Abstract
This essay seeks to identify and assess the general shift in Russian foreign policy thinking during Vladimir Putin's presidency. The main thesis of this essay is that a general shift in Russian foreign policy had occurred during Putin's presidency owing to the rise in Statist thinking. To substantiate the thesis, the author uses the State of the Nation addresses of Boris Yeltsin and Vladimir Putin to make a comparative analysis of the presidents’ foreign policy approaches. As demonstrated in the essay, the Russian foreign policy had experienced a dramatic influx of state power during Vladimir Putin's presidency, which resulted in the relative quantitative and qualitative reduction of cooperative initiatives between the United States and Russia.
Introduction
The beginning of the twenty first century marked the dawn of a new era in US–Russian relations. The end of the Cold War in the late 1980s and the ensuing warm relations between the former adversaries brought the decades of geo-political, military, economic confrontation and of the competition for the spheres of influence across the globe to an end. The collapse of the Soviet empire resulted in a form of an alliance between Moscow and Washington in the first half of the 1990s, when president Yeltsin was the head of the Russian state, which gradually transformed into fragile interstate relations filled with mutual suspicion, mistrust and political confrontation after Putin succeeded Yeltsin as the new Russian leader. During the Soviet era the confrontation and the inability to bridge the gap between the superpowers could be understood in the broader context of the ideological struggle. In the mid-1990s, however, when Russia's leadership vowed to support the ideals of democracy and market economy and when the Western world was no longer concerned about the spread of communism in Europe, other factors came into play. Rising nationalism and internal political pressure engendered by deteriorating economic conditions, widespread social discontent and a threat posed to state security by the secessionist movements in the Caucasus brought Putin to power and allowed him to accumulate a substantial amount of political might.
Given such adverse domestic conditions, the demand for a strong leadership in Russia rose and mainly because of that, president Boris Yeltsin hand-picked Vladimir Putin to lead the country out of chaos and disorder. Yeltsin assumed that Putin's character and determination would be critical in strengthening Russia's economic and political position in the world and also in assuring the continuity of the country's political and foreign policy course. However, Putin's response to major global political processes differed from the preceding political decisions made during Yeltsin's presidency. Putin hoped that a change of a political strategy would provoke the growth of the country's welfare, enhance security and revive the global power image that was largely lost by the preceding leadership as the former superpower transformed into a new nation-state. Increasingly, Putin maintained a hard-line stance on many domestic and foreign policy issues, which resulted in the renewal of political tensions between US and Russia, reminiscent of the confrontation during the Cold War era. Even today, he continues to wield a substantial amount of political power largely because he never managed to lose the support of power elites. Over the years of his rule, Putin structured the entire political system in Russia according to his own belief of how to reach progress and stability for all. Obviously, the centralization of executive power was the major step taken by Putin toward authoritarianism and, simultaneously, the distancing of Russia from the West. Why did Putin decide to change the Russian foreign policy course and was it a product of his personal motives or of a much broader negotiation process among the political and business elites? While answering this question is not a simple task, I will try to bring to light some aspects of Putin's leadership which I thought were the engine of this change.
Although a change of a pro-Western Russian foreign policy could be observed as early as 1993 when Boris Yeltsin was in power; the arrival of Putin marked the beginning point of a new political era for the Russian society. Moreover, following Putin's election, the official Russian foreign policy thinking experienced a dramatic shift. Undoubtedly, Putin came to power when Russia's domestic economic and political conditions differed drastically from those during Yeltsin's presidency. Such a policy shift could be seen as a normal reaction of any administration to various circumstances. Indeed, many scholars contend that there was no fundamental change of Russian foreign policy from Yeltsin to Putin. They believe that Putin's foreign policy was in large part a continuation of the course that was conceived during the late-Yeltsin period. Mankoff (2009, p. 4) argues that “the assertive, narrowly self-interested foreign policy that has characterized Russia during the Putin–Medvedev years is merely the culmination of a process that began over a decade earlier, during the presidency of Boris Yeltsin, at a time when the bulk of the Russian elite came to recognize that integration with the West and its institutions was neither possible nor desirable, at least in the short run” (Mankoff, 2009). However, to understand the distinction between Yeltsin's and Putin's foreign policy, one would need to look deeply into Russia's official standing on various issues of global and domestic importance as expressed in the State of the Nation addresses and a political behavior of both presidents.
The State of the Nation address is the central annual speech made by the Russian president to highlight the country's main economic and political challenges, objectives, and priorities. It also reflects and reinforces the general political orientation of the leadership. The rhetoric of the Russian president in the annual address sets the tone for the country's foreign policy during the years of any administration in power. Critical international and domestic issues are addressed in the speech to express the official standing of the leadership and inform any interested parties, including other global powers. I will use a number of case studies to support the main argument of the essay – namely, the US National Missile Defense, NATO expansion initiatives, the situation in Kosovo, the war in Chechnya and, more broadly, US reactions to the Russian policies in the Caucasus, as well as US–Russian relations in the context of the global campaign against terrorism. By comparing the annual State of the Nation addresses of Putin and Yeltsin, I will identify the shift in the official positions toward these aspects of foreign policy and assess the ramifications of the statements. The purpose of this essay is not to formulate a substantive critique of Putin's or Yeltsin's approach to foreign affairs but rather to trace the distinction and provide an explanation of policy actions of both presidents under various circumstances.
When Putin succeeded Yeltsin as President in 2000, the Russian foreign policy toward the United States began to shift – from what looked like a soft confrontation and sporadic economic and political partnership during Yeltsin's era to an explicitly cold, aggressive and highly pragmatic diplomacy, accompanied by military demonstrations, strong rhetoric and other conspicuous aspects that characterized Putin's foreign policy. This change was mainly aroused by his personal perceptions of Russia's new political and military standing in the world, his strong patriotic and nationalist convictions. In order to illuminate this dramatic shift in Russia's foreign policy, I will draw a comparison of two time periods – the foreign policy trends from 1992 to 1999 and from 2000 to 2007 under Yeltsin's leadership and under Putin's leadership, respectively.
