Observations on the Russian Scene ...
VALENTINE M. SMITH
For the past few days, I have been mulling over in my mind the
Russian situation, and how I view it, and then two different
encounters yesterday gave me two new views of how to look at that
situation, AND a realization about how I operate that might satisfy
my friend Igor's comments on 4 November, whom I thank for having set
this train of thought in motion.
One was a description of a geographic computer models for a
geographic mapping process called GIS (not sure what that stands for)
where in you have layers of data - one layer lays out all the plots
of the city, another all the water lines and water mains, another
electrical lines and underground conduits, still another trees per
block, and so on. That's one way I see Russia and the CIS states,
layers, that may or may not interact and/or correlate.
THe other is via a process *I* call "information synthesis," wherein,
again in layers, I take in print, e-mail, radio and TV information
and try to assemble an always-changing, always updating political,
societal and interactive synthesis/"model" of what I perceive is
happening, what I've heard called by some analysts an
"inter-disciplinary" or "multi-disciplinary" - utilizing at least
political science, history, sociology, communications studies and
rudimentary economic observations - approach to the complexity that
the CIS, eastern Europe, and various subdivisions within represent.
So, from describing these two manners of perceiving the problem, I
think I perceive these layers of Russian "political activity" (that
term embraces a wide variety of things, as you shall see) -
1) President Yeltsin, his advisors, and those in the military,
security and government apparatus, separate from Parliament, who
support him.
2) Those folks within those structures who do not support him.
3) The various parties and factions from the National Salvation Front
to Civic Union, and all in between, mostly whom appear to oppose
Yeltsin.
4) The Supreme Soviet, and all the factions within it.
5) The outlawed CPSU, and whatever portion of its former 18 million
members are now "out" of the power loop, and those left in place, but
called "outlawed" as party members by the Yeltsin decree banning the
CPSU.
6) The military and police apparatuses as separate entities.
7) The Congress of People's Deputies.
8) The CIS "apparatus," and whatever burdens Russia assumes as part
of that, such as Shoposhnikov's role as commander-in-chief of the
"joint command" of the CIS - a fiction within a fiction, some would
say.
9) Industrial, infrastructure and "new market entrepeneur" leaders.
10) Gorbachev and Solzhenitsyn (whom I believe are wild cards whosee
value or potential impact is not discernible at all until, or if,
they chose to act or speak out).
11) The ex-USSR "putsch plotters" and their overt and covert
supporters.
12) The Constitutional Court.
That's just a cursory glance at main categories and camps, some of
which overlap, some of which contradict, some are allies while others
are foes, some are sub-groups that fall under, or within, one of
these larger categories. It is very hard to see all the players,
harder to see their connection processes, harder even yet to model
and predict about.
Suynthesizing all the motion I read, hear and see says things in
Russia are moving with slow, relentless kinds of motion that will
real soon call for some hard decision making. The economy - prices,
wages, the voucher system, rubles and the "ruble zone," free market
practices, changing from command to entrepeneurial planning and
pricing, and the general "hyper-inflation" (whether at the level
Sachs of Harvard is talking about, or less) seems to me a juggernaut
that threatens to engulf Russia via the back door. What happens if
the currency goes bottom up? How long can Russia print money without
paying the price? How many people have to be unemployed or "below the
poverty line" before critical mass is reached?
Yeltsin's immediate crisis potential appears the Gaidar government,
wherein it looks as though a deal has been struck with
Rutskoi/Volskii to axe the current government and replace them with
Civic Union-named people. Somehow, I get the suspicion such a deal
may be acted upon PRIOR to the convening of the Congress of People's
Deputies on 1 December to present that larger, less controllable body
with a fait accompli in an attempt to forestall what would appear to
be a strongly sure move to "impeach" Yeltsin.
I think another "crisis" simmering close to the surface is all the
military outlay in so many directions - 130,000 troops in the
Baltics, the Russian 14th Army in the Trans-Dniester region of
Moldova, Russian troops in Abkhazia in northern Georgia, "CIS" troops
in Dushanbe, Russian troops around Nagorno-Karabakh in Azerbaijan,
now Russian troops in Chechen, Ingushetia, and north Ossetia,
probably some Russian troops still in Baku, probably some Russian
troops in Tatarstan, and who knows where else Russia or "CIS" troops
might be. (That includes Russian troops in eastern Germany).
