“The Importance of Being Russia”

from Limes 6/2004

By Lucio Caracciolo

Russia will decide between the United States and China. Whether this will be another American century or if instead it will witness the rise of the Middle Kingdom will depend in large on the fortunes of the Russian Federation. The major heir of the Soviet Union keeps in its immense territory the resources and the threats capable of altering the course of history.

The resources are energy-related. Russia is the primary exporter of natural gas and the second greatest exporter of oil in the world. The Americans and especially the Chinese are interested in energy exports managed by Moscow, to diversify the sources of energy supply in times of geopolitical uncertainty. The outcome of the veiled conflict for control of Russian fields and for the means of commercialization of hydrocarbons will contribute to redefining international hierarchies on a global scale.

The threats are atomic. The Cold War is over, it appears.But Russian and American nuclear forces remain in a state of alarm, ready to reciprocally strike one another. Russia is the only country in the world capable of launching a nuclear attack on the United States. Moscow still possesses 18 thousand atomic warheads and 631 intercontinental ballistic missiles. And it is announcing a new generation of supermissiles in order to punch through a US “space shield”. Worse: fissile material has already leaked from the decaying net of its nuclear apparatus to terrorists groups and proliferating states.

As an extreme paradox, the Russian Federation would prove to be a decisive factor even if it collapsed. Energy resources and atomic threats do not depend on the existence of the state. Rather, the end of Russia as an international actor would make the hunt for oil and gas all the more savage. And the dangers of proliferation of weapons of mass destruction would multiply. A godsend for terrorists, who already today, according to the secretary of the Russian Security Council, Igor’ Ivanov, could plunder supplies of chemical weapons or put together a radioactive dirty bomb, sufficient to sow destruction and panic in a major city (see note 1).

The disintegration of the Federation is not an academic hypothesis. Until a few years ago, it was a probability admitted by Russian leaders themselves: “Today we are seriously threatened by the danger that our country will fall to pieces”, stated Prime Minister Evgenij Primakov in his inaugural speech on September 14, 1998 (see note 2). Since he took power in January 2000, Vladimir Putin has made the salvation of the Russian state his absolute priority.
Primum vivere. Seeing that Russia will perhaps never again be a superpower. But it intends to participate as an actor in the reconstruction of a new global balance of power, destroyed by the fall of the USSR.

Put differently, Putin wants Russia to play a decisive role in the Sino-American game as a subject and not as an object. As a power factor able to defend its own interests, not as an immense, decomposing Balkans. Its internal and external politics are therefore a function of the necessity of saving the state. For this it is necessary to reconstruct the dorsal fin—the “verticality of power”—broken by Gorbachev’s adventures and Yeltsin’s cyclotomy.

For this objective Putin is ready to sacrifice all, including the parodies of the Western liberal democratic model that during the 1990’s brought Russia to the brink of anarchy. Seen from the Kremlin, the Russian space is too vast and heterogeneous to be governed according to Westminster rules. Holding the residual empire together militates against the importation of mechanisms based on the separation of powers and the alternation of governments of the people. Either democracy or empire. This is the essence, that hardly precludes, but rather implies, recourse to the rites of passage of popular suffrage, opportunely fixed. But the power is Putin.

The president had advertised this immediately to whoever would listen to him.
In his “self-portrait”, depicted conversing with three Russian journalists shortly after entering the Kremlin, Putin stated the necessity of “a more rigid presidential power”.
And to clarify the point, he confessed to the inspiration of Napoleon Bonaparte.
Then he fixed his stakes. First: “Since time out of mind in Russia the state power has been extremely centralized. It is a characteristic that is practically written in the country’s genetic code, in its tradition and the mentality of the people”. Second: “Russia needs a strong state-oriented power”. Third: “Russia will never become the second edition of the United States or Great Britain”. Putin even anticipated the grip on the governors of the provinces—they will be nominated by the Kremlin, not elected by the people: “We can prepare the systems to link them more rigidly to the central power” (see note 3) .

It was hardly expected that the former KGB spy would succeed in the historical task he has assigned himself. But it is necessary to recognize a certain coherence in him. And a great deal of courage, seeing that if he fails he will be the first to pay: the more that power is identified with one person, the easier the search for a scapegoat.

