Ryan Mauro's
WORLD THREATS.COM

                                                       

(moment of silence)

Thank you gentlemen.

FP:  Oleg Kalugin, let’s begin with you.   What do you make of Litvinenko’s murder and its fallout?

Kalugin: Alexander Litvinenko was assassinated by the Russian security service, and president Putin bears full responsibility for this crime, irrespective of whether he ordered the execution or simply let his subordinate thugs to do the job.

Ever since Mr. Putin took over as chief of the federal security service in 1998 and later moved to the Kremlin as president of the country, scores of his prominent critics in Russian legislature, business and the media were killed or jailed. The civilized world is facing a growing power of the authoritarian state which, if unchecked, may degenerate into a fascist dictatorship and pose threat to all freedom loving nations and peace on earth.

FP: Thank you Mr. Kalugin. Well, if I ever received an unambiguous answer to one of my questions, this is definitely one of them.

Vladimir Bukovsky, are you on the same page with Mr. Kalugin?

Bukovsky: Yes, I agree with Gen. Kalugin.

I am an analyst, not a policeman, so I don't follow the current lines of Scotland Yard's investigation, and, frankly, I don't believe they will catch any murderer. But the general picture is pretty clear to me.

Consider this: in July of this year, the Russian Duma passed a law authorizing the Russian President to use secret services as "death squads" in order to eliminate "extremists" -- even on the foreign territory (Federal Law of 27 July 2006 N 153-F3).

At the same time, the Duma amended another law, expanding the definition of "extremism" to include anyone "libellously" critical of the current Russian regime (Federal Law of 27 July 2006 N 148-F3).

Thus, as we warned in a letter to the Times on July 11 (together with Oleg Gordievsky):

"a stage is set for any critic of Putin's regime here, especially those campaigning against Russian genocide in Chechnya, to have an appointment with a poison-tipped umbrella. According to the statement by the RF Defence Minister Sergei Ivanov, the black list of potential targets is already composed."

Then followed the murders of Anna Politkovskaya and Alexander Litvinenko. The question is: why would the Russian authorities rush through these laws if they had no intention of implementing them? The ball, therefore, is now in the Russian court: they have to prove to us that they did not do it.

FP: Sergei Kirov’s murder, Trotsky’s murder . . .the current events appear to be an eerie rendezvous with history, almost as if the Soviet purges are being resuscitated. Perhaps this is an exaggeration, but the ghosts of the Stalinist terror are definitely lurking in the shadows.

Dr. Pipes?

Pipes: The affair is very murky but all indications are that Moscow ordered the murder of Litvinenko as it did that of Politkovskaya. They fit a pattern. If it were true, as Moscow claims, that the murder was committed by its enemies in order to discredit Russia, we would have seen far more activity on Russia's part to discover the culprit or culprits.

In reality, Moscow treats the killing (by its alleged enemies) rather nonchalantly. At this stage all I can say with certainty is that if it turns out that the order for the killing of Litvinenko emanated from the Kremlin, then Russia and the rest of the world face an appalling prospect of this vast country turning once again to gangster methods of dealing with its opposition.

FP: I fear that the Putin regime is searching for the killers like O.J. Simpson has been trying to track down the murderers of his wife. David Satter, what’s your take on the Litvinenko murder and its significance? And kindly also shed some light for us on who exactly Litvinenko was and to whom he posed a danger. Who profits most from his death? Why? What knowledge did he have, what behaviour was he engaged in that posed a threat to Putin – or to someone else?

Satter: I also am convinced that Litvinenko was murdered by the Russian intelligence service. No one else had both the motive and the means. Litvinenko was not only murdered. He was tortured to death. This is a message to his colleagues in the FSB about the cost of defecting.

Litvinenko was highly unusual because he not only refused to participate in the planned murder of Boris Berezovsky but took the risk of announcing the plot publicly. He represented some danger to the FSB although not a great one because his former colleagues could bring him information.

I think the reason he was killed is either that the regime wanted to get rid of him and now thinks it can ignore the West totally or there is a power struggle going on and the more fascistic faction in the leadership is using these murders as part of its bid for power.

FP: Thank you David Satter.

While I would like the rest of the panel to also offer their perspective on the how and why here, I would also like to expand the discussion into the realm of why these fascistic and Stalinist strains continue to dominate Russian politics even despite the fall of communism. Is it because communism actually never even fell? After all, there was never a de-communization process in the same sense that there was a de-Nazification process in Germany after the Second World War. There were no Nuremberg-style trials in the former Soviet Union. In many ways, the same ideology and the same criminals remain in power, but just under another name.

Or is there also something larger than the continuation of Soviet communism here? Is it Russia’s traditional inability to embrace democracy and individual liberty, and its addiction to firm and brutal despotism? If so, how come the country can’t shake off this dreadful ghost?

And when David Satter raises the possibility that Putin might now be able to “ignore the West totally” what does it mean? Have we become helpless in being able to apply pressure on Russia? Why? Why does Putin feel he can do whatever he wants without a fear of the West -- if this is the case?

I apologize if there are too many loaded questions here. Just provoking a bit of discussion to give the Litvinenko murder some context.

Lt. Gen. Ion Mihai Pacepa?

Pacepa: Assassinating anyone who stood in their way is indeed a tradition that Russia’s tsars passed on to the Communist rulers--and beyond. The custom goes back to Ivan the Terrible, whose political police, the Oprichnina, killed tens of thousands of boyars who refused to swear an oath of allegiance to his eldest son, an infant at the time.

Under Communism, these arbitrary assassinations became a state policy. During Stalin’s purges alone, some nine million people lost their lives. Nikita Khrushchev condemned Stalin for aiming the cutting edge of his political police against his own people, and he shifted the killing abroad. The “Western bourgeoisie” and “our own traitors” became the Kremlin’s main enemies. Khrushchev ordered the KGB to develop a new generation of weapons that would kill without leaving detectable traces in the victim’s body, and he created units for assassination abroad in all Eastern European foreign intelligence services. I was present when Khrushchev told Romania’s dictator, Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej, that killings abroad should be approved only by the country’s ruler, that they should be kept forever a secret, and that after each assassination abroad “we” should surreptitiously spread “evidence” accusing the CIA or other convenient “enemies” of having done the deed, thereby killing two birds with one stone.

