Putin's Wars

However—as is the case in the Shanghai Cooperation Organization—the BRIC was not only a forum for Russia, but equally for China. In December 2010 South Africa became a member and China sent an invitation to South African President Jacob Zuma to participate in the 2011 BRIC summit in China. The aim was to broaden the BRIC into BRICS, this despite the fact that the size of the South African economy is only a quarter of Russia’s and its growth in 2011 would not exceed 3 percent. China especially, which, with South Africa, is the biggest investor on the African continent, seemed to profit from this enlargement of the BRIC.^[44] However, during the BRICS summit in the South African town of Durban on March 26 and 27, 2013, President Putin succeeded in forging a closer cooperation with his South African counterpart. Vladimir Putin and Jacob Zuma agreed to create a kind of platinum OPEC,^[45] and Putin offered South Africa help with the construction of a nuclear power plant. The two leaders also decided to build a strategic partnership and deepen cooperation in the military sphere, including joint exercises of the armed forces of the two countries. Plans were also announced to set up a joint production of the Ansat light purpose helicopter.^[46] The cherry on the cake was a declaration by both countries “not to participate in any treaties and agreements which have an aim to encroach on the independence, sovereignty, territorial integrity or national security interests of the other party,”^[47] which can be read as a South African pledge to keep its distance from NATO. Another Russian hope: to build a BRICS development bank that would challenge the hegemony of the Western-dominated IMF and World Bank had to be postponed to the summit of 2014.

There are plans to enlarge the BRICS with other emerging economies. The main candidate is Indonesia. Its accession would transform the BRICS into BRIICS.^[48] Another candidate is Turkey. In fact there is a whole series of emerging economies that would qualify for membership. The list of potential new members includes Mexico, Nigeria, South Korea, and Vietnam. However, as Martyn Davies, indicated, “There is a debate within the Brics as to whether to ‘deepen’ or ‘widen’ the grouping. While South Africa and Brazil are keen to expand the number of member countries, China and India prefer to consolidate. Russia is ambivalent.”^[49] The Russian ambivalence could be explained by the geopolitical rather than economic importance it ascribes to the grouping. It would certainly welcome an old ally, such as Vietnam, and possibly even Turkey, which is considered by the Kremlin to be an independent and critical NATO member. It would certainly be, however, reluctant to admit a close US ally, such as South Korea. All this cannot conceal the fact that the BRICS remain a highly artificial construct, and this will even be more so when the club expands. Ruchir Sharma wrote:

China apart, they have limited trade ties with one another, and they have few political or foreign policy interests in common. A problem with thinking in acronyms is that once one catches one, it tends to lock analysts into a worldview that may soon be outdated. In recent years, Russia’s economy and stock market have been among the weakest of the emerging markets, dominated by an oil-rich class of billionaires, whose assets equal 20 percent of GDP, by far the largest share held by the superrich in any major economy. Although deeply out of balance, Russia remains a member of the BRICS, if only because the term sounds better with an R.^[50]

Notes

1.

“Top Kremlin Aide Says Putin Is God’s Gift to Russia,” Reuters, July 8, 2011.

2.

Yevgenia Albats, The State within a State: The KGB and Its Hold on Russia: Past, Present, and Future (New York: Farrar-Straus-Giroux, 1994), 325.

3.

Former Prime Minister Primakov, for instance, did not hide his disappointment. He wrote that after the war with Georgia in 2008, “Russian society was pained by the silence in the beginning from our CIS allies, and still more by that of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO). Quite certainly we have overestimated relations within the CIS and the CSTO.” (Evgueni Primakov, Le monde sans la Russie? À quoi conduit la myopie politique, with a preface by Hubert Védrine (Paris: Economica, 2009), 175.)

4.

Cf. Janusz Bugajski, Georgian Lessons: Conflicting Russian and Western Interests in the Wider Europe (Washington, DC: Center for Strategic & International Studies, 2010), 19.

5.

Dmitry Babich, “Russia-Belarus Union State on Shaky Legs,” RIA Novosti (December 8, 2009).

6.

Chubais quoted in Valery Paniouchkine and Mikhaïl Zygar. Gazprom: L’arme de la Russie (Paris: Actes Sud, 2008), 188.

7.

Larissa Sayenko, “Kto kogo dushit,” Moskovskie Novosti, no. 13 (March 30–April 6, 1997), 8.

8.

“Lukashenka at Bay,” The Economist (December 4, 2010).

9.

Dmitri Trenin, Post-Imperium: A Eurasian Story (Washington, DC, and Moscow: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2011), 46.

10.

Jan Maksymiuk, “Belarus: Lukashenka Eyes Union with Ukraine,” RFE/RL (November 24, 2006).

11.

“Putin Named PM of Belarus-Russia Alliance,” msnbc.com (May 27, 2008).

12.

“Medvedev Says Belarus Has Not Been Asked to Become Part of Russia,” RIA Novosti (November 23, 2009).

13.

“Medvedev Says Belarus Has Not Been Asked to Become Part of Russia.”

14.

Sergey Borisov, “Common Economic Space May ‘Absorb’ Union State of Russia, Belarus,” RT (October 19, 2010).

15.

Borodin quoted by Ivan Savelyev, “Union State of Russia and Belarus Needs Intensive Care,” RIA Novosti (October 14, 2010).

16.

Dmitry Medvedev’s blog, October 4, 2010. http://rt.com/About_Us/Blogs/kremlin-messages-president-talks-to-the-web.html.

