[R-G] "A Pan-European Security System That Would Include Russia"

[Yoshie Furuhashi]

Medvedev proposed "a pan-European security system that would include
Russia," but such a proposal can't become viable unless and until the
Europeans, under the French leadership (France being the only nuclear
weapons state in Western Europe), unite politically and culturally and
define and assert their collective regional interests independent of
the purely US interests that aren't even good for Americans but that
Washington passes off as Atlantic or even global interests.  "Europe"
is still just a common currency zone, however, the European project
lagging far behind the Latin American project.  When will "Europe"
become Europe? -- Yoshie

<http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/jul/14/russia>

At last, a true moderniser in Moscow. Why punish him?

Despite western howls of suspicion, Medvedev is Russia's first
post-Soviet leader. It would be lunacy to kick him into the cold

          o Jonathan Steele
          o The Guardian,
          o Monday July 14, 2008

Suppose you were the president of Russia. At your first G8 summit you
meet a seemingly friendly George Bush, and the American leader tells
the media afterwards what a "sharp guy" you are. But, while this
flattery is going on, Condoleezza Rice is in Prague signing a deal to
install a US missile radar system in the Czech Republic. Of course,
the Americans insist the new weaponry is not directed against Russia,
but are you fooled?

If the missile system was really aimed at rogue third parties such as
Iran or North Korea, then why not position it closer to those
countries to allow more time to detect and react to a hostile launch?
Rice then goes on to Bulgaria - a one-time Russian ally that has
become a base for 2,500 American troops - and to Georgia, to discuss
the Caucasian republic's plans for joining Nato. Of course, these
plans are not directed against Russia either.

No wonder Dmitry Medvedev, who became the Kremlin's master little more
than two months ago, describes himself as "deeply distressed". To
Russia's new president, as well as to millions outside the country,
the creeping expansion of the American military empire through central
Europe to the Caucasus and central Asia is unnecessary and
short-sighted. At the G8 summit Medvedev proposed a pan-European
security system that would include Russia. Western leaders gave him
short shrift, and will no doubt be equally dismissive when he goes
into more detail, as he has promised to do in the autumn. They
describe Russia as a strategic partner, but anything that brings
Russia into the security tent is ruled out.

<http://www.russiaprofile.org/page.php?pageid=International&articleid=a1215522778>
July 8, 2008
Wrong Time for New Thinking
Comment by Vladimir Frolov
Special to Russia Profile
	
Medvedev Should Avoid Grand Foreign Policy Initiatives That Lack Substance

President Dmitry Medvedev's call for a new all-European treaty and an
all-European summit is reminiscent of Soviet leader Mikhail
Gorbachev's attempt to launch a brand new foreign policy course – say
something glamorous first, and worry about implementation later.
Medvedev's ideas are not only virtually impossible to implement, they
are also likely to fall on deaf ears.

I have a suspicion that nothing will come out of President Dmitry
Medvedev's sweeping proposal last month in Berlin for a new
all-European treaty and an all-European summit to create a new
security architecture in Europe.

On the surface, it seems like a good idea – creating a modern security
system in Europe that would not be based on ancient cold war divisions
and would indeed cover the entire transatlantic space from Vancouver
to Vladivostok, a vision first advanced by former Soviet President
Mikhail Gorbachev in the late 1980s. The idea is about making Europe
really whole and free and moving beyond the cold war security
structures like NATO that no longer have a mission in Europe and are
wasting time and money reinventing themselves in far away places like
Afghanistan, Iraq (to a smaller extent) and even Darfur.

It is really difficult not to notice that the European security
architecture has basically frozen in time since the late 1980s. With
NATO's continued eastward enlargement and the Organization for
Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) sliding toward irrelevance,
European security has become "divisible."

There are two distinct security zones in Europe today – the NATO-EU
zone (non-NATO EU members like Sweden, Austria and Finland are in
reality likely to be covered by NATO security guarantees) and the
Russia-CIS Collective Security Treaty zone that is shrinking as some
of its members aspire to NATO membership. The two do not match and are
perpetuating a competitive relationship that is one step away from
hostility. Add to this mix the Shanghai Cooperation Organization
(SCO), in which Russia and China are dominant players, and you get a
picture of geopolitical competition and diverging security agendas.