It seems that Vladimir Putin is continuing Khrushchev’s tradition. Yury Andropov, the other KGB officer who was enthroned in the Kremlin, used to tell me that every society reflected its own past. The Communist party was a foreign organism introduced into the Russian body, and sooner or later it would be rejected. But “our gosbezopasnost”—the Kremlin’s political police—would remain unchanged for as long as the Russian motherland still existed. "Our gosbezopasnost" had kept Russia alive for the past five hundred years, and "our gosbezopasnost" would steer her helm for the next five hundred years. Andropov has proved to be a dependable prophet: Communism is history; but the gosbezopasnost has taken over the Kremlin itself, and a gang of over 6,000 former KGB officers are now running the country. It is as though today’s Germany were being run by Gestapo officers.

The assassination of Litvinenko looks like a modernized version of Khrushchev’s attempt to kill Nikolay Khokhlov, another KGB defector who dared to expose assassinations abroad and display the latest weapon created by the gosbezopasnost for secretly committing them (an electrically operated gun fitted with silencer and concealed inside a cigarette pack, which fired cyanide-tipped bullets).

In the late 1970s, Leonid Brezhnev gave Ceausescu, via the KGB, radioactive thallium that could be inserted in food to silently kill his own political enemies abroad. The substance was described to Ceausescu as a new generation of the radioactive thallium weapon unsuccessfully used against Khokhlov in West Germany in 1957. (Khokhlov lost all his hair but did not die.) Ceausescu baptized it with the codename “Radu” (from radioactive), and he used it to secretly kill his own political enemies. The polonium 210 that killed Litvinenko looks to me just like an upgraded form of “Radu.”

Putin and his KGB/FSB may temporarily be able to hide their involvement in Litvinenko’s vicious murder. But in the long run political crime does not pay, even when it is committed by the leader of a superpower.

Woolsey: I'm afraid I have to make it unanimous. Although if this were an isolated case, given the complex facts, it would be imaginable that it was the result of some feud between people in the Russian government and one or more oligarchs and Putin was not involved -- but that seems most unlikely in the current context.

The murder of Politkovskaya, the attack on Gaidar, the imprisonment of Khordokovsy, the proliferation of former intelligence officers in positions of power, the several other killings -- all point toward a Russian state that has regressed to the days of Nicholas I or worse.

I think the most damning fact is that Litvinenko had taken a position on the apartment bombings that were used to justify the second Chechen War. The FSB was extremely clumsy, as David Satter has very effectively chronicled, and the type of explosive used, the one plot that was uncovered (the FSB said it was for "training") and a number of other facts point toward those attacks having been an FSB provocation. This calls into question much of the rationale for Putin's rule and the basis for most of his suppression of civil liberties. Pursuing that issue could well have been Litvinenko's final death sentence.

It may never be known whether Putin gave a direct order or, like Henry II, just surrounded himself with a certain type of subordinate and then, musing on Litvinenko, mumbled the 21st century Russian equivalent of Henry's question: "Will not someone rid me of this turbulent priest?" It doesn't really matter. The rest of us have to deal with a solidifying Russian dictatorship, engorged on oil money, destroying independent media and political figures, determined to reassert control over as much of the former USSR as it can (in part using energy as an instrument of coercion).

Tell me again why this dictatorship is in the G-8?

FP: Thank you Jim Woolsey. Yuri Yarim-Agaev?

Yarim-Agaev: Let us describe what happened. British investigative journalist (not spy) and Putin critic Alexander Litvineko was killed in London by (most probably) Russian terrorists. The case is very similar to the Anna Politkovskaya murder, only now it is a British citizen on British territory. Why do most journalists and politicians prefer to see it differently? The two reasons are psychological and political.

Psychologically, people prefer not to hear for whom the bell tolls. It is much more comfortable to be presented with a cloak and dagger case rather than the murder of a colleague and compatriot.

The political reason is even more compelling. We have here a classic case of terrorism, the same terrorism that Bush and Blair are crusading against. Combine it with the previous murders and the laws quoted by Vladimir Bukovsky, and according to Bush’s definition, Russia is a country that “harbors terrorism.” To fit this definition the president of such a country does not have to authorize or even to know about specific terrorist acts. It was never claimed that Taliban leader Mullah Omar gave direct orders to Osama Bin Laden or even knew about 9/11 beforehand. That, however, was not considered a good excuse.

According to the Bush doctrine, countries that harbor terrorism call for preemptive action and retaliation. Had Bush and Blair demanded the immediate repeal of the laws authorizing the killing of Putin’s critics, Politkovskaya and Litvinenko’s murders could have been avoided. They did not. Instead , without saying a word, they went to St. Petersburg to pay tribute to Putin, who (what a coincidence!) had signed those laws only one week before the summit.

At least our political leaders should demand repealing those laws now. They should also consider other measures, including the possible suspension of Russia’s affiliation with the G-7 club. This is not only a matter of retaliation. This is necessary to guarantee that the lives of their own citizens will be protected, independent of whether those citizens like Putin’s regime or not. Unfortunately, so far we hear only assurances of eternal partnership with Putin, assurance that may invite even more murders.

Communism is dead, but many of its structures remain. The most dangerous of them - the KGB - is currently in power. Without communism, however, this power is limited. They cannot so easily imprison their critics or stop them from leaving the country. Therefore, they revert more to secret murders. And they will continue to do so until they are stopped.

It is not important whether these murders are in Putin’s personal interest or not. He remains merely a representative of the KGB, which put him in power in the first place, and he has to obey the rules of that organization. What should he tell his pals? “Thou shalt not kill’ or “We cannot suppress freedom of speech”? The only viable argument for them would have been that such killing would be very costly. The American and British position, however, does not provide much support for such an argument.

