Post-Soviet Russian-Western Relations [Part III: the Club of First-rate States]

To recap, by the end of 1991 and for the first time since 1721, Russia was neither an empire nor the de facto and uncontested center of power for a vast empire-like union of states that was internationally recognized as a super-power. Moreover, the Eastern world/bloc was gone too—thereby substantiating the impracticability of the Soviet model in the long-run. And ‘the West,’ as a concept, developed beyond the contextual strictures of an obsolete political/ideological rivalry to entail historical and cultural (which were, and continue to be, I must say, of distinct Europeanness) connotations. Nevertheless, one thing that Russians had, beyond a shadow of doubt, wished to retain from the Soviet era—the status of great/super-power; which, in a post-WWII nuclear world; and given the unprecedented and peculiar Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) configuration between the United States and the Soviet Union; the result of exceptionally unparalleled strategic nuclear parity; would be primarily derived, insofar Russians were concerned, from Russia’s ability to maintain its perceived peerage vis-á-vis the United States on the world stage.

In addition, from a pre-Soviet cultural and historical vantage point, Russians reckoned that it was most fitting for their newborn country (as a federation) to join the Collective West. And, what is the Collective West? In fine, it is the ‘club of first-rate states’. Leastways, that’s how the Russian Federation’s first foreign minister, Andrei Kozyrev, viewed it within the international sphere and had articulated his country’s foreign policy such that Russia might, one would hope, harmoniously be integrated into it: “Our Choice…to progress according to generally accepted rules. They were invented by the West, and I’m a Westernizer in this respect—the West is rich and we need to be friends with it—It’s the club of first-rate states Russia must rightfully [emphasis added] belong to [my formatting].” (Stent 24)

And which state happens to be the leading power in that club? It is the United States of America, no wonder.

As I have stated previously in the prelude to this article, not much had changed for the ‘Western World,’ in ordering terms, through the transition from the Cold War I context to the next—the United States continued to be the Sun of that world. What did that mean to the Russian Federation then; to seek accession into a club led by its former arch-rival and equal [emphasis added]? It meant that it was time to form a partnership. Alas, such partnership would be paradoxical in essence, and its formation would prove irksome to both parties.

So, what was the view from Washington?

There was no question in Washington as to the necessity of engaging Russia in world affairs and integrating her into international structures. The Americans were well-aware of post-Soviet Russia’s (a nuclear super-power, no less) need for international relevance and prestige. And, God’s honest truth, the United States endeavored towards that end. The problem was, however, that the U.S. did it in a remarkably American way and from a purely American perspective; eo ipso, sowing seeds of contempt into their Russian counterparts.

What do I mean by a remarkably American way and from a purely American perspective?

Well, the Bill and Boris honeymoon commenced with financial and economic assistance to Russia. The aid package was meant to stabilize the Russian economy. As a matter of fact, “During the seven years both were in office, “Bill and Boris” met eighteen times, nearly as often as their predecessors had met throughout the entire Cold War,” (“Milestones: 1993–2000”). One could almost sense a genuine camaraderie between the two heads of state.

Russian President Boris Yeltsin and US President Bill Clinton — When Yeltsin got drunk| image credit: Jim McKnight/AP Photo| via @History.com

“For his first trip abroad, Clinton met Yeltsin in Vancouver in April 1993… At Vancouver, Clinton promised Yeltsin strong support in the form of financial assistance to promote various programs, including funds to [stabilize the economy, to house decommissioned military officers, and to employ nuclear scientists]. The US Congress—including broad, bipartisan majority in the Senate—approved the program in September [my formatting]. At Clinton’s behest, and at a meeting he hosted in Denver in June 1997, for instance, Russia became a member of the so-called G—8, the group of leaders representing eight of the world’s leading economies, thus ensuring that Russian interests would be considered [again, my formatting] at this important annual forum.” (“Milestones: 1993–2000”)

The official narrative in the West at the time painted a very rosy picture: that the United States was set out to help Russia stand on her feet, economically, and engage her politically.

OSTENSIBLY, IT WAS ALL VERY FINE. And the Clinton administration kept reassuring Yeltsin that even NATO enlargement into Russia’s neighborhood was a “win-win” proposition; that way, NATO would ensure stability and order in Russia’s periphery (Stent, 2014).

