He's Back And He's BAAAD!

Vladimir Putin, every Russian's "Good Czar" was at his self-promoting, uber-nationalist best speaking to the Duma yesterday.  The assembled parliamentarians--most of whom are card carrying members of Putin's United Russia Party--interrupted the Czar's speech with applause a number of times.  It was almost like the good old days when the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union spoke to his adoring sycophants.

The Putin speech gave one the impression that it is a tryout for next year's presidential campaign.  If so one wants to know one fact above all else:  Have Vladimir and his one time protegee, Dimitri Medvedev, reached an agreement on executing another swap of offices or will Vlad of the Bare Chest be squaring off against Dimitri the Techno-Nerd?

In either event the smart money will be on Putin.  Many of the reasons for this contention are to be found in the substance and tone of yesterday's speech.  At the very core of Putin's remarks as of his worldview is nationalism, pure and quite unapologetic nationalism.

This puts Czar Vladimir at a sharp contrast with Dimitri the Sophisticated.  Medvedev is quite cosmopolitan in comparison with Putin.  He is familiar with the West and is happy with his familiarity.  Dimitri sees much in Western economics, technology, society, and politics worthy of translation into Russian.  He does not see the West, either the EU or the US, as a threat--now or into the far future.  If Russia faces a threat in Medvendev's view, it comes from within, from corruption, from inefficiency, from outdated technology, from lack of venture capital, from disease, from alcohol, from despair.

Putin incarnates all the ancient and defining characteristics of Russian nationalism, the free floating fear of outside threats, the sense of inferiority in comparison with the West, the belief that either a state must expand or it will collapse, the sullen withdrawal into plotting a future caper when challenged or defeated in a current ploy.  Like the Russian people generally over the long sweep of the centuries, Putin can swing almost instantly between grandiose euphoria of triumphs in the making to profound, Arctic nights of bleak and cold feelings of failure.  As has been the case so often with so many of his predecessors--both czars and commissars--Vladimir is eager to be suspicious, alert to the faintest hint of potential threat, trembling on the ragged edge of paranoia, and quite sure that no matter how well affairs are going at the moment, the knife in the back and the kick in the groin are soon to happen.

Putin's speech reflected all of these characteristics.  It was ripe, over ripe, with hosannas onto Vladimir the Brilliant, Vladimir the Resolute, Vladimir the Unbelievably Successful.  It was also stuffed with dire warnings of unspecified foreign threats looming over Russia's present and future.  Putin demanded that Russia be stronger, much stronger, in order to counter these threats.  He declaimed more than once that not only did Russia need more, newer, and better weapons of all categories, it needed more births, more children, more sturdy Russian citizens to carry the burden of defending against the array of unspecified but potentially lethal threats confronting nation and state.

Putin took credit and warned of the need to do more, much more, to improve the economy.  Because Putin was so prescient as to have practiced a form of economic autarchy, Russia had come out of the global recession faster and in better shape than all other states.  He warned that only by following the Putin Paradigm and avoiding "sharp moves and ill-conceived experiments" could Russian prosperity be continued and expanded.  This was a less than well-concealed blow directed against Dimitri who is open to both "moves" and "experiments" imported from the Big Boys of the G-whatever.  Even more pointed was his follow-on comment, "those who are weak will get advice from foreign visitors on which way to go and what policy course to pursue."

Ouch!

However, the observation might have been directed as well at the US which has a sorry record extending from Bill Clinton through George W. Bush to Joe Biden of offering gratuitous and semi-insulting advice to various Russian leaders, including both Putin and Medvedev.  The lesson for future American politicians is simple: Never stoke a Russian's inherent bent toward holding on to his inferiority complex.

The Russian prime minister, the once and (perhaps) future president, rejected any notion that Russia might be swept by a people power movement such as those which have so visibly perturbed the Arab states.  Putin assured any nervous auditors that as long as his firm and steady hand is on the helm and as long as his wise and farsighted mind is on the job, the policies of his government will keep the Russian people happy and fully in support of the government.

In line with his keep-the-peasants-happy philosophy of governance, Vladimir the Most Generous and Compassionate took pride in his past and projected increases in state pensions, welfare programs, and the birth incentive scheme.  In addition, the workers and peasants could take joy in the proposed weapons acquisition program, the best part of a trillion dollars over the next five or so years.  The same constituency would receive benefits beyond counting from the Putin Economic Diversification Plan which would reduce Russia's dependency on resource exploitation.  (This served to steal some of Medvedev's thunder as he has been plumping this approach for years now.)