FP: But how can we “demand” that another nation repeal its laws? And what can we really do about it anyway? Can we really suspend Russia’s affiliation with the G-7 club? What else? Would even Putin care? Has the West lost its will and lost its respect?

Andrei Piontkovsky?

Piontkovsky: I think that the West now has the last opportunity to positively affect events in Russia.

Jim Woolsey`s King Henry argument is very appropriate in this situation. It would be pointless for G8 partners to speculate on the extent to which Mr. Putin is personally involved in these crimes. That never comes to light in political assassinations. What is more important is what Mr.Putin will do now.

Within Russia and beyond her frontiers, assassinations and attempted assassinations are taking place of “enemies of the people”, lists of whom are to found on all of our country’s quasi-fascist websites. It is only going to be possible to continue blaming these murders on the CIA, or the oligarchs Boris Berezovsky (in Great Britain) or Leonid Nevzlin (in Israel), for a few more days, until the British, as seems likely, publicly and officially produce compelling evidence showing that the tracks of Alexander Litvinenko’s murderers lead straight back to Moscow. The President of the Russian Federation will then have to take possibly the most momentous decision of his life.

Much the same dilemma faced the one-time President of Poland, Wojciech Jaruszelski, when his intelligence services brutally murdered their own “enemy of the Polish people”, the priest Jerzy Popieluszko. He could have tried to cover up the crime, thereby irrevocably becoming an accomplice (and if he had, he would undoubtedly be in prison today). Instead he chose to hand the murderers over to justice and as a result has remained, even today in post-Communist Poland, a respected political figure.

More important, however, than the fate of the Russian President is the fate of his country. The effective legitimization of these serial political murders will make not only President Putin but all of us hostages of the institutions which are committing them. That is quite apart from the fact that Russia’s international reputation for years to come depends on whether a radiological attack on a G-8 partner was sanctioned by the Head of the Russian State rather than by some rabid FSB oil baron.

To judge by several signals from the Kremlin, Putin is wavering. Some sound advice from his partners in the G-8 to their friend Vladimir could play a crucial role.

Such advice from the White House should be accompanied by a totally unambiguous warning of something that very many in Russian political class, including Putin himself, would find profoundly hurtful. That is, that if the Kremlin shields the murderers of Anna Politkovskaya and Alexander Litvinenko, and if its propaganda continues to accuse “Western intelligence agencies” of those crimes, as it does at present, as it accused and continues to accuse the United States of sinking the submarine Kursk and of being behind the massacre of children in Beslan, then relations between the USA and Russia will be totally soured and will remain so until the last day of V. Putin’s occupancy of the Kremlin.

Bukovsky: I agree with most of what has been said. Except, perhaps, a largely unnecessary analysis into as deep a history as Ivan the Terrible or even Nicholas I. Both of them were hardly worse than their contemporaries in Europe. Instead, let me provide an update to the general political context of the present-day Russian situation:

The current ruling clique in Kremlin knows very well how much they are hated in the country, all the "polls" notwithstanding. They know that they are perceived as usurpers and impostors. True, in 2000 Putin came to power by winning an election, but so did Hitler in 1932. And, pretty much like Hitler, he immediately proceeded to dismantle all democratic checks and balances.

Now, as the power transition of 2008 is approaching, Putin is paranoid in his suspicion that the West will try to use this opportunity to stage an "orange revolution" Ukrainian style. Hence his government’s clumsy provocation against the British Embassy in Moscow a couple of years ago (the "electronic stone" case) aimed at discrediting non-governmental organizations perceived by them as hostile, cutting their funding from abroad and placing them under the Kremlin's control. Hence is the decision to silence the most persistent critics of the regime -- even by violent means if need be. In a way, this is understandable: they know they all will be in jail if a genuine democrat wins an election, particularly if it happens by means of a popular upheaval.

The question is: what should be done by the West and, first of all, by the British government? As the police investigation of the case is at its end, we expect the British Government to finally make a statement and to announce the measures in connection with it. I am afraid that the preliminary indications are that Blair will try to avoid a firm stand on the matter using one or another excuse. At least a leak to that effect was published by Sunday Times couple of weeks ago alleging that he said to the cabinet: "Our priority is to retain good long-term relations with Russia". If this is to happen, and quite apart from the fact that he will be in dereliction of his prime duties to the security of the UK citizens as well as to the sovereignty of this country, it will send a very wrong signal to the Russian rulers. They already believe that their energy supplies and the world's dependence on them places them above the international law and will allow them to get away even with murder. Further acts of appeasement by the West will make them outright dangerous.

What if they occupy Georgia or Moldova tomorrow? What if they do something equally stupid against one of the Baltic countries which are members of NATO now? What would the West do then? More excuses, more appeasement? No, in my firm belief, they should be stopped now, they should be shown their proper place in the world.

The options are limited and none of them is good. If Britain simply kicks out some 30 odd Russian diplomats from the Russian Embassy in London, there will be tit-for-tat expulsions, and the British government will be left looking rather silly. A suspension of diplomatic relations is even more silly, as we all know they will be quietly resumed in a year or so. In both cases, nothing would be achieved. Russia would not be forced to back off while relations will be spoiled for a couple of years anyway. Therefore, I suggest:

First, it should be made absolutely clear that a murder of a British citizen on British soil by agents of a foreign power constitutes an act of aggression and a violation of British sovereignty, and, as it happened, an act of a radioactive attack on a NATO country. Second, Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty should be invoked demanding a collective response by the NATO countries. Third, NATO should present Russia with an ultimatum demanding an immediate repeal of that offensive law with apologies. Failing that, Russia should be expelled from all international organizations, starting with G8, Council of Europe, WTO, etc. etc. Top Russian officials should not be allowed to step on the territory of NATO countries. Russia should be proclaimed a rogue state.

What would be the likely response? At first, Russia will posture as an injured innocent, it might even flex its "gas muscles" for a while. But, then, in two years time, after that all-important transition of power in 2008, they will quietly drop that law from the books (without saying much to their public at home), and will be eager to mend fences. Of course, for two years relations will be strained, but they will be in any case. At least, Russia will be forced to climb down.