To get the Russian colossus back on its feet again, Putin must cure it of at least five degenerative maladies, all connected: the demographic decline; the energy monoculture, a drug on which nearly the entire economy depends; the pervasiveness of corruption and the mafias; the delegitimization of politics and its institutions, the Kremlin excepted for now; the internal and external geopolitical fragility. They are five aspects of the same structural weakness: the Russian state does not control vast portions of its own territory.
If it does not recover at least some strategic position the prognosis remains in doubt.

Lets examine separately the five emergencies and their eventual remedies.

A) Each year, starting from 1999, at least 900 thousand Russians exit this world. According to the 2002 census their were then 145,181,900 Russians (81.5% from the eponymous ethnic group), today they estimate little more than 143 million of them. In 2003 the average life expectancy in Russia was 64.9 years (72 for women, 58.6 for men), compared to 70.1 for the Soviet Union in 1987. More than justifying the alarm expressed by Putin in 2000: If the present trend keeps up, the survival of the nation will be in jeopardy” (see note 4).
The trend continues.

Alcohol is lethal, causing one of three deaths, particularly among men. The vice of vodka and its perfidious surrogates kills individuals and destroys families. Often wives push for divorce as a result of their husbands’ attachment to the bottle. Couples rarely produce more than one child. From this some catastrophic extrapolations—perhaps excessively linear—by which Russia will lose 50 million inhabitants in 50 years (see note 5).

The depopulation is accentuated in the already semi-deserted Siberian regions and it is scourging the countryside: according to the 2002 census, out of 155 thousand villages, 13 thousand are simply abandoned and 35 thousand house less than ten souls. And if Moscow is growing (by 16.7% from 1989 to 2002), St. Petersburg is falling off (-6.4%). Of particular geopolitical importance is the growth in the Caucasian regions and even more so the Islamic settlement, crucible of separatisms. The migrations from the countries of the former Soviet Union compensate in part for the demographic decline and stimulate ties between Russia and its ancient imperial peripheries. The immigration between 1989 and 2002 of about 6 million Russians hailing from ex-Soviet republics, where there remain about 19 million “red feet”, is symptomatic. A Russian and Russian-speaking diaspora that in some countries, especially the Baltics, is considered Moscow’s fifth column and treated of consequence.

B) The legendary corruption of the Russian bureaucracy has inspired the very realistic imagination of illustrious writers. The culture of illegality—or better of abuse—prepares the ground for organized crime. Which “controls a notable portion of the national economy”, as Putin admits (see note 6). According to Russian intelligence sources, 40% of the wealth and 70-80% of business transactions are in the hands of about 100 thousand Mafiosi divided into 8 thousand groups, deferent to about fifty “brigades” rooted on Russian territory and possessing serious international ramifications (for example, the Cypriot offshore account, repository of Russian Mafia funds—and not only theirs). Principal fields of activity: trafficking in arms, drugs and human beings, recycling of dirty money, and parallel commerce in oil and methane. The same public administration participates in the feast, to the extent that it is often difficult to distinguish between police and thieves.

Alongside the “classic” mafia, that has its vanguard in the Muscovite brigade Solncevo, the so-called “government” cartels sprung up during the Yeltsin years. Other bureaucrats and secret service officials have not missed the opportunity to pounce on the fallen superpower’s patrimony. In the perception of the overwhelming majority of Russian citizens, the following formula has emerged: Mafioso=oligarch=democratic and pro-Western reformer (to which some would add Jewish). One can guess the result this has on the legitimization of democracy in Russia.

The “national” mafias are of special significance, the Chechen one above all others, celebrated for its ferocity. Perhaps more dangerous is the penetration of the Chinese triads in Vladivostok and central-eastern Siberia. The clandestine banks of the Chinese Mafiosi have invested in hotels, restaurants, casinos and cafes in the Primorje Territory. The “yellow invasion” that haunts many Russians assumes the contours of the mafia.

C) The spectacular growth rates of the Russian Gross Domestic Product in the last five years—in 2003 it reached 7.3% (a record in the G8 sphere) while this year the trend is declining towards 6.5%—are due largely to energy exports. The growth of oil production (which has reached 9 million barrels a day) and the boom in the price of crude oil has further illustrated the dependency of the Russian economy on the energy sector, which is alone worth 25% of the GDP while employing 1% of the population. A structural vulnerability with potentially devastating consequences if the curve of oil prices hits bottom. And especially if solid alternatives to the pure export of hydrocarbons are not found.