The Russian policy toward the United States under Putin was mainly concerned about the advancing US plan to build a National Missile Defense system against the so-called “rogue” states and the abrogation of the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty. Russia perceived the plan to install the missile shield as being targeted against it. As a result, Putin had sparked an international campaign against these US initiatives. The missile shield was seen as a threat to the strategic parity, the global balance of power, and, more importantly, to Russia's strategic and geo-political interests in Europe. The US plan “wonderfully fits the overall picture of the American global anti-missile defense, which, according to our analysis – just look at the map – is being deployed along Russia's perimeter, and also China's, incidentally” (Putin, 2007a). US–Russian relations were further strained when George W. Bush succeeded Bill Clinton as US President in January 2001 mainly because he made the final decision to implement the project rapidly. Although, President George W. Bush had sought President Putin's acquiescence to his administration's plans, in December 2001, Bush announced his intention for the United States to withdraw from the ABM Treaty in six months without waiting for Moscow's approval.
The unilateral withdrawal of the United States from the arms control treaty and the drive of US policymakers to expand their military presence and to pursue their security objectives in the areas of traditional Russian influence in Europe and across the globe, had sparked a new cycle of political contention, when Russia began to rise as an energy superpower and an important world actor willing to be reckoned with on matters related to global security and peace. Certainly, sky-rocketing oil prices, high dependence of foreign markets, primarily European, on Russia's energy resources, and an economic boom accounted for the form of the tone with which Putin asserted the country's position on the global political arena. More importantly, however, this assertiveness mirrored a highly substantial agreement among the Russian political and public circles on the nature of Russia's new role in the modern world, inspired by the patriotic convictions of the former Russian President Vladimir Putin. Herspring and Rutland (2003a, p. 259) explain the nationalist sentiments in Russia as “if there is an “ism” that drives Putin, it is nationalism – nationalism built not on ethnic, cultural, or spiritual values, but on the centrality of state power, which in Putin's case embraces a deep-seated desire to restore Russia's former greatness” (Herspring and Rutland, 2003a). Putin claims that “patriotism is a source of courage, staunchness, and strength of our people. If we lose patriotism and national pride and dignity, which are connected with it, we will lose ourselves as a nation capable of great achievements” (Quoted in Herspring and Rutland, 2003a; p. 259).
During the early 1990s, the situation was drastically different, when Russia – dependent on foreign, mainly US economic assistance and investments sought to collaborate with the West on a multitude of issues, from liberal reforms to disarmament and space program to economic transformations. US–Russian relations were often described as apprenticeship rather than rivalry of any form during the early years of Yeltsin's presidency. The Russian society then quickly became embittered by the economic reforms initiated by a group of liberal reformists headed by Yegor Gaidar and soon after that, Russia's leadership started to move toward bilateral partnership and reduce the dependence on Western political expertise and guidance. Prior to Putin, the Russian foreign policy thinking had already been influenced by Primakov and other hard-line policymakers. Consequently, Putin's approach seemed not such a drastic change of state policies toward the West. The radically transformative domestic policies and a lean toward an authoritarian rule were suggestive of Putin's will for Russia to appear as a strong and competitive player in the eyes of the Western community. While the contrast between Yeltsin's and Putin's domestic policies is hard to overlook, the correlation between domestic and foreign policies in Russia is probably more intimate than in many other countries. Russian foreign policy is in large part reflective of the internal political processes as much as it is a reaction to international developments and events that touch upon the short- and long-term security interests of Russia.
The revival of statism in Russia
For centuries, Russia's foreign policy has been shaped by the developments in the West, how the status of Russia as a global power was evolving in that light, and how its national strategic interests were met by key external actors. In the aftermath of the demise of the Soviet empire, the new leadership and the elites embarked on a quest for a new sense of national identity. Initially, a pro-Western vision of national identity and foreign policy was espoused by the Russian leadership, which was consistent with their perception of the world at large. Subsequently, following the economic decline, the new Russian worldview derived primarily from the perception of its economic backwardness relative to steadily growing Western economies and the ideological unity among most of the Western countries relative to a political disorder, consecutive financial crises, and the disintegration trends that dominated the Russian domestic arena.
Statists, along with Westernists and Civilizationists, constitute the three distinct traditions, or schools, of Russian foreign policy thinking. Tsygankov (2006a, p. 4) maintains that these schools “sought to preserve Russia's international choices in ways consistent with the schools’ historically established images of the country and the outside world” (Tsygankov, 2006a). Westernists tend to embrace Western modes of thinking, stressing Russia's similarities with the West. Westernists emphasize Russia's alignment along the Western-orientated political course. They view Russia as a Western power that should strive to acquire the status of a modern, liberal-democratic global power. Westernists are also labeled as Atlanticists and International institutionalists. Their mode of thinking was popular from 1987 to 1990 and was captured in such phrases as “global problems” and “interdependence”. Andrey Kozyrev was probably the foremost defender of Russia's orientation toward the West. Along with other reformists of the Yeltsin era, including Anatoly Chubais and Yegor Gaidar, he was later criticized for having conceded the Russian position to the West on a multitude of foreign policy issues. In light of the political challenges brought about in the mid-1990s, the Russian political establishment was compelled to reassess the country's official foreign policy thinking and expel the Westernists from the political arena.
Faced with such new challenges as military conflicts in the Russian periphery and within Russia (Chechnya), the semihostile attitudes of some of the former Soviet republics toward Russia, NATO expansion, and the flare-up in the Balkans, those advocating international institutionalism were unable to offer a conceptual perspective on how the country should meet them. Their grand strategy involving the development of a deep, multisided partnership with the West has turned out to be flawed. As a result, international institutionalism has been challenged by other schools of foreign policy thought (Tsygankov, 1997; p. 250).
