Spring 1998

Russia’s New Foreign Policy By Leon Aron

Few propositions about today’s world can be stated “national patriotic” plurality in the Duma (the with greater certainty: never in the four and a half lower house of the Russian Parliament), which centuries of the modern Russian state has there early in 1996 “annulled” the 1991 Belavezhskie been a Russia less imperialist, less militarized, less agreements formalizing the dissolution of the threatening to its neighbors and the world, and . This deafening chorus is led daily more susceptible to the Western ideals and prac- by the flagships of Communist and nationalist tices than the Russia we see today. media—, Sovetskaya Rossia and Zavtra, with a combined daily press run of more than Although obvious even to a person with only a half a million—and by the nearly 300 local pro- cursory acquaintance with Russian history, this Communist newspapers.

state of affairs results from a long series of com- Yet even when the chance to propitiate the Russian Outlook plex, often painful, and always fateful choices national patriots and to reap a political windfall made by the first post-Communist regime. Some by adopting a rigid and hostile stance was handed of the most critical decisions were made between to President on a silver platter, the 1991 and 1996, when Russia was reeling from Kremlin passed—as in the case of the North economic depression, hyperinflation, pain of Atlantic Treaty Organization expansion. After market reforms, and postimperial trauma. Many much blustering, Yeltsin chose to sign the NATO- a nation, even in incomparably milder circum- Russia Founding Act and to accommodate the stances, succumbed to the temptation of making United States and its partners rather than to repeat the linchpin of national unity and (even if rhetorically) the cold war. “It already hap- cohesion at the time of dislocation and disarray. pened more than once that we, the East and the From Argentina to China, Malaysia, and Indone- West, failed to find a chance to reconcile,” Yeltsin sia, in various degrees of crudeness and militancy, said in February 1997, when the final negotiations countries have recently resorted to the palliative with NATO began. “This chance must not be of nationalism to dull the pain of market reforms missed.” The leader of the national-patriotic oppo- or reversals of economic fortune. sition and the chairman of the Communist Party of In Russia, too, retrenchment and truculence the Russian Federation, Gennady Zyuganov called were urged by leftist nationalists inside and out- the founding act “unconditional surrender” and a side the Supreme Soviet and, since 1995, by the “betrayal of Russia’s interests.”

Leon Aron is a resident scholar at the American A Historic Disarmament Enterprise Institute. Another version of this essay was published in the April 20 Weekly Standard. For more information on the subject, see Leon Aron, This instance was emblematic of a broader strat- “The Foreign Policy Doctrine of Post-Communist egy of post-Communist Russia. Between 1992 Russia and Its Domestic Context,” in Michael Man- delbaum, ed., The New Russian Foreign Policy, Coun- and 1995, Moscow implemented all Gorbachev’s cil on Foreign Relations, May 1998. commitments and completed contraction of the

1150 Seventeenth Street, N.W., Washington, D.C. 20036 202.862.5800 www.aei.org - 2 - empire inherited from the Soviet Union—a contrac- reduction of the armed forces by 500,000 men, to 1.2 mil- tion remarkable for being undertaken in peacetime and lion. A week later, the minister of defense, General Igor voluntarily. On September 1, 1994, when the last Russ- Rodionov, referred to himself as the “minister of a disinte- ian units left Germany, most troops had already been grating army and a dying fleet.” removed from Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Repub- At the same time, Yeltsin promised what surely will be lic. In four years, Russia repatriated (frequently without the coup de grâce of Russian militarism: the ending of the homes for officers or jobs for their spouses) 800,000 draft and the institution of an all-volunteer armed force of troops, 400,000 civilian personnel, and 500,000 family 600,000 by the year 2000. Even though this plan almost members. certainly will take longer than three years to implement, a Even as Moscow publicly and loudly linked its retreat mere talk by the Russian leader about ending almost two from Estonia to the granting of full civil and political centuries of conscription epitomized the distance that the rights to the ethnic Russians there, it quietly continued new country put between herself and the traditional Russ- to withdraw. In two years, between the end of 1991 and ian (let alone Soviet) militarized state. In the meantime, the last months of 1993, the number of Russian troops in following the Supreme Court’s October 1995 decision Estonia diminished