Russia and the West. The end of the affair

Russia's relations with the West are deteriorating

THE strategy was reminiscent of the response to the Kursk submarine disaster: minimise the damage, resist scrutiny, blame the West. Addressing the nation after the Beslan massacre, President Vladimir Putin conjured up a spectre of manipulative foreign powers exploiting terrorism to weaken Russia. Several Europeans and Americans have since criticised Mr Putin over Chechnya, and over his grab for more power. Mr Putin's fraternal response to September 11th had persuaded optimists that the dream of bringing Russia closer to the West might be realised. In the past two weeks, it has looked as chimerical as ever.

The Russians are used to moans from soft Europeans; from the Americans they expect harder-headed pragmatism. So it rankled when President George Bush expressed “concern” over Mr Putin's planned changes to Russia's electoral system and regional government. Sergei Lavrov, Russia's foreign minister, had earlier remarked acidly that his country did not comment on American presidential elections. Mr Putin likened those who advocated negotiating with the Chechens to 1930s appeasers. A British diplomat was called in to account for Britain's failure to extradite Akhmed Zakayev, an aide to Chechnya's one-time elected president, Aslan Maskhadov. (Shamil Basayev, Russia's other most-wanted man, has claimed responsibility for Beslan, but denied taking cash from Osama bin Laden.)

Some Russian liberals see this contretemps as a foreign-policy turning-point. Just as Mr Putin has revealed himself as an insatiable centraliser at home, he is emerging as an incorrigible great-power nationalist abroad. According to this view, Mr Putin still sees Russia's interests in terms of spheres of influence. Worse, the “Russian” values that Mr Putin espouses in such matters as human rights and strong government make closer integration with the West impossible. For the past couple of years Russia had seemed to be pursuing a “normal” foreign policy, but in reality it was detente in another guise. In future, the argument runs, mutual suspicion will co-exist with Russia's westward energy sales, just as in the last years of the Soviet Union.

If Mr Putin wants to fall out further with the West, he has chances aplenty coming up. Russia's dealings with the Europeans will be more painful now that the EU has taken in several ex-communist countries. Political consultants have been dispatched from Moscow to Ukraine ahead of next month's presidential election. Viktor Yushchenko, the Europe-friendly opposition candidate whom the Russians want to stop, resumed campaigning this week after suffering, say his supporters, an assassination attempt by poisoning. Mr Putin may also be more tolerant than the Europeans of Alexander Lukashenka's efforts to change the constitution of Belarus and stay on as its president - not least, fear Russia's liberals, because Mr Putin would like to follow suit.

Mr Putin may also alienate the West by making good on his threats to launch pre-emptive strikes against terrorists abroad - notably in Georgia's Pankisi gorge, the alleged hideaway of Chechen rebels. Russia ought to have reason to cultivate stability on its southern border. Yet it is still meddling in Abkhazia and South Ossetia, two breakaway regions of Georgia.

A happier interpretation of recent events, pushed by Kremlin sympathisers, is that Mr Putin and Mr Bush, at least, are playing to their domestic galleries. Mr Bush managed a few remarks in response to accusations that he was doing too little to encourage Russian democracy. Mr Putin's xenophobia, and his evident nostalgia for the Soviet Union, are designed to deflect the blame for Beslan and to pacify influential hardliners. Underneath, this interpretation has it, the two presidents still understand each other and get along fine.

The truth probably lies somewhere in between. Russia's relations with the West are not as bad as they sometimes were in the volatile Yeltsin years. Mr Putin picks his fights carefully: witness his relative equanimity over NATO's eastward expansion. He may refrain from provocations in Georgia. But he is certainly no internationalist. All parties feel short-changed by their experience of the past few years: the Europeans over Russia's human-rights and democratic failings; the Americans over Iraq; Mr Putin over meddling and misunderstandings on terrorism. A new period of great-power rivalry may be far off; but Russia's closer integration with the West is probably even more remote.

Russia's relations with the West are deteriorating.

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