OUTSIDE VIEW: RUSSIA’S FUTURE
By Norman Levine
UPI, United Press International
September 6, 2005 Tuesday 11:25 AM EST
ST. PETERSBURG, Russia, Aug. 28
Today people over 65 in Russia are a lost generation, the old
communist welfare state is gone, and besides living in poverty they
are discredited as political mishaps from a bygone era.
World historical revolutions leave the effected country psychologically
traumatized. The sudden lose of customary politico-social environments
creates a state of psycho-social disorientation.
Communism was installed in Russia by the Leninist Revolution of
1917, and Leninism was extinguished by the Yeltsin Revolution of
1991. The Soviet Union lasted for 74 years, a span of time in which
four generations lived their lives, in which the structures of a
communist society were incorporated by individuals as behavioral norms.
Fourteen years now separates the Yeltsin Revolution from contemporary
Russia, but the population is still disquieted. A gap between pre-and
post Yeltsin generations is easily discernible, and the confusion
between the politico-social rules of communism, and the unexpectedly
triumphant demands of capitalism leapt from the lips of Russians
to whom I talked during my recent visit to Russia. Politically and
psychologically, the aftershocks of the revolution of 1991 reverberates
throughout Russian society.
“Fourteen years ago we were the second-greatest superpower in
the world,” Dr. Elizaveta Isaev, Professor of Russian Politics,
said to me. “Today we fear the expansion of NATO to the east, the
Islamic Revolution on our Southern Flank, and the encirclement by the
United States with its military bases in Uzbekistan, and Krygystan,
or Central Asia.
“Fourteen years ago seniors enjoyed a social safety net that gave them
dignity in later life,” Isaev said. “Today people over 65 are a lost
generation, the old communist welfare state is gone, and besides living
in poverty the are discredited as political mishaps from a bygone era.”
>>From the international perspective, the current Russian malaise
encompasses three geographic pivots: On its Western border Russia
fears European Union and NATO expansion eastward, on its Southern
Flank Russia worries about Islamic Fundamentalist secession, and
on its Eastern border it is concerned about U.S. encirclement from
Central Asian bases.
The Yeltsin Revolution not only denuded Russia of all territorial
gains made by Bolshevism, but also by Czarism, or a Double Imperial
Extinction.
On its Western Pivot the collapse of the Soviet Union extinguished
the Bolshevik empire in Eastern Europe. The fall of the Soviet Union
amounted to the cancellation of the Yalta Agreement, and Red soldiers
evacuated Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Rumania, and Bulgaria.
But the Double Imperial Extinction also entailed the simultaneous
eradication of Czarist territorial acquisitions. The Baltic States,
Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia gained their freedom from Moscow
in 1991, and the Baltic expansion of 1791 of Peter the Great was
concurrently annulled.
Tsarina Catherine the Great suffered the same affront. This empress
absorbed the Ukraine and Crimea from the Turks in 1783, and by
participating in the three Partitions of Poland moved Czarist Russia’s
Western borders to Warsaw.
However, the collapse of the Soviet Union also involved the synchronic
loss of Catherine’s conquests. Although Russia retained the Crimea,
the Ukraine slowly gained its independence from Catherine’s initial
18th century grasp.
This Double Imperial Extinction meant that on its Western Pivot
post-1991 Russia retreated to the boundaries of 17th century Russia.
Approximately 300 years of territorial annexations were reversed.
“This was Gorbachev’s great failure,” Isaev said. “He did not negotiate
a Second Yalta. When he decided to pull Red troops out of Eastern
Europe he should have bargained for a Second Yalta with the West
setting hard limits to the advance of NATO and the EU into Eastern
Europe. Without a Second Yalta Russia was forced to accept a Second
Treaty of Brest-Litovsk.”
The Double Imperial Extinction is also manifested on the Southern Flank
of Russia. The First Imperial Enlargement in the Caucasus and Central
Asia was carried out by the czars. In the 1880’s in the Caucasus the
czars had seized Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan from the suddenly
collapsing Persian Empire, and in Central Asia in the same decade
the czars took control of these mostly tribal territories. Power
vacuums in the Caucasus and Central Asia opened the way to Tzarist
penetration into the Islamic world.
After the Leninist Revolution the Communists’ Imperial Enlargement
simply absorbed the Czarist Imperial Enlargement in the Caucasus and
Central Asia. Like a carpet the Bolsheviks took the conquests of the
czars and swept them under the Communist rug, which was called the
Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.
Imitating the events in Eastern Europe, the Yeltsin Revolution
witnessed the erasure of the Communist Imperial Enlargement, which
was simultaneously the evaporation of the Czarist Imperial Enlargement
in the Caucasus and Central Asia.
The dismemberment of the Soviet Union in December 1991 led to the
Balkanization of the Caucasus. Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan,
all non-Slavic peoples, followed the Slavic Ukraine into declaring
their independence.
(Norman Levine is a professor of international history and a regular
contributor to the Munich-based World Security network. This article
is reprinted by permission of WSN.)
(United Press International’s “Outside View” commentaries are written
by outside contributors who specialize in a variety of important
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