In 1994, Russia worked with the United States and NATO to handle the situation in Bosnia. In that joint-effort, Russia perceived herself as the United States partner—not NATO’s [emphasis added]—something that Yeltsin and his colleagues highly valued. But NATO’s Partnership for Peace (PfP) Program, “Which was offered to all former Warsaw Pact members and the CIS countries [my formatting],” (Stent 39) had, from Moscow’s viewpoint, downgraded Russia’s international status; given that it had placed Russia on par with her former Soviet satellites vis-á-vis the West.

Remember, the USSR had one equal, not many equals.

Paradoxically enough, Yeltsin and his team viewed NATO—in terms of geopolitics and strategic security—as Russia’s most expedient gateway into the ‘club of first-rate states’. That was mainly due to the fact that, “…the road to [European Community] membership was long and involved massive economic restructuring for which Russia was hardly prepared and a complex process of accession to tens of thousands of pages of the acquis communautaire,” (Stent 38). Nevertheless, the PfP had limited NATO-Russia relations to unappealing quotidian cooperation; for it manifested in what used to be a Russian space or sphere of influence. In other words, it was NATO’s clout that expanded whilst Russia’s contracted [emphasis added]. To the same effect, and simultaneously, to make things worse, “barely had PfP begun when the [NATO] enlargement process began,” (Stent 39).

Do you begin to realize what I meant by the American way and American perspective?

The American perspective is drawn from the premise that, the one who puts money in others’ pockets is the de facto boss, and gets to tell them what to do. By the same token, a nuanced patronization is the American way; the boss knows what is best for everybody, and his decisions are—beyond any contestation—in everybody’s best interest. This modus operandi works well business-wise in Anglo-Saxon cultures, yet proved occasionally problematic when applied on a global cross-cultural scale. And the true difficulty lies in it being so profoundly ingrained into the American psyche, that it has been considered the natural order of things universally. Having that said, the Americans were totally oblivious to its counterproductive ramifications on their dealings with the Russians.

“The Clinton administration argued that it tried to conduct its policy toward Russia with sufficient sensitivity to Russia’s difficulty in adjusting to its reduced international status [my formatting] [failing to recognize that they (the Americans) were primarily responsible for this reduction in Russia’s international status, at least from Russian perspective; since it (Russia’s international status) was chiefly derived from Russia’s parity withthe United States]. Others disagree. Former Ambassador Jack Matlock argues that Washington was unwilling to put itself in Moscow’s shoes and craft policies that treated Russia with greater empathy. Alexander Voloshin, former head of Yeltsin’s presidential administration, agrees: “The United States is very egotistical and not ready to understand other countries’ interests [my formatting].”” (Stent 25)

To be fair, the Americans were also thrusted, unprepared, into quite a burdensome international position at the end of World War II. The United States then had to fill-in Britain’s shoes on the international stage, overnight. And those were very big shoes for any country, without a prior imperial experience, to step into; of an empire that was so vast that the sun never set on, with a very long history (spanning centuries) of global presence and ever active interventionism. All this had to be done and accommodated in conjunction with a radical transition in foreign policy from, relatively speaking, pre-World-Wars isolationism to hands-on interventionism on multiple and, needless to say, critical international theaters—namely, Europe.

Moreover, when I said the United States had to fill-in Britain’s shoes on the international stage overnight, I meant it literally; that the Americans were lured and forced to take on the task, rather than having had assumed it by choice, especially in Europe. It was no circumstantial accident, but a British contrivance. British historian, David Reynolds, infers:

“So from the British point of view, a fundamental axiom of policy was to try to draw the United States into European commitments. Because that was the only way Britain could hope to deal with the huge problems of postwar Europe.

The British had a certain conceit here that had developed over the course of the war. They considered the Americans as being somewhat junior in the business of being a world power [my formatting]. Britain, on the other hand, considered it had a great deal of experience and savoir-faire as a power, and could somehow persuade the Americans to remain in Europe after the war; that, at least, was the British mentality.” (Fitzgerald & Packwood 32)

The Georgetown Set: Friends and Rivals in Cold War Washington, by Gregg Herken

Albeit that the United States has had a formidable and competent foreign intelligence apparatus, which I have an utmost regard to, the post-Cold War political circles in Washington stand notably inferior to their Cold War era formers. During the Cold War years, Washington had the Georgetown Set. ““According to the author Robert Merry, was “a group of government officials and journalists who combined brains, ambition, style, and a thoroughly modern view of America’s role as world power [my formatting]”” (Herken 7). This “natural aristocracy,” had dwindled and, well, died out by the end of the twentieth century.