While Good Czar Vladimir did not name any specific "foreign threat," the repeated references to such plays well to the natural and historically deeply rooted Russian fear of invasion.  There are several candidates for the title of "main enemy."

One, of course, is the old standby, the US.  The technological asymmetries between the US and Russian military forces do not operate to Russia's advantage.  The aging and decrepit nature of so much of the old Soviet military machine particularly in the strategic and force projection categories must be worrisome to a crew given to paranoia.  The difficulties experienced to date in bringing a new ICBM online have done nothing to reduce the apprehensions of American superiority rampant in the highest levels of Russian political and military life.  While the Boys in the Kremlin know perfectly well they have nothing to fear from the current American administration, they cannot be sure that We the People will not toss another George W. Bush, or, worse, Ronald Reagan, into the Oval.

A credible alternative is China.  Putin along with the entire military high command is very well aware that the vast majority of China's nuclear delivery systems have Russian zip codes in their reentry vehicles.  They also fret over the basing of the large and increasingly competent Peoples Liberation Army.  It is clear from the locations of the bases that China is not poised to go to war with Vietnam--or India.  So, much as the US is getting Xanax moments from China's adventures in naval construction, the Russians are having an even larger need for Valium from the positioning of the ground combat forces.

There is a prevalent, vague anxiety over the intents of NATO and the EU with respect to the "near abroad," those constituents of the former Soviet Union which have gone their own independent ways since the early Nineties.  The Kremlin will not be ready to sleep with any degree of soundness unless and until it has reestablished operational dominance over places such as Georgia and the Ukraine.  Strategists in Putin's service undoubtedly see these former glacis states as potential points of conflict between Russia and an expansionist oriented NATO/EU combine.  (Hey! Paranoia does not require realism simply rationality.)

Then there are the Muslims.  The ongoing operations against purveyors of violent political Islam in the North Caucasus represent but one part of the emerging challenge presented by militant Islam.  The difficulties currently experienced by several of the now independent Central Asian Republics have already spilled over into Russia and show strong signs of doing more of the same in the near future.  Coupled with ideological appeal and backed by Iran, the advocates of violent political Islam are poised to be a "foreign threat" without equal.  They are a "main enemy" in the process of being created.

Vladimir Putin is a vastly skilled and able Russian politician.  He understands nationalism of the Russian sort and uses it to advance his claim on the throne.  As a Russian nationalist he is guided in foreign affairs by one guiding principle--the national interests of Russia.  Given the high probability of his being elected president once again next year, there is a strong likelihood the US will be dealing with him for some years to come.  In a way he is the best possible interlocutor for the US to have in the Kremlin.  He is a prime example of what you see is what you get.  This means he will continue to be a very difficult person with whom to make a diplomatic deal, but his motives and goals will never be obscure or hazy--and once he has made a deal he will stick with it, provided such is in Russia's national interest.

The Deep Thinkers of the Obama administration would be well advised to parse Putin's speech very closely and carefully.  To do so is to understand the man and his policy context.  To blow off his speech as mere politics, or to deprecate Putin as an imitation Western politician is to do him and us a great disservice.  Vladimir is not just another politician or one more Russian dictator.  No, he is the Good Czar, and a Good Czar with a totally Russian soul.

James Clapper Has Problems With Words

Yesterday in testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee, the Director Of National Intelligence, James Clapper, made a series of blunt statements which perturbed the senators massively.  The remarks regarding the possibility of Gaddafi prevailing in the current insurgency were bad enough apparently.  Even worse was Clapper's contention that Russia and China presented the greatest "mortal threats" to the US.

The Clapper testimony coming as it did on top of his earlier contention that the Muslim Brotherhood had become a primarily secular organization sent at least one powerful Republican senator, Lindsey Graham (SC), into high Earth orbit level dudgeon.  The Chairman of the Armed Services Committee, the antediluvian Democrat from Michigan, Carl Levin, confessed himself nonplussed, saying that Iran and North Korea came to mind far ahead of Russia and China.  With its usual courage and eagerness to defend honestly held and expressed conclusions, the White House dispatched National Security Advisor Tom Donilon to declare Clapper off the reservation and damn his interpretation of events in Libya as too static and having failed to take into account the fluid, dynamics of the situation.