In the meantime we can observe the overturning of power relations between the military-industrial complex (Vpk), jewel of the Soviet era, and the now dominant energy and fuel sector (Tek). In theory, this would mean a victory of the private over the public.

This is undercut by the fact that Russian “privatizations” are a form of auto-privatization carried out by political-economic groups tied to the power.

The logic of the energy monoculture rests on the growing productive capacity and enormous reserves, especially in the natural gas sector (1.680 trillion square feet). But in this perspective commercialization will decide all. In the case of gas, Russia has sufficient reserves to remain the world’s primary exporter for a long time. Investments on plants and gas pipelines are however of such dimensions that to maximize them it is best also to transport the gas of other producers. As far as oil is concerned, Russian production, expected to supersede 10 million barrels a day by 2010, will not be able to sustain this rate for decades. The transportation and sale of other nations’ crude oil, especially those of the former Soviet countries of the Caspian (thanks to the investments of Western societies), will therefore become vital. From the Kremlin’s point of view it is essential that oil coming from within its former borders be commercialized from Russian territory. In this instance, its vastness is an advantage, because it puts Russia in direct communication with the areas of consumption, from Europe to China, from Japan to the United States.

When Putin took power, the energy sector was in the hands of oligarchs deferent to Yeltsin’s “family”. They operated according to the logic of the market, indifferent to Russian national interests. If anything, the oligarchs were inclined to associate with the great American and British oil companies, which, when commercializing their hydrocarbons, interact with their governments, seeking to balance the needs of the firms and national interests. In Russia, the some of the interests of a few large energy companies did not produce a national strategy.

The ongoing dismantlement of the oil giant, Yukos, through politico-judiciary channels exemplifies Putin’s attempt to reconstruct a national energy strategy that makes Russia the fulcrum of hydrocarbon trade on a Eurasian scale. An ambitious design that rests on the compelling the major energy companies to do the president’s fiduciary work. The task of attracting Western investments to enlarge the productive base, exploiting the resources of eastern Siberia and the Arctic Ocean, is up to the new oligarchs.

At the same time, the liquidation of Mikhail Khodorkovskij’s empire signals the Kremlin’s decision to restore order in the fiscal jungle. Unearthing the Yukos accounts, the Russian justice system has “discovered” the cheerful system of elusion based on the areas assigned to facilitate taxation (like the autonomous District of Evenki and the Republic of Calmucchia), that would have had to favor the exchange between fiscal exemption and investments of the major energy corporations, promised but never realized (see note 7). More interesting yet is the case of the domestic offshore accounts; those of the former atomic Soviet cities, closed and secret centers where fissile plutonium was produced or nuclear warheads were designed and assembled. Among the strategies devised by Moscow to limit intelligence (and plutonium) leaks, is the attempt to attract oil corporations to the atomic citadels through suitable tax breaks. So in Arzamas-16, the first Russian atomic city, built in 1946 on the historical site of the Sarov monastery, since the fall of the Soviet Union, the only active scientists are employed for research by the oil and gas companies. The atomic cities are by now corporate centers entrusted to the energy giants.

D) The fiscal question is tied to the recent politico-institutional reforms promoted by the Kremlin and to the struggle against corruption. In all cases the goal is to tighten the loose screws of state control over territory.

The tragedy of Beslan has moved Putin to mark a turning point. Russia is at war, stated the president on September 4: “Some want to steal ‘a nice piece of pie’ from us. And others help them in the conviction that Russia—as one of the world’s major nuclear powers—still constitutes a threat. This threat is gone (see note 8). Shortly after, the deputy head of Kremlin administration, Vladislav Surkov, provided the authentic interpretation of Putin’s words. Russia is menaced by “decision-makers in America, Europe and the East”. An international conspiracy that aims to liquidate that which remains of the Eurasian superpower. And “terrorism is only an ulterior instrument of their design”.
As in any self-respecting plot, there is a “fifth column” of “extremists on the right and on the left”, guilty of conspiring with the enemy. In Surkov’s flowery metaphor, “the lemons (referring to the National-Bolsheviks of Eduard Limonov) and the apples (“Apple” is the name of Grigorij Javlinskij’s pro-Western party) grow on the same branch”. In sum, “the enemy is at the gates, and the frontline runs inside every city, along every street, through every house” (see note 9).