Civilizationists, on the other hand, have always seen Russia's distinctive role in the world through the prism of a cultural opposition between Russia and the West. They assert that Russia is not a Western power. Early-Soviet Civilizationists challenged the West in a most direct fashion, defending the doctrine of the world revolution. They are also labeled as Revolutionary expansionists. Other Soviet thinkers, however, advocated a peaceful coexistence and limited cooperation with the “capitalist world”. Yet another version of Civilizationist thinking is the so-called Eurasianism that saw Russia as a distinctive entity from both European and Asian cultures. Eurasianists believe that Russia has a unique destiny. According to this paradigm, Russia is a Eurasian power that lies between the Western and Eastern civilizations and has its own – a “third” way of development. Eurasianism stresses Russia's dominance in Central Asia and the Caucasus. Alexander Dugin, a neo-Eurasianist, contends that Russia and the West – represented by the US, are destined to collide because of their uncompromising values (Dugin, 1997). According to Dugin (1997), “In principle, Eurasia and our space, the heartland Russia, remain the staging area of a new anti-bourgeois, anti-American revolution.” According to his 1997 book, The Basics of Geopolitics, “The new Eurasian empire will be constructed on the fundamental principle of the common enemy: the rejection of Atlanticism, strategic control of the USA, and the refusal to allow liberal values to dominate us. This common civilizational impulse will be the basis of a political and strategic union” (Dugin, 1997). Generally speaking, Civilizationists have always viewed Russian values as different from those of the West. However, Dmitry Shlapentokh believes that it remains unclear whether Putin belongs to the so-called “Eurasianist camp” of policymakers and ideologues (Shlapentokh, 2005).
Putin's presidency marked a consistent political course toward the enhancement of the bilateral and multilateral partnership with the Central Asian republics. Additionally, Putin took steps to consolidate the position of the Russian government in the Caucasus. Early in his tenure as president, Putin even proclaimed that Russian foreign policy is prepared to make a “decisive turn” (Putin, 2000a) toward the Asia-Pacific region. Indeed, Putin made consistent efforts to restore the Russian geo-political and economic presence in the Asia-Pacific region. The relations with China and India as well as other countries of the Asia-Pacific region were promising mainly due to economic partnership and numerous arms trade agreements, all of which formed the backbone of a wider Russian strategy to weaken the US position in the region and prepare the groundwork for the so-called “multipolar triangle,” and further a “quadrangle” – with Brazil to be included – despite the fact that the US ties with China and India were also solid as never before. However, it would be wrong to view Putin as the leader guided entirely by the Eurasianist paradigm. The reform of state power institutions was seen by Putin as the best solution to Russia's looming political and economic crisis when he succeeded Yeltsin as Russia's new leader. Putin exhibited an undeniable conformity to a Statist paradigm though his commitment to an Eurasianist conception could justify the necessity to counterpoise the Western influence across the world.
Statists have always sought to preserve and increase the role of the state and its ability to sustain the social, political and international order. Statist way of thinking is conducive to the consolidation of state control. More importantly, Statism is reinforced and accompanied by a strong national idea. For Statists, the West is seen as a threat to a strong state because Western interests are thought to weaken statehood in Russia. Statists, by their nature, tend to prevent and undermine any Western involvement and influence in Russia as well as across the globe. One of the central preexisting factors leading to Statism is the presence or perception of the external threat to the security of the state. Plans to expand the US military presence in Europe and in the former Soviet territories sparked a new wave of Statist thinking because of the perception of immediate threat to Russia's state interests, among other factors. As will be demonstrated in this essay, Vladimir Putin's main political vision of Russia's place in the world coincided with the Statist paradigm, particularly if Russia's national security and cultural identity initiatives under Putin are scrutinized. Putin's views were intimately tied to a Civilizationist perspective of Russia's role in the modern world combined with a renewed belief in state institutions. In other words, according to Putin, Russia is neither a Western nor an Eastern power. Russia is a global power in its own right whose security and integrity are the ultimate goals of state leadership.
Yeltsin sought Russia's integration in the Western community even though he never challenged Russia's distinctive role in the world. Likewise, Putin sought Russia's integration in the global economic and political affairs, yet through the increased reliance on power structures and with the grown ambition to create a new Russian state identity. The attempts to negotiate the accession of Russia to the World Trade Organization have led to nothing since Putin's reforms were aimed at the consolidation of state power institutions, the erosion of democratic mechanisms, and a markedly grown state involvement in the economy – particularly, in the resource extraction sector contradicted the norms of the WTO. Putin believed that the state plays a key role in Russia's resurgence as a global power; whereas, all other considerations, including the significance of a thriving civil society and democratic institutions, are essentially incompatible with the Russian milieu. Putin took steps to reduce the involvement of private capital in the economy, particularly in the industrial and resource extraction sectors, thereby appropriating the major source of state income. These tendencies significantly alienated Russia from the West during Putin's presidency and the political contention between Russia and US culminated in a 2008 war between Georgia and Russia over South Ossetia and Abkhazia.
A reliance on power structures, military force, and coercive state power while excluding civil actors from the political process makes Statists diametrically opposed to Westernists. Putin eliminated the presence of foreign NGOs and civil society actors on the Russian soil who were active in promoting governance reforms, a free society, and crisis management. Many opposition groups and government critics were silenced during the first few years of his presidency. In the aftermath of Putin's reforms, the executive and legislative branches of power merged – that is, many government officials were simultaneously members of the ruling party – the United Russia, headed by Putin, which bears a close resemblance to the Communist Party's dominance of the political landscape during the Soviet era. Opposition parties and prominent anti-establishment figures were effectively marginalized in the years of Putin's rule so as to achieve state-centrist objectives. State-centrism also characterized the foreign policy course under then President Putin, which led to a discord with the US leadership over the plans to install the components of the National Missile Defense system in Central and Eastern Europe.
US national missile defense
Plans to install a National Missile Defense system date back to late 1950s when the US leadership sought to develop and implement a defensive system against Soviet ballistic missiles. The current national missile defense initiative is the latest version of a long series of systems under development. It is intended to protect the United States against a limited nuclear attack by a “rogue” nation like North Korea or Iran.