FP: What a wonderful thing it would be if the West could actually act with such resolve, not only against Putin but also against Islamism. But I fear it is too good to be true.

Dr. Pipes, what do you think of the others’ comments so far and Mr. Bukovsky’s recommendations, and the realism of them?

Pipes: I agree with the various analyses and recommendations, with one exception: Vladimir Bukovsky's astonishing statement that "all the polls notwithstanding" the rulers in the Kremlin know that they are "hated" in Russia. The polls conducted by such highly regarded pollsters as the late Iurii Levada cannot be dismissed so easily: they are professionally done and honestly reported.

This is the problem: the Russian people with a sizable majority approve of the authoritarian policies of the Putin regime because they respect "groznyi" (severe) rulers who (in their eyes) offer them protection from foreign and domestic enemies lurking around every corner. They are prepared to regard the Politkovskayas and Litvinenkos as traitors and the Putins as true patriots. This is the real tragedy of Russia.

It behooves the West to make it unmistakably clear to the Russian government and its citizens that such behavior will not be tolerated, that it disqualifies Russia from membership in the ranks of civilized nations, and, whenever possible, to give this opinion a practical demonstration. Appeasing evildoers will fail, as it always does.

Satter: I agree with Richard Pipes that the Levada polls need to be taken seriously but we need to consider the reasons why Putin's popularity rating is so high. During the Yeltsin period, the Russian people were subjected to a frontal attack on their values and material well being. If we take the latter first, in some months under Yeltsin, wage arrears exceeded 50 per cent of the total wage bill due.

By January 1, 1998, wage arrears reached 13 per cent of the total money mass (M2) or $8 billion at the official rate of exchange. Official statistics even introduced a heading "wage arrears" and by December, 1998, 26 million people lived in dire poverty. At the same time, an ideological vacuum was created. Of course, it was a good thing that communist ideology was discredited but no new system of values took its place. The "reformers" spoke a great deal about establishing the authority of "universal values" but universal values are reflected in the rule of law. What was introduced instead was unrestrained criminality.

Putin was Yeltsin's hand picked successor. He came to power to preserve the oligarchic regime. He immediately benefited, however, from the spectacular rise in oil prices (from $9 a barrel in 1998 to $78 a barrel recently.) By claiming to restore Russia as a great power, he also helped to fill the spiritual vacuum that resulted from the Soviet Union's fall. He did nothing to bring about the energy windfall and his efforts to "reassert Russia's greatness" consisted mainly of bullying small powers. Nonetheless, he won the support of the demoralized Russian population, which, at the very least, began to be paid on time. Therefore, Putin's popularity should not be underestimated. At the same time, it is one of the reasons that the murder of Alexander Litvinenko demands a strong Western response.

Unfortunately, Russian society cannot subject the regime to moral restraint on its own. Individuals in Russia have an almost impossible time defending their sense of right and wrong against the pressure of the regime even when they are so inclined. If we accede to absurd official Russian explanations for the death of Litvinenko, we will show that we too cannot defend our sense of right and wrong. This will encourage the view in Russia that the authorities can act with total impunity. The torture death of Litvinenko will then not mark the end of the present leadership's assault on civilized standards but only the beginning.

Pacepa: Let’s face the facts. On May 28, 2002, NATO welcomed President Putin as a partner in the alliance. A month later, his chief military prosecutor charged Litvinenko in absentia with high treason for providing old KGB secrets to the government of a NATO country. [1] No body blinked in Moscow. Quite a few Russians still love Byzantine deception—generations of them have kidded themselves about the glorious state of their country. The Russians also love Putin. They call him the “Gray Cardinal” for his secrecy and Vatican-like mastery of backroom intrigue, and they admire his icy blue eyes as indicative of the strong, silent type, a real man, who chooses his few words with great care.

So, what can we do? First, we should tear off the veil of secrecy surrounding Putin. When you get right down to it, his magic derives from his following the tradition of Soviet rulers who cloaked themselves in secrecy and began being known only after they were gone. It is true, we may get a glimpse of Putin’s wife and hear about his love of karate through occasional self-controlled appearances, but on the whole Putin looks less three-dimensional than his Soviet predecessors.

Next, we should admit that Putin is a dictator brought to power by a KGB putsch. Every Soviet bloc intelligence service had a “survival plan” in case Communism would collapse. Romania’s, which I wrote out by hand (typewriters were considered insecure), was christened with the pedestrian name “Plan M” and stated that a couple of hundred undercover Securitate officers (named in an attachment) should take over the government. Their task was to abolish the Communist Party, remove “Socialist Republic” from the name of the country, restore the old Romanian national flag, re-baptize the Securitate with a Western-sounding name, simulate privatization by secretly transferring state enterprises into their own hands, and introduce Romania to the world as a democratic country. The plan of East Germany’s Stasi was called OibE (Offiziere im besonderen Einsatz, “officers on special assignment”), and was registered as Top Secret Document 0008-6/86 of March 17, 1986. Plan OibE, published on June 27, 1990 by the German newspaper Der Morgen under the title “The Most Secret of the Secret,” was identical to my Plan M but provided for a much larger number of intelligence officers (2,587) assigned to take over the government. The speed of Eastern Europe’s collapse did not allow for plans M and OibE to become operational, although quite a few politicians who rose to prominence in those countries after Communism collapsed had been secretly affiliated with the Securitate and the Stasi in the past.

Russia’s “democratization” looks like an operation staged by my Plan M. The Communist Party was abolished, the Soviet Union re-became Russia, the Red Flag was replaced by the old tsarist one, the KGB got a Westernized name, and a small clique of predatory intelligence insiders plundered Russia’s most valuable assets. The looting penetrated to every corner of the country, and it eventually created a Mafia-style economic system that threatened the stability of the whole Russia. By July 1998 the ruble had lost 75% of its past year’s value, short-term interest rates had climbed from 21% to 60%, and the stock market had slumped by more than 60% since the last year.