A less impassioned view of the Clapper comments shows that the DNI was not being overly pessimistic.  Nor does it show the man to be somehow demented or terminally out to lunch.  Rather, the larger context indicates that Clapper, a man with nearly a half century in the intelligence racket, was providing an assessment based on capacities without regard to intentions.

The Geek has never been a fan of the Office of National Intelligence.  He saw it (and sees it) as an unnecessary complication in the already overly complex US intelligence community.  The ONI arguably is an artifact of Congress, a disfiguring carbuncle created by poorly informed politicians in response to an overly rapid and superficial analysis undertaken in the panic ridden aftermath of 9/11.  The gestation of ONI was the consequence not so much of a documented need for such an addition but rather the result of the usual politician's need to appear to able to take charge and move out, to do something, anything, so as to reassure We the People that someone, somewhere, is taking care of the store.

The ONI and its Director are presumably the tip of the Great American Intelligence Community Pyramid.  It is to be presumed that the DNI has the best analyses available predicated upon the totality of the best catch.  So, what is wrong?  Why are the senators--and some representatives--so torqued off with Clapper that they want his head detached from the rest of his body?  Is Clapper's view so out of touch with the facts and the analyses that his comments merit only contempt?

Or does the retired Air Force general simply have a problem with words?  Does he choose to speak too bluntly?  Would he be better off if he were to have shaded his assessments, qualified them with appropriate covers of vagueness, and expressed them with well nuanced euphemisms?

Well, let's step back and take a closer look at what Clapper said and what predicates support his views.

The Muslim Brotherhood is a many faceted creature.  As testimony before Representative King's subcommittee brought forth yesterday, the vast majority of Muslim terror plots in the US can be traced in one way or another to some faction or personality in the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood.  Homegrown terror appears to develop best if provided with foreign fertilizer.

At the same time, the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood has had to learn to deal with the real world's real problems in realistic ways during its years of operating an impressive array of social and educational services throughout the country.  It is not surprising that the Brotherhood has discovered the strictures and duties of the Koran do not provide all, or even most, of the solutions which must be constructed to meet the real and pressing needs of Egypt's massive impoverished population.  This has provided a significant impetus to adopting secular answers to the challenges confronting the Egyptians.

The tension between these two poles of the Brotherhood has existed for some years.  It has grown in recent months and weeks.  The uprising in Egypt and the consequent removal of Hosni Mubarak have accelerated the growth of the tension.

This implies strongly that Clapper was not wrong in his assessment but did not express it in a way which properly noted that while tensions exist, it is too early to say with certainty that the Brotherhood would tilt more and more to the secular side of the continuum as the outflow from the Mubarak overthrow continues.  He would have been far better off to have noted the foundations of the tensions, the results to date, and the range of most probable outcomes over the next few months.

In short, Clapper wasn't so much wrong as he was inarticulate.

In his assessment of Gaddafi's potential for success in the insurgency, Clapper was on solid ground.  Gaddafi has billions of dollars worth of cash stashed in and around Tripoli.  He has sufficient money to keep his mercenaries well paid.  He has sufficient cash on hand to hire more.  He has more than enough of the old vigorish to pay off his indigenous supporters.  He even has enough bread to get more weapons and munitions on the black market where cash is king and ethics totally situational.

Given that Gaddafi has no safe harbor (other than, perhaps, Venezuela) as well as a world class case of megalomania, it is certain that he has the political will to continue the war.  The US and the rest of the West have stiffened this political will by the threats of criminal prosecution.  (Way to go, guys!)

At the same time, the insurgents have a number of very serious problems.  Compared to the "elite" battalions of the Libyan army commanded by Gaddafi's kids, the rebels are untrained, poorly armed, badly organized, and overstretched in the logistics area.  While they have many reasons to keep on fighting, the coherent political will required for protracted insurgency has not had time enough to develop.  Also, compared to Gaddafi, the insurgents lack financial resources.  This, in and of itself, is a major, major disadvantage.

Overall, the correlation of forces is such as to favor Gaddafi greatly over the longer term.  The rebels failed to take the country by assault.  Now the war is rather like a siege.  There are serious reasons to doubt the capacity of the insurgents to maintain coherence and will as the siege drags on.