Medvedev proposes to abandon this futile quest by signing a legally
binding security treaty that will regulate the role of military force
in the entire transatlantic space. He sees the new treaty making
European security indivisible and incorporating serious elements of
the arms control infrastructure already in place. And he cites the
Brian-Kellog Pact of 1928 as a potential model for the new treaty.

And this is where it gets murky. When you take a hard look at the
sketchy details of Medvedev's proposal, you get a sense that major
parts are missing, and even the ones that are on the table do not
really match. Take the issue of membership in the new treaty, for
example.

Medvedev says that the parties to the new treaty could be "all
organizations that currently operate in the European space." What that
means, in theory, is that organizations as diverse as NATO, the EU,
the OSCE, the Council of Europe, the CIS and its Collective Security
Treaty Organization all need to come together as parties in a
pan-European security pact. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov
even suggests that the SCO (i.e. China) should be thrown into the mix.

Is it a realistic approach? Not really. I find it hard to imagine a
magician-diplomat who could cobble together a security agreement from
this motley crew. Even Henry Kissinger would balk at taking this up.
Why, then, propose something that you know well beforehand would never
work?

Why is Medvedev suggesting an all-European summit to discuss the
treaty in which European states should participate only on an
individual, not alliance, basis? Why would you need a summit of
individual states if you want the treaty to be signed between
"organizations"?

Why invite China to European politics, if only through its membership
in the SCO? What does Russia gain with this? If the intention is to
strengthen China's global role, why then is it in Russia's interest to
see this happen?

Then there is the issue of the treaty's substance, rather than format.
What kind of European security will it provide? It cannot, by
definition, provide binding security guarantees and commitments, since
it is not intended as an all-European security alliance. NATO would
never agree to this and no other organization in Europe is capable of
providing such protection.

Perhaps, as the citation of the Brian-Kellog Pact suggests, the
interest is in legally excluding the use of force in Europe. If so,
then the substance of the agreement should be a simple non-aggression
pact. But then the question is: a non-aggression pact between whom?
There is no need for a non-aggression pact between Russia and the
Council of Europe, or the CIS and the EU, or the SCO and OSCE. There
are no security issues between them.

There are, however, serious security issues between Russia and NATO,
resulting from lingering mutual suspicions that perpetuate adversarial
military postures between them. Both maintain military capabilities
suited to attack each other, but do very little else.

The CFE Treaty, a true relic of the cold war, is a good example of how
outdated agreements negotiated "a long time ago in a galaxy far, far
away" perpetuate adversarial relationships. Why should NATO be
concerned about the way Russia stations its conventional forces on its
own territory? It knows it has an overwhelming superiority over Russia
in a conventional conflict. Why should Russia be concerned about
bean-counts of NATO tanks or artillery pieces (combat aircraft are
another matter)? We know full well that, in case of a NATO attack, our
only chance is to go nuclear as quickly as possible. As long as Moscow
maintains a robust capability to put a nuclear bomb on every NATO
capital in a nick of time, it should not be concerned with NATO tanks.

Logically, the new treaty should deal with the security issue between
Russia and NATO, since both continue to contemplate scenarios of a
military conflict between them. Thus, in practical terms, it should be
a non-aggression pact between Russia and NATO. Indeed, a senior
Russian official with responsibility for NATO policy told me recently
that the idea is to eliminate the applicability of Article 5 of the
NATO Charter to Russia. This is where a Russia-NATO non-aggression
comes in handy. But why not say so directly?

Medvedev's proposal should not be viewed simply as Russia's attempt to
weaken NATO. Rather, it is an invitation to identify a new agenda for
transatlantic cooperation and reflects the Russian leadership's
frustration with and tiredness from the old agenda of NATO expansion,
Kosovo and orange revolutions.

Nor is it an attempt to "decouple" Europe from the United States,
despite assertions that "atlanticism has outlived it usefulness." Both
Medvedev and Lavrov made it clear that Russia's new big ideas on
transatlantic security recognize the U.S. role as an essential partner
for Russia and the EU. However, both clearly stated the Russian
insistence on an equal role for Russia, the EU and the U.S. in dealing
with European security challenges and forming the new institutional
architecture in the transatlantic space.

The problem, however, is in implementing this grand vision.

Medvedev wrongly chose a "Gorbachevian format" of launching foreign
policy proposals – say something glamorous to the West first and worry
about implementation later.

Making grand sounding proposals that lack both substance and a
receptive audience is not the way to make sure you would be taken
seriously at the world politics tables.