This up-to-date version of the theory of encirclement, with which the Russian and Soviet powers have always justified clampdowns against internal enemies, is intended to legitimate the reconstruction of the “ladder of power”. Thus the presidential proposal for reform of the electoral system to make it more proportional. It should produce a peculiar Russian brand of bipartisanism. Alongside the president’s current party—Russia Unity—already dominant in the Duma, a second more or less Kremlinist party would arise, formed by splinters of what remains of the Communist Party, by Dmitrij Rogozin’s Party of the Patria and the followers of the picturesque nationalist leader Vladimir Zirinovskij.

With the relations of forces in the center thus stabilized, it remains to straighten the periphery. Here “verticality of power” means tying all the links in the chain of territorial command to the Kremlin. Putin has completed the first step, nominating seven super-prefects, his underlings in as many macroregions. The next step will be the presidential nomination of provincial governors. The third, still in pectore, would extend those criteria to the mayors of the provincial capitals, which otherwise could assert themselves in the confrontations with the governors over their popular legitimacy.

In the West—more than in Russia—diverse voices have been raised to denounce the “authoritarian involution”. Zbigniew Brzezinski has compared Putin to Mussolini. It is hardly surprising that the same one who theorized the need to split the Russian Federation, not content with the Soviet suicide, can now be found denouncing the Kremlin’s presumed fascist drift. It is coherent to long for a liberal democratic Russia and propose to break it apart. History teaches that holding together the empire is the “Russian system”: a specific mode of government (not traceable to any political science manual) that according to Lilija Sevcova, analyst for the Carnegie Endowment, mixes “paternalism, dominion of the state over the individual, isolation from the outside world and ambition to be a great power”. At the top, “a powerful leader, above the law, or rather the incarnation of the law” (see note 10).

Nor should one think that the Putin-led reforms are encountering harsh resistance from Russian public opinion—a somewhat abstract category, owing to the Kremlin’s control over almost all media. The president’s approval rate from 2000 up to today has remained over 70%. As Jurij Dzibladze, director of the Center for Development of Democracy and Human Rights, observes, the majority of Russians considers civil liberties “an abstraction that has nothing to do with daily life” and is ready “to sacrifice them” (see note 11).

E) The continuity of the frontiers, an immense continuum of over 70 thousand kilometers, from the Great North Arctic to the Black Sea, from the Asiatic steppes to the Sea of Japan, is essential for Russia’s stability. In the most unstable areas of the Russian limes, internal and external thrusts and counterthrusts intersect, which simultaneously or in succession can lead to the disintegration of the Federation (over 17 million square kilometers). Along with domestic fragility of ethnic, economic or social origin, one can add that caused by the aging, weakened transportation networks. So any zone of weakness can become an island exposed to storms.
At the same time, some areas of friction between Russia and the outside world can turn themselves into opportunities if the Russian system manages to connect its interests to those of other peoples. Let us here analyze six macroareas of primary geopolitical importance.

Western Arctic Border.
This area holds notable strategic importance. During the Cold War the Svalbard-Kirkenes line (Northeastern Norway) was the northern extension of the iron curtain, patrolled by Atlantic and Soviet submarines. Still today it is a zone of strict surveillance, but the balance of forces clearly favors the US and its allies.

The risks seem however minor compared to the opportunities. The area of the Barents and KaraSeas rest on a stable Russian territory, which also thanks to climate changes can enhance the value of Siberian hydrocarbons and offshore drilling, convoying them towards Western markets. The terminal of Murmansk is destined to become the gateway for crude oil exports from the Timan-Pecora basins and western Siberia, particularly heading in the direction of the US.

Baltic.
Descending towards the southwest we encounter a much more contested area, that of the Baltic. Putin is transforming his St. Petersburg into the showcase of the empire.
But here Russia is confronted with an array of Russophobe states—Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland—besides Sweden, formally neutral but geostrategically anti-Russian.
So the projected Baltic pipeline that should transport Russian methane to Germany and the rest of Europe from the gate of Vyborg near St. Petersburg is largely underwater, so as not to deal with the eventual transit problems raised by hostile countries. A conduit with high geopolitical content, destined to merge Russian and European interests: “The day in which British and Norwegian gas reserves will be exhausted is not far off.After that, we will become the sole supplier of gas to Europe”, explains Putin (see note 12).

