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International Affairs:
A Russian Journal
New Pragmatism of Russia’s Foreign Policy
By A. Fedorov
The Yugoslav crisis and the events in Kosovo they evoked cast a dense shadow on the future of the system of international relations that remained efficient throughout the postwar period. Whether we are prepared to accept this or not, a possibility of a continued existence of a traditionally interpreted multipolar world (albeit in a very simplified form) was narrowed down by the NATO war against Yugoslavia.
It is for the first time in the last decades that one of the sides is openly using its military-political victory to shape its new global policy. We have to admit that the Kosovo crisis started a de facto political redivision of the world. The United States and NATO practically alone will determine how deep the process cuts and where it stops.
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Russia’s possibility to influence this process is very limited yet strong enough in certain areas. The country finds it hard to pursue an efficient and authoritative foreign policy while its economy remains unstable and the parliamentary and presidential elections are adding tension to domestic policies. A suppliant finds it hard to speak out and be heard. Still, the present complicated situation calls neither for silence nor moody grumbling. It calls for a realistic approach to Russia’s foreign policy potentials.
The war against Yugoslavia has done Russia at least one favor: many people, including those placed high enough, grew disappointed with the West as a strategic partner. It has been obviously taking Russia into account to the extent it sets itself. It is for Russia to shape her foreign policy herself once more that would rely on her idea of the world and her possibilities. It seems that the relations with the West, and the United States in the first place, will hardly reach the same level of cooperation and mutual understanding that existed in the past (all reservations considered.) The world does not expect much from Russia: in the very least her domestic policy should not destabilize the international situation in the nearest future.
I believe that today the country should not so much concern itself with a deeper integration in the world community as with preserving its political image in the changing world. Russia should carry out a policy worthy of a still important state. These efforts partly caused the Russian paratroopers’ battle-march to Pristina. The problem itself is much wider and more serious: How and at what price the image will be preserved and who personally will be responsible for this in the nearest future.
Time has come to analyze the real possibilities and resources of Russia’s foreign policy. We have to answer the question: Can we remain a figure of world importance on the international scene or should we limit ourselves to the responsibility zone directly connected with our national interests and security?
It seems that the objective political and economic situation in Russia is pushing us towards the latter. In the new conditions Russia should stick to a strictly realistic policy aimed at settling the problems of prime importance for the country and citizens. In other words, ambitions should be replaced with clearly stated pragmatism when dealing with the West (in the broadest sense of the word) and the East. Early in the new millennium Russia should derive the greatest possible political and economic effect from her relationships with the world while retaining the positive experience she accumulated.
To achieve this the country should clearly identify its priorities in dealing with individual states and supranational structures and boldly state them. We cannot be involved in “the world as a whole” therefore we should concentrate “on our interests in the world.”
In fact, this spells a reasonable policy of partial self-isolation in foreign policy which will help us to use our resources and potentials in the most rational way. It has become clear that we have to postpone our real and equal participation in many regional and international structures (such as WTO). We shall have to revise the schedules that existed prior to the Yugoslav crisis: today we probably cannot count on any real help from the West.
A reasonable and pragmatic approach will teach us to look before leaping: we should learn to coordinate our foreign policy moves with our national interests and possible domestic repercussions.
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This new pragmatism calls for a sober approach to our relationships with partners in all fields. Today, Russia is still capable of concentrating on several key fields. At least, this will allow her to preserve her great-power status on the international level and create an adequate image in the world. Obviously, in 2000 the new President of Russia will adjust the course yet the key approaches will probably remain the same. Everything that has been achieved in recent years through contacts on the highest level with leaders of the largest states that are Russia’s partners will be taken into account.
The situation in the world clearly indicates that the future of the United Nations Organization and its role in the changing world should be discussed. It is equally obvious that much will depend on Russia: will the reform cut deep enough; what character will it assume; and, most important, will UN (renovated in the best sense of the word) be able to play the role history assigned to it? Today, UN is more important than ever for Russia - it is one of the few, or even the only, international mechanism she can use actively and consistently to influence decision-making on a wide range of problems. The West, the United States in the first place, might employ the urgent necessity of reforms for their own ends. They are striving towards flexible political maneuvers in the Security Council in line with the new NATO strategic conception approved by the NATO leaders in Washington last April. The road to this lies through a weaker mechanism of decision-making in the UN Security Council.
The Yugoslav crisis amply demonstrated that the hopes we pinned on OSCE as an efficient multisided mechanism of European security and conflict settlement on the continent were vain. Today, this organization is much farther removed from its ideal than it was several years ago. It has no influence on the political decisions the NATO members make all together or individually. This is a reality to be taken into account. In recent years OSCE failed to develop into an efficient mechanism. This should not be taken to mean, however, that in the new conditions Russia should abandon it. Its very weakness offers a serious possibility of breathing new life into it. A system of conflict prevention on the territories of OSCE members can be created if OSCE is reformed and there is an understanding on its new role in Europe 25 years after the Helsinki Final Act. We should clearly realize that the mechanism of implementing decisions has been and will remain the organization’s weakest point especially in cases of armed conflicts. OSCE should not be opposed to UN: this is what Russia’s new pragmatism requires.
What is needed is a mechanism of mutual support and contacts that can be very efficient in ensuring more or less objective decision-making within OSCE and implementation of its decisions, in some cases with UN support.
