Andrey Shitov — about Fiona Hill's lecture in Tallinn, responses to Sergei Karaganov's article and the "Wagnerian" rebellion, as well as the dialogue on arms control with the United States
Speaking at a recent meeting of the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum, Russian President Vladimir Putin once again reminded that our country did not start the conflict in Ukraine, but is trying to stop it. "The war on Ukraine, in the south-east of Ukraine, was started by the Ukrainian regime with the support of their sponsors in the West in 2014," the Russian leader said. "No one tries to talk about it in the West."
I imagined it…
This is indeed the case. And that's why my eyes involuntarily caught on an article in the latest issue of the American magazine Foreign Affairs, which opens with the words that the same "war began in 2014," that in 2022 "Russia expanded it," and the West, "dramatically strengthening its 2014 campaign for stigmatization and isolation of Russia, did the dissociation (cutting off) of this country by its undisguised (explicit) political goal."
Take your time, though, to hold your breath. After reading it, I was convinced that there is really no deviation from the canons of modern Washington propaganda in the publication of an authoritative publication. The blame for what is happening lies entirely with Moscow, and the general conclusion is that, "no matter how long the war lasts and no matter how it ends, the key new reality of international relations of the XXI century will almost certainly remain after it: Russia will be absent from the West, and the West in Russia; there is a gap between them hostility." As they say, thank you for the fact that the authors — historian and retired diplomat Michael Kimmidge and a staff specialist on Russia at George Washington University Maria Lipman — more or less adequately imagine who, with whom and how long has been fighting in Ukraine.
Across the ocean, glimpses of such adequacy remain now except in the blogosphere. From the traditional media, not to mention the information space of official statements and documents, they are mercilessly swept away: remember at least Tucker Carlson, the former star host of the Fox News channel, who, despite all the ratings, was not so long ago excommunicated from the air. Although, of course, he defended not a pro-Russian, but a purely American domestic political conservative agenda. That is, the truth — in the understanding of those people who have always considered and consider themselves the moral majority in the United States.
However, it is all the more interesting to follow such glimpses when they do appear. The same Kimmidge and Lipman casually admit, for example, that "Russia's undocking from the West ... does not mean a turn to autarky," that "since the beginning of the war, Moscow has been developing — and not reducing — its relations with the outside world," since it has enough partners: from China and India to such a member NATO is like Turkey.
"They are the world!"
Even more interesting, in my opinion, is the speech of Anglo-American Fiona Hill — Donald Trump's former adviser on Russia — at the international political science conference in memory of Lennart Meri, held in Estonia in May. In my opinion, it clearly shows that for all their propaganda blindness, some overseas analysts are able to soberly assess the events taking place in the world. After all, the question often sounds right or is in the air: do they really "not catch up" with the essence of these events or are they just fooling around? To understand this, we, in fact, sift their propaganda chatter through a fine sieve, looking for crumbs of rationality in it. And in Hill's speech — and not just anywhere, but in Tallinn - a lot is said in plain text and called by their proper names.
The title of the speech, officially called the lecture, is "Ukraine in a new world disorder. The revolt of the "rest of the world" against the United States." The author proves that we are witnessing "not a proxy war of the United States or the collective West against Russia," but a "proxy uprising" of Russia and the "rest of the world" against the United States." As for me, nothing changes from such a change in the places of the terms in this case. Anyway, Hill immediately emphasizes that "the war in Ukraine is, apparently, the event that makes the demise of (passing) Pax Americana obvious to everyone."
It should be clarified that in English, "The West and the Rest" (The West and the Rest) is a stable phrase, one might say, a political science stamp; books and articles (both apologetic and critical) about Western civilization have been called this more than once. Hill emphasizes that she chose the definition meaningfully; judging by her explanations, she means what we in Russia now call the "world majority".
"The resistance of the countries of the global South to the calls of the United States and Europe for solidarity in Ukraine is an open uprising," the American says. "This is a revolt against what they perceive as the dominance of the collective West over international discourse, imposing their own problems on everyone else and dismissing aside their priorities — compensation for climate change, economic development and debt relief."