By that time the Kremlin was reporting that Yeltsin was suffering from a “cold.” When the Russian media recalled that in the past “colds” had proved lethal for the rulers (former presidents Konstantin Chernenko and Yury Andropov were dead in weeks after catching colds), the Kremlin acknowledged that in fact Yeltsin had the “flu,” which later proved to be a euphemism for a heart problem that necessitated a multiple by-pass operation. Soon Yeltsin came down with one more “cold,” which metamorphosed into a two-month bout of pneumonia [2] To top it all off, an influential newspaper in Moscow was already reporting that a KGB putsch against the ailing Yeltsin was in the making.[3]

On December 31, 1999, Yeltsin announced his resignation. “I shouldn’t be in the way of the natural course of history,” he explained.[4] For his part, the newly appointed president, Vladimir Putin, signed a decree pardoning Yeltsin, who was allegedly connected to massive bribery scandals, “for any possible misdeeds” and granted him “total immunity” from being prosecuted (or even searched and questioned) for “any and all” actions committed while in office. Putin also gave Yeltsin a lifetime pension and a state dacha.[5] Now over 6,000 positions in Russia’s federal and regional governments are held by former KGB officers.

Finally, we should help the Russians realize that there might be more to their world than just Soviet traditions.

FP: Thank you Mike Pacepa. You definitely don’t lack a punch.

Jim Woolsey?

Woolsey: My colleagues have all made extraordinary contributions. I find nothing really to disagree with. Even the split between Messrs. Pipes and Bukovsky about Russian attitudes toward Putin seems to me to present the two sides of a recognizable historical phenomenon: authoritarian rulers being simultaneously popular (especially if they come to power after a period of chaos and rule simultaneously with a factor-of-seven increase in the price of their country's principal export) and also hated. The brave will in one way or another express their hatred of tyranny and love of liberty even in the face of government-sponsored terror: some, such as the remarkable Mr. Bukovsky, will take a public stand and be persecuted for it; others, such as Count von Stauffenberg and Pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer will take up arms. But most citizens of an economically successful tyranny will feel simultaneously fear, hatred, and physical satisfaction. Most of us are capable of a fair amount of cognitive dissonance.

I am inclined to think that these assassinations and the new Russian statute do present the West with an opportunity that should be seized in order to increase the pressure on Mr. Putin. It would probably be difficult to marshal support for a whole range of retaliatory steps, but refusing Russian membership in the G7 as its 8th member seems to me to present an ideal focus for getting Mr. Putin's attention. These seven democratic nations should simply refuse to have as a member a dictatorship that assassinates its enemies, whether on its own soil or the soil of a fellow member state, and proudly claims by statute its intention to do so. Taking such a step of expulsion, especially if it is combined by serious efforts to move away from dependence on oil (via alternative fuels, including electricity via the coming plug-in hybrid technology) and gas (via conservation, renewables, Russia-skirting pipelines to Central Asia) should get Russian attention.

With current demographic trends (ethnic Russians are having children at the incredibly low rate of about half what is needed to replace their population and Russian men's life expectancy is below that of Bangladeshi men) Russian rulers should be hearing some footsteps behind them: by the middle of the century Russian population, under these assumptions, will be under a hundred million, below that of Yemen, and nearly one-third will be Muslim. Mr. Putin and his thuggish compatriots may care about nothing beyond their own generation and its creature comforts, but some Russians in political authority before too many years will take a longer view. If they see a resolute West, their energy leverage declining, and their population declining even faster they will begin to re-think things. In the meantime we should begin our help for present and future Russian reformers by refusing to permit those who currently rule Russia to participate in the G7.

Yarim-Agaev: For any opinion poll to be meaningful, it has to have two components: a good pollster and people with opinions. I do not question the integrity of the late Yuri Levada, whom I knew when he was still a young nonconformist sociologist. The problem is with the second component. I am afraid that most Russians still do not have personal opinions on political matters. And, I mean real opinions, of conviction and consequence, opinions according to which a person acts.

We often under-appreciate the fact that to have such opinions is the privilege of a sovereign person living an independent life. Most people gain such independence not through metaphysical meditations, or even from liberties granted from above, but rather by possessing private property and running their own business. Most Russians do not have property and still work for the government, upon which they feel very dependent.

For almost a century, they were actively taught not to have opinions; they were in fact punished for having them. They remember this part of their education, and they still do not see much use in having their own opinions. Hence, however accurately you conduct a poll, you cannot reveal what does not exist. You can skim superficial sentiments and momentary emotions. Those are too volatile, though, and should not be given too much credence.

Similar considerations may be applied to a phenomenon even more important than opinion polls: elections. A democratic election also must have two components: first, a political and legal framework, and secondly, voters. Again, most Russians are not real voters--yet. For many of them, voting is merely a required ceremony or a way to express their emotions rather than a political act with consequences. Many Russians do not believe that their vote can influence the outcome of an election, or that it can somehow influence their future life. Most elections in post-soviet territories are merely a rubberstamping of the rule of the existing leader or a successor chosen by him. The rare exceptions, which start to approximate democratic elections, are called revolutions--such as in Ukraine, Georgia, or Kyrgyzstan.

The paradox of Putin’s first term election may serve as a good example that both opinion polls and voting in Russia carry very little weight. The totally unknown Putin was elected only because he was appointed by Yeltsin and ran on a platform of continuity, whereas at the same time the approval rating of Yeltsin himself and his policies dropped to 12%.

We ignore all these factors and concentrate only on the technical aspects of elections in these countries. We send hundreds of observers to make sure that all formal rules are adhered to, and if they are, we declare that the country has had a democratic election. As a result, we overrate the elected officials, who at this stage of political development in Russia and other former Soviet countries should be considered merely transitional, provisional authorities.

This one-sided approach is responsible for the America’s main policy mistake toward post-totalitarian countries: equating their majority vote with democracy. As soon as the first elections were completed in Russia, Afghanistan, or Iraq, we rushed to proclaim them democracies. This mistake has had dire consequences both for these countries and the U.S.

