[lbo-talk] George Bush as Russia's Manna From Heaven

[Chris Doss]

George Bush as Manna From Heaven
By Alexei Bayer
Moscow Times
Friday, October 22, 2004. Page 8

You don't often see Russia's political leaders endorse
American presidents, certainly not conservative
Republicans. But Vladimir Putin's recent comments at a
news conference in Dushanbe, Tajikistan, amount to a
ringing endorsement of U.S. President George W. Bush.

Moreover, by declaring that terrorists in Iraq are
directing their attacks personally against Bush and
that their goal is to prevent his re-election, Putin
clearly played into the hands of the Bush campaign.
The American incumbent's central message has been that
he is the best man to make the world, and the United
States, safe from terror. 

This wasn't the first time the Kremlin extended a
helping hand to Bush. Last June, for example, Putin
suddenly declared -- without a shred of evidence --
that Russian security services had repeatedly warned
Washington about terrorist attacks on U.S. soil being
prepared by Saddam Hussein's agents. That too was
helpful to Bush, who at the time was struggling to
explain to the American public the link between the
war on terror and the Iraqi dictator.

But for the source of those statements, they could
have easily been used in Bush/Cheney commercials
running in battleground U.S. states. However, you
can't separate the message from the messenger. An
apparent endorsement by Putin puts Bush into a rogue
gallery of foreign political leaders whom Russia
supports, including Belarussian strongman Alexander
Lukashenko and convicted felon and Ukrainian Prime
Minister Viktor Yanukovych.
  
At first sight, it seems clear why Moscow should back
that unsavory twosome. Keeping the two Slavic
ex-Soviet republics on a tight leash is integral to
the revival of Russia's imperial ambitions under
Putin. It seems far less obvious what Russia hopes to
gain from Bush's re-election. 

In reality, it is exactly the opposite. Lukashenko has
been nothing but an embarrassment and a financial
burden on Russia, and Ukraine under a universally
ostracized President Yanukovych would be the same. 

On the other hand, Russia should thank its lucky stars
for Bush's first term. In fact, Bush should be placed
high on the list of crazy favors Providence seems to
have showered Russia with in the course of its
history. 

All successful modern nations benefited from good
fortune or lucky turns at some point in their history.
However, Russia has been particularly favored by
fortune. Throughout its history, there is always some
inexplicable event saving Russia from inevitable
destruction at the last moment or helping it expand
its already vast domains. In the 14th century,
invading Tatars turned back from Moscow after
Tamerlane had a vision of the Virgin in a dream. Peter
the Great was briefly captured by Crimean Tatars while
battling the Swedes, but was then suddenly let go.
Invading foreigners, from Napoleon to Hitler, were
driven out of Russia by unusually vicious winters. It
should also be mentioned that Russia has been blessed
not only by a vast territory but by a wide variety of
natural resources, which the other two large countries
in the Old World, China and India, so glaringly lack.

It is therefore not at all surprising that the most
beloved character in Russian folklore is the
simple-minded younger son, who spends his days lying
by the stove but who in the end, with the help of
incredible good fortune, gets the firebird, the
kingdom and the beautiful princess. 

But to counteract their good fortune, Russians have
been going out of their way to do great harm to
themselves. The communist era was especially egregious
in this respect. In the two decades from the October
Revolution to 1937, the country exterminated its
writers, artists and scientists, shot and exiled its
service nobility and competent administrators,
expropriated its entrepreneurs and business managers,
and dispossessed its productive peasants. The great
Soviet economic experiment created a remarkably
wasteful system, which for eight decades produced
machinery to mine coal and iron ore in order to
produce steel and make more machinery.

Naturally, when the entire rotten system came apart,
Russia was plunged into a severe economic, political
and social crisis, which culminated in the 1998 ruble
devaluation and debt default.

Things seemed dire enough until 2000, when the United
States elected Bush as president. Bush's foreign
policy blunders have been tailor-made to help Russia
resolve its numerous problems. First and foremost,
Bush's misguided invasion of Iraq stirred trouble in a
volatile, unstable region, driving oil prices to
record levels and heightening Russia's strategic
position as a relatively predictable supplier of
energy. In addition, Washington's single-minded
concentration on the war on terror in the aftermath of
Sept. 11, 2001, provided a unique opportunity for
Moscow to find a multilateral solution to its
festering separatist war in Chechnya. Finally, by
straining the United States' relations with its allies
in Western Europe, Bush's White House raised fears in
Paris and Berlin that America could turn into a rogue
nation, driving them closer to Moscow.

All this created conditions for Russia to become a
pivotal international player once again, and to
develop its economy by attracting foreign investment.
During Putin's stable first term, the country seemed
to be moving in this direction. However, the judicial
persecution of Yukos, which began in the summer of
2003, was a watershed. Since then, Russia has
definitively turned away from economic reforms and
democracy, wasting its considerable financial windfall
and reminding potential Western partners why they had
been so leery of Russia to start with.

The good luck represented by Bush's election has not
run its course yet. Bush may yet be re-elected.
However, having good luck is not the same as taking
advantage of it. While the hero of Russian folklore is
always skillful in exploiting his big chance, Russian
leaders have been rather the opposite. Russia's great
good luck of having Bush in the White House for
another four years is likely to be wasted as well.
What Russia has never had good luck with is the
quality of its leadership.

Alexei Bayer, a New York-based economist, writes the
Globalist column in Vedomosti on alternate weeks. He
contributed this comment to The Moscow Times.


=====
Nu, zayats, pogodi!


		
_______________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Express yourself with Y! Messenger! Free. Download now. 
http://messenger.yahoo.com