As the decade wore on, NATO’s unilateral escapade in Kosovo—which bypassed the United Nations—after failing to secure Russian participation—had dashed the utopianism surrounding the principle of “generally accepted rules”; served the final blow to the Yeltsin administration’s hopes of co-chairing the world stage alongside the United States; and further cemented Russian suspicions of NATO’s anti-Russia purposiveness. The message the bombing of Kosovo had communicated was clear: it was a relationship of supra and sub-ordinate parties. That, in effect, had put Yeltsin and his team under tremendous domestic pressure; “Yeltsin’s opponents were warning him that, if NATO could bomb Belgrade, “Today Yugoslavia, tomorrow Russia!” “Wasn’t it obvious,” Yeltsin asks, “that each missile directed against Yugoslavia was an indirect strike against Russia?”” (Stent 43)

The strain had grown too much for the Yeltsin administration, that seeds of contempt entered the hearts of those most passionate Westernizers on his team; even Kozyrev himself. “Yet, after listening to why Russia should take military action against the Serbs, Kozyrev told Talbott that “it’s bad enough you people tell us what you’re going to do whether we like it or not. Don’t add insult to injury by telling us that it’s in our interests to obey your orders,”” (Stent 42). There we see again, the American way.

It seemed that the Americans were completely ignorant to the fact that Russia was, historically, the Big Brother of all Slavs. And, the big brother is always obliged in rerum natura to fend for his younger siblings. Moreover, the Russian spirit posits a moral categorical imperative with respect to familial duties; which the Russian psyche is inherently incapable of abandoning, nor neglecting; no matter how hard Russians may try to suppress or tame it. As a result, they (the Americans) had, perhaps unintentionally, invoked Russia’s reversion to assertiveness.

Therefore, the Russian bravado at the end of the war is totally comprehensible to the meanest intelligence, when “Russia and the United States almost came to direct physical blows in 1999 when Russian troops rushed to the airport in Pristina, Kosovo’s capital, before NATO troops had entered Kosovo—directly contravening the terms of the cease-fire— in an attempt to establish control over the area. …The Russian soldiers who “dashed” to Pristina apparently disobeyed not only their political leaders but also their military superiors [my formatting]” (Stent 44). In fine, that was the Russian spirit paving according to its natural inclinations.

In a nutshell, it is evident that the continuous rejection of Russia’s accession into the “club of first-rate states Russia must rightfully belong to,” in her early post-Soviet years, as a federation, was a great disappointment and a strike of insolence on her international prestige and self-perception as super-power.

In more recent years, nonetheless, Russia reinvented her approach, and sought accession into the European Community via economic corridors—i.e. via expanding the Nord Stream project by bringing Nord Stream 2 online. Unfortunately, that too faced fierce resistance and opposition from the United States and Ukraine. One can fathom why the latter would oppose and try to kill such a project, driven by self-interest; alternatively, the U.S.’s resistance and opposition were impetuous and egotistical stances, stemming from sheer hubris, megalomania, and shortsightedness.

image credit: nord-stream2.com via @ The Moscow Times

Rather than appreciating the faint light in the darkness; that the Nord Streams are integrative projects, in nature: a tangible proof of the Russian self-perceived European identity, as well as a concrete reassurance of Russian everlasting connectedness to the European whole; the Americans stared purposelessly into the darkness emanating from the abyss of global rivalry.

Unfortunately, today, Russians have given up on joining what they once thought a ‘club of first-rate states’, and no longer wish to adhere to the generally accepted rules it had invented; for they learned, rather the hard way, that accession by means of compliance is inherently exclusive of Russia; thus, Russia is now intent on rebuilding its own Russky Mir (Russian World). A country of Russia’s size, history, and might cannot remain worldless.

As per a tweet from Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, “President Putin: The Western countries are seeking to preserve yesterday’s world order that benefits themselves and force everyone to live according to the infamous “rules”, which they concocted themselves.”