17.

“Union State Should Re-integrate Former USSR, Russian Analyst Says,” Belta (November 26, 2010).

18.

Zbigniew Brzezinski, Strategic Vision: America and the Crisis of Global Power (New York: Basic Books, 2012), 94.

19.

“Speaker Rules Out Ukraine Joining Belarus-Russia Union State,” iupdp.org (April 7, 2010).

20.

“Speaker Rules Out Ukraine Joining Belarus-Russia Union State.”

21.

“Klaus von Beyme: Slavic Federation of Ukraine, Belarus and Russia Would be a Natural Partner for the EU and NATO,” Information Analysis Portal of the Union State (November 19, 2010). http://www.soyuz.by/en/print.aspx?guid=93465 (accessed December 7, 2010).

22.

“South Ossetia May Join Russia-Belarus Union State,” RT (August 2, 2011).

23.

Andrew Jack, “Putin ‘Could Head Post-Soviet Confederation,’” The Financial Times (October 28, 2003).

24.

“Ukraine to Observe Russian-Belarusian-Kazakh Negotiations on Creation of Customs Union,” Office for a Democratic Belarus (December 1, 2010).

25.

“Ukraine to Observe Russian-Belarusian-Kazakh Negotiations on Creation of Customs Union.”

26.

“Putin Reminded to Whom Belarus Obliged Its GDP Growth,” udf.by (July 13, 2012).

27.

“Ukraine to Observe Russian-Belarusian-Kazakh Negotiations on Creation of Customs Union.”

28.

Åslund quoted by Konstantin Rozhnov, “Will a New Customs Union Hurt Russia’s WTO Bid?” BBC News (June 30, 2010).

29.

“Putin: Ukraina prodast Evrope 2 litra moloka, a Tamozhennyy Soyuz dast ey $9mlrd v god,” Zerkalo Nedeli. Ukraina (October 6, 2012).

30.

Cf. Konstantin von Eggert, “Due West: Georgia’s Wildcard in Russia’s WTO Membership,” RIA Novosti (December 8, 2010). http://en.rian.ru/colmnists/20101208/161688551.html.

31.

Pavel K. Baev, “Medvedev Enjoys Foreign Policy ‘Successes,’” Eurasia Daily Monitor 7, no. 222 (December 13, 2010).

32.

“Putin Reminded to Whom Belarus Obliged its GDP Growth.”

33.

“Russia Still Considering to Include Armenia in Single Customs Union,” News.am (December 6, 2010).

34.

For a critical analysis of Medvedev’s proposal, see my paper “Medvedev’s Proposal for a Pan-European Security Pact: Its Six Hidden Objectives and How the West Should Respond,” The Cicero Foundation (October 2008). http://www.cicerofoundation.org/lectures/Marcel_H_Van_Herpen_Medvedevs_Proposal_for_a_Pan-European_Security_Pact.pdf.

35.

Cf. Stephen Blank, “The CSTO: Gendarme of Eurasia,” Eurasia Daily Monitor 8, no. 176 (September 26, 2011).

36.

Fyodor Lukyanov, “Eurasian Union is Putin’s Top Priority,” Valdai Discussion Club (June 4, 2012).

37.

Uwe Halbach, “Vladimir Putin’s Eurasian Union: A New Integration Project for the CIS Region?” SWP Comments 1, Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik (January 2012), 3.

38.

“Interview: Analyst Says Uzbekistan’s Suspension Shows CSTO is ‘Irrelevant,’” RFE/RL (June 29, 2012).

39.

“Serbia Becomes PA CSTO Observer,” Tanjug (April 11, 2013).

40.

Hall Gardner, Dangerous Crossroads: Europe, Russia, and the Future of NATO (Westport, CT: Praeger, 1997), 112.

41.

Boris Nemtsov and Vladimir Milov, Putin Itogi: Nezavisimyy Ekspertnyy Doklad (Moscow: Novaya Gazeta, 2008), 54.

42.

Eugene B. Rumer, “Russian Foreign Policy beyond Putin,” Adelphi Paper No. 390 (London: The International Institute for Strategic Studies, 2007), 24.

43.

Anders Åslund, “The End Seems Near for the Putin Model,” The Washington Post (February 26, 2010).

44.

It led in South Africa to critical comments. One economist “berated the government for simply replacing Western corporations plundering Africa’s natural resources with a new group of what he called ‘sub-imperialist’ powers, the Brics.” (Peter Fabricius, “Brics Summit Important for SA,” IOL News (March 22, 2013).)

45.

Alain Faujas, “La création de la banque de développement des Brics renvoyée à 2014,” Le Monde (March 29, 2013).

46.

“Russia Offers S. Africa Help with Nuclear Power,” RIA Novosti (March 26, 2013).

47.

“Russian, South African Presidents Sign Declaration on Strategic Partnership,” ITAR-TASS (March 26, 2013).

48.

Cf. Michael Schuman, “Should BRICS Become BRIICS?” Time (March 3, 2010). Cf. also Karen Brooks, “Is Indonesia Bound for the BRICS?” Foreign Affairs 90, no. 6 (November/December 2011).

49.

Martyn Davies, “Indonesia and Turkey Top Brics Contenders,” Business Day (South Africa) (March 3, 2013).

50.

Ruchir Sharma, “Broken BRICs: Why the Rest Stopped Rising,” Foreign Affairs 91, no. 6 (November/December 2012), 4–5.