from 35,000—50,000 to 3,000. The that allowed local judges to rule on constitutional matters, departure of the last Russian soldier from the Paldiski Russian judges have thrown out dozens of cases brought submarine training base in Estonia in September 1995 by the army against the “deserters” who exercised their marked the end of Russian presence in East-Central constitutional right to alternative civil service. Europe. The lands acquired and held during two and a The extent of the rout of the formerly invincible half centuries of Russian and Soviet imperial conquests defense sector became evident in the twelve months were restored to the former captive nations. Russia following the 1996 presidential election. An often sick returned to its seventeenth-century borders. president fired two defense ministers, the head of the Unfolding in parallel was demilitarization, historically general staff, and the commanders of the paratroop and unprecedented in speed and scope. Reduction is a ridicu- space forces, and he ordered the retirement of 500 gen- lous euphemism for the methodical starvation, depreda- erals from the immensely bloated Russian field officers tion, and strangulation to which Yeltsin has subjected the corps. Soviet armed forces and the military-industrial complex. No other Russian or Soviet leader, not even Stalin, In a few years, the Russian defense sector—the country’s attempted to remove at the same time as many pillars of omnipotent overlord, the source of national pride, the the national defense establishment for the fear of desta- master of the country’s choicest resources and of the liveli- bilizing the regime (to say nothing of risking one’s hoods of one-third of the Russian population—was neck). With the 40 million votes that he received on reduced to a neglected and humiliated beggar. July 3, 1996, Yeltsin apparently felt no fear. Dictator- Begun with an 80 percent decrease in defense procure- ships and autocracies depend on the army’s good graces; ment ordered by Yegor Gaidar in 1992, the decline in the democracies (even young and imperfect) can afford to share of the Russian gross domestic product spent on the be far less solicitous. military continued from at least 20 percent to 5 percent— 7 percent today. Yeltsin promised to reduce it to 3 percent The Rationale of Disarmament by the year 2000. According to Sergei Rogov, a leading Russian expert and the director of the USA and Canada Russia’s historic disarmament results from political and Institute, the 1996 expenditures for organization and economic democratization, not from a weak economy, as maintenance of Russian armed forces were at least 2.5 often suggested—as if national priorities are determined times lower than in 1990, for procurement and military by economists and as if, throughout human history, eco- construction 9 times, and for research and development nomic rationale has not been invariably and completely 10 times. When, in May 1997, the government imple- overridden by fear, hatred, wounded national honor, mented an across-the-board spending cut (“sequestering”), messianic fervor, or a dictator’s will. In our own century, defense was again hit the hardest: its already delayed where was a “strong economy” and excess wealth in the funding was reduced by another 20 percent. Soviet Union in the 1930s and after World War II; in Along the way, the Russian army shrank from around 4 Vietnam between the 1950s and the 1980s; in Cuba million in January 1992 to about 1.7 million by late 1996. since the 1960s; in Ethiopia under Comrade Mengistu; In July 1997, Yeltsin signed several decrees mandating a in an Armenia fighting for Nagorny-Karabakh; in a - 3 - Pakistan developing a nuclear arsenal; or in an Iraq expect any time soon a reversal in the enormous Chi- starving its people to produce the mother of all weapons? nese military buildup and modernization, helped by a No, the shrinking of the Russian military is due to the burgeoning economy and fueled by resurgent national- weakening of the Russian state’s grip on the economy and ism, with which China, unlike Russia, chose to anchor to the constraints imposed on imperialism, aggressiveness, and unite the nation during its dizzying economic and brutality by public opinion, the free mass media, and transformation. competitive politics, which have forced the Kremlin to Historically, the key feature of a transition from a end the war in . Tardy in bestowing on Russia traditional to a modern society and from a village- to its other blessings, Russian democracy has already made an urban-based economy was the “disposal” of surplus high defense expenditures and violent imperial projects peasantry. Everywhere this process was attended with quite difficult to sustain. enormous societal convulsions, revolutions, violence, Most fundamentally, Russian demilitarization is a con- and cruelty (England showing the way.) For