Although Yeltsin was objecting to US plans to deploy the elements of the National Missile Defense system in the former Warsaw pact countries, the financial aid package and the membership in the G-7, a group of economically advanced democracies, promised in exchange for implementing liberal and economic reforms helped to tone down Russian criticism. The signing of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty in 1996 and the promise of advancing the ratification of the Chemical Weapons Convention were indicative of the relative success and of the ongoing cooperation between US and Russia during Yeltsin's rule. Following Yeltsin's resignation in December 1999, Putin became the Acting President of Russia. Soon after that, a new National Security Concept was signed into law which reaffirmed Russia's strong commitment of the previous 1997 Concept to the principle of nuclear deterrence and the possible preventive first use of nuclear weapons. The Concept reiterated the leading role of nuclear weapons in protecting state integrity and security. Whereas the 1997 National Security Concept had reserved the right to a nuclear strike “in case an armed aggression creates a threat to the very existence of the Russian Federation as an independent sovereign state (National Security Concept of Russian Federation, 1997),” Putin's version of the document contained an alteration of the wording: “the use of all forces and means at its disposal, including nuclear weapons, in order to repel armed aggression against itself or its allies, when no other means are deemed possible to prevent the liquidation of Russia as a party to international relations (National Security Concept of Russian Federation, 2000).”
Putin's 2000 military and foreign policy doctrine referred to NATO as an impediment to securing the Russian strategic interests, yet it also highlighted the difference between Europe and US and underscored the importance of the “multipolar” global order. The signing of the SORT treaty in May 2002 by Putin and George W. Bush opened the door to the reduction in the number of nuclear warheads to 1700–2200 in Russia and US over the next ten years (Cirincione & Wolfsthal, 2002). Unlike the START treaties that were signed prior to and following Putin's presidency, the SORT treaty was later criticized on a number of aspects, including the absence of proper verification provisions that ensured the implementation of the terms of the treaty; no guarantees prohibiting the redeployment of warheads after the treaty expires in 2011 and other weaknesses related to implementation mechanisms (Cirincione & Wolfsthal, 2002).
Interestingly, Yeltsin expressed his opposition to the US initiative to install the components of the National Missile Defense system in Central and Eastern Europe, yet he never used the language of threat so as to influence the decision of the countries involved and to delay or disrupt their plans. Both Yeltsin and Putin consistently stressed the importance of respecting Russia's national strategic interests by international partners, yet Putin went further to threaten targeting the former Warsaw Pact allies by the Russian offensive strategic nuclear forces in an effort to prevent the installation of the system. In an interview with newspapers from the Group of Eight (G8) industrialized nations, Putin stressed that: “If the US nuclear potential extends across the European territory, we will get new targets in Europe. It will then be up to our military experts to identify which targets will be aimed by ballistic missiles and which ones will be aimed by cruise missiles” (Blomfield, 2007).
We have taken several other steps required by the Adapted Conventional Armed Forces Treaty in Europe (ACAF). But what have we seen in response? Eastern Europe is receiving new weapons, two new military bases are being set up in Romania and in Bulgaria, and there are two new missile launch areas – a radar in the Czech republic and missile systems in Poland. And we are asking ourselves a question: what is going on? Russia is disarming unilaterally. But if we disarm unilaterally then we would like to see our partners be willing to do the same thing in Europe. On the contrary, Europe is being pumped full of new weapons systems. And of course we cannot help, but be concerned (Putin, 2007b).
A perception of external threat posed by the expansion of US defensive missile systems in Europe led Putin to pursue a counter-strategy aimed at the revival of the military, forging new alternative alliances, demonstratively testing new missiles, resuming strategic bomber flights in close proximity to NATO's bases, and conducting war games in concert with anti-Western countries. Putin also took steps to restore relations with Germany and France, offering them an alternative Russian–European missile shield to counter US proposals. However, European NATO member countries felt reluctant to accept Putin's proposal, which excluded the US ally. Subsequently, US–Russian relations improved and the concept of multipolarity was mentioned less frequently. During his speech at the Munich Conference on Security Policy in 2007, Putin said:
why is this being done, why are our American partners so insistent about implementing the missile defense plans in Europe, if they are obviously not needed for protection against the Iranian or North Korean missiles? It is well known where North Korea is located and what the range of their missiles needs to be to reach Europe. It is clear that it is not against them or us, because everyone knows that Russia does not intend to attack anyone. Why is this being done? Perhaps, to provoke our response and to prevent our integration into Europe. Missiles with a range of about five to eight thousand kilometers that really pose a threat to Europe do not exist in any of the so-called “problem” countries. Any hypothetical launch of, for example, a North Korean rocket to American territory through Western Europe obviously contradicts the laws of ballistics. As we say in Russia, it would be like using the right hand to reach the left ear (Putin, 2007c).
The international war against terrorism improved the Russian relations with NATO and in May 2002 the NATO-Russia Council was formed in which Russia became one of the twenty members. Its goal was to promote cooperation in fighting terrorism, crisis management, arms control, rescue operations and emergency situations, to name a few. In January 1992, Boris Yeltsin also called for a global missile defense system that could be developed and operated by both Russia and US. Such a system could be based on modified Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) technology. In essence, Yeltsin's offer contradicted his previous statements reaffirming Russia's compliance with the Antiballistic Missile Treaty which prohibits extensive missile defense systems. The proposal was left unrealized because of the pessimism prevalent among US policymakers with regard to a joint anti-ballistic missile defense system with Russia. Bobo Lo (2002) describes the “overall of Russian foreign policy during the Yeltsin period as ‘ad hoc’ and ‘reactive”. He argues that “policymakers consistently sought to give the impression of strategic vision and long-term thinking. But the competition between sectional interests within the elite had anaesthetizing effect on policy. Decision-making was driven by lowest common denominator principles, based on the avoidance of risk. The outcome, largely accidental, was a ‘pragmatism by default’ instead of the consensus sought by the regime” (Lo, 2002). Russian foreign policy priorities in the Yeltsin period were geared to accommodate the need to reinforce statehood to the expectation that was prevalent among the American decision-makers to move forward with the realization of governance reforms in Russia and implement the disarmament initiatives according to the agree-upon timeline. It is clear that Yeltsin aspired to see Russia become a part of the world community and especially the West, and cooperating with the US leadership on a broad range of issues was deemed as the most effective way of achieving that. Putin's political course effectively decelerated the progression of the state along that vector. His rhetoric related to US missile defense initiatives manifests a more deterministic approach to foreign affairs – all the more so as Russian national interests were believed and claimed to be directly affected by the US defense initiatives in Europe. Putin perceived the US plan to install the elements of NMD in Europe as being designed to protect primarily against Russia's offensive nuclear potential, not the Iranian or North Korean missiles as the officials from the Bush administration had stated. Whereas his opposition to Western security initiatives can be seen as a response to the rejection of his proposals to deploy a joint missile defense system with both Europe and US, more importantly, state-centrism and the objectives set forth by a new military doctrine appeared to be the main vehicle of the shift in Russia's foreign policy thinking and the relations with the United States on the question of NMD deployment in Central and Eastern Europe.