Chapter 5

The Eurasian Union

Putin’s Newest Imperial Project

On October 8, 2011, Vladimir Putin launched a new project, when he published in the paper Izvestia an article with the title “A New Integration Project for Eurasia: The Future That Is Born Today.” In this article he announced the creation of a “Eurasian Union.” The Union, he wrote, would be “an open project.” The three countries of the Customs Union—Belarus, Russia, and Kazakhstan—formed the core of this new Union. However, wrote Putin, “we hope for the accession of other partners, and first of all of the countries of the CIS.”^[1] This was the first time, after the establishment of the CIS in December 1991, that the Kremlin launched an integration initiative that intended to incorporate the quasi-totality of the former Soviet Union. Putin explicitly denied that it was an attempt “to recreate, in one form or another, the USSR.” On the contrary, he said his project was inspired by the example of the European Union. Like the EU the Eurasian Union would develop itself through a process of deepening and enlargement. It would, like the EU, also have its own supranational organs, such as a Commission and a Court.

Precursors of the Eurasian Project: Igor Panarin and Aleksandr Dugin

Ideas about creating a “Eurasian Union” were not new. They had already been circulating for many years in Russia. What was new was the fact that the Russian leadership, after years of hidden support, finally decided to embrace the project openly. One of its main protagonists was Igor Panarin, a former KGB analyst, who, in his capacity as dean of the Diplomatic Academy of the Foreign Ministry, became one of the main ideologists of the Eurasian idea. In an interview in Izvestia,^[2] published in April 2009, he had predicted the creation of a powerful “Eurasian Union,” led by Vladimir Putin. This Union, modeled on the EU, would have a parliament in Saint Petersburg and create a single currency. The Eurasian Union, he said, would not only encompass the territories of the former Soviet Union. He predicted that Alaska would return to Russia and that Russia would play a leading role in Iran and the Indian subcontinent. In the end China and the European Union would also become members and form a triumvirate that would dominate the world. Panarin predicted that the global role of the United States was over. According to him this country would soon fall apart.^[3] In a lecture, delivered in Berlin in February 2012—after Putin’s official adoption of the Eurasian Union project—Panarin declared that “the Eurasian Union should have four capitals: 1. St. Petersburg; 2. Almaty; 3. Kiev; 4. Belgrade.”^[4] He added a timetable also. Armenia, Tajikistan, and Ukraine could join by December 30, 2012; Serbia and Montenegro, as well as Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, and Mongolia, by December 30, 2016. After this date “Turkey, Scotland, New Zealand, Vietnam, and several other countries could join.”^[5] When Putin declared that the Eurasian Union is not a reconstitution of the former USSR, he was completely right because the scope of the project seems to be much more ambitious. Panarin mentioned here no fewer than seven possible members that were not former parts of the defunct Soviet Union, although New Zealand^[6] and Scotland (after independence) are improbable candidates. Panarin warned that the West had started the “Second World Information War” against Putin’s Eurasia project. This war would be led by Zbigniew Brzezinski (“an agent of British (!) Intelligence”), Mikhail Gorbachev (“the Judas of Stavropol,” who must “be brought before a public tribunal in Magadan, for his role in the collapse of the USSR”), and Michael McFaul, the US ambassador in Moscow (“a theoretician and practitioner of coups d’état,” “sent to Moscow to enhance the efficiency of Operation Anti-Putin”).

A similar combination of geopolitical megalomania and wishful thinking could be found in another admirer of the Eurasian idea, Aleksandr Dugin, the founder of an international Eurasian movement. Dugin similarly pleaded for a reconstitution of the Soviet Union. And like Panarin he did not want to stop at the frontiers of the former empire, but wished also to incorporate the countries of Central and Eastern Europe (except the former GDR), as well as Manchuria, Xinjiang, Tibet, Mongolia, and the Orthodox world of the Balkans. Dugin’s main focus, however, was Ukraine, the independence of which he considered to be an anomaly. For him, “the battle for the integration of the post-Soviet space is a battle for Kiev.”^[7] It might not come as a complete surprise that Dugin is an admirer of Italian fascism. In his book Konservativnaya Revolyutsiya (The Conservative Revolution) he praised the “third way,” which was “not left and not right” and was embodied in “Italian fascism in its early period and also in the time when the Italian Social Republic [Mussolini’s mini-fascist state at the end of the war—supervised by the Germans] existed in Northern Italy.”^[8] Dugin was also a source of inspiration for the Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev, who in 1994 had spoken out in favor of the formation of a Eurasian Union.

Fear of Loss of Sovereignty

On November 18, 2011—only six weeks after the publication of Putin’s article in Izvestia—the presidents of Belarus, Russia, and Kazakhstan, acting as the “Founding Fathers” of the future Eurasian Union, took the first concrete steps. In Moscow they signed a treaty installing a “Eurasian Economic Commission.” This Commission, to be located in Moscow, consisted of nine persons (three from each country), who were given the title of federal minister.^[9] The Commission was headed by a council consisting of the deputy prime ministers of the three participating countries. In Moscow the three presidents also signed a declaration on Eurasian economic integration, a road map that would lead to the Eurasian Union.