The Yugoslav crisis put an end to our somewhat romantic attitude to NATO and our recent (some 2 or 3 years ago) urgent desire to regard the alliance as a partner rather than a potential danger. Today, we know that the Yugoslav crisis has produced very serious psychological and political changes in Russia among the people and the political elite. Obviously, the Russia-NATO relations which are still needed will not, in the nearest 5 or 7 years at least, develop as it was expected in May 1997 in Paris when the NATO and Russia heads of state signed the Founding Act.
The following formula can be applied to Russia’s pragmatic policy vis-a-vis NATO: cooperation in the spheres where it is inevitable. I believe that today the entire system of relations with NATO should be thoroughly revised. We have to admit our mistakes and the failure to use in full the possibilities the documents on cooperation gave us. It seems that a stage-by-stage process can be prescribed: due to domestic political reasons, in the first place, it is impossible, even from a formal point of view, to regain the past cooperation level at one stroke.
We are entering into new relations with NATO, many of which cannot be fully registered in the existing documents. To a great extent the prospects of such relations on a high enough level, including our restored presence in the NATO Headquarters, will depend, in many respects, on operational relations between our military contingent and the NATO structures in Kosovo and on the West and NATO’s role in the future of President Milosevic and the political processes in Yugoslavia.
The stage-by-stage restoration of our relations with NATO will be greatly determined by the Alliance’s conception of expansion and the practical steps, today and in future, in this direction. There will be no warming up in our relations if NATO speeds up its eastward expansion by incorporating the Baltic countries. Russia’s position can be pragmatic and firm: the Baltic republics within NATO do not mean merely an eastward movement. This creates a real military and political threat for Russia especially in the context of the Kosovo lesson. This will change the balance of forces. Russia will have to respond in a way that will be probably harsher than everything done before. Obviously, the anti-NATO rhetorics which at times reached an inadequate scope produced no results. It seems that only a rational and rigid stand can adequately demonstrate the West and NATO that we are prepared to act even if our possibilities are narrow.
The new situation probably requires that Russia should publicly abandon her statements about drawing closer to NATO or even joining it. Today, this is counterproductive - the new approach should be clearly outlined in Russia’s foreign policy.
On the whole, the Yugoslav events and the crisis in our relations with NATO objectively demand that the conception of Russia’s national security and her military doctrine be thoroughly revised. It would be wrong to stick to the old convictions that there are no external threats and that neither NATO nor the West are potentially dangerous.
Objectively speaking the complex relations in Kosovo and the situation on the whole are fraught with possible, probably milder than in Yugoslavia, yet serious enough pressure on Russia put by NATO or individual Western countries in the nearest future.
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The new pragmatic foreign policy should be applied to one of the key issues - the Commonwealth of Independent States. Today, CIS meets neither Russian interests nor those of other members. In a certain sense, the GUUAM alliance is a result of the repeated attempts to destroy the commonwealth from inside. This reflects the present state of affairs in CIS and promises no future if the current direction is pursued.
It seems that Russia’s political pragmatism prompts her to state openly that preserving CIS at all costs is not her aim. As an artificial construct CIS will not help Russia defend her national interests: it will impede many processes in the Russian Federation and across the post-Soviet territory.
I believe that CIS should be probably reshaped through cooperation of those countries that are interested on real political, economic, and military cooperation. In short one can say: Better fewer but better. Obviously, CIS continued existence will require from Russia unjustified economic contributions.
It is very important to analyze political and other effects on CIS and the post-Soviet space created by rapprochement between Russia and Byelorussia. If successful it may determine, in many respects, the CIS future: some of the members may move closer to Russia or even form a union with her while others may opt for total political independence of CIS.
Georgia and Azerbaijan seem to stand close to the latter. These possible developments should be taken onto account when talking about our national security. If they withdraw from CIS and if Azerbaijan decides to admit foreign military contingents on its territory our security, military security in the first place, will be seriously challenged. The complicated situation in the Caspian region makes this inevitable.
It seems that the next President of Russia will have to address the problem of CIS future. Not bound to the Belovezhskie agreements and the present CIS conception (that are dominating Russia’s foreign policy) either politically or morally he may find it easier to make decisions.
Any analysis of our relations with the West and the CIS members poses a question of the desired policy of alliances. It seems that the new realities require a much more sober approach based on Russia’s strategic role and place in the system of new international relations and security rather than on serving the current foreign political needs.
The Kosovo crisis objectively pushes Russia towards a sort of a Moscow-Beijing-Delhi triangle yet, it seems, so far there are no objective conditions for it or for its effective activity. I believe, that our good neighborly bilateral relations with China and India will be as efficient as any mechanism. We should bear in mind that China is a self-sufficient state that seeks no allies, Russia included.
The future of Russia’s foreign policy depends, to a great extent, on whether the concensus in the Russian political elite created by the NATO aggression against Yugoslavia is stable enough. The crisis played a positive role: it drew together all political forces in Russia (except the marginal politicians), attracted their attention to the foreign policy issues and the need to follow a more or less common political line. This allowed the legislative and the executive power work together in a normal and constructive way.
It is highly desirable to preserve this in the new State Duma and in its relations with the new President of Russia. Their consensus is indispensable for a more pragmatic foreign policy and for a revision, to a certain degree, of the conception of Russia’s natural security and the defense doctrine to add more pragmatism to them as well.
Andrei Fedorov is President of the Political Research Foundation and Director of Political Programs at the Foreign and Defense Policy Council.