Russia, the sequence of rearranged national priorities, of a change in problem was “resolved” by the terror of Stalin’s collec- the criteria of greatness, and of society’s gradual liberation tivization and industrialization. For China, with its from the state. Russia has abandoned the tradition of the 800,000,000 peasants, the resolution is still ahead. The unchallenged preponderance of the state’s well-being and justified fear of instability felt by the Chinese political concerns, particularly in the matters of foreign policy and class, already anxious about the migration of millions national security, over domestic economic and social of destitute peasants into the cities, is the single biggest progress. The vigilance against foreign aggression, the impediment to Chinese democratization—and to the strength of the fortress-state, and the allegiance and sacri- prospects of a Chinese demilitarization. fice to it have been replaced in a new national consensus China is relevant in another respect, as well. Of all by the goals of societal and individual welfare, new civil the morbid fantasies about the innumerable facets of and political liberties, and stabilization within a democra- the alleged Russian menace, the prophecy of a coming tic framework. Sino-Russian alliance directed against the United States In June 1997, in a television address to the nation on is intellectually the most embarrassing one. What his- the seventh anniversary of the Declaration of State Sover- torical precedent is there to support such a forecast in eignty of Russia, Yeltsin said: “A great power is not moun- the case of two giant nations that vie for regional super- tains of weapons and subjects with no rights. A great powership, share nearly 3000 miles of border (much of power is a self-reliant and talented people with initia- it in dispute), and have for centuries competed for the tive.... In the foundation of our approach to the building huge underpopulated land mass to the east of the Urals? of the Russian state . . . is the understanding that the As with history’s other pair of perennial combatants, country begins with each of us. And the sole measure of Germany and France, such an accord will have to wait the greatness of our Motherland is the extent to which until both countries are stable and prosperous democra- each citizen of Russia is free, healthy, educated, and cies—not in our lifetime and, alas, perhaps not in our happy.” children’s, either. In any case, should it ever come to Unless this new consensus is extinguished by an eco- pass, an alliance of two democracies is unlikely to be nomic catastrophe and a return to a dictatorship, Russian anti-American. militarism is not likely to recur. For that reason, as stated To be sure, there will be periods of rapprochements in one of Ronald Reagan’s magnificently vindicated theo- when, as today, Russia will sell its submarines and MIGs, rems—nations mistrust one another not because they and Chinese migrant workers and entrepreneurs will are armed; they are armed because they mistrust one flood the Far East and Siberia, setting up Chinese lan- another—Russia, while far from a model of openness and guage schools for their children and opening the best consistency, is easier to trust today than at any other time restaurants in Ekaterinburg, Irkutsk, and Khabarovsk. in its history. Russia will attempt to play the Chinese card in its deal- ings with Washington—just as China, at the same time, The Chinese Angle will be using a Russian card in its relations with the United States, which will remain far more important to This connection between democratization and national both than they will be to each other. Just as certainly a security policies makes the Russian case so different Sino-Russian truce will be followed by acrimonious and from the Chinese. For the same reason, one should not perhaps violent ruptures. - 4 - Post-Soviet Space sandr Lukashenka, and the exuberance in the Duma. Already, five months later, in September, First Deputy Along with finding its place and role in the post-cold Prime Minister declared that “unity” war world, Russia also had to make some critical choices between Russia and Belarus, with its Soviet-style econ- about the “post-Soviet political space,” as the territory omy and Lukashenka’s dictatorship, would be just as of the former Soviet Union has been referred to in impossible as a union between North and South Korea. Moscow since 1992. At that time, everyone—from the A week later, ostensibly in retaliation for the jailing of national patriots on the Left to the radical free marke- a Russian journalist in Belarus, Yeltsin refused to grant teers on the Right—agreed on four things. First, a stable permission for Lukashenka’s plane to enter Russian air and prosperous Russia was impossible without a mod- space. icum of stability in the “post-Soviet space,” which from Regarding the