However, in the speeches of the three presidents during the ceremony different accents could already be heard. Although Russian president Medvedev reassured his colleagues that “the decision making mechanism in the Commission’s framework absolutely excludes the dominance of any one country over another,”^[10] it was clear that the question of a possible loss of sovereignty was, indeed, in the back of the minds of Russia’s two junior partners. During the ceremony president Lukashenko reminded the audience that at home people were against this process. “One could understand who were standing behind these people,” he said,^[11] —a reference to secret foreign enemies that certainly would not have displeased his Kremlin hosts. Lukashenko added: “But we overcame all this and clearly said: yes, we will not lose any sovereignty, nobody is driving anyone anywhere. . . . Any question can be brought to the level of the heads of government (the three of us) and only by consensus can we make any decision.”^[12] Kazakhstan’s president, Nursultan Nazarbayev, spoke in the same vein. He was in fact the auctor intellectualis of Putin’s new project, because in 1994 he had proposed the formation of a Eurasian Union in a speech to students of Moscow University. At that point in time his proposal fell on deaf ears. Yeltsin considered it an unpractical pipe dream. However, Nazarbayev’s proposal met with more sympathy in Putin’s Russia, and when he relaunched his project in 2004 he asked the Eurasianist Aleksandr Dugin to write a book on the subject. As a result Eurasianism got a prominent place on the political agenda—not only in Kazakhstan, but also in Russia. However—just as in Belarus—in Kazakhstan also not all shared this enthusiasm for integration projects with Russia. “In March 2010,” wrote Laruelle, “175 members of the Kazakh opposition parties, as well as non-governmental organizations and people from the world of the media, signed an open letter to President Nazarbayev asking him to pull out of the [Customs] Union.”^[13] The opposition feared that deeper economic integration would cause not only political, but also economic problems by opening up Kazakhstan to the competition of Russian manufacturing and chemical industries, thereby reducing Kazakhstan to a market where Russia could dump its goods. The opponents argued that economic integration with Russia would hinder rather than promote the necessary modernization of the Kazakh industry. This criticism of the opposition seemed to be confirmed, when, in 2011, Kazakhstan’s exports to Russia and Belarus amounted to $7.5 billion, while imports from these countries rose to almost $15.9 billion, causing a large trade deficit.^[14] The higher external tariff barriers that were imposed on Kazakhstan also had a negative effect on its trade with China.^[15]

On November 18, 2011, at the Eurasian summit in Moscow, Nazarbayev addressed his opponents, declaring: “During this time we heard a lot of criticism coming from all sides: from the West, from the East, from within our countries. . . . They say, in the first place, that we will lose our sovereignty. However, nobody mentions the fact that each of us . . . will gain a great sovereignty . . . because we will vote there by consensus, we will solve questions together. That is the first thing. In the second place, they tell us that Russia is initiating the reincarnation of the Soviet Union—that the empire attacks again. . . . But tell us, please, how one can speak of a reincarnation? The Soviet Union was a rigid administrative command system with total state ownership of the means of production and one communist idea as the embodiment of the communist party. Could you imagine us reinstalling now the Gosplan [committee in Soviet Union responsible for economic planning] and Gossnab [Soviet central State Committee for the allocation of producer goods]? We need to tell people that these are just irrational fears of members of the opposition or simply of our enemies, who don’t want such an integration taking place on this territory.”^[16]

Eurasian Union Versus European Union

Putin, in his Izvestia article, had already tried to dissipate fears concerning his new integration project. “Some of our neighbours have made clear that they don’t wish to participate in advanced integration projects in the post-Soviet space,” he wrote, “because this allegedly goes against a European choice. I think this is a false alternative. . . . The Eurasian Union will be built on universal integration principles as an integral part of Greater Europe, united solely by the values of freedom, democracy and market laws. . . . Now dialogue with the EU will be undertaken by the Customs Union, but later it will be the Eurasian Union. Therefore, entering the Eurasian Union . . . will leave each of its members in much stronger positions to integrate more quickly into Europe.”^[17] In fact in his article Putin used three arguments:

The first argument was that the Eurasian Union was a project similar to the European Union. It was presented by him as a supranational project with similar institutions to the EU, which would include a commission, a council, a court, and—in time—a common currency.

The second argument was that the Eurasian Union—like the European Union—was built on shared values. As examples of these shared values he mentioned freedom, democracy, and a market economy.

A third argument was his suggestion that no competition existed between the Eurasian Union and the European Union. A choice to adhere to the Eurasian Union, according to him, would not imply a definitive geopolitical choice that would exclude future integration with the EU.

In fact all three arguments were severely biased. In the first place the Eurasian Union is not a European Union bis. This is not only because its institutions lack real supranational authority, but also because of the fundamental disequilibrium in particular that exists between its constituent parts. The EU is a union of four big states, two medium-sized states, and a group of smaller states in which none of the member states would be able to establish a unilateral hegemony over the others. Even Germany, the EU’s economic powerhouse, is in no position to dominate the rest. It has to recognize the superior military and diplomatic power of both Britain and France. In the Eurasian Union, on the contrary, the disequilibrium between the member states is striking. Not one of its prospective member states can match the economic and military power of Russia. Even if the whole CIS were to join, Russia’s weight would still dwarf the collective weight of the other member states. In addition, there is still another problem. Russia is the former imperial center with a centuries-long history of imperial conquest, which was characterized by the suppression of the national identity and autonomy of the dominated peoples. For this reason, wrote Umland, the “intellectual elites of the other post-Soviet republics have more or less ambivalent stances, and, sometimes, negative views on their nations past relations with Moscow.”^[18] These reservations also concern Putin’s past. Putin, as a former KGB colonel, is “a representative of those organs previously responsible for the execution of, among other crimes, anti-national policies.”^[19] One could, of course, point to Germany, which from being a European outcast became a respected member of the EU. However this comparison would not be valid for two reasons. The integration process in Western Europe was set up after World War II to heal the scars the war caused. Germany started a painful process of Vergangenheitsbewältigung (coming to terms with its past), which led to repentance, official apologies, and compensation payments (Wiedergutmachung). In the case of Russia there are few signs that it feels responsible for the crimes committed or the repressive policies in the former Soviet Union and Soviet bloc (excuses for the Katyn massacre are a rare exception). The European Community, in addition, was not only meant to heal. This originally French project was also meant to bind Germany to prevent history from repeating itself. Putin’s initiative for the Eurasian Union, on the contrary, comes from the former imperial center. It neither heals the crimes of the Soviet past, nor does it bind the former imperial power. On the contrary, it represents a thinly disguised attempt to restore the lost empire on new foundations.^[20]

