Grigori Yefimovich Rasputin, a peasant who rose to become a mystical, religious, spiritual and hence political advisor to Tsar Nicholas and Tsarina Feodorovna, is often viewed as an evil genius who helped undermine the Russian monarchy in the eyes of the Russian people. Though he was murdered in 1916, a year before the Russian Revolution, his scraggly bearded image (above) and his willingness to use biblical knowledge to implement his power have lingered throughout the ages as the epitome of Russian scheming and dangerous political intrigue. Though he probably had less of an influence than most surmise, no one would ever suggest that his presence in the Russian Court was anything but manipulative and evil.
Manipulation of the truth and behind the scenes scheming seem to have become hallmarks of Russian leadership over the years, a factor which does not seem to have changed in the modern era. Denying that Russian operatives were functioning in Crimea, fomenting unrest, and then admitting the obvious after that region had been annexed by Russia, Russian President Vladimir Putin also declared that the entire Internet was created and controlled by America’s C.I.A. Despite the tumble of the rouble in the currency markets and that the continued erosion of average buying power for the average Russians continues abated, Putin’s militaristic expansionism – his stated desire to reassemble (in one form or another) the Soviet bloc – has been wildly popular with his own people.
Putin is his own advisor. He needs no Rasputin to direct his actions. But to Americans and others in the West, the underlying willingness to manipulate and mislead, to exaggerate and twist events to devious interpretation, seem to be the Russian way. Putin is likely to continue to take steps to erode political stability in his neighboring states, once a part of the Soviet Union, literally forcing these weakened states back into the Russian orbit. He feels compelled to move them away from his fear of N.A.T.O. encroachment (replete with military alliances, missile installations and hostile forces) in what he believes is Russia’s absolute right to influence and control his region, the C.I.S. countries of today and perhaps some of his former Eastern bloc satellite nations. Putin sees himself as a champion of traditional national conservatism fighting a battle against the liberal West.
Putin has massed his troops on the eastern border with Ukraine, where pro-Russian separatists have taken Western “observers” as hostages, telling the world that a state of war now exists between them and Ukraine. Putin might be able to delay a presidential election in Ukraine, further weakening a country which he has pushed to the brink of a civil war. Perhaps he will invade, perhaps he will just continue to pull the legs out from under this already-shaky regime, but he is reveling in the unwillingness of the West to do anything that remotely troubles him, even though it will be increasingly difficult for Russia to participate in the global economy.
But as the West seeks to find some mechanism to contain this destabilizing force, applying sanctions to Russian oligarchs in the hopes that they will moderate Russian efforts through their influence with the President, their efforts have been incredibly unsuccessful. Riding high with his own people, Vladimir Putin appears to be completely in control, and so far his constituents are willing to ignore their economic malaise in this rise from a litany of what they perceived to have been Western humiliations of their great nation. Is there a middle path, short of the kind of World War III scenario that Western leaders are unwilling to embrace (not to mention Europe’s own “humiliating” dependence on Russian oil and gas)?
Putin is rich… really rich, reputed to be one of if not the richest man on earth. His wealth does not appear to be centered in Russia, and rumors of massive deposits of wealth in secret tax havens have been the stuff of rumors – and perhaps some serious tracking by the C.I.A. (did they use the Internet?) – for the past 15 years. Is this his Achilles Heel?
“Now, as the Obama administration prepares to announce another round of sanctions as early as Monday targeting Russians it considers part of Mr. Putin’s financial circle, it is sending a not-very-subtle message that it thinks it knows where the Russian leader has his money, and that he could ultimately be targeted directly or indirectly.
“‘It’s something that could be done that would send a very clear signal of taking the gloves off and not just dance around it,’ said Juan C. Zarate, a White House counterterrorism adviser to President George W. Bush who helped pioneer the government’s modern financial campaign techniques to choke off terrorist money… So far, the American government has not imposed sanctions on Mr. Putin himself, and officials said they would not in the short term, reasoning that personally targeting a head of state would amount to a ‘nuclear’ escalation, as several put it.
“But officials said they hoped to get Mr. Putin’s attention by targeting figures close to him like Mr. Timchenko, and other business magnates like Yuri V. Kovalchuk, Vladimir I. Yakunin and Arkady and Boris Rotenberg… Among those likely to be on [the U.S. government’s] list, officials said, are Igor Sechin, president of the Rosneft state oil company, and Aleksei Miller, head of the Gazprom state energy giant.” New York Times, April 27th.
How did this happen? Why didn’t the West see the obvious pattern in Putin’s rather consistent anti-Western statements, his crass defiance and support of the Syria’s murderous Assad regime, his claims to the Arctic region (planting a platinum Russian flag claiming the North Pole) and the slow addiction of Europe to his nation’s abundant fossil fuels? Is Putin stoppable without war? What do you think is the most effective approach we can take… or do we just let him have his way?
I’m Peter Dekom, and these vicious cycles of political excess always seem to arise after sustained periods of economic hardship.
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