maintenance of regional dominance, Moldova to erupted in a dozen violent civil however, there ought to be no illusions: Russia is likely to and ethnic wars. Second, some sort of mending of mil- deploy much the same combination of roguery, bribery, lions of ruptured economic, political, and human ties and diplomatic pressure that great land powers have used (“reintegration”) was imperative if the entire area was for millennia to assert control over a self-declared sphere to survive the transition. Third, with the “new world of influence. Heading the list are economic and military order” buried in the hills around Sarajevo, Russia could assistance to friendly regimes and the denial of aid to count on no one but herself in securing peace and sta- neighbors deemed insufficiently accommodating. In the bility in the area. Finally, Russia’s preeminence as the case of especially recalcitrant countries, support for all regional superpower was not negotiable. manner of internal rebellions is always an option. Given Beyond this agenda, which still stands, the consensus the economic and political fragility of most post-Soviet dissolved into two sharply divergent objectives and states, their dependence on Russian resources (especially strategies. One was aimed at making the post-Soviet energy), and their susceptibility to ethnic and civil strife, space resemble the USSR as closely as possible and as Moscow’s stance could sometime make a difference quickly as possible. The cost—in money, world opinion, between a young state’s life and death. or even blood—was no object. All means were accept- able, including the stirring of nationalist and irredentist Relations with Neighbors tendencies among the 25-million-strong ethnic Russian diaspora in the newly independent states—just as Serbia While relentlessly probing for weaknesses, exploiting did in Bosnia and Croatia. In this scenario, the regime in their neighbors’ troubles, and taking advantage of Moscow was urged at least to threaten recalcitrant states openings to further its regional superiority, the post- with the politicization of the ethnic Russian community colonial policy is constrained by a cost-benefit analysis. and the “massive redrawing of borders” to join to the There is a wariness of open-ended, long-term, and metropolis the areas heavily populated by ethnic Rus- expensive commitments in the “near abroad.” Such sians, especially northern Kazakhstan and eastern considerations were anathema both to Russian “mes- Ukraine. Advocated largely, but not exclusively, by sianic” (the Third Rome) and, especially, to Soviet the nationalist Left, this is an imperial, revanchist, “ideological” (world ) varieties of imperialism. and ideological agenda. Most critically, Moscow has chosen not to cross the In the other model, which might be called postcolo- thickest lines in the sand: independence and sovereignty nial, reintegration was given a far less ambitious content. of the CIS nations. While “near,” the Confederation of Its advocates relied on the incremental pull of a privatized Independent States is still “abroad.” In the end, this is the Russian economy and its democratic stabilization to do critical distinction between the imperial and the postcolo- the job. Its time frame stretched over decades. nial modes of behavior in the region. Haltingly and inconsistently, Russia opted for the This difference is akin to the one between twisting latter game plan. Even the April 1997 “union” with someone’s arms and cutting them off. Much as observers Belarus—which some American observers hastened to may (and do) find both activities equally reprehensible, to declare the beginning of Russia’s inexorable march to the arms’ owner the actual choice makes a great deal of the West—has been quietly but substantially diluted and difference. Unlike some American journalists and colum- slowed to a crawl, despite the Kremlin’s rhetorical fan- nists, whom they quickly learned to overwhelm with com- fare, the conjugal ardor of Belarussian President Alyak- plaints about Russia, the leaders of neighboring nations - 5 - from “near” and even “medium” abroad know only too the area. The signing was attended by Presidents Yeltsin well the alternative to the arm-twisting postcolonial and Kuchma as “coguarantors” of the agreement. choice. In June, the Tajikistan regime, supported by Russia, Hence their wholehearted support for Yeltsin in his and the Tajik Islamic opposition ended five years of a September–October 1993 confrontation with the Left- bloody civil war by signing in Moscow a Peace and nationalist radical supporters of the Supreme Soviet. The National Reconciliation Accord. Primakov and his first Czech President Václav Havel said October 4 that the deputy, Boris Pastukhov, reportedly continued mediation clashes in Moscow were not simply “a power struggle, but until the final agreement emerged two hours before the rather a