The second argument, used by Putin in his Izvestia article to justify the Eurasian Union, was that the new Union would be built on shared values. He mentioned as such democracy, freedom, and the principles of the market economy. The reader will probably rub his or her eyes: whatever positive things one may say about Belarus, Russia, and Kazakhstan, one can certainly not say that these three countries are shining examples of freedom and democracy. All three have “lifelong” leaders kept in place by organizing fake elections. All three have repressive regimes that suppress opposition voices and violate fundamental human rights. All three also lack an important condition of a functioning market economy: impartial courts.

The most amazing argument, however, is Putin’s third argument: a choice to join the Eurasian Union does not exclude integration with the EU, but, on the contrary, “will leave each of its members in much stronger positions to integrate more quickly into Europe.” Putin is playing here a game of words with the concept “Europe.” As members of the Eurasian Union these countries do not integrate into the EU, but in “Greater Europe,” a name he gives to the Eurasian Union and the EU together. In fact Putin is referring here to trade negotiations between the EU and the Eurasian Union and the eventual benefits for the member states of the Eurasian Union if they negotiate with the EU as a bloc. However, this has nothing to do with integration into “Europe” or the EU. It is a formulation intended to conceal that membership of the Eurasian Union implies an unequivocal geopolitical choice that excludes membership of the EU.^[21]

The Ultimate Goal: The Creation of a “Big Country”

Putin’s article is a textbook case of active disinformation. What is at stake for the Kremlin in the project for a Eurasian Union remains carefully hidden. However, one week after the signing ceremony by the three presidents in Moscow it was possible to get a clearer idea of the way of thinking of the Russian political elite. On November 24, 2011, they came together to discuss the new project in the building of the Federation Council, the Russian Upper House. The title the organizers had chosen for this roundtable was in itself interesting. It was called “Big Country: Perspectives of the Integrative Processes in the Post-Soviet Space in the Framework of the ‘Eurasian Union.’”^[22] Big country! The first catchword used to describe the new Union was not “economic modernization” or “economic cooperation,” but “big country.” One cannot but think of the centuries-old Russian fixation on territorial expansion. Had not Putin already said in 2009 in a speech before the Russian Geographical Society: “When we say great, a great country, a great state—certainly size matters. . . . When there is no size, there is no influence, no meaning.”^[23] In the same vein, on the occasion of the signing of the treaty, Russian president Dmitry Medvedev said: “Yes, we are all different but we have common values and a desire to live in a single big state.”^[24] “A single big state”? It is not sure that the CIS countries, after having been reassured by Putin that their autonomy would not be jeopardized in the Eurasian Union, would welcome the prospect of living in “a big state.” And certainly they would appreciate even less the prospect of living in “a single big state.”

Expansionism Even Beyond Former Soviet Frontiers?

However, for some Russian analysts Moscow’s integrationist fervor should not stop at the frontiers of the former empire. Dmitry Orlov, a political scientist, wrote that the Eurasian Union should not only bring together the countries of the former Soviet Union, but should equally include “Finland, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Mongolia, Vietnam and Bulgaria, as well as two countries not in either Europe or Asia, Cuba and Venezuela.”^[25] For Orlov, the Kremlin should not satisfy itself with reuniting the parts of the former Soviet Union, but it should aim higher, trying to restore the whole former communist bloc—and even beyond (Finland). Dmitry Rogozin, deputy prime minister and former ambassador to NATO, was quoted as saying that the project was designed “to unite not so much lands, but rather peoples and citizens in the name of a common state body.”^[26] Rogozin, a Russian ultranationalist, who always wanted to activate the Russian diaspora abroad and even create new Russian diaspora (he was, for instance, in favor of responding positively to the request of the estimated twenty thousand Serbs in Kosovo, applying for Russian citizenship), went even further than Orlov. He wanted not only to assemble a maximum number of countries into the Eurasian Union, but also the Russian diaspora “in the name of a common state body.” It led Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili to declare that the project represented “the most savage idea of Russian nationalists,” adding that when Russia announces such ideas, “as a rule, they try to implement them.”^[27]