NATO expansion
After the collapse of the communist system in Russia, deep structural transformations, liberal and economic reforms were encouraged by the West and reinforced by the pledges to provide a substantial foreign aid. A great influence upon President Yeltsin's foreign policy strategies was exerted by the so-called group of Westernists who, in large part, steered the country toward the accommodation of Western interests and urged the fulfillment of the international financial institutions’ demands in exchange for large inflows of aid. In 1991, in an effort to demonstrate a pro-Western policy orientation, the Yeltsin administration even sent a letter to NATO expressing a strong interest in the membership and the willingness to move toward a full-scale partnership. “His letter did receive some publicity in the media, but suspicion lingered in the West about the permanency and even about the viability of Yeltsin's democratic reforms in Russia” (Felkay, 2002a; p. 178).
By not encouraging Russia to become a member, the West missed an excellent opportunity to strengthen Russia's nascent democracy. An acceptance, or at least a positive response, would have given an initial boost to Yeltsin's pro-Western foreign policies, a much-needed new identity to the floundering Russian military, and would have effectively countered Yeltsin's nationalist and Communist critics (Felkay, 2002a; p. 178).
Felkay (2002a, p. 178) maintains that “despite NATO's reluctance to embrace Yeltsin's Russia, the Yeltsin–Kozyrev team pushed on toward integrating Russia with the rest of Europe and building a friendly relationship with the United States.” Yeltsin realized that he had to make the post-Soviet political and economic transformations attractive to the American decision-makers, and especially President Clinton, because Russia's integration into the rest of the developed world was of foremost importance. Yeltsin's foreign policy was largely driven by pragmatism and adaptability to Western approaches in decision- and policy-making was central to the realization of those foreign policy objectives. It was deemed as being conducive to strengthening Russia's overall position as a global player rather than adversary. Bobo Lo (2002, p. 8) suggests that “during the Yeltsin period, America represented the single greatest external influence on Russian foreign policy, whether in relations with the IMF, in terms of the strategic disarmament agenda, in determining the level of Russian interest in regional and global issues, or in shaping elite perception of national identity.”
The rhetoric was much stronger during Putin's leadership over what he perceived and presented as the encirclement of Russia's geo-political domains by the US-led NATO forces. In a similar fashion, Putin expressed an interest in Russia's membership in NATO. However, subsequently, no further actions were undertaken to secure Russia's inclusion in the European community. To make matters worse, Putin took steps to emphasize the dependence of most European countries on Russia's energy resources as well as their economic vulnerability – particularly, when he gave direct orders to cut the supplies of natural gas to Europe via Ukraine and Belarus in the midst of winter. This had a detrimental effect on the relations with other Western leaders. In his 2000 State of the Nation address, Putin stressed the need to alleviate Russia's dependence on foreign aid: “it not only relates to our national pride, though it is also important. The question is more dramatic and of much greater significance. It is whether or not we can survive as a nation and civilization when our well-being again and again depends on international loans and the favor of world economic leaders” (Putin, 2002a).
At the 2007 Munich Conference devoted to global security issues, President Putin criticized the US leadership for conducting a unilateral foreign policy, for pursuing its national interests while ignoring those of other countries, both major and minor. He described the US diplomacy as using an “almost uncontained hyper use of force – military force – in international relations, a force that is plunging the world into an abyss of permanent conflicts” (Putin, 2007d). He also expressed Russia's concern when he pointed to the “so-called flexible frontline American bases with up to five thousand men in each. It turns out that NATO has put its frontline bases on our borders” (Putin, 2007d). In a 2007 speech commemorating the 62nd anniversary of the Nazi defeat in World War II, Putin tacitly compared US foreign policy to that of the Third Reich. He stated that: “We do not have the right to forget the causes of any war, which must be sought in the mistakes and errors of peacetime. In our time, these threats are not diminishing. They are only transforming, changing their appearance. In these new threats, as during the time of the Third Reich, are the same contempt for human life and the same claims of exceptionality and diktat in the world” (Quoted in Kramer, 2007).
In his 1997 speech, Yeltsin reiterated his opposition to NATO expansion plans by stating that “they aim to contradict the Russian security interests and are conducive to fracturing the European political space. The significance of existing European-wide political organizations will diminish. Never before has anyone been able to create an effective security system in Europe without Russia or against it” (Yeltsin, 1997). He further proposed to increase the dialog in an effort to ease tensions.
This year Russia's diplomacy sought to implement those foreign policy objectives outlined in the previous addresses, namely, to create favorable external conditions for the continuation of domestic reforms, for building and maintaining genuinely equal relationships with the leading countries of the world, corresponding to the status and potential of Russia. Our aim is to defend our national interests not by resorting to confrontation, but by building the foundation for future stability and cooperation in international relations. Russian foreign policy is aimed to construct the system of international relations based on the multipolar peace, devoid of the dominance by a single center of force (Yeltsin, 1997).
