechen police units) as well as his strong-arm methods of imposing “stability.” The “Echo of Moscow” radio station reported on March 4, that one of the first acts of the Kadyrov presidency was to ask Moscow for another amnesty of former insurgents. Kadyrov's loyalties were perhaps best described best described by Lenta.ru: “Putin in his heart--and a Koran in his hands.”

Above, a young Kadyrov with Chechen terrorist Shamil Basayev (mastermind of the Moscow theatre siege in 2002 and the Beslan massacre in 2004). Below, Putin and Kadyrov at a meeting in the Kremlin in 2004.

Roughly a year after their first visit, Hamas is back in Moscow. According to Nezavisimaya Gazeta, whereas the March 2006 invitation was extended by President Putin, this time, Hamas leaders (Khalid Mishal and Musa Abu Marzook) have themselves asked to come to Moscow for “consultations”. As last time, President Putin has preferred not to meet with the group’s representatives, leaving the discussions to Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and his deputy, Aleksandr Saltanov. Russia is still the only member of the Middle East Quartet that recognizes Hamas as a legitimate party and is thus willing to entertain talks with the group.

The purpose, however, is less clear--from both sides. As reported by Vesti, Hamas still adheres to its hard-line approach, while Mishal noted in Moscow that it is “Israel who is occupying Palestinian lands…The Quartet should talk to them, not us." Gazeta notes that there has been no progress on convincing Hamas to free the kidnapped Israeli corporal Gilad Shalit, with Mishal continuing to insist on reciprocation from Israel in “releasing a certain number of Palestinian prisoners." In an interview with Vremya Novostei, Mishal admitted that Shalit was alive and “treated well," but firmly stated that “our positions cannot be bought."

Moscow’s position may be less principled than that of Hamas. After the Quarter meeting in Berlin last week, according to the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Lavrov rejected the assertion that the Quarter is conducting “the politics of boycott." Yet this week in Moscow, according to Izvestiya, Lavrov praised the February 8 Mecca Accords between Hamas and Fatah--which still refrained from recognizing Israel--and noted that “[Russia] strives for the international community to support this process… including efforts to help lift the blockade.” Today’s edition of the liberal Kommersant has a different take on the situation: “In sum, Russia has been unable to demonstrate to the West the purpose of having dialogue with terrorists."