Games without frontiers
by Simon Tisdall
From The Guardian
With sparks flying again between Moscow and
Washington, Simon Tisdall asks is this Cold War II?
Thursday February 22, 2001
A spy working for Russia is discovered in the heart of the FBI;
tactical nuclear weapons are secretly deployed along the
frontiers of Europe; an American president plans a massive new
strategic missile system; the Kremlin tests allied defences with
air patrols over the north Atlantic and the Sea of Japan.
Between Washington and Moscow, angry rhetoric and
accusations fly back and forth. Sound familiar? For those whose
memories stretch back to 1989 and before, it certainly does.
During the cold war between the US and the Soviet Union, such
threatening events were considered the norm. But alarmingly, all
the episodes sketched out above have occurred in the past few
months, raising the question: are we on the brink of a second
cold war?
The idea is not as far fetched as it might seem. Although the
underlying ideological confrontation between communism and
capitalism is absent this time around, age old rivalries to do with
power, influence, security and money remain.
And after a period of détente and relative amity between
Russia's Boris Yeltsin and America's Bill Clinton, new faces at
the top - Vladimir Putin and George Bush - have brought with
them a renewal of old fears and distrust.
Only this week, Condoleezza RICE, the US national security
adviser, was quoted as saying: "I sincerely believe that Russia
constitutes a threat for the west in general and our European
allies in particular."
Donald RUMSFELD, the US defence secretary, recently accused
Russia of exacerbating the proliferation of weapons of mass
destruction - America's biggest security concern.
"Let's be very honest about what Russia is doing," Rumsfeld
said. "Russia is an active proliferator. They are part of the
problem. They are selling and assisting countries like Iran and
North Korea and India and other countries with these
technologies which are threatening other people including the
United States and western Europe and countries in the Middle
East."
As if in turn, Putin attacked the US this week over its air raids
on Iraq which Russia deems illegal. Bush has hardly been more
emollient. He has identified Russia as a potential strategic rival
rather than a partner and has already moved to halt further US
aid intended to promote market reforms.
Although he and Putin have talked by phone, he has not
responded to Russian overtures for an early summit meeting.
And, to the Kremlin's annoyance, he has refused to intervene in
the case of Pavel Borodin, a senior Yeltsin era official who is in
detention in New York in connection with Swiss fraud charges.
From where Putin is sitting, the trend looks worrying.
America's proposed National Missile Defence system, also
known as "son of Star Wars" could potentially blunt Russia's
ability to defend itself by countering at least part of its offensive
nuclear arsenal.
The intention of Nato to expand into eastern areas, including the
Baltic republics, is strategically undesirable. The expansion of
the EU into central and eastern Europe presents a parallel
economic and cultural challenge.
The recent Anglo-American raids on Iraq are highly objectionable
in Russian eyes, another example of American military
adventurism of the very kind that they so fiercely opposed in
Yugoslavia in 1999.
More broadly, they see such action as evidence that the US
considers itself alarmingly free to ignore the UN and international
law when it suits its purposes. When it comes to weapons
proliferation, the Kremlin believes persuasion and dialogue is the
best way forward, hence Putin's recent contacts with north
Korea and his invitation to Iran's president to visit Moscow this
spring.
It believes the US, in contrast, is set on confrontation with such
so-called "rogue states" in order to justify its overweening
superpower ambitions.
On top of all this, Moscow resents the way the big American oil
companies have moved into the formerly Soviet-controlled
Caspian region, rivalling its own efforts to exploit the area's oil
and gas wealth.
From where Bush is sitting, Russia looks like a negative force
opposing US interests, not as powerful as it once was but still
dangerous.
Bush and his advisers genuinely believe they need a ballistic
missile defence against rogue states and see Russia's
opposition as unnecessarily obstructive. Putin's efforts to woo
Iran and north Korea and his indirect support for Iraq are viewed
at best as political opportunism and, at worst, as providing
succour to the enemy.
Russia's continued espionage against US targets, its reported
but unconfirmed deployment of tactical nuclear missiles in the
Baltic enclave of Kaliningrad, its resumption of cold war-era air
patrols, its discussions with China about a friendship treaty and,
for example, Putin's recent visit to Cuba, are all seen in the
same light in Washington: as an unwelcome attempt by the new
Kremlin boss to reassert Russian standing in the world in
opposition to America.
Washington had become accustomed to regarding Russia as a
busted flush. Now it is reluctantly beginning to realise that,
despite all its economic and social problems, it still has the
ability to thwart or at least complicate US ambitions and
security concerns.
Its disapproval of Putin's authoritarian tendencies at home, for
example in his war in Chechnya and his attempts to muzzle the
free media, has added to the growing gulf between the two
sides.
The US also suspects Putin of seeking to reclaim Russian
leadership in the former Soviet republics of central Asia and
Ukraine, where economic woes and political corruption have
tarnished the dream of independence.
One classic cold war manoeuvre, for example, is Putin's current
attempt to woo European opinion by offering alternatives to the
US missile defence plans and thereby sowing discord and
dividing Nato.
Germany, closer to Russia than most, has proved to be
particularly susceptible to his blandishments. France, for
reasons more to do with its visceral anti-Americanism than
rational calculation, is happy to see Russia opposing the
domineering "Anglo-Saxons". Putin has been assiduous in
courting Tony Blair.
That these various mutual suspicions and opposed ambitions
will soon translate into a big new east-west confrontation
remains unlikely, given Russia's relative weakness compared
with the days of Brezhnev and even Gorbachev. But Bush and
Putin both need to tread more carefully and show a bit more
respect. Given the current levels of mutual distrust and the
speed at which US-Russian relations are deteriorating, the
potential for miscalculation is enormous.
Email
simon.tisdall@guardian.co.uk
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