By Jon Haron-Feiertag, Contributor
This week’s stately meeting between Presidents Obama and Medvedev marks another in the unfolding saga of U.S.-Russian summitry, a saga that dates back to the years of Eisenhower and Krushchev. But that was not all that the occasion marked. The meeting was another in a set of efforts intended to draw to a close Russia’s long period of estrangement and begin to rehabilitate her diplomacy.
Why? Because in the preceding century her international relations have suffered tremendously. It is difficult to describe the enormous reversal in Russian fortunes. During the 19th century she was at the center of European security. It was her army that marched to Paris and unseated the conqueror Napoleon and reset the order of Europe. It was by the force of her arms that the Greeks achieved their liberation from the merciless Ottoman Turks in 1829. Her armies kept the order of Europe, suppressed the civil tumult, restored order to Warsaw in 1832, and in 1849 rescued Frederick Wilhelm IV in Prussia and Franz Joseph in Austria from uprisings that would jeopardize their rule, and perhaps also the integrity of their kingdoms.
Even after the humiliation of the Crimean War, Russia still remained near the center of European diplomacy. Her armies successfully entered the remote khanates of Central Asia. They completed their conquests within the Caucuses. And by their enterprise they crossed the Amur River and infiltrated Chinese Manchuria. It was Tsar Alexander II who, together with President Lincoln, issued one of the two great orders of emancipation in the 19th century; Lincoln with the American slaves in 1863, Alexander II with the Russian serfs in 1861. It was the victories of Russian armies that cleared the way for the independence in Romania and Bulgaria. It was by her league with Prussia that Russia secured peace on her western borders for a hundred years. It was with the initiative of Russia that the First and Second Peace Conferences in The Hague were convoked to create the international institutions of peace and regulate the tempers of war.
Of course all of that changed with the Bolshevik Revolution and the slow decline of Russian relations, abased, estranged, and subject of endless suspicion. The years in between represent one of the great disasters of diplomacy. At the end of the Second World War, Russian strength was renewed, but her relations continued to languish. The years that followed, which are colorfully termed "the Cold War", were not so much a war (actually not a war at all), but a long struggle by Russia to relax the strained relations with the West and achieve some kind of détente. The solidarity of the West had proved both too strong for her to break and too formidable for her to confront.
It is at this juncture that Russia finds herself today. President Medvedev and Prime Minister Putin preside over a country that has never been isolated, nevertheless it has for a long time been estranged. Not since the era of the Holy Alliance has Russia had the benefit of a real, reliable ally in peace time. Today Russia has been abandoned by all her confederates from the Warsaw Pact. She has proven unable to resist the NATO enlargement, or block its interventions in either Bosnia or Kosovo. Her actions in Georgia go unaided, and have become the subject of continuing scorn by the U.S. and Europeans. And her longtime military customers, like Ethiopia, Syria, Algeria, India, et al, have turned away from her influences and begun to seek new combinations for security.
It is little wonder therefore that Russia would seek to reinvigorate its diplomacy with a blitz of new initiatives. In recent weeks the Russian President and Prime Minister have been host to a myriad of events in an effort to refashion the dress of Russian diplomacy. The reset in U.S.-Russian relations among these represents just one. It is an important development, especially from the U.S. perspective. But for Russia it may not even be the most important. Consider a few others.
First, is the proposal formally unveiled at the G8 foreign ministers conference in Trieste for a new European security organization. The idea is as old as the early years of the Cold War. Originally presented by foreign minister Molotov in 1954, the concept of a general European security organization was realized in the form of the OSCE after an understanding reached at the Helsinki Accords. But the OSCE proved a feckless organization, and has not truly given Russia a place in European security, nor has it replaced the security needs that sustain NATO. It is not surprising then that Russia would renew this half-century old idea, and try again to give it force in the hope that its achievement might finally give Russia a station in Europe commensurate with its power and dignity.
