Tuesday, March 4, 2003

Trans-Atlantic Putin 
By Nikolas Gvosdev and Ray Takeyh
EVER since the end of World War II, Britain has played a special role within the Euro-Atlantic community - the trusted mediator between Washington and continental Europe. This was always a challenging balancing act for London. To maintain its position as the vice chair of the Western alliance effectively, the British had to enjoy the confidence of the United States, yet be able to parley with the other members of the coalition.
However, British Prime Minister Tony Blair's uncritical embrace of the war with Iraq has dissipated much of the confidence that Britain enjoyed among the key continental powers, especially France and Germany. It is this diminution of Britain's influence that has created unique opportunities for Russia to usher in a momentous geopolitical shift.
It is significant that Russia's public opposition to war with Iraq - down to Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov's very public statement in Beijing that Russia would veto a resolution authorizing military action - has received scant attention and even less criticism from Washington. To the extent that Americans proffer an explanation for the Russian position, it is usually couched in economic terms - oil contracts and the repayment of Soviet-era debt.
However, such a simplistic analysis fails to account for Russia's essential motives. President Vladimir Putin has sensed in the current trans-Atlantic crisis an opportunity to displace Britain as the mediating power within the West. In turn, Washington is increasingly viewing Moscow - not London - as its principal liaison to France and Germany as a vote in the Security Council draws near. And it is willing to excuse Russia's public diplomacy (e. g. Ivanov's statements) in return for private action (Presidential Chief of Staff Alexander Voloshin's hush-hush visit this past week to Washington being a prime example).
When Ivanov recently declared, "The preservation of a unified Euro-Atlantic community, with Russia now part of it, is of immense importance," the critical phrase was the assertion of Russia's membership of the Western world. As the first Russian leader unburdened by imperial pretensions, Putin has identified his mission as modernizing Russia's economic institutions as the first step to a restoration of its great power status. This requires a greater degree of integration into Western institutions. To achieve this goal, Russia requires both the benevolence of the continental powers and the trust of the U.S. colossus.
The adroit Russian diplomacy since Sept. 11, 2001, as well as its tempered opposition to a war on Iraq, has garnered it ample benefits from both sides of the Atlantic divide. Indeed, as Blair becomes more discredited on the continent, Putin could emerge as a leader trusted by all parties, in a position to arbitrate conflicts and ease tensions.
Russia has made itself indispensable to the United States by rendering full support for the prosecution of the war on terrorism and Islamic militancy - to the point of countenancing a robust U.S. military presence in its Central Asian periphery. However, Washington's war on Iraq will provide proof beyond doubt of Putin's pragmatic diplomacy.
Moscow can be counted on to endorse Franco-German opposition to the war and their efforts to block Washington from obtaining a second UN Security Council resolution.
Russia appreciates that providing such diplomatic cover for France and Germany will expedite its attempt to gain full integration into the European economy. Yet Russia will not suffer any lasting U.S. retribution for its opposition, since Moscow was never expected to provide personnel or funding for a U.S.-led war against Baghdad (especially since the Russians have already quietly signaled that, no matter what their public statements may be, they will undertake no efforts to actively oppose U.S. military action against Iraq).
Indeed, such a diplomatic balancing act is increasingly placing Putin in the enviable position of having favorable relations with all the contending countries and acting as a potential bridge between them.
No one should be surprised that Putin has borrowed a page from the Nixon-Kissinger triangular diplomacy playbook that enabled the United States to improve relations with both Moscow and Beijing during the 1970s. In a similar manner, by cementing ties with both the United States and the continental European powers, Putin hopes to replace Blair as the "indispensable European" to whom all powers turn for the mediation of trans-Atlantic conflicts.
After all, the goal of Russian foreign policy, as Ivanov observed, is the "development of a constructive partnership between my country, Europe and the United States" that is "united by a common responsibility for maintaining peace and stability in the vast Euro-Atlantic area." In such an arrangement, Putin hopes that Moscow, not London, would become the vice chairperson of the board.
Putin's triangular diplomacy offers the administration of U.S. President George W. Bush, an excellent opportunity to reshape trans-Atlantic relations in the 21st century. NATO's big tent can no longer hold all of its members in lockstep unison now that the Soviet threat has evaporated. London is well poised to remain America's military wingman. But the United States also needs an interlocutor for the other major powers within Europe that have grown increasingly skeptical about America's intentions.
Putin's Russia is poised to step into this role. The groundwork is being laid in quiet negotiations for a "reluctant" acquiescence to the United States' plans for regime change in Iraq.
Ray Takeyh is a fellow in international security studies at Yale University and Nikolas Gvosdev a senior fellow in strategic studies at the Nixon Center. They contributed this comment to The St. Petersburg Times.