But the good intentions of Russia and a few other countries, Germany in particular, can be frustrated by tension relating to the future of the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad (Konigsberg), which Lithuanians and Poles want to isolate from the Motherland. There are those who dream of a “fourth Baltic republic”. For Putin the defense of Russian rights to Kaliningrad is not merely a national interest but an imperative of domestic tranquility given that his wife was born there.

Ukraine.
In central eastern Europe, external pressure is concentrated on Ukraine. The enemies of Moscow are aiming for the total Westernization of Kiev to guarantee that Russia will never again extend its empire towards the heart of Europe. The question of the Transdniestr, the Moldovan territory conquered by the Russian mafia, is only an sideshow of the Ukraine game.
For Moscow that strip of land serves to reinforce its influence over Kiev and strengthen its ties with the more Russophilic southeastern zone of Ukraine.

Black Sea-Caucasus-Caspian.
A new area of American pressure, dressed up by Nato, targets the Black Sea-Caucasus-Caspian system. In the Black Sea geostrategic and energy objectives intertwine. The first concerns the control of the Soci coastline, last Russian outpost on the “warm-water seas”. The second derives from the outlets of conduits of oil and gas exports controlled by Moscow on the Russian tract of the Black Sea.

The external Western thrust on the Caucasus-Caspian system was realized with the obtaining of indirect control over Georgia. The new pro-American president Saakashvili (so amenable to Washington that it embarrasses the Bush administration, which would like a low profile) wants to conclusively remove his broken and exhausted country from the Kremlin’s influence.In the meantime the US has planted their base in Krtsanisi, near Tblisi.

Moscow fears that American pressure in the Transcaucasus will stimulate secessionisms that assail the Russia Caucasus and could extend further north, towards federal subjects with higher Islamic density. Putin explained in his autobiographical libretto of 2000 that Russia would never have conceded independence to Chechnya to avoid an explosive domino effect.
In fact, the Islamic guerillas active in Chechnya “wanted to annex Daghestan and would have been the beginning of the end. The whole Caucasus would have fallen: Daghestan, Inguscezia and then, following the course of the Volga, Baskortostan (Baschiria) and Tatarstan; a deep penetration into the heart of the country” (see note 13).

Reversing perspective, the entire area understands and western Kazakhstan could offer Moscow the opportunity to create an integrated system of energy exchange, multiplying the possibilities of exportation towards the west, by way of the Black Sea, towards the south by way of the Gulf of Oman and the Arabian Sea and towards the north through the network of continental Russia.

Siberia.
The Chinese are exerting pressure on the Siberian front, resulting from the economic and particularly the demographic disparity between the northern provinces of China and the southern ones of Siberia: one hundred million Chinese against seven million Russians.
They fear “the yellow invasion” in an area that is inhospitable but very rich in natural resources (minerals, lumber, energy). The lines of Chinese penetration reach to the west at the Novosibirsk-Krasnojarsk-Irkutsk axis. In the center, Mongolia is within the Chinese sphere of influence. In the east, migratory flows from Manchuria trend towards Vladivostok and the PrimorjeTerritory.

Demography and geopolitics also explain the three-man game over the future of energy channels from Siberia to China and/or Japan. Beijing is well-prepared for Siberian oil and has tried in vain to convince Putin to grant them the privilege of a pipeline from Angarsk towards Daqing, in the Chinese Northeast, from the channel at the Russian door of Nakhodka, on the Sea of Japan, that interests Tokyo. The Russian president has been clear with his peer Hu Jintao: “First of all we must defend our national interests: to develop the Russian territories of the Far East” (see note 14). Despite its contentiousness over Curili, Moscow appears disposed to favor energy relations with Japan to construct together a counterweight to China’s moves in the Northeast Asia.

Bering.
There is a forgotten border between Russia and America. Thirty-seven kilometers of sea—in the Bering Strait—separate the autonomous District of Cukci (737,700 square km with 53,600 inhabitants) and the US state of Alaska (1,530,700 square km for 650 thousand souls).
Beyond the bases and military observation posts, this area has acquired significance for the recent discovery of oil and gas deposits that have yet to be fully exploited. If they wanted to concretize the Russo-American railway projects from Jakutsk (Siberia) to Fairbanks (Alaska) by tunnel, this border could become a symbol of solid connection between the two former archenemies.

