DGA in the News - Professor Motyl Quoted in International Herald Tribune
William Laventhal
Resurgent Russia
Russia's blitzkrieg against Georgia has taken place 70 years after the infamous Munich Agreement of September 29, 1938, when France, Britain and Italy agreed to cede Czechoslovakia's Sudetenland to Nazi Germany in the hope of establishing "peace in our time."
Like Hitler's Germany, Vladimir Putin's Russia is a post-imperial authoritarian state that must expand. The Soviet empire's collapse in 1991 left the Russian population feeling humiliated; economic collapse in the early 1990s only compounded their demoralization. As in Germany, Russians blamed democracy for their collapse and humiliation. And, as in Germany, a strongman promising greatness and glory seized power, dismantled democracy, and created an authoritarian, hyper-nationalist regime with a personality cult based on promises to re-establish imperial greatness.
The war against Georgia is not the first instance of Russia's aggressiveness vis-à-vis its former colonies. Estonia was the target of a cyberwar; Latvia, Lithuania, Belarus, Ukraine and the Czech Republic have been subjected to energy cut-offs; Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine have been punished by trade sanctions.
These states, like all of Russia's non-Russian neighbors, know that the war in Georgia is really about them.
The Munich Agreement is considered a classic example of the perils of appeasement. Had the democracies said no then, it's possible that World War II could have been averted. At some point - and that point surely arrived with Russia's invasion of Georgia - the West must learn to say no to Russia. Expelling Russia from the G-8 would be symbolically nice, but Putin would respond with a laugh. Only an "anti-Munich" would say no in a meaningful fashion: Admit Ukraine and Georgia into NATO's Membership Action Plan - immediately. Putin will glare in response; he will threaten retaliation - and then, like all loud-mouthed dictators, he will acquiesce.
Alexander J. Motyl Newark, New Jersey Professor of political science, Rutgers University
Regarding "In the shadow of the Red Czar" by Simon Sebag Montefiore (Views, Aug. 26): The West's future with Russia will not be shaped by demonizing the Russians, rubbing their Stalin past under their noses.
Russians are to remain partners of the West.
Rolf Joachim Siegen, San Diego
Regarding the article "Russia formallly recognizes enclaves" (Aug. 27): The expressions of shock and outrage, and the reverence for international law and the territorial integrity of sovereign states, emitted by the American and certain NATO governments in response to Russian recognition of the "independence" of Abkhazia and South Ossetia are worthy of an Olympic gold medal in the synchronized hypocrisy event.
Have these governments forgotten that this year they recognized the "independence" of a rebellious province of Serbia, which their military forces still occupy, notwithstanding a UN Security Council Resolution?
John V. Whitbeck Jidda, Saudi Arabia
Out of touch
Regarding Matt Bai's "The race that isn't about race" (Views, Aug. 26): It is stunning that Democrats are making the same mistakes in 2008 that they made in 2004 and 2000. To suggest that recent presidential losses are the fault of voters is proof that elite Democrats in New York and Los Angeles are out of touch with the swing-voters in the Midwest who will decide this election.
Ken Haumschilt Escondido, California