"The rest of us feel that they are constantly marginalized in world affairs," Hill continues. "Why on earth, in fact, are they called the "global South" (as I myself did in this speech), and before they were called the "third world" or the "developing world"? For that matter, why are they in the "rest" world? They represent 6.5 billion people, they are the world! And our terminology reeks of colonialism."
Etc., etc. — even to the point of mentioning that the peoples of the world are drawn to such associations as the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) and the SCO (Shanghai Cooperation Organization), because "The United States and the European Union do not offer sufficient alternatives to countries so that they turn away from China, in particular including in the field of security."
"Defending hegemony"
Hill believes that the US and the EU need an "honest conversation" with the rest of the world, and not from above, but taking into account the real interests and concerns of partners. She warns that the block principle "with us or against us" will not be understood by "the rest", because "for them, the current war is aimed at defending the benefits and hegemony of the West, and not at protecting Ukraine."
Hill has worked all her life in overseas "think tanks" and served at one time as a specialist on Russia not only in the National Security Council at the White House, but also in the National Intelligence Council of the United States (in 2006-2009, in the administrations of George W. Bush Jr. and Barack Obama). I don't know for sure why she was suddenly carried away by frankness now, especially in the Estonian capital.
But perhaps it's just that this summer she is moving (or has already moved) from Washington to her historical homeland — to the prestigious post of chancellor of Durham University, one of the oldest in the UK. So he shows academic free-thinking, attracting attention both to himself and to his new employers. And the former, so to speak, pricks the eyes with the truth.
Prologue or epilogue?
However, with all its critical fervor towards Western politics, her lecture, of course, is by no means pro-Russian, rather the opposite. Russia in her understanding is "the last continental empire in Europe", which is now defending its interests by force of arms, and what is happening in Ukraine is "not a conflict of the XXI century, but a retrograde war — the last, let's hope, spasm of European convulsions that shook the rest of the world in the XX century because of former imperial conquests and mercantilist the dominance of Europe".
Chairman of the Russian Historical Society, Director of the Foreign Intelligence Service of the Russian Federation Sergey Naryshkin came to TASS the other day for a press conference, and I took the opportunity to ask him to comment on the thesis of the American. In response, he recalled that if we talk about the history of the origin of Ukrainian nationalism, the roots of current events "can be found in the XIX century." "And the prerequisites for the conflict of the present time can probably be counted to a certain extent from the coup d'etat in Kiev in 2014, from the beginning of the war of the Kiev regime against the residents of Donbass, who did not want to live under the rule of the Kiev regime," said a senior specialist.
In our country, as far as I can tell, the hybrid war with the West is perceived in a historical context not so much as an epilogue to past events, but as a prologue to the future new world order, but Naryshkin did not go into such details. After all, the difference, by and large, is conditional: it is clear that for the Anglo—Saxons, the departure of Pax Americana is a sunset, but for the rest of the world it may well be the dawn.
To throw off the "yoke"?
Paradoxically, Hill's lecture echoes the recently sensational article by Sergey Karaganov, Honorary Chairman of the Presidium of the Council on Foreign and Defense Policy (SWAP) of the Russian Federation, "A difficult but necessary decision " — that "the use of nuclear weapons can save humanity from a global catastrophe." According to the venerable Russian analyst, "by breaking the will of the West to aggression, we will not only save ourselves, we will finally free the world from the Western yoke that lasted five centuries, but we will also save all of humanity." What is not the "revolt of Russia and the rest of the world" against Western domination, about which the American woman was broadcasting?
Another thing is that the rescue of drowning people by definition should be primarily the work of the drowning themselves. And "the agreement of the world majority with the Russian position" that allows the use of nuclear weapons, "and even more so a friendly uprising against the West in order to throw off its "yoke" is far from an obvious scenario." Pointed to this ru/articles/preventivnyj-yadernyj-udar-net/" target="_blank" rel="nofollow">in his response to Karaganov's article, an expert from MGIMO, Director General of the Russian Council for International Affairs Ivan Timofeev. His detailed comment, containing other objections (for example, about the danger of underestimating the Washington bureaucracy looming behind the president with his "age and eccentricities"), is titled unequivocally: "A preemptive nuclear strike? No."