It is important to mention that the agreed-upon financial aid package did not eliminate, but helped to tone down Russian criticism of NATO's eastward expansion during Yeltsin's rule. The American assurances given on the ABM Treaty also helped. The signing of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty and the promise of advancing the ratification of the Chemical Weapons Convention were gestures of ongoing cooperation between the two nations, despite their disagreement on NATO expansion. The American side had made another concession to appease Yeltsin, by announcing that the United States would support Russia's full participation in future meetings of the Group of Seven (G-7).
In contrast to Yeltsin's diplomatic gestures and his manifested willingness to cooperate despite the unilateral engagement of NATO in Kosovo, Putin pursued a consistent and strictly pro-Russian policy course on matters related to global security and peace. Putin was more cautious about the NATO expansion plans. The 2008 war between Georgia and Russia is a good case in point. The Russian military campaign against Georgian forces exacerbated the tense relations between US and Russia. For the US, Georgia was a geo-strategic partner and an ally waiting for the membership in NATO and in the European Union. The accession of Georgia represented a salient opportunity to implement the NATO eastern expansion objective. However, Western leaders were reluctant to aggravate tensions with Russia by acceding Georgia into NATO. Rather, this demonstrates that at that time – maintaining peaceful and cooperative relations with Russia was more important for the West than expanding the NATO presence eastward. Nevertheless, that does not diminish Russia's concern about a threat posed by the military bloc.
Kosovo
The conflict in Kosovo vividly demonstrates that the shift in Russian foreign policy thinking toward Statism was manifested not only in the statements made by the presidents, but also in the actual actions of the Russian government under Putin's protégé, President Medvedev. The conflict in Georgia in 2008 over the two annexed republics of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, when the invasion by the Russian military forces was justified as being in line with the actions of the West in Kosovo and the US-backed declaration of independence of the breakaway region is illustrative of the Putin administration's disregard for international legal norms and of the commitment to use military force in advancing a new national idea. In Yeltsin's era, however, there was a tendency to defer the making of difficult decisions. Moscow was prone or at least attempted to ignore problems related to Yugoslavia in an effort to postpone a decision on how to respond to Milosevic and his barbaric actions in Yugoslavia (Herspring and Rutland, 2003b; p. 227). As a result of such policy, it appeared that Moscow approved the Western policy in the Balkans. Yeltsin was compelled to invent a new type of relationship with the US seeking a greater economic support and a solution to the accumulating domestic political pressure in light of the painstaking transition process and the successive financial crises that had nearly thrown the Russian economy into an abyss of chaos. At that time, the US was the sole superpower and as many people in the Russian elites asserted – a major source of donor aid. In that context, Yeltsin had no choice, but to place a primary emphasis on strengthening the US–Russian ties. However, his consistent health problems, inability to handle the domestic processes, the peculiarity of his personality, and, at times, lack of assertiveness also created additional impediments to forming a solid foreign policy course.
In the wake of his rule, Putin came to power when Russian foreign policy was weak, inconsistent and ineffective. It was then that a new course began to form. Putin's foreign policy appeared increasingly solid, goal-oriented, consistent and pragmatic. During his visit to Kosovo in 2001 Putin said that: “the international community, which set up a protectorate in Kosovo at the end of the civil war in 1999, must act to implement a UN Security Council resolution guaranteeing the rights of minority Serbs in the province of Kosovo and the integrity of Yugoslavia” (Quoted in Putin, 2001). Putin reiterated that the long-standing Russian ties with the Serbian people constitute the foundation of the bilateral relations. Russia viewed NATO intervention in Kosovo as being the cause of the Albanian nationalism in the region.
In his 2000 State of the Nation address, Putin said that:
The Cold War is in the past, yet even today we have to overcome its hard consequence, including the attempts to infringe the rights of sovereign states under the umbrella of the so-called humanitarian interventions and the difficulty of finding a common language when it comes to resolving the issues of regional and international threats (Putin, 2000b).
The situation in Kosovo, which Yeltsin failed to handle appropriately, sparked a new wave of anti-Western sentiments and helped Putin to consolidate his political platform and to engage in the wide-scale military operations in the North Caucasus. Yeltsin said that: “Russia has a number of extreme measures in store, but we decided not to use them so far. We are above that. On the moral level we are superior to the Americans. The NATO aggression against Yugoslavia is a very big mistake made by the American diplomacy and by Clinton, and they will be held accountable” (Quoted in Felkay, 2002b; pp. 88–120). Subsequently, Yeltsin appealed to the leaders of the Contact Group on Yugoslavia and called for the Security Council meeting to end the bombing and to continue the search for peace – an effort that did not yield results. However, this demonstrates Yeltsin's higher commitment to peace and political dialog. He strove to prevent unilateral military interventions and sought a greater involvement of the UN in the resolution of the crisis. In his State of the Nation speech, Yeltsin proclaimed: “I will do everything to put an end to military actions in Yugoslavia, but Russia has already made its choice – it will not allow itself to be drawn into the conflict. We are trying to avoid another global split” (Quoted in Felkay, 2002b; pp. 88–120).
Chechnya
Disagreements between US and Russia over the resolution of the conflict in Chechnya became commonplace after Putin was elected President of Russia. He perceived and presented Chechen rebels as a threat not only to the Russian society and its territorial integrity, but also to the civilization at large, which he predominantly associated with the West, so as to achieve a greater international support for the operations in the Caucasus. In his April 2002 State of the Nation address, Putin said that “in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks on New York and Washington, many people realized that the Cold War is over and that there are different threats and there is another war with international terrorism. This does not require additional evidence and equally applies to Russia” (Putin, 2002a). The first wave of terrorist attacks in Moscow and the second Chechen campaign that followed them boosted his ratings substantially before the presidential elections in 2000 and gave him confidence in promoting a centralized governance system across the nation.