Then, a third mess brewing (and this is all without the Congress
having yet happened - a potentially catalytic event) is the conflict
betwen Parliament and President Yeltsin. Passing a law at week's end
declaring that only Parliament could name new Cabinet people,
stripping Yeltsin of the power to name his own ministers, is only
going to be confrontational, and set Khasbulatov and Yeltsin at
loggerheads for sure (as if the disbanding of the Parliamentary Guard
did not!), a crisis that would appear to favor the Parliamentary
Chairman more than the President.
Still another potential cesspoool of controversy - the case before
the Constitutional Court regarding the legality of Yeltsin's banning
of the CPSU. If he is upheld, that throws perhaps 12-15 million
Communists towards the welcoming arms of the nationalists, or worse,
and martyrs of the lot for having their $50-80 billion (I've heard
all kinds of numbers, these are not written in stone) worth of
property seized by the state.
That dovetails into the outlawed organization of the National
Salvation Front, with its very odd diversity of membership. This
"Brown/Red" alliance, with all of its "rightist" nuances, could be
swelled if the above occurred. However, if Yeltsin were reversed by
the Court, then the CPSU would have a huge leg on ALL the opposition
together in terms of a warchest to wage an attempt to get back power
by one process or another. The NSF could be a beneficiary of such a
ruling, in that if one decree were declared invalid, so might
another.
All the news claims the military, the Ministry of Security and the
MVD (police not KGB) are firmly behind Yeltsin. I do not believe it.
The commissar structure is still in place in the Army, only one
segment of the KGB was spun away from it in the reorganization, so
all those apparatchiks are still in place, and while Yeltsin expanded
the MVD, where did the men come from who filled those slots?
Then, unseeable factors for an external observer come into play -
crime, drug use, violence, ethnic fighting, weapons thefts, and sales
of nuclear weapons material down to bullets to places like Iran,
several different layers of "structure" not very discernible to most
viewers. Minor, but potentially image-powerful players, remain
Gorbachev and Solzhenitsyn. The former HAS lambasted the Yeltsin
government, but NOT in the midst of serious crisis; the latter, whom
I believe is in Russia, has been relatively silent.
Where does it all go, what finally happens? Well, in the league of a
Stephen Cohen or a Jeffrey Sachs, I'm just a little guy, but I'm not
as much in the "go-slow"/alarmist camp of Civic Union as Cohen
appears to be, or in the speed-up action because all hell is about to
break loose view Sachs seems to hold, though I think the latter is
closer to the mark about what could happen than the former.
What perhaps is the most fascinating "wild card" on the Russian scene
at the moment (next month, next year, the "most fascinating wild
card" will be something else, I'm sure) is not the spiralling
unemployment, price and inflation hikes, not the steadily de-valuing
ruble, not the paucity of goods and the possibilty of a harsh winter,
not all the factors I describe above, but, I believe, the Congress of
People's Deputies, which appears to be a focus point for many of
these disparate factors.
Here is perhaps a last chance for the old order to derail the new, to
try to attempt to turn the clock back to an earlier, more secure
time. But, many would ask, what will be done if Yeltsin IS impeached?
If such an action actually occurred, would that be the "shot heard
'round the world" that presages the Second Russian Civil War of this
century? What other things could or will occur almost frighten the
imagination.
The Congress convenes in fifteen days, if it convenes at all
(emergency Presidential rule, which surprising people seem to
support, such as G. Popov, the former Mayor of Moscow, is still a
strong possibility!) It would appear that a quite lively two weeks
might be had by all. For someone taking the approaches I describe
within, or closer to the scene like a Cohen or a Sachs, to name the
ones the nets have discussed this past week, it would seem that not
person on the planet has a clear handle on where this Russian
situation could go - therefore the playing field IS a bit more level
than before, for there probably is no "right" answer(s) to the knotty
question, "Where does Russia, and the CIS, go from here?" VMS