The Putin-Surkov theory of international plots is intentionally geared towards internal ends. But for some in the West the Cold War is not over. From the point of view of a part of the American elite Russia’s dimensions remain excessive. Any “succulent slice of cake” subtracted from the former Evil Empire can consolidate the first world of the United States and strengthen them in regards to the Chinese competitor. On the energy level, the ideal Russia for Washington is a country withdrawn to its exclusive resources. A geopolitically weak territory in which to invest—as though it were Kazakhstan—provided that the Russians continue to produce enough oil to steady the stock market.

As far as the threat of weapons and nuclear proliferation is concerned, logic and the instinct for self-preservation would warrant that Washington not want to see Russia’s disintegration.
In such a crumbling structure, even a minor crack can provoke the collapse of the system.
Best not to think of the effects of such a crash on the fate of the weapons of mass destruction more or less under Moscow’s custody. Especially in the contest of the war against Islamic terrorism, which in Russia has battle-hardened deputies to destabilize pieces of territory to establish their own bases and put their hand on nuclear arsenals.

In sum, Washington would like a Russia weak enough to assist their energy interests and to discourage any foolish neo-imperial ambitions, but sufficiently stable to avoid advance jihad in the heart of Eurasia and the plunder of its unconventional weapons. The squaring of the circle. It is not surprising that the American approach towards Russia oscillates between two contradictory necessities. Perhaps with Bush 2 the agencies of American power will mature a unitary vision at least on this dossier. Especially now that Condoleezza Rice, a woman that couples experience in the energy business (Chevron) with training as a Sovietologist, is now Secretary of State. To measure the trends of the White House will be worthwhile to keep a close eye on the major or minor emphasis on human rights, liberty and democracy. Rhetoric is often a excellent geopolitical signpost.

As far as China is concerned, despite the diplomatic fair play and the longing for energy that can best be satisfied by Russia, it is physiologically averse to Moscow. Seen from Beijing, Siberia is a natural zone of demographic and economic expansion. The interpretation of the war on terror dear to Putin and Hu Jintao—each one has a free hand with their Islamic enemies, the Russians in Chechnya and the Chinese in Xinjiang—is not enough to create an alliance. The Russia-China-India “strategic triangle” dreamed up by Primakov to balance the US superpower remains a thing of virtual geometry.

But for Putin the major delusion comes from Europe. The Petersburg leader has strong ideas about Russian identity: “We make up part of Western European culture.
It does not matter where the people of our country live, in the far eastern zones or in the South: we are nonetheless Europeans” (see note 15). Attention, however: “Nato and Europe are not the same thing. And I have already said that Russia is a country of European culture and not of Nato culture” (see note 16). His clever decision to immediately support Washington in the war on terrorism was dictated more by the absence of alternatives than by an overwhelming passion for America. His strategic objective was and remains to anchor Russia to Europe once and for all. Or better, Europe to Russia.

But since May of 2004 the European Union has changed. It has pushed its frontiers to close to the Russian Federation thanks to the integration of culturally and geopolitically Russophobe nations, already gathered under Nato. Thus is secured a Euro-Atlantic front based on former Muscovite or Soviet satellite republics—Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary and Slovenia, while the neo-Atlantic Romania and Bulgaria should accede to the EU in 2007—that leaves aside the old Russophilic Europe, founded on France, Germany and Italy.

The crisis in Euro-Russian relations is degenerating. The surprising attack on Putin by the Dutch foreign minister Bernard Bot (under Baltic pressure) over the managing of the Beslan tragedy is only the tip of the iceberg. The project for an EU-Russia strategic partnership is stalled. As a demonstrative gesture, Moscow postponed the Euro-Russian summit scheduled for November 11th for a couple of weeks. Russia fears that the European Union has inherited, from the Americans, the temptation to play the human rights card to interfere in its internal affairs. Moreover, it sees in the European community a prevalence of Atlantic thought, that conditions its approach toward Russia.