The events of 2004 proved a major challenge for Putin, after two civilian airplanes were downed and more than a thousand schoolchildren and teachers were taken hostage in Beslan, North Ossetia, both of which resulted in hundreds of casualties. The attacks seemed to have been spreading across the whole region and people felt increasingly less secure from the threat. The initial reaction was hardly in line with the pragmatic Western-oriented course. In his first statement, President Putin admitted that Russia lacked sufficient and adequate defense, but also relegated partial responsibility for the Beslan incident to some unspecified external forces that worked to undermine the Russian influence in the region and to instigate secessionist sentiments and movements. In a vague reference to the West, he said that “some want to tear off a big chunk of our country and others are helping them. They are helping them in the belief that Russia, as one of the greatest nuclear powers of the world, still poses a threat to them and, therefore, this threat has to be eliminated. Terrorism is their only tool” (Tsygankov, 2006b; p. 145).
However, US–Russian relations improved in the wake of the terrorist attacks in New York and Washington and after the two presidents met in 2001. Whereas certain Russian policymakers had expressed their willingness to support the USA, given the concessions on NATO enlargement initiatives were made, President Putin immediately endorsed the US plan to launch a global war on terrorism, which was seen in line with Russia's own domestic campaign to suppress insurgencies and secessionism. The events of September 11, 2001 presented a perfect opportunity for Moscow to build a solid foundation for the domestic policies. “Fighting terrorism has been the argument used by Russia to combat rebel groups in Chechnya and it builds on a strong national consensus created by the bombings of civilian apartment complexes in Russia in 1999” (Wallensteen, 2007; p. 217). The obvious reason was that Putin already saw Russia as fighting such a war in Chechnya and that the resumption of this war in 1999 had greatly contributed to his accession to power. Russia thus supported the US-led campaign to oust the Taliban regime and to eliminate the Al-Qaida network in Afghanistan. As a result, Putin reluctantly accepted the US plan to deploy military bases in Central Asia, despite the domestic opposition. Russia was seen as an even closer ally than NATO. The response of the US leadership was the softened criticism of the war in Chechnya, which was subsequently referred to as the internal affair of the state.
When referring to the situation in Chechnya in 1994, Yeltsin had stressed the need to rely strictly on negotiations so as to reach a social and political consensus. The consensus is aimed at a common goal of consolidating the Russian state and increasing the welfare of its citizens without regard to the differences in opinions and political positions (Yeltsin, 1994). His 1995 State of the Nation speech depicted a cooperative and conciliatory tone of Russian foreign policy, in large part due to the widely criticized military campaign in Chechnya. In 1995, he stated that in rare cases when coercion is to be used all actions need to conform to the will of the people, which is enshrined in the Constitution (Yeltsin, 1995). He further stated that Russia was compelled to use force against the outlawed Chechen regime in the first campaign that was started against the backdrop of weak statehood, poor condition of military forces, fragile civil society institutions, and a still growing democracy when the government was able not to suppress the wave of criticism and remain open, both domestically and internationally (Yeltsin, 1995). In 1997, Yeltsin signed a peace treaty with Maskhadov to put an end to hostilities between Russia and the Chechen republic. Despite the war in Chechnya, Yeltsin was well aware of the necessity to maintain a solid, business-like relationship with the West, and was not about to forfeit Russia's right to fully participate in European and world affairs. To alleviate the international criticism during the height of the campaign, Yeltsin even allowed OSCE fact-finding missions to enter Chechnya in an effort to resolve the conflict. By permitting the OSCE to play an important role in Chechnya, the Yeltsin administration attempted to give evidence of its willingness to cooperate with international organizations, notwithstanding the strong criticism by the Republican-led US Congress.
In his 1994 State of the Nation address, Boris Yeltsin stressed the need to enhance the dialog with the Chechen authorities with the aim of holding democratic elections in the breakaway republic (Yeltsin, 1994). He also said that:
without developed civil society institutions, state power will inevitably become totalitarian and despotic. It is because of civil society that this power serves the interests of citizens. The distinction of the situation in Russia is that parallel to building civil society institutions, democratic foundations are being developed in so far as a democratic society cannot exist without a civil society. It is not about the interference of the state with the life of the civil society structures and not about equipping these organizations with executive powers, but about a targeted assistance of those institutions that are capable of consolidating the democratic potential of the power (Yeltsin, 1994).
Vladimir Putin's position on the Chechen question was drastically different, which primarily derived from his firm conviction that state collapse can be averted only by the strengthened nationwide state control. Putin was able to consolidate his rule in Chechnya following the major offensive by the Russian army and a counter-insurgency phase of the military campaign that was started in September 1999. Putin's rhetoric related to the war in Chechnya and secessionism in general was obviously more rigid and harsh in comparison to that of Yeltsin. In his May 2003 address, Putin stated that:
Russia will be a strong country with modern, well-equipped, and mobile armed forces, with the army prepared to protect its homeland and its allies, the national interests of the country and its citizens. Our history shows that a country like Russia will exist and prosper only if it is a great power, yet in time of economic or political crises there has always been a threat of disintegration (Putin, 2003).
Putin took the problem of secessionism in Russia more acutely. His official rhetoric associated with the Chechen problem highlights the paramount necessity to suppress the separatist movements by force of arms under the pretext of the war against international terrorism and to project a strong Russian influence across the entire North Caucasus. Generally speaking, state-centrism was the most salient feature of Russian foreign and domestic policies under Putin. When he succeeded Yeltsin as President, the policies of the state toward the Chechen republic and secessionism in general took a more assertive form – that is, despite Yeltsin's initiation of a major offensive against the Chechen separatists in December 1994, Putin's campaign against rebel fighters appeared increasingly uncompromising. This was, in part, due to the external circumstances that dominated the global and post-Soviet political space. Putin strove to link the struggle of the Chechens for independence to a global terrorist threat and Al-Qaida in order to achieve the support of the leading democracies in his state-building campaign. The 9/11 attacks in New York and Washington and the subsequent US-led military invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq have proved to be a turning point in Putin's anti-insurgency campaign.
According to Richard Sakwa, “Putin's image as an ‘iron chancellor’ was created and sustained by his uncompromising approach to the Chechen problem. His use of street language in the press conference on 8 September, where he used the underworld jargon of ‘soaking the bandits in the John’, appeared at first as if it would be a public relations disaster, but in the event it only reinforced Putin's image as a man of the people” (Sakwa, 2008; p. 22).