fight between democracy and totalitarianism.” signing ceremony. In a joint statement Presidents Lennart Meri of Estonia, The same month Abkhaz President Vladislav Ardzinba Guntis Ulmanis of Latvia, and Algirdas Brazauskas of spent two weeks in Moscow with top mediators (Yeltsin’s Lithuania called the struggle in Moscow “a contest Chief of Staff Valentin Yumashev, Security Council Sec- between a democratically elected President and antide- retary Ivan Rybkin, and Defense Minister Igor Sergeev) to mocratic power structures.” Their Moldovan counterpart, discuss an interim protocol, drafted by the Russian Foreign Mircea Snegur, called the Supreme Soviet supporters Ministery, for a settlement between Georgia and seces- “Communist, imperialist forces who want to turn Russia sionist Abkhazia. In August, Ardzinba traveled to the into a concentration camp.” “In my thoughts I am on the Georgian capital, Tbilisi, for the first face-to-face meeting barricades with the defenders of Russian democracy, as I with Shevardnadze since the war began in 1992. In his was next to them in August 1991,” Eduard Shevardnadze weekly radio address at the end of August, Shevardnadze said in a message to the Kremlin on the late afternoon “expressed his appreciation” of Primakov’s effort in arrang- of October 3, 1993, when the outcome looked quite ing Ardzinba’s visit. grim for Yeltsin. “Deeply concerned about the events in On September 4, in the presence of Prime Minister Moscow, I am again expressing my resolute support for Victor Chernomyrdin the presidents of North Ossetia President Yeltsin and his allies.” and Ingushetia (autonomous republics inside Russia) Hence, with an almost audible sigh of relief, the signed in Moscow an agreement settling a conflict over neighboring countries welcomed Yeltsin’s victory over North Ossetia’s Prigorodnyi Raion, which had festered Zyuganov in 1996. The tone of the greetings sent to the since fighting broke out in November 1992. During the victor by the leaders of the new states far exceeded proto- next two days, in the capital of Lithuania, Vilnius, Cher- col requirements. “The future development of Ukraine nomyrdin held bilateral meetings with the presidents of depended on the results of the Russian election,” Presi- Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania. At the end of the sessions, dent of Ukraine Leonid Kuchma said on July 4, 1996. each of the presidents announced that his country would Yeltsin’s victory, he continued, was “a signal that Ukraine “soon” be able to sign border agreements with Moscow. should press ahead with economic reform.” For the proponents of the postcolonial choice, to Accord with Ukraine which demilitarization of conflicts in the near abroad had always been central, 1997 was by far the most productive But by far the most momentous diplomatic coup of that year. Following Yeltsin’s near-miraculous resurgence after busy year was the May 31 Treaty of Friendship, Cooper- heart bypass surgery, Moscow moved to settle all hostilities ation, and Partnership between Russia and Ukraine in the region. Only in Nagorny Karabakh, over which signed by Yeltsin and Kuchma in Kiev on May 31. An Armenia and Azerbaijan had fought to a standstill, did accord between Europe’s largest (Russia) and its sixth Russia fail to make some progress. most populous (Ukraine) nations is just as central to On May 12, Russia signed a peace accord with the stability of the post–cold war European order as the Chechnya, granting it all but an official recognition of French-German rapprochement engineered by Charles independence. Within days, after two months of shuttle de Gaulle and Konrad Adenauer in 1958 was to the diplomacy by the Foreign Minister Evgeny Primakov, post-World War II one. By the terms of the treaty, the Moldova’s President Petru Lucinschi and Igor Smirnov, two nations undertook to “respect each other’s territor- the leader of the self-proclaimed Transdniester Republic ial integrity, confirm[ed] the inviolability of the exist- (a Russo-Ukrainian secessionist enclave on Moldova’s ing borders, . . . mutual respect, sovereign equality, a border with Ukraine), signed in the Kremlin a memoran- peaceful settlement of disputes, non-use of force or its dum that effectively affirmed Moldova’s sovereignty over threat.” - 6 - The success of this settlement after five years of tur- Revisionist or Not? bulent negotiations is more stunning because so much augured failure. First, the technical complexity of some The most fundamental choice that Russia had to resolve issues bordered on intractability. One issue was the fate both on the world scene and in the post-Soviet space of the Soviet Black Sea Fleet, on which both countries was the one between nonrevisionist and revisionist poli- had legitimate claims. Another contentious point was cies. The former seek advantage within the constraints the sovereignty over the beautiful