During the “Big Country” conference former prime minister Yevgeny Primakov was more prudent. According to him the Eurasian Union should start with building a Belarusian-Russian-Kazakh Union. “For the time being one should not go beyond this framework,” he said, [notwithstanding the fact that] Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan are knocking on the door.”^[28] According to him one should not repeat the mistakes of the EU, which was in crisis because of its too rapid enlargement process. In the same vein a Chinese expert warned that building a Eurasian Union “is an uphill road. . . . Former Soviet republics are unlikely to go for integration with Russia gratis. . . . The accession of former Soviet republics to the Eurasian Union will hardly be a boon for Russia. The Belarusian economy is highly unstable and if such poor countries as Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan join the Eurasian Union, Moscow may face even bigger problems than the EU does over Greece.”^[29]

The Eurasian Union as the Ultimate

Integration Effort

Despite these warnings and despite the fact that “the Eurasian Union has only little integration potential and has few attractions to offer the newly independent states,”^[30] the Kremlin does not shy away from spending money—a lot of money—on this project. While in 2009–2010 Russia still refused to transfer loans to Belarus when that country failed to privatize and sell industrial companies to Russian companies, in late 2011 the situation had changed fundamentally. Russia began to provide billions of dollars in oil and gas subsidies and allocated $10 billion for loans for a nuclear plant in Belarus. It also paid $2.5 billion for the second half of Beltransgas shares. In addition, it also signed on November 21, 2011, an agreement in Moscow on a loan for $1 billion.^[31] The willingness of the Kremlin to subsidize Lukashenko’s rickety economy was a clear sign of the political importance it attached to the Eurasian project.^[32]

In fact, the Eurasian Union is for Moscow the ultimate integration effort, crowning and superseding all earlier integration efforts. The Eurasian Union is not just some new integration project alongside the other existing integration projects created by Russia in recent years. The Eurasian Union is something different. This new structure is like the crowning synthesis in a Hegelian dialectic: it is not only the most complete realization of earlier Russian attempts at integration, but—while keeping these other structures in place—it absorbs them over time. (Hegel calls this process aufheben, which means both “to preserve” as well as “to bring to a higher level.”) We can, therefore, expect that the Eurasian Union will gradually take over functions from other existing structures, such as the Russia-Belarus Union State, EurAsEc, the Customs Union, and the CSTO. Belarusian President Lukashenko hinted at this when he declared that the Russia-Belarus Union State may disappear if the project of the Eurasian Union were to develop further.^[33] This hidden function of the Eurasian Union, to replace and absorb already existing integration structures, is also recognized by Uwe Halbach, a German expert who wrote on the Eurasian Union that “a piece of integration theatre is being played out on multiple stages and levels, which ultimately calls for an ‘integration of the integrations.’”^[34]

The centerpiece of this intended “integration of the integrations” is, undoubtedly, military integration. Putin did not mention this in his Izvestia article, but Ruslan Grinberg, director of the economic institute RAN, hinted at this at the “Big Country” conference. Grinberg mentioned “the necessity to build supranational structures, [also] partly, military.”^[35] “The Eurasian Union is primarily an economic project accompanied by Russian efforts toward integration within security policy areas,” wrote Uwe Halbach. “The main recipient here is the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), an ‘alliance’ of seven [now six, MHVH] CIS states.”^[36] Halbach is right. This hidden ambition of the Kremlin, however, is not trumpeted too loudly in order not to frighten away potential candidate members of the Eurasian Union.

The Eurasian Union, this ultimate integration project of Russia and pet project of Vladimir Putin, has to be taken seriously. It is the last product of the Kremlin’s funnel strategy in which countries are invited to participate in an integration project on the basis of a manifest agenda that is different from the Kremlin’s hidden agenda. The hidden agenda behind the Eurasian Union is twofold. In the first place it is the creation—over time—of a military arm of the Union, similar to the defunct Warsaw Pact. This military arm (the CSTO) will reserve for itself the exclusive right to intervene militarily in the post-Soviet space. Such an exclusive right of military intervention that excludes the intervention of external powers (the United States, NATO, but also China) has found its theoretical elaboration in the Grossraum (big space) theory of Carl Schmitt, which was already at the core of Medvedev’s proposal for a pan-European security pact.^[37] A Russian droit de regard over the post-Soviet space would further imply that Russia wants to introduce qualified majority decision to replace the consensus rule of the CSTO (Article 12 of the CSTO Charter) for substantive decisions on peacekeeping operations or interventions.