Vladimir Putin's rhetoric shows a tendency toward increased state control and the use of coercive military force against the separatist movement in Chechnya in an effort to prevent the disintegration of the Russian state and, more importantly, to consolidate the power base of the ruling regime. Interestingly, Yeltsin had emphasized the involvement and the significance of democratic institutions, civil society and negotiations in tackling ethnic problems in his State of the Nation addresses. The First Chechen campaign that was waged during Yeltsin's presidency was the result of the decision-making process among the elite groups and individuals who often bypassed the president's approval of certain policies and avoided his complete comprehension of critical issues. This is not to suggest that it was launched without Yeltsin's consent, yet many political decisions during his rule can be attributed to his inner circle and key generals in the military rather than his personal initiative. Yeltsin was forced to make unpopular decisions because of the pressure exerted on him by the oligarchy and individuals that were directly linked to his family. Putin was able to overcome the influence of various interest groups, suppress the impulses of power elites in the decision- and policy-making processes and impose his own will and convictions on the formation of new domestic and foreign policies.
Terrorism
In the wake of the terrorist attacks in New York and Washington in 2001, Putin offered the US leader his country's strong support in operations against Al-Qaida bases in Afghanistan. This included intelligence cooperation, opening Russian airspace for humanitarian aid flights, participation in rescue operations as well as compelling the Central Asian leaders to provide support to US military forces. There was logic behind these actions. In his February 2002 interview to Wall Street Journal, Putin expressed his willingness to provide alternative energy market opportunities for the United States (Putin, 2002b). At that time, Russia was the major oil producer, yet only one percent of imported American oil had Russian origins. Putin anticipated an increase in the production of crude oil much of which was intended for export, mostly to the United States. Theoretically, this could put the United States in a position of dependence on Russian oil supplies and create another economic lever for Putin to manipulate US foreign policy, as was the case with EU-Russia partnership on energy issues. Eager to engage the United States, Putin was careful not to overly express his opposition on the long-standing issues, such as the NMD, NATO expansion and the situation in the former Yugoslavia. His decision to support the US invasion of Afghanistan derived from the goal to oust the Taliban regime and to replace it with the Russia-backed Northern Alliance. However, while offering his support, Putin made it clear that Russia will not engage in the military operations because of the painstaking domestic and international authorization process. In return for his support of the US invasion of Afghanistan, he expected a US approval of his policies in Chechnya and, possibly, accession to WTO.
When the George W. Bush administration announced its plans to overthrow the Saddam Hussein regime in support of a democratic Iraq, Russia responded in a different manner. Putin decided to join the coalition of the opposing countries. Not convinced by the US arguments about the WMD threat, he was insisting on the broader UN involvement, thereby asserting his disagreement with the US leadership. The decision to oppose the US invasion was driven by Russia's economic and geo-political interests in Iraq under Saddam Hussein's regime and by the reluctance to let US companies occupy the oil-rich country. At that time, Russia was the main supplier of arms to Iraq and had highly profitable oil contracts with the Iraqi regime. In his 2003 State of the Nation address, Putin said: “Countries with highly developed economies are around us. I must say they push us aside from the lucrative world markets whenever possible. Their visible economic advantages give them the reason for geo-political ambitions” (Putin, 2003). However, in the end, his efforts to oppose the invasion of Iraq were wasted and Russia could not use its veto power in the Security Council because of the Bush administration's disregard for international normative standards, in favor for unilateralism. In addition, Putin's fears have not materialized and Russian companies have won a significant number of auction bids for oil development projects in Iraq.
Conclusion
The State of the Nation addresses of Yeltsin and Putin examined in this essay suggest that there was a fundamental shift in thinking from Yeltsin to Putin on the foreign policy course of the Russian state. This is seen from the expressed commitment to consolidate the bilateral cooperation with the US, to develop civil society institutions and to build a free market economy during Yeltsin's presidency to a strong political and diplomatic opposition by Putin of all US-backed security initiatives, military and economic coercion, the centralization of executive power and the willingness to use military force in tackling political problems, both domestically and internationally. The shift is mainly manifest in the rhetoric and policy actions of Putin and members of his administration. Multiple factors can explain the difference in foreign policy approaches of Yeltsin and Putin in the context of US–Russian relations, such as different personalities, distinct socio-political circumstances that accompanied both leaders, distinct manners of speaking, particular personal relationship chemistries and different manners of reacting to US proposals. Most importantly, however, the change of the foreign policy course can be seen as a consequence of Putin's strong personal conviction that Russia's global power image can be restored by means of consolidation of coercive state power. Arousing the nationalist agenda is one way of achieving that.
As was mentioned earlier, Boris Yeltsin was compelled to make difficult and unpopular decisions that were hardly in line with his stated commitment to adhere to a liberal-democratic course. However, many of his decisions were the result of the political pressure that was exerted on him by the oligarchy and senior administration officials. Yeltsin's poor health condition essentially undermined his ability to fully engage in the decision-making process closer to the end of his second term as president. He was preoccupied with the necessity of finding a political successor and ensuring the continuity of Russia's foreign policy course. Yeltsin anticipated a change of domestic and foreign policies; however, at that time, he was mainly concerned about the ability of his successor to handle the complex situation inside the country and in the ever-changing world. Throughout the span of Putin's presidency, his rhetoric on major political and economic affairs suggests a heightened patriotic and nationalist stance. Despite the many setbacks that followed Putin's decisions, the Russian society achieved a high degree of stability and consolidation during his eight-year rule as president. Favorable economic conditions – particularly, as a result of high oil and gas prices on the world market and the revenues from resource exports proved to be the stimulus for the Russian leader to transform the system of governance and, along with that, the entire concept of the Russian state security in the twenty first century. This was seen as the reassertion of Russian state interests in the West and resulted in a relative tension with the global security vision that was and continues to be espoused by the US leadership and the decision-makers within the US establishment.