Neither the Senate nor the White House might have liked to hear Clapper's contentions.  That does not make the DNI wrong.  He would have been better off had he been vague, superficial, and hewed to the official White House line.  Of course, this ignores the reality that intelligence officers are presumed to have the intellectual and moral courage necessary to tell it as they see it regardless of the reaction up the chain of command.  In short, Clapper did his job.

Russia and China, "mortal threats" or not?  James Clapper was asked to rate threats.  He concluded, after having touched on Iran, North Korea, and violent political Islam, that Russia and China constituted the only "mortal threats" to the US.  This assessment sent Graham into his high Earth orbit.  This position nonplussed Levin.  Clapper's words will also disturb the Boys in the Kremlin and the Trolls of Beijing, who will use the characterization as being "Cold War rhetoric" and similar shopworn slogans.

Clapper based his contention on perceptions of capability.  This is a well established and conservative way to measure threats.  There can be no doubt but in current and near term potential capabilities, only Russia and China present a genuine threat to the US as well as its national and strategic interests.  Both countries have impressive conventional and nuclear forces today.  Both are committed to major upgrades in both the conventional and nuclear areas.  In either case, but more so with respect to China than Russia, the proposed procurement plans will result in forces far in excess of those necessary for purely defensive measures.

Both countries, again China more than Russia, are current threats with the capacity to deal a mortal blow to CONUS.  Given the upgrades both are undertaking, each will be even more of a potentially "mortal threat" in a very few years.

It is true that the US has requested "clarification" from the Trolls of Beijing and the Boys in the Kremlin regarding current and future intentions.  Neither have responded in unambiguous fashion.  This is how it should be.  No self-respecting nation-state would believe itself to be obligated to justify its military expenditures to another nation-state.  (It boggles the mind that the Obama administration actually believed it had the right to ask let alone expect an honest answer from either county.)

Historically, intelligence agencies, military services, and governments have used perceptions of capability to equate with perceptions of intent.  While Clapper did not directly address intent, his accurate assessment of capabilities demands close attention be paid to probable intents in both the Kremlin and Forbidden City.  No one in Congress or the White House wants to do this.

If one takes Clapper's assessment to its logical conclusion, the US would have no choice but to assume the intentions of either or both the Boys in the Kremlin and the Trolls of Beijing are not beneficent toward the US.  One would have no choice but to conclude that at the least either or both governments want to challenge US national and strategic interests.  This would require the US to invest more in its own military capabilities both conventional and nuclear (as well as newer critical arenas such as space and cyberwarfare.)

Spending more on defense (to use the polite euphemism) is not a popular notion today.  Ideology and fiscal constraints conspire to put defense on the slow track.

This is a tough matter.  On the one hand, there is a strong impetus not to spend more on the military.  On the other, the DNI honestly and too bluntly identified the "mortal threats" facing the US.  So, the best answer is to do the equivalent of shooting the messenger.  Denial is cheaper and ideologically more satisfying than facing a highly unpleasant and most inconvenient truth.

And, when the balloon does go up, when the US wakes up to find itself outclassed by one or two countries that have an agenda opposing our own, the politicians of both parties have an easy out.  They will point fingers and claim with one united voice, "Intelligence failure!"   Then they will create yet one more senior intelligence office.

Now, Obama Best Consider A Gesture To Russia

Russian President Medvedev has tossed down a gauntlet to the US. He has also handed the Republicans a major issue for 2010 and, tah-dah!--2012. The front man half of the Putin-Medvedev duarchy has announced that not even the current economic distress in which Russia finds itself will prevent a major modernisation of the Russian military capacity.

According to Medvedev and Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov something approximating ninety percent of Russia's military machine is outdated. The Deep Thinkers of the Kremlin also believe (or at least pretend) that Russia faces a number of national security threats including "NATO encroachment." The remedy to these looming menaces is an expensive, extensive upgrading of Russia's military capacities including nuclear and strategic forces.

It is doubtful that NATO is casting covetous eyes at Russian territory. Nor is NATO seeking to coerce Russia into compliance with its policy dictates. That doesn't matter. The outside threat is sufficient to provide a stimulus for internal support of rearmament.