Bringing Ukraine Back into the Russian Orbit

The second and most important point of the Kremlin’s hidden agenda is the incorporation of Ukraine into the Eurasian Union. For the Kremlin the Eurasian Union is a new instrument to bring Ukraine back into its orbit.^[38] This is also the reason that the Kremlin has a great interest in attracting Moldova, which, in March 2012, was promised lower consumer prices (of up to 30 percent) for gas and oil, and a “big market (comparable with the EU) for Moldovan products.” It was also offered more beneficial conditions for Moldavan workers in countries of the Customs Union if it would adhere to the Customs Union, which functions as the entrance to the Eurasian Union.^[39] Moldova’s membership of the Eurasian Union would, in fact, see Ukraine encircled by three member states of the Eurasian Union: Russia, Belarus, and Moldova, thereby making Ukraine’s membership of this organization more logical and an eventual future membership of Ukraine of the EU more problematic. The Kremlin’s Moldova policy is, therefore, an integral part of its Eurasian Union project. There seems to exist a clear will in the Kremlin—in case the Moldovan leadership cannot be convinced to join the Eurasian Union and is opting instead for EU membership—to split the country and make the breakaway province of Transnistria independent along the lines of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. On July 31, 2012, speaking in the Nashi Seliger camp, Putin said that Transnistria is entitled to self-determination. This “reference to self-determination is a novel one in Moscow’s rhetoric about the Transnistria conflict,” warned Vladimir Socor.^[40] Putin’s declaration was followed by the reappointment on August 2, 2012, of deputy prime minister Dmitry Rogozin to the additional post of special representative of the Russian President for Transnistria (Rogozin had already been appointed in March 2012 to this post by Putin’s predecessor, Dmitry Medvedev). On the same day, Rogozin received Transnistria’s leader Yevgeny Shevchuk in Moscow. When Rogozin and Shevchuk made a declaration after the meeting, Russia’s flag and Transnistria’s “state flag” were displayed on an equal footing—a clear sign of Russian support for Transnistrian separatism. “Moscow’s July 31 and August 2 statements,” wrote Vladimir Socor, “add further elements of de-recognition [of Moldova’s territorial integrity], firming up suggestions for Transnistria’s ‘self-determination’ and acknowledging its ‘state’ attributes (territory, flag).”^[41] Moscow’s support for Transnistrian separatism is directly linked with the Kremlin’s Eurasian project. “Moscow declared its intention to build a ‘Eurasian economic region’ in Transnistria aiming to prevent the weakening of Moscow’s control over Tiraspol, in a direct response to EU and Moldova’s efforts to attract Transnistria through economic cooperation.”^[42]

Notes

1.

Vladimir Putin, “Novyy integratsionnyy proekt dlya Evrazii: budushchee, kotoroe rozhdaetsya segodnya,” Izvestia (October 8, 2011).

2.

“Professor Igor Panarin: Gosudarem postsovetskogo prostranstva stanet Vladimir Putin,” Izvestia (April 1, 2009).

3.

On Panarin’s grandiose visions see also Marcel H. Van Herpen, Putinism: The Slow Rise of a Radical Right Regime in Russia (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013), 82–83.

4.

Igor Panarin, “The Information War against Russia: Operation Putin. Part 1. Eurasian Integration: A Pathway Out of the World Crisis.” Lecture in the International Conference Securing Mankind’s Future (February 25–26, 2012), organized in Berlin by the Schiller-Institut. http://www.schiller-institut.de/seiten/201202-berlin/panarin-english.html (accessed June 28, 2013).

5.

Panarin, “The Information War against Russia: Operation Putin.”

6.

New Zealand has expressed an interest in creating a free trade zone with the Eurasian Union, but this is, of course, nowhere near becoming a full member. (Cf. Letter of Dmitry Shtodin, Minister Counsellor at the Russian Embassy in Rome, published as an appendix to Mauro De Bonis, “Urss? No grazie, Putin sogna l’Unione Euroasiatica,” Limes (September 3, 2012). Shtodin corrects the statement of De Bonis that New Zealand would become a member.) More viable candidates—mentioned by Panarin in another article—are Cuba and Venezuela. This “might sound like something out of a novel today,” he rejoiced, “far more than my own idea about Serbia joining, but we are living in very dynamic times” (Cf. Igor Panarin, “Eurasian Union: Stage 1,” RT (November 18, 2011)). In another article even war-torn Syria is mentioned as “seeking a free trade zone” with the new emerging Union. (Cf. Svetlana Kalmykova, “Eurasian Union Idea Takes Shape,” The Voice of Russia (October 20, 2011).)

7.

Dugin quoted by Marlène Laruelle, Russian Eurasianism: An Ideology of Empire (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008), 117.

8.

Dugin, Konservativnaya Revolyutsiya, 1994. http://anticompromat.ru/dugin/3put.html.

9.

Cf. “Evraziyskie komissary poluchat status federalnykh ministrov,” Tut.by (November 17, 2011).

10.

“Vstrecha prezidentov Rossii, Respubliki Belarus i Kazakhstana,” Official Website of the President of Russia (November 18, 2011).

11.

“Vstrecha prezidentov Rossii, Respubliki Belarus i Kazakhstana.”

12.

“Vstrecha prezidentov Rossii, Respubliki Belarus i Kazakhstana.”

13.

Marlène Laruelle, “When the ‘Near Abroad’ Looks at Russia: The Eurasian Union Project as Seen from the Southern Republics,” Russian Analytical Digest no. 112 (April 20, 2012), 9.

14.

“Evraziyskiy tamozhennyy soyuz i ego vliyanie na Tsentralnuyu Aziyu,” Analiticheskiy Forum Tsentralnoy Azii no. 4 (February 2013), 2.

15.

“Evraziyskiy tamozhennyy soyuz i ego vliyanie na Tsentralnuyu Aziyu.”

16.

“Evraziyskiy tamozhennyy soyuz i ego vliyanie na Tsentralnuyu Aziyu.” Putin, in his speech, said: “The combined GDP measured in purchasing power parity of countries such as India and China is already greater than that of the United States. And a similar calculation with the GDP of the BRIC countries—Brazil, Russia, India and China—surpasses the cumulative GDP of the EU. And according to experts this gap will only increase in the future.” (Cf. “Putin’s Prepared Remarks at 43d Munich Conference on Security Policy,” The Washington Post (February 12, 2007).) http://www.washingtonpost.com/wpdyn/content/article/2007/02/12/AR2007021200555.html.

17.

Putin, “Novyy integratsionnyy proekt dlya Evrazii: budushchee, kotoroe rozhdaetsya segodnya.”

18.

