Prodded From the Right, Moscow Renewing Middle East Activism

By Leon Hadar

One of the most widely discussed topics among Israeli diplomats this spring is a secret Israeli Foreign Ministry analysis of Russia's new diplomacy in the Middle East. Prepared for Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin on the eve of his recent visit to Washington, it declares: "The new mediation efforts on the part of Russia, as well as its attempts to improve its relations with Syria, reflect placement of the Middle East at the top of Russia's foreign policy agenda. " A major transformation is taking place in Russian diplomacy, according to the analysis, which warns that "The Russians have decided to end their role as the junior partner of the United States in the pursuit of Middle East peace."

The document, prepared by the Foreign Ministry's Department for Policy Planning, headed by Harry KnoiTal, a former member of the Israeli Embassy in Washington, was classified "Secret. " However, its contents were leaked to the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, apparently by ministry officials who believe that Israel is not taking seriouslyenoughthe new Russian maneuvers in the region.

On one level, the new Russian activism in the Middle East reflects the increasing strains in the Moscow-Washington relationship. The strains are a product of Russia's changing political configuration following the parliamentary election, which saw the erosion of Boris Yeltsin's political supremacy, the rise of nationalist leader Vladimir Zhirinovsky, and growing support by the Russian public and its leaders for a resurgent imperial Russian agenda. That trend is seen by many analysts as a backlash against the accommodationist foreign policy of the Gorbachev era, with its emphasis on cooperation with Washington on global issues, including the Middle East, coupled with growing public frustration over the inability of Russia to solve its economic problems.

Indeed, the so-called Zhirinovsky style nationalists and fascists who dominate the Russian parliament, the Duma, as well as their supporters in the military, diplomatic service, and the nomenclatural bureaucracy, have been critical of the "abandonment" of former Soviet Union allies in the Middle East, including Iraq, Syria and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO). In particular, they have repeatedly condemned Moscow's backing for America's war against Iraq and Yeltsin's willingness to play second fiddle to Washington in the Arab-Israeli peace process.

Richard Rudy, an American Soviet specialist who has befriended Zhirinovsky and has conducted long interviews with him, suggested recently in the National Review that the nationalist leader places the Middle East at the center of his geopolitical game plan for an imperial Russia. According to Rudy, Zhirinovsky envisages a world divided into major spheres of influence. Germany will control Western and Central Europe, U.S. dominance will be confined to the Western Hemisphere, and the domain of China and Japan will be Oceania and the rest of Asia, with the exception of India.

Zhirinovsky envisages U.S. dominance confined to the Western Hemisphere.

In this scheme of things, Russia will extend its control past Greater Russia, including the territories of the former Soviet Union, to the entire Middle East (including Iran and Turkey), East Africa and the Balkans, which will be dominated by Russia's traditional allies, the Serbs. India will become a Russian protectorate encouraged to assert control of dismembered Pakistan east of the Indus River. Iraq, a friend of Russia, will exercise suzerainty over the Arabian peninsula. As part of an agreement with the United States, Israel, after withdrawing from Arab territories, will be permitted to exist with Russian Jews forced to emigrate to that country.

Ironically, Zhirinovsky, who is a friend of Iraq's Saddam Hussain, with whom he met recently in Baghdad, shares with Israel's leaders and their supporters in the United States a concern over the "threat" of "Islamic fundamentalism." He describes the so-called Green Peril as the greatest danger to Russian and world security and calls on the "White Race," including Europe and the United States, to unite in containing this Muslim menace as well as the threat from the "Yellow Peril," the rising power of China and Japan. These views sound amazingly similar to those expressed by U.S. political scientist Samuel Huntington in a Foreign Affairs article in which he called on the United States and the West to prepare for a "Clash of Civilizations" with an "Islamic-Confucian" coalition.