Given the history of Russia and the Soviet Union before that, in fact stretching back into the mists of the Russian Empire, the government has never lacked the political will to spend money on the military regardless of negative consequences to the civilian population. It is legitimate to take Medvedev at his word. It matters not that oil prices have fallen, the Russian stock market melted to oblivion and foreign direct investment fled. Defense uber alles will be the watchword.

Or not. There is a big "unless" tacit to the Medvedev declaration.

It is an "unless" predicated upon a real world concern. Or, to err on the side of accuracy, a real world deficiency within the Russian version of the "military-industrial complex." Not to put to fine a point on matters, it is doubtful that Russia currently possesses the physical or intellectual infrastructure to play catch-up with the US and the West in the new categories of military technology.

While espionage might remedy some of the intellectual deficiency in the near future as it did so often in the Soviet past, that force multiplier will not be enough to cure all the systemic lacks suffered by the Russians. It will not, for example, give the core of very highly skilled technicians necessary to construct and maintain the systems. It will not provide the industrial facilities needful to make the devices the Russians must make if they hope to hold their own with the US and the rest of the West--or even China for that matter.

When it comes to countries which may have a political need to inhibit Russian diplomatic actions or coerce the Kremlin into compliance, China has to lead the list for any rational Kremlin strategist. Even if the Men in the Forbidden City harbor no ambitions regarding those portions of Siberia which lingered so long as a bone of contention, there can be little doubt that these men want the most free hand possible in pursuing global ambitions.

This means that the Russians as well as the Americans have to be inhibited, deterred from opposing Chinese policy. The massive improvements in the Chinese military as well as in the underlying economy generally provide the basis for this.

This implies an opportunity for the US. Taking advantage of this opportunity will require more than symbols and smooth words--even if those are a necessary launching pad. The first challenge for the Obama administration is that of convincing the Putin-Medvedev regime that the US sees Russia as a fellow Great Power and will treat it accordingly.

The second challenge is simply not to be taken in by Putin or Medvedev. The record of the past several years shows that both men, particularly the first, are accomplished workers in the snow job department. Apparent affability or seemingly implacable hostility are both tools in the kits of these accomplished political sharks.

All too many European and American diplomatic and policy level politicians have failed to recognise that Putin (and therefore his chosen front guy, Medvedev) is a Russian nationalist. The current regime is nationalist. This reality is not going to change. Not now. Not in the next few years. Perhaps not ever.

European and American statesmen beyond counting made the precise same error in dealing with the leaders of the Soviet Union. They ignored the obvious. Regardless of internationalist rhetoric, Soviet bosses from Stalin on were resolute Russian nationalists. All efforts were bent to securing and protecting Russian national and strategic interests.

This fundamental Russian trajectory did not die with the last of the Czars. It did not fall with the last of the Commissars. It is alive and well today with Putin and company.

Putin, Medvedev, et al are not globalists. They are not sensitive multi-culturalists. They do not accept such soft, squishy ideas as "We are all passengers on spaceship Earth."

They are Russians, the lot of them. This means they pursue Russian national and strategic interest first, last and always.

So, get a grip, folks. Don't bemoan the nationalism of the Kremlin Crew. Don't think of it as backwards, reactionary, a grave violation of the Lofty Ideals of the High Minded of the West.

Work with it! Nationalism is neither inherently evil nor necessarily good. It simply is a brute fact which must be taken into account in formulating and executing foreign policy.

For the Obama administration and for the president personally, this recognition is liberating. It allows, indeed, demands a fresh approach to US-Russian relations. The US and Russia have several critical coinciding national and strategic interests. The list of real world, realpolitick issues which can either divide or unite us is headed by Iran, Islamism, economic imperatives, nuclear proliferation, transnational terrorism and China (not necessarily in that order.)

Putin, Medvedev and company have been waiting to see if the new administration has a better grip on the realities of international life than the neocon ninnies of the past eight years. Medvedev has provided a solid wake-up call.

Will the Obama administration (and the president personally) pick up the phone? Will it and he accept that Russia is a Great Power, first among all other potential claimants of that status? Will it and he recognise that nationalism--not ideology--provides the best, perhaps the only, base for productive relations? Constructive address of mutual interests and concerns?

Obviously it is too early to give the answers to these critical questions. It is not too early to assert that if the US does not give the correct response, we are in for an expensive arms race when we can least afford it and the Obama agenda will be buried in the rhetoric of democrats-are-soft-on-defense as have been so many administrations and agendas before it.