and fecund island of of an existing framework accepted by the majority of the Crimea, where ethnic Russians outnumbered Ukraini- international community. The latter are aimed at under- ans by more than two to one. For almost two centuries mining and changing the framework itself. Russia has a staple of Russian poetry and the most popular Russian chosen nonrevisionism. She may bemoan the unfairness resort, teeming with tsars’ summer palaces and dachas of the score (and does so often and loudly), but she does of the best Russian painters, musicians, and writers, it not try to change the rules of the game. was “given” to the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic To be sure, the imperatives of history, geography, and by Nikita Khrushchev in 1954, when the end of the domestic politics will cause Russia to be less than happy Soviet Union and an independent Ukraine seemed about much U.S. behavior in the world and to challenge beyond the realm of the possible. Yet another political it often. In poll after poll, a majority of Russians agree that and emotional hurricane was touched off by the status the United States was “using Russia’s current weakness to of the port and naval base of Sevastopol, a symbol of reduce it to a second-rate power.” As de Gaulle said to Russian military valor. The defense of the city in the Harry Hopkins, “America’s policy, whether it was right or 1854–1855 Crimean War against the British and the not, could not but alienate the French.” Wherever the French and in World War II against the Germans United States provides an opening by seeming either not had earned Sevastopol an honorary designation of to care much about an issue or, as in Iraq, to hesitate, Rus- City-Hero. sia is likely to seize the opportunity to further its claim on And then there were precedents of similar postim- being reckoned with as a major international player. perial divorces, all attended by horrific bloodshed: Yet, as with France, the tweaking, the shouting, and England and Ireland, India and Pakistan, Bosnia and the occasional painful kick in the shins must not be con- Serbia. In 1992, many a Western expert confidently fused with anti-Americanism of the kind professed by the predicted a war between Russia and Ukraine, some Soviet Union, Iran in the 1980s, or Iraq, Cuba, and Libya even an exchange of nuclear strikes. today. Russian truculence is not informed by ideology. It is Perhaps the greatest obstacle to the recognition of not dedicated to a consistent pursuit of strategic objectives Ukraine as a separate state was her unique place in inimical to the truly vital interests of the United States, Russia’s historic memory and national conscience. and it is not part of a relentless, antagonistic struggle to Kiev was the birthplace of the first Russian state and the end. Rather, it is pragmatic and selective. And when its first baptized city, from which Christianity spread America’s wishes are communicated at the highest level, throughout Russia. No other part of the non-Russian forcefully, directly, and unambiguously, Moscow is likely to Soviet Union was so pivotal to Russian national iden- moderate opposition and even extend cooperation, as it tity as Ukraine. In no other instance was the temper- did in Bosnia. ing of Russia’s imperial tradition and instinct put to But just as Francis Fukuyama’s much misunderstood a harsher, more painful test than by an independent “end of history” was never meant to suggest the absence Ukraine. of lapses, reversals, lacunae, or lengthy and furious rear- In the end, Russia gave up Crimea and Sevasto- guard battles, neither does the end of 75 years of relent- pol and ceded to Ukraine the entire Black Sea Fleet. less Soviet revisionism spell the end of our Russian Some of Sevastopol’s naval bays were to be leased, problem. Indeed, it may become worse before it becomes and half of the fleet rented by Russia from Ukraine, better. The reason is the “underinstitutionalization” of with the payments subtracted from Ukraine’s enor- Yeltsin’s foreign policy: the lack of organizational and mous debt to Russia for gas and oil deliveries, esti- personnel structures that could carry on the present pol- mated at the time of the treaty signing at $3–3.5 icy in the absence of the impulse from the top. The new billion—perhaps the most generous, and least publi- foreign and security policies of Russia have stemmed cized, bilateral foreign assistance program in the world mostly from Yeltsin’s domestic political and economic today. revolution, not from implementation of some long-term - 7 - strategy or a conscious effort at restructuring the policy- weight, and the confidence that came from a landslide making process. victory in 1996 kept the vector of Russian foreign policy pointed in the right direction. The president’s inevitable Yeltsin’s Passion physical decline and lame-duck status change a great deal. Like