Popular Views

Rudy and other experts take Zhirinovsky very seriously. They stress that even if he is not elected as president in Russia's 1996 elections, his views on foreign policy in general, and on the Middle East in particular, will remain very popular among members of the Russian foreign policy establishment. They cite the increasingly nationalist rhetoric and policies of relatively moderate Russian Foreign Minister Andrei Kozyrevincluding his increasing support for the Serb position in Bosnia and his growing involvement in the Arab-Israeli peace process as an indication that the more aggressive foreign policy attitude is spilling over into the mainstream of Russian diplomacy. In that context, Russia is interested in expanding its arms exports to the Middle East as one way of dealing with its economic problems.

Zhirinovsky's vision of Russian domination of the Middle East, including the destruction of Iran and Turkey, like his idea of reestablishing Russian control of Alaska, will probably remain little more than the plot of a futuristic novel. However, the Israeli study suggests, the notion that Russia should begin raising its profile rather than submit to a Pax Americana in the Middle East has become part of the foreign policy consensus of the Russian leadership. In short, Russia is returning to the Middle East game, making it clear that, for better or for worse, it sees that region as part of its diplomatic and security "belt," as did Czarist Russia.

This major strategic and diplomatic change was reflected in Russia's recent bold moves in the region, as opposed to its more submissive attitude toward the United States in the immediate aftermath of the Cold War and the Gulf war. Then, the Russians seemed to be pleading with the Bush administration to permit them to become cosponsors of the peace process initiated in Madrid.

In mid-March, however, when Kozyrev left for the Middle East to meet with Rabin and Yasser Arafat, he did not inform the Clinton administration that the Russians were planning to raise ideas of their own to restart the stalled Middle East talks following the massacre in Hebron. These maneuvers, as well as the invitation to highranking PLO officials for talks in Moscow and Russia's growing involvement in the diplomacy of the war in Bosnia, clearly angered U.S. officials, who accused Russia of trying to "sabotage" their Middle East diplomatic efforts.

Another reflection of changing Russian policy has been Yeltsin's decision to give Victor Posbuliok, who directs Middle East relations in the Russian foreign ministry, a new title. As "the representative of Russia's president for Middle Eastern affairs, " Posbuliok already has traveled several times recently to the Middle East, including PLO headquarters in Tunis.

At this stage, Russia's ability to expand its influence in the region is limited. It is observing U.N. sanctions against Iraq, but most experts believe that if the sanctions are lifted, Russia will offer to replace the weapons Iraq lost during Desert Storm.

There still are a few Russian military advisers in Syria. However, neither Syria nor Libya are paying their debts to Russia for military purchases from the time of the Soviet Union. Until those debts are paid, Moscow insists it will not go ahead with sales of new weapons to either. The Russians have, however, reached an agreement with Jordan which permits Amman to pay back only 20 percent of its debt to Moscow.

At present, therefore, Russia is politically and financially constrained in its ability to provide the Arab countries with the diplomatic and military support they could look to during the Cold War. And while Russia may challenge America's position in the Middle East, it is difficult to imagine Moscow purposely moving toward confrontation there in the short or medium-run. Certainly both Israeli and Arab negotiators recognize that the United States is the only outside power with serious leverage on both sides at present.

However, the Israeli Foreign Ministry policy paper warns, "The willingness on the part of Russia to take upon itself a new role in the peace process is bound to open a tactical window for the Syrians and the Palestinians, at a time when many in the Arab world sense that they have lost some of their diplomatic flexibility as a result of the collapse of the Soviet Union."

Israeli Prime Minister Rabin rejected any serious role for the Russians in the peace talks during his meeting with Kozyrev in Tel Aviv. However, the paper warns, "Hostile public reactions that play down the role of Russia in the peace process could produce negative Russian reactions in the future." Among such reactions, according to the Israeli analysis' might be a return by the Russians to their more traditional criticism of Israel in international bodies like the United Nations.

Leon Hadar reports on international and Middle Eastern issues from Washington, DC.