People in Russia and similar countries do not take it seriously when their leaders tell them that they are living in a democracy and free market. They take it differently when the ultimate authority on democracy and capitalism, the United States of America, reaffirms the declarations of their leaders. And America reaffirms it not only through numerous statements by its presidents, but in the case of Russia, by issuing it an official “diploma” as a democratic and capitalist country by admitting it to the G-7 club. Russian people looked around and said: “If America says that we live in a democracy and free market, it must be a democracy and free market, but we do not like it. If this is the American lifestyle, we do not like America.” Inadvertently, our impatience has helped both to create a new wave of anti-Americanism in Russia and to discredit not only democracy and the free market, but also freedom itself.

Faced with the eternal dilemma of freedom vs. security, Russia once again turned to the latter. With the primacy of security, it is only natural to have the KGB as a ruler.

If we want Russia to be a democratic country, we have the very difficult task of helping to rehabilitate democracy and capitalism in Russia. So far, we are doing a poor job. We endorse the rule of the KGB, we overlook the suppression of voices of freedom, and we pander to Russian chauvinism and xenophobia.

Until freedom and reason are rehabilitated in Russia, its people and leaders will persist in a quagmire of prejudice and absurdities. The recent campaign concerning Litvinenko’s and Politkovskaya’s murders is a good example of that. Russia’s officials and its controlled media are spreading the idea that behind those murders were forces that tried to discredit Russia and to spoil its relations with the West. It doesn’t occur to them that this is a self-incriminating proposition, since we know that such forces do not exist in the West. I know only of one place where these forces exist. It is Russia. And these forces are heavily concentrated around the Kremlin.

Piontkovsky: It's significant that most of us used the word "opportunity" in our discussion. The tragedy we are dealing with does present an opportunity, maybe the last one, to prevent Russia from sliding into the camp of authoritarian anti-Western dictatorships. Whether this opportunity will be smartly used depends on political will and the integrity of Western leaders, such as George W. Bush and T. Blair personally.

There is an additional human tragedy aspect in this macabre affair:

Given all the emerging evidence it is quite clear that Kovtun and Lugovoy brought Polonium 210 to London. Now they are hidden from the world behind the walls of a highly secret medical establishment. The fate of these people are being now decided in the Kremlin consumed with panic as to what to do next in the face of the growing heap of hard evidence. I see the Kremlin really facing two options here:

Option #1: Lugovoy and Kovtun quietly pass away behind the clinic walls and we will forever be left speculating about the reasons and motives of the Litvinenko assassination.

Option #2: Lugovoy and Kovtun testify against Boris Berezovsky or Leonid Nevzlin as the alleged mastermind behind the crime at a Moscow trial staged by the Kremlin (a-la Zinoviev and Kamenev trials in Stalin's Russia in 1930-s).

Knowing that Putin is famous for his indecision when it comes to serious political action, I would say that the first more inertial and less dramatic variant of events is the likeliest. In any case the fate of Kovtun and Lugovoy is not the subject of envy now. A dramatic factor is the fate of Lugovoy's family. His wife and children traveled with him to London on October 31 and also are in hospital now. What will happen to them now?

Anyway these two young gentlemen sent by the Russian King to England with an important mission look more and more now like the characters of William Shakespeare's "Hamlet" or rather Tom Stoppard 's "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead" play.

If George Bush and Tony Blair let Vladimir Putin get away with this scandal they will become another pair of Rosencrants and Guildenstern. They will become morally dead as proponents of Western principles and values.

Bukovsky: The last thing I intended to do was to question Mr. Levada's integrity. But, as Yuri has explained, opinion polls mean very little in Russia. Suffice it to recall that in 1996, before his second elections, Yeltsin's rating was in single digits. Yet, in a couple of months, he won a landslide victory. Russian polls (and elections) are like a guessing game or a bet on who is more likely to win. They are no a real measurement of public sentiments. And, what else would one expect, bearing in mind that the people are never given a genuine, honest choice? It reminds me a popular joke circulating before Putin's first election victory in 2000 (based on the famous Aesop's fable about Mr. Crow with a piece of cheese, and a hungry Mr. Fox): So, Mr. Fox asks Mr. Crow: "Are you going to vote for Putin?" Mr. Crow keeps his beak closed, mindful of cheese. "Well, tell us, tell us, would you? Just say `yes’ or `no’. Very simple - `yes’ or `no’?" "Yes", finally says Mr. Crow and a happy Mr. Fox scurries away with cheese. Now, a very sad Mr. Crow sits on a tree top and muses: "Suppose I would have said `no.’ Would it change anything?"

Anyway, much more to the point is what the West will do to counteract Russian aggressiveness. Judging by what has been said in this discussion, my suggestions are perceived as too optimistic. Yet, nothing less will do the trick. So, are we at a dead-end? Perhaps we are, in some sense. On the other hand, perhaps this is a new beginning. Indeed, there is little doubt that Frau Merkel, Monsieur Chirac and Signor Prodi will do their best to undermine NATO unity and to water-down any serious measures. Equally, there is little doubt that the new NATO members, former Warsaw Bloc countries and the Baltic states, would vote for the toughest proposals on the table.

So, if a NATO member refuses to accept its responsibility under Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty, its membership should be terminated, should it not? In other words, this might be a great moment to do what is long overdue (and what we have been discussing on Frontpagemag.com for a very long time): to re-configure NATO. There are quite rough times ahead of us, and it sure pays to be well-prepared.

Satter: Andrei Piontkovsky raises an important point. We need to ask ourselves: what are the consequences if the West fails to respond forcefully to the murder of Litvinenko? The problem with contemporary Russia (and with Russia historically) is that it tries to redefine morality. We see this in the Litvinenko case. It is said that Britain is refusing to extradite persons wanted by Russia so Russia is under no obligation to extradite those wanted by Britain. The underlying assumption is that Russian justice is as impartial as British justice.

When the Soviet Union fell, it was suggested that Russia would become an authoritarian state on the Latin American model, corrupt but not totalitarian. Russia is certainly corrupt and authoritarian. But it is an authoritarian regime with pretensions. To a degree largely unanticipated in 1992, a new Russia has emerged with great power ambitions and a renewed insistence on its “special way.” What this amounts to is that the Russian regime refuses to be bound by higher moral values. Acts like the murder of Litvinenko, which it conceives as being in its interest, are treated as wholly legitimate.