Second, the same week Iran was convulsed by post-election turmoil Russia was host to a triptych of international conferences: the CSTO, the SCO, and the BRIC countries. The first of these, the CSTO conference, has become the forum for Russian designs to create a league for the security of Central Asia; an effort to align the Central Asian stans into one grouping, create a joint force, plan together, train together, coordinate security policy together, and perhaps even create a bloc within the Asian steppe that will deny to outside powers the opportunity of mischievous influence in the region. It comes after earlier false starts in the form of CIS and SCO, which evolved into organizations with a purpose different than that of regional security. Never before has a confederation resembling a Central Asian NATO appeared, and the outcome for CSTO remains clouded with uncertainty. But it reveals the ingenuity of their diplomacy that Russia sustains the effort in any case.
Third, has been the Russian ambition to repair the relations with China, set it on sure footing, and build a bilateral relation predicated on equality, not inferiority, to China. The creation of the SCO in 1996 was a first charge at this goal, but the progress of that organization has been wanting. And the Chinese have been cautious not to adhere to any agreements that would carry strategic implications. Instead they have temporized, and put off for another day the question of the final extent of Sino-Russian relations. That said, the Chinese starve for supplies of energy and Russia is well disposed to guarantee its provision. It is little surprise then Medvedev and Hu Jintao signed agreements in Yekaterinburg for the financing and construction of a gas pipeline into China. Pipelines, as we’ve seen in Europe, particularly Ukraine, Hungary, and Germany, deliver more than gas; they also supply the infrastructure for new political relationships. In Ukraine relations have become rancorous; but in Germany they have proven congenial. It could be that the savvy of Russian gas diplomacy will overcome Chinese hesitance and create a fait accompli in questions regarding the relationship.
Fourth, has been Russia's expeditionary diplomacy with the purpose of renewing relations with American, African, and Middle Eastern states. The willingness of Putin to sell arms to Chavez in Venezuela and support his bellicose policies, including a visit by a Russian warship, were strong symbolic gestures. More subtle, but no less important, has been the flurry of Russian deal-making in Africa, with Nigeria, Egypt, and Angola, and in the Middle East, with Egypt again, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, and Israel, et al. The Russians have nursed these global ambitions before. It was General Secretary Brezhnev who first made a concerted effort to project Soviet influence beyond its near abroad, particularly with the provision of money and heavy weapons to countries like Egypt, Cuba, and Angola, to cultivate overseas proxies. But the American policy of containment, together with blunders in the Afghanistan War, and then the dissolution of the entire Soviet Republic, arrested these initial efforts. Though Russia is no longer driven by the dogma’s of communism, certainly it would like to discover overseas allies in the way the Americans and British have done so successfully.
Fifth, and probably most notorious, has been Russian gas diplomacy in Central Asia and Ukraine. Of course it has long been a staple of Russian foreign policy to control the oil and gas resources around the Caspian region. But the aggressive use of Russian corporations to acquire the infrastructure of transit and delivery of energy into Europe and elsewhere represents a new innovation in an old Russian policy, and may well translate into diplomatic influence in Eastern Europe and the Caspian that were unknown to it before.
It cannot be known of course what the consequence of all this diplomatic activity will be. But it can be suggested with some confidence that the cumulative effect of all these efforts is probably the emergence of a new cast of Russian diplomacy. Not since the secretaryship of Gorbachev has the diplomacy of Russia undergone so many changes. If so, one wonders whether the combined effort is truly capable of ending Russian estrangement and curing her of the long loneliness she has suffered in international affairs.
At first glance one would be inclined to think so, if only because no other program of diplomacy could produce less than was accomplished by the Soviets. But even so, that does not mean her fortunes are destined to rise again. It is hard to discern who in international affairs is well suited to join her in a symbiotic peace time alliance. And without a reliable partner in this multi-polar world, it will become more and more difficult for Russia to protect her interests.
Perhaps even more foreboding for Russia, the Cold War has created a legacy of Russian influence as a menace rather than a help, and the occasion of that confrontation has proven that if enough countries judge it so, it is possible to form a bloc to resist her influence successfully—proof of the limits of Russian power. It was similar for Louis XIV in his war with the Dutch. Once it was revealed that other European states could repel his intrusions by alliance and compel him to subservient terms, all his other designs, be it in the War of the League of Augsberg or the War of Spanish Succession, were doomed to failure. His enemies knew the recipe for his defeat.
For Russian diplomacy then, it may be the end of her long estrangement. But more earnest for Russia is whether that means her days of glory and influence have entered into eclipse.