Andreas Umland, “The Stillborn Project of a Eurasian Union: Why Post-Soviet Integration Has Little Prospects,” Valdai Discussion Club (December 7, 2011).

19.

Umland, “The Stillborn Project of a Eurasian Union.”

20.

Tatyana Valovaya, minister responsible for the main areas of integration and macroeconomics of the Eurasian Economic Commission, reacting to the remark that “the idea of unifying the countries of the CIS is often called the realization of the imperial ambitions of our country’s leadership,” said: “In this space some ‘unity’ has always existed.” She added: “The original six countries of the EEC were, in fact—precisely the empire of Charlemagne.” Valovaya saw no problem in comparing the empire of Charlemagne, which ended in 814—this is 1,200 years ago!—with the Russian Empire, which ended only twenty years ago. (Cf. “Integratsiya obedinyaet vsekh: ot kommunistov do ‘Edinoy Rossii’ i pravykh,” Izvestia (July 20, 2012).)

21.

Putin’s argument is repeated by Yevgeny Vinokurov, who wrote that “one should not consider European and post-Soviet integration to be mutually exclusive. On the contrary, the regionalism of the CIS is a step along the way toward integration with the European Union.” (Y. Yu. Vinokurov, “Pragmaticheskoe evraziystvo,” Rossiya v Globalnoy Politike (April 30, 2013).)

22.

Tropkina, Olga. “Yevgeny Primakov nazval usloviya dlya uspekha Evraziyskogo soyuza,” Izvestia (November 24, 2011).

23.

Putin quoted by Maria Antonova, “State Lays Claim to Geography Society,” The St. Petersburg Times (November 20, 2009). The speech was held on November 18, 2009, when Putin became head of the Society’s Board of Trustees. Putin’s sudden interest in Russia’s oldest organization seemed less motivated by scientific than by geopolitical reasons. According to Antonova, “Tsar Nicholas I created the Russian Geographical Society in 1845 as part of the imperial drive for geographical expansion and exploration of the country’s natural resources.”

24.

Gleb Bryanski, “Putin, Medvedev Praise Values of Soviet Union,” Reuters (November 17, 2011).

25.

“Moscow Fleshes Out ‘Eurasian Union’ Plans,” EurActiv (November 17, 2011).

26.

“Moscow Fleshes Out ‘Eurasian Union’ Plans.”

27.

“Eurasian Union Proposal Key Aspect of Putin’s Expected Presidency,” EurasiaNet.org (October 7, 2011).

28.

Tropkina, “Yevgeny Primakov nazval usloviya dlya uspekha Evraziyskogo soyuza.”

29.

Prof. Sheng Shiliang, “Putin’s Eurasian Chess Match,” Valdai Discussion Club (October 31, 2011).

30.

Katharina Hoffmann, “Eurasian Union: A New Name for an Old Integration Idea,” Russian Analytical Digest no. 112 (April 20, 2011).

31.

Andrei Liakhovich, “The Reasons behind Putin’s Unprecedented Generosity Towards Lukashenka,” Belarus Digest (January 5, 2012).

32.

Andrew Wilson wrote that Lukashenko “might find a new role with Putin by selling Belarus as an exemplar in Russia-supported integration schemes such as the Eurasian Union. Russia cannot allow Belarus as a member of the Eurasian Union to go bust because that would seriously undermine the whole idea of Russian-sponsored integration projects.” (Cf. “Andrew Wilson on His Belarus Book and Lukashenka’s Survival,” Belarus Digest (December 4, 2011).)

33.

“Russia-Belarus Union State May Take Backseat if Eurasian Union Project Pans Out: Lukashenko,” RIA Novosti (November 18, 2011).

34.

Halbach, “Vladimir Putin’s Eurasian Union: A New Integration Project for the CIS Region?”

35.

Tropkina, “Yevgeny Primakov nazval usloviya dlya uspekha Evraziyskogo soyuza.”

36.

Halbach, “Vladimir Putin’s Eurasian Union: A New Integration Project for the CIS Region?”

37.

On the influence of Carl Schmitt’s geopolitical Grossraum theory on Medvedev’s proposal, see my paper “Medvedev’s Proposal for a Pan-European Security Pact: Its Six Hidden Objectives and How the West Should Respond.” http://www.cicerofoundation.org/lectures/Marcel_H_Van_Herpen_Medvedevs_Proposal_for_a_Pan-European_Security_Pact.pdf.

38.

This part of the Kremlin’s hidden agenda is also emphasized by Marlène Laruelle, who wrote: “Putin’s Eurasian Union project is aimed mainly at Central Asia, less at the South Caucasus, with the ultimate aim and supreme reward being the potential reintegration of Ukraine into the Russian bosom” (emphasis mine). (Cf. Marlène Laruelle, “When the ‘Near Abroad’ Looks at Russia: the Eurasian Union Project as Seen from the Southern Republics,” 9.)

39.

“Posol RF: Moldaviya i Tamozhennyy soyuz: vozvrat v proshloe ili proryv v budushchee?” Regnum (February 7, 2012).

40.

Vladimir Socor, “Putin Suggests Transnistria Self-Determination, Rogozin Displays Transnistria Flag,” Eurasian Daily Monitor 9, no. 149 (August 16, 2012).

41.

Socor, “Putin Suggests Transnistria Self-Determination.”

42.

George Niculescu, “The Myths and Realities of Vladimir Putin’s Eurasian Economic Union,” The European Geopolitical Forum (January 8, 2013).