Other enemies of the Russian regime have been murdered inside Russia. Litvinenko, however, was murdered, as were several victims of the Soviet regime, in the West. Are we to accept this as normal and lend our implicit support to the deluded Russian view of reality? If we fail to act, can we expect the Russian authorities to be more restrained in the future? And having made such a moral compromise will we be in a position to fight against the Islamic fanatics who are also trying to redefine morality?

We aren’t going to declare war on Russia. We have no intention of disrupting economic relations. We can’t refuse to give them credits because they don’t need our credits. But we can exert moral pressure. This may seem inconsequential but its effect is greater than often imagined, in part because there is no effective moral opposition inside the country. The alternative to attempts to hold the Russian leadership responsible for crimes in which they are implicated – at least in the West - is greater acts of Russian aggression -- as the leadership falls increasingly under the illusion that there is some substance to their talk about Russia’s “special way” after all.

Pacepa: I agree that refusing Russian membership in the G7 as its 8th member may get the Kremlin’s attention. But we must act now. Otherwise, we may see a repeat of what happened during the Cold War, when the Kremlin moved from killing émigrés to assassinating international leaders (Laszlo Rajk and Imre Nagy of Hungary; Lucretiu Pãtrãscanu in Romania; Rudolf Slansky and Jan Masaryk in Czechoslovakia; the shah of Iran; Palmiro Togliatti in Italy). The U.S. kept quiet, and eventually the Kremlin killed America’s own president. (At the time, the leaders of Moscow’s satellite intelligence services unanimously agreed that the KGB had been involved in the assassination of President Kennedy; as a Communist general, I was involved for the next 15 years in Moscow’s cover-up “Dragon” operation aimed at throwing the blame on the U.S. itself for JFK’s death). Again the U.S. kept quiet, and the Kremlin was emboldened to attempt the murder of Pope John Paul II, who had started a crusade against Soviet Communism.

Appeasement and closing an eye to evil do not work. Appeasement was instrumental in spawning the current wave of international terrorism. In December 1979 the Kremlin assassinated the American-educated prime minister of Afghanistan, Hafizullah Amin, replaced him with a Soviet puppet, and invaded the country. The U.S. merely protested by boycotting the Olympic Games in Moscow. That indulgent attitude generated the Taliban regime and Osama bin Laden’s terrorism. In the 1990s, the U.S. government virtually ignored bin Laden’s first assault on the World Trade Center, the bombings of the U.S. embassies in Africa, and the attack on the USS Cole. Subsequently, we had barely set foot in the 21st century when bin Laden’s terrorists directly attacked our country and unleashed a relentless general war against us.

For the long run, we should help the Russians learn about our Western democracy. They have never before experienced a free society, have never really owned property or been allowed to make decisions for themselves. They have never had a real political party, and few in post-Soviet Russia seem to see a particular need for one. But they are the only ones who can rid Russia of Putin-style leaders. Turning that huge country westward may be a lengthy, sinuous and expensive process, but we can help. I suggest publishing this Symposium in Russian as well. And maybe later, we could have a weekly Russian edition of the FrontPagemag.com. Let us remember that the missiles that destroyed European Communism were originally launched from Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty.

Woolsey: I especially like David Satter's formulation that we have now a Russia "with pretensions" that seeks to "redefine morality". This is indeed far more totalitarian than what most of us had hoped for from a post-Yeltsin Russia. Many were prepared to understand some degree of corruption and authoritarianism in the aftermath of the chaotic nineties. But these pretensions and this indignity when assassinations and provocations are exposed are quite remarkable. At least the Communists had a bizarre ideology as a cover story for their trashing of things like truth and elementary human rights. Putin and the siloviki have nothing but the indignant pretensions of raw power.

Were it not for fossil fuels those pretensions would get the derision they deserve. But as one Russian neighbor after another is exposed to natural gas blackmail, as one international energy corporation after another is subjected to godfather-like offers they can't refuse and their investments, well, stolen, the character and extent of Russian extortion get clearer. As Tom Friedman puts it, the path of freedom and the price of oil run in opposite directions.

But last Sunday something happened in Detroit that bears watching, especially in Moscow, Caracas, Riyadh, and Tehran -- wherever the price of oil fuels repression. The General Motors that many thought moribund dramatically unveiled a concept car and joined Toyota in a race to be first into the market with a plug-in hybrid passenger vehicle. The plug-in aspect is crucial - both companies are headed toward having on the market soon cars that get on the order of 500 miles per gallon of petroleum products. This is because they can run on cheap off-peak electricity by being plugged in at night, but then just become an ordinary hybrid after some 40 miles of all-electric driving. And what liquid fuel they use after their all-electric run need not be petroleum-based -- it can easily be ethanol or bio-or renewable-diesel.

Can the new battery technology that makes 500 mpg (of gasoline) cars possible undermine the roots of Russian pretensions? Stay tuned. Consumers who will enjoy seeing their driving costs cut to a fraction of today's, the automobile companies that have woken up, and electric utilities (who smile at the prospect of being able to sell otherwise-wasted off-peak power) are joining the environmentalists and those who are seriously concerned about depending on dictatorships and autocratic kingdoms for our transportation fuel. These folks don't see everything alike, but they are united in having had it with oil. The need for natural gas for electricity generation and heating is another story -- but even there we are seeing important progress both in the efficiency of renewables and in the ability to utilize coal in a way that sequesters the carbon produced by its use. One can now begin to see a future where sitting on oil and gas reserves doesn't give dictators and autocrats anything like the leverage they have today. The progress of energy technology, Mr. Putin, does not bode well for your pretensions.

Yarim-Agaev: The KGB is not capable of inventing new morality, and does not need to do so. This new “revolutionary morality” was created by Lenin a century ago. According to this morality, specific rules of operations were developed for Soviet structures, such as the KGB, which has been operating under those rules for generations.