In the same spirit, other responses are sustained, including from the "nestlings of the nest" of Karaganov himself; in any case, I have not come across publications with direct support of his appeal. Acting chairman of the Presidium of the SWAP, editor-in-chief of the magazine "Russia in Global Politics" Fyodor Lukyanov published a column about "why we will not be able to "sober up the West" with a nuclear bomb." Ilya Fabrichnikov, a member of the SWAP, proposed to adhere to "demonstrative restraint" as a "recipe for unnecessary decisions" — within the framework of the profile Russian doctrine. By the way, he pointed out that the "indicative fussiness of collective Westerners" trying to provoke an escalation "only confirms the loss of initiative" by themselves, and suggested "not to deprive our imported "partners" of the privilege to make all the mistakes they are trying to program us for."
"Bring back the fear"
There are really enough provocative tricks in the West now. Including, for example, the proposal of the expert of the American Business Institute, ex-Pentagon employee Michael Rubin, "to clearly state to Russia that any use of nuclear weapons of any size against Ukraine will lead to the transfer of nuclear weapons of the same type to Ukraine by the United States without any control over where and how Ukraine could use them."
But this was published a few days before Karaganov's article. But the article itself, to my surprise, did not cause a special reaction from the Anglo-Saxons. Unless Rose Gottemoeller, who served in the past as US Deputy Secretary of State and First Deputy Secretary General of NATO, mentioned her on the pages of The Financial Times — along with the warning of the Deputy chairman of the Security Council of the Russian Federation Dmitry Medvedev that in the event of the transfer of nuclear weapons by the West to Kiev, "it will be necessary to strike a preemptive strike." Against this background, Gottemoeller proposed reviving "certain key principles of detente" and "restoring nuclear cooperation" with Moscow in order to "reverse the nuclear fever."
In our country, President Putin, in fact, drew a line under the dispute over the article, confirming at the SPIEF that for us "the use of nuclear weapons is certainly theoretically possible," but now there is "no need" for this, or even for "reasoning" on this score. In my opinion, this is also a response to curtsies to Karaganov from some of his colleagues for raising an important, but, in fact, taboo topic. I have heard warnings from diplomatic friends before that its "banalization" in public discussion does not bring benefits. It weakens, so to speak, the "fear of God" before the threat of nuclear Armageddon; but experts, including, for example, Dmitry Trenin from the IMEMO Center for International Security of the Russian Academy of Sciences, link the current increase in this threat precisely with the disappearance of fear of it in geopolitics. And they even demand to return the insurance.
Never Say Never
Actually, in fact, Gottemoeller wrote about the same thing. And from the official stands there is a poorly distinguishable exchange of signals against the background of militant propaganda rhetoric, but still intelligible for experienced observers. For example, in the form of public statements by Assistant to the US President for National Security Jake Sullivan and Deputy Foreign Minister of the Russian Federation Sergey Ryabkov about the prospects of the arms control regime. Of course, there is no sense of mutual trust in this correspondence dialogue, but when our diplomat says that the United States has plagiarized the long—standing Russian idea of taking into account the potentials of other nuclear powers and that he is happy about it, then, in my opinion, it is obvious that the key message is in the word "glad", and not in sarcasm.
That is, although I argued above that the official Western approaches to relations with Russia are completely swept out of the glimpses of adequacy, this is still not entirely true. There are topics that simply require at least some sanity. First of all, this is nuclear safety and stability, but not only.
The propaganda "bazaar" is still "filtered" in its overseas source — you just need to understand which filters and why they are used in each specific situation. Examples before my eyes: from the proactive assurances of US President Joe Biden and his subordinates about the West's non-involvement in the preparation of the "Wagnerian" rebellion to Barack Obama's relatively balanced new statements on Crimea. In the first case, the reasons for demonstrative washing of hands in Washington, apparently, is understandable without explanation, and in the latter it is obvious that the former US president is just once again justifying the track record of his own administration in hindsight. But after all, the word sounded, and you can't throw it out of the song now either.
Well, we will try to continue to understand all this as much as possible. Recently, life regularly presents us with surprises from the category of those about which it was customary to think that such a thing could never happen. You will inevitably agree with the Anglo-Saxons, who call on Charles Dickens to never swear this word with a light hand. And let's believe that surprises can be not only unpleasant.