In this context, what are the Italian interests? How can Rome influence the European Union’s approach toward the Russian Federation? It is convenient for Italy that Putin manage to stabilize Russia. We have consolidated good energy and diplomatic relations with Moscow, to which one can add in the last few years the public and one hopes not free friendship between Berlusconi and Putin. ENI is interested in acquisitions that further reinforce its standing in the Russian market, also fishing in the dismembered Yukos.

It is not just a matter of the economy. Italy and Russia are the two countries most damaged by the EU enlargement to fit Nato parameters. We remain the only large European country with an ample extra-community frontier, extending from North Africa to the Balkans and to Switzerland. We are therefore totally exposed to both recurring Balkan turbulence and to the flow of criminal trafficking from Central Asia by way of the Russian (Chechens), Ukrainian and Turkish mafias. It is probable that the Russian president, in his battle to save the state, will use certain mafias to fight other ones which he considers more dangerous. The important thing is that Putin does not become the tool of his hardly presentable tools. If Russia takes the war against organized crime and terrorism seriously, we have great interest in backing it and sponsoring the cause through the EU.

In his dramatic speech on September 4th, Putin sounded some notes of nostalgia for the house in which he was born and for which he spied, the “vast and grand” USSR. And he has admitted to having underestimated the dangers that menace “the nucleus which remains of it”, the Russian Federation. For this he seeks to cover the imperial flanks. In perspective, Putin intends to reintegrate some states once part of the USSR, from Byelorussia to Ukraine and perhaps Kazakhstan. An imperial vision, consistent with the geopolitical doctrines common to the Czars and the secretary generals of the Soviet Communist Party.

It may already be too late. Energy and atomic bombs count for much. But any empire worthy of the name gives off its aura—its soft power, as the Americans would say. The USSR had: communism, the Western utopia theorized by the Russophobe Marx and “realized” in Russia. Today, the Russian Federation has no sway of this sort. It does not conquer the “hearts and minds” of other peoples. In its hard future there will be a new full-fledged empire.
It will be perhaps the great state of the Russians, pompously dressed up as a Third Rome. Or it will be nothing.


  1. Cfr. I. IWANOW, “Russland und die europäische Sicherheit”, Neue Zürcher Zeitung, 11/11/2004, p. 7.
  2. So said Evgenij Primakov in an interview with Rossijskaja Gazeta, 15/9/1998, cit. in editorial “Sangue e terra”, Limes, “La Russia a pezzi”, n. 4/1998, p. 7.
  3. Cfr. V. PUTIN, Memorie d’oltrecortina, Roma 2001, Carocci. The references are taken in order from pp. 159, 184, 178, 210, 208 e 175.
  4. Cfr. the article by V. PEREVEDENCEV in this volume, p. 78.
  5. D. GRAMMATICAS, “Life ebbs away from Russian villages”, BBC, 5/11/2004.
  6. Cfr. “Putin attacks crime-ridden Russia” BBC News, 11/2/2002, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/1813825.stm
  7. Cfr. WORLD TRADE EXECUTIVES, “Political and business intelligence for investors in the FSU”, 1/11/2004, http://www.wtexec.com/RPIStateOffensive.html
  8. V. PUTIN, speech at the Kremlin on 4 September 2004, in President of Russia, Official Web Portal, http://president.kremlin.ru/eng/text/speeches/2004/09/041958_76332.shtml
  9. Cfr. CH. GURIN, “The Kremlin Details Its Enemies List”, The Jameson Foundation, 1/10/2004; M. GLIKIN, “Il nemico alle porte”, Nezavisimaja Gazeta, 4/10/2004.
  10. L. SHEVTSOVA, Putin’s Russia, Washington 2003, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, p. 16.
  11. Cfr. WPS MONITORING AGENCY, “Political forecasts”, 3/11/2004.
  12. “President Putin: Baltic Pipeline is Answer to Europe’s Energy Shortage”, Rosbalt, 6/30/2003.
  13. V. PUTIN, Memorie d’oltrecortina, cit., p. 139.
  14. R. MC GREGOR, “Putin treads carefully on China energy demands”, FT.com, 3/11/2004, http://www.ft.com/cms/s/685d8fbc-1d9b-11d9-abbf-00000e2511c8.html
  15. V. PUTIN, Memorie d’oltrecortina, cit., p. 162.
  16. Ibid. p. 171.