an old bulldozer—once mighty and responsive but As every great and successful modern political leader, now more and more awkward, slow, hard to handle, and with a notable exception of de Gaulle, Yeltsin is a with the motor nearly worn out—Yeltsin today clears the domestic leader. His interests, his instincts, and his pas- boulders deposited by the receded Soviet glaciers one at a sions, like Ronald Reagan’s (unlike Nixon’s, Carter’s, time, with much screeching, creaking, and even retreats. or Gorbachev’s), are engaged mostly (and most prof- Any worsening of Yeltsin’s physical condition would itably) by his country’s domestic politics. For that rea- further increase the policy-making impact of the Ministry son, Yeltsin never cared to establish a foreign policy of Foreign Affairs and the Russian diplomatic corps— alter ego (a Kissinger, Brzezinski, or Shevardnadze): a perhaps the most authentic and recalcitrant relic of the strategic thinker and confidant endowed with a great Soviet past among Russian institutions, a class whose fall deal of power and independence. from the pinnacle of Soviet society in terms of material There have been only two exceptions, two areas of stature and prestige can be compared only with that of the international relations that Yeltsin has firmly arrogated for military. Predictably, Russian diplomats’ zeal in defending himself. One is the relationship with the United States, the reformist regime often seems less than overwhelming. which Yeltsin single-handedly salvaged by signing— An additional toughness and shrillness in the tone of against the advice and dire warning of virtually the entire Russian foreign policy rhetoric in the next two years will political class—the Russia-NATO Founding Act. come about because of domestic politics, as the Foreign The other domaine réservé is the settlement with Ministry will more and more look to please the unde- Ukraine, into which Yeltsin put enormous personal effort clared contenders in the 2000 presidential election, all of and which he pushed along, ignoring or evading dozens of whom seem far less impervious to nationalist temptation stern resolutions by the Supreme Soviet, the Duma, and than Yeltsin. Russian behavior in the latest Iraq crisis, the Council of Federation (the upper house of the Russian with Yeltsin, clearly disengaged, mouthing a bizarre line legislature) and pretending not to hear fiery statements of about World War III, is a foretaste of things to come. the country’s top political leaders, from his own ex–vice This must not take us by surprise. Seven years ago, president, Aleksandr Rutskoy, to the perennial chairman an enormous and evil empire, which had deformed and of the Duma’s Committee on Foreign Relations, Vladimir poisoned everything and everyone it touched, broke to Lukin, to the mayor of Moscow, Yuri Luzhkov. After the pieces. Yet its harmful rays, like light from a long-dead treaty was signed, Ukrainian officials told reporters that star, will continue to reach us for some time. The current “only Yeltsin had the political will and strength to drop Russian leaders came of political age and advanced under Russia’s residual claims on Ukraine” and that the Ukrain- the empire. They cannot be counted on fully to fashion a ian leadership “prayed that Mr. Yeltsin would not die world of which they know little. At best, in domestic poli- before doing so.” tics, economy, and behavior in the world, they will forge Outside these two areas, Yeltsin considers foreign pol- a hybrid. If we are lucky (as we have been with Yeltsin), icy a distant second to his domestic agenda and is content more than half the product will be new and benign, while to use it to accommodate the opposition rather than to the rest will be instilled with various degrees of malig- expend his political capital. The choice of Primakov as nancy. It is up to the next generation of leaders (with lots foreign minister is characteristic: the man’s announced of good fortune) to turn the hybrid into a purebred. objective of a multipolar world—without American hege- U.S. policy makers must be prepared to encounter the mony but also without a challenge to the key postulates Soviet legacy in Russian foreign policy—such as relentless of the established order or a slide into a new cold war— and often senseless spying or the sale of technology and made him the only key minister in Yeltsin’s cabinet weapons to nations hostile to the United States—and to acceptable to all major political forces in the country. counter them with unflinching resolve. What will never In the next two years, the pitfalls of such a modus serve American interests, however, is the wholesale impo- operandi will become especially apparent. Until now, sition of old stereotypes on a different new reality, remark- Yeltsin’s unique place in Russian politics, his political ably auspicious in some of its key ingredients.

#9126