Now, without the communist system, the KGB is left with those rules like a severed limb with knee reflexes. The reflexes are simple. The enemy is neither good nor bad; it is only strong or weak. The US is enemy number one. If America comes up with any conciliatory step, it is a sign of weakness and invites attack. If attack does not encounter retaliation, it must be escalated.

These are typical rules for such structures. Look at Syria. Just as Washington started to mention it as a possible partner in Iraq’s situation, Syria immediately killed the most pro-democratic Lebanese minister. It was a knee-jerk reflex. One cannot exert moral pressure on a knee. Political or financial retaliation, yes. Even a knee can learn restraint, if with every jerk a leg painfully hits something hard.

Having said that, I do not deny the importance of providing a political and moral standard to people in Russia. For that purpose, however, we need first to stick to our own principles without compromising them and adapting to other countries’ rules, as we do now. Here are a couple of examples.

We know that a necessary condition for democracy to take root in Russia is to have a lustration, i.e., to prohibit former communists and KGB officers from holding positions of power. This condition is even more important for a democratic election than a proper vote count. We cannot force Russia to adopt a law to that effect, yet nobody can force us to recognize Russia as a democracy until such a law is passed. And we should not pretend that there exists some alternative form of democracy—Putin’s so-called “sovereign” democracy—which does not require such a condition.

The second example is the broadcasting done by Radio Liberty and the BBC, which were major vehicles for providing moral and political support to Russian democrats. As we have written recently, the work of these radio stations was greatly compromised by modifying their programs to the taste of the Russian audience and government.

These compromises are based on two premises: that we have to appease the Russian government, since we depend on it, and that we have to gain instant popularity with the Russian people, since that would help world peace and stability. Both premises are wrong and counterproductive.

We do not depend on the Russian government either strategically or economically. Our alleged strategic dependence is based on the fact that Russia has leverage over our enemies, such as Iran and North Korea. But Russia has this leverage only because it is their ally, not ours, and always acts in their interests.

There is no more validity to our alleged economic dependence on Russian oil. This is mutual interdependence, whose degree is determined by the percentage of oil in the corresponding GNP. Since oil constitutes a much smaller part of our GNP than Russia’s, we depend on Russia much less, than Russia depends on us. We can easily eliminate any dependence on oil by building nuclear power plants—the cleanest source of energy from the environmental standpoint. I welcome any new scientific developments, but I do not think that they will change our attitude. The existing economy and technology are sufficient for our independence. This dependence is not of a material, but rather of a psychological nature, and we can change this perception at any moment.

Our government is trying to gain popularity in Russia by supporting the KGB and by pandering to Russian chauvinism. This is a great disservice to the Russian people and an awkward way to improve relations between our countries. Such a policy helps to enhance the worst of the Russian nation and to suppress the best. It is demoralizing for true Russian democrats, people who deserve our real support. There may not be many of them, but they are the only hope for Russia to develop into a free, democratic and peace-loving country.

Piontkovsky: For Western governments to stand up to the Putin's regime is not just an issue of morality or concern for Russian democracy. It's an issue of self-interest and security.

Emboldened by US failure in Iraq, Putin's regime is challenging Western strategic interests more openly and aggressively all over the world. There is no brutal dictator or murderer in the world (from the Burma junta to Sudan’s genocidal rulers) which wouldn't be supported and covered both politically and militarily by Moscow.

Americans somehow talked themselves into the double stupidity. They still believe that they need Putin for dealing with Iran, North Korea, Syria and other rogue states and that they also need to reward him politically for his services.

But Putin has already been playing on the side of enemies of the West for a long time. Paradoxically he is also playing on the side of Russia’s enemies because enemies of the West (i.e. Islamofascists) regard Russia as part of the "satanic" West. Putin hates the West more than he loves Russia.

For the sake of Western, Russian and World security this disruptive and suicidal course of Moscow foreign policy should be stopped. And Western governments have sufficient leverages to do it.

Putin`s KGB cleptocracy wants to enjoy two pleasures simultaneously: to hate the West and to harm it and at the same time to enjoy a wealthy Western lifestyle. (Nothing new about it - the same is the behaviour of Saudi royals. All of their billions of dollars are held in Western banks and their real estate is at Cote d'Asure, Florida and Canary Islands.

The day after Crown Prosecutor office names the suspects in Litvinenko murder, Putin and his "brigade" should be demanded to expose the superiors of Lugovoy and Covtun, those KGB generals who were sent on their murder mission to London. Putin should be told very clearly that there will be no business as usual with him any more. If he gets away with this murder, he will not only hate the West but also despise it.

FP: Oleg Kalugin, Richard Pipes, Vladimir Bukovsky, Jim Woolsey, Lt. Gen. Ion Mihai Pacepa, David Satter, Yuri Yarim-Agaev and Andrei Piontkovsky, thank you for joining to Frontpage Symposium.

Notes:

[1] Steven Lee Myers, “Treason trial evokes ghosts of Soviet past,” International Herald Tribune, June 12, 2002, Internet edition, www.iht.com/articles/61081.html.

[2] “The Perils of Catching Cold,” The Time Inc., Magazine Company, December 1997, p. 38, Internet Edition, geocities.com/CapitolHill/Lobby/9802/yelt1.

[3] “Can the crisis end in a coup?” Moscow, the Nezavisimaya Gazyeta, July 7, 1998, p. 1.

[4] Barry Renfrew, “Boris Yeltsin Resigns,” The Washington Post, December 31, 1999, 6:48 a.m.

[5] Ariel Cohen, “End of the Yeltsin Era,” The Washington Times, January 3, 2000, Internet Edition, cohen-20000103.

Jamie Glazov is Frontpage Magazine's managing editor. He holds a Ph.D. in History with a specialty in U.S. and Canadian foreign policy. He edited and wrote the introduction to David Horowitz’s Left Illusions. He is also the co-editor (with David Horowitz) of The Hate America Left and the author of Canadian Policy Toward Khrushchev’s Soviet Union (McGill-Queens University Press, 2002) and 15 Tips on How to be a Good Leftist. To see his previous symposiums, interviews and articles Click Here. Email him at jglazov@rogers.com.