World Affairs Institute

The Great Exception: Russian Civil-Military Relations

Author(s): STEPHEN BLANK
Source: World Affairs, Vol. 165, No. 2 (FALL 2002), pp. 91-105
Published by: World Affairs Institute
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20672654
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 Vol. 165No. 2 Fall 2002
The Great Exception:
Civil-Military
By STEPHENBLANK
n 25 September 2001 President Vladimir
O between Russia and both Europe and theUnit
Putin addressed the Bundestag and
again urged Russia's admission into NATO,
this time as part of a global coalition against
terrorism. Such membership faces many
obstacles. One is that forRussia to join NATO,
it must completely transform its system of
civilian control over themilitary. Although the
current system is nominally or formally civil
ian control, it certainly is not a democratic
form of control nor does it conform in any way
to Europe's emerging normative community
regarding civil-military relations.' Indeed,
Putin has realized the disjunction between
Russian and European realities because one
month later it was revealed that his govern
ment had "discreetly" asked NATO for help
with reforming itsmilitary and restructuring
its armed forces.2
That request, while revolutionary in terms of
Russian politics, signifies the failure to date of
military reform and of the general democratiza
tion process. While it is a promising start, that
is all the requests to NATO are; the real test
comes in the implementation of reforms,
whether they originate inMoscow or in Brus
sels. And the reformsmust be across the board,
for failure to establish truly democratic and
civil controls within and over the armed forces
is one of themost basic obstacles to Russian
democratization, integrity,and security.Conse
quently, thoroughgoing reform in this area is a
systemic precondition for achieving all of those
now insufficientlyattained objectives.
Russia's failure obliges us to question the
past decade's shibboleths of democratization,
especially insofar as civil-military relations are
concerned, as well as the notion that democrati
zation and demilitarization of the state also
should be defined as a kind of arms control pro
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91
Russian
Relations
gram. Thus the failure of military reform in Stephen Blank is a professor at
the Strategic Studies Institute,
Russia, while it lasts, also prevents full realiza U.S. Army War College. This
tion of a trulycooperative security relationship article originated in a paper
prepared for delivery to a confer
ence on civil-military relations in
ed States on the continent.3 Russia shows that
post-cold war Europe, 1Novem
we must stress democracy, not only civilian ber 2001, Washington, D.C. The
control over the military and police. Failed views expressed here do not in
any way represent those of the
democratization and failed military reform are
U.S. Army, Department of
inseparable aspects of the same negative and Defense, or the U.S. government.
regressive process, and both entail serious
domestic and international consequences. It is
also difficult to argue for two different
sequences of reform in these processes. Rather
they should be coterminous because progress,
or failure, in either domain, means the progress
or failure in the other.Military obstruction and
leadership neglect of reformhave fostered overt
politicization of the armed forces, even greater
corruption than before, a repeated resort to
internalwar, and thus heightened insecurity.4
Boris Yeltsin bequeathed to Putin an unre
formed and undemocratic policy process, per
vasive corruption, internal war, and military
politicization. And at least in Russia's case,
the consequences of failure, obstructed
democracy, and internal war reinforce each
other and are unlikely to be overcome anytime
soon. The new minister of defense, Sergei
Ivanov, lists improving the flow of weapons to
the armed forces, regulating their optimum
size and readiness, and increasing defense
spending in general, and soldiers' salaries in
particular, as the goals of his reform plan.5
These are worthy goals but are irrelevant to the
fundamental issues discussed here.
Russia remains the great exception or
antipode toNATO's insistence on a genuine and
workable democratic civil-military relationship
as a condition of membership. Military reform,
as understood here, entails a transfor
complete
mation of the entire national security structure
from top to bottom. It encompasses both the
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 922Worl Affairs

civilian and themilitary leadership as well as fourth since 1991), an overlarge military econ
Russia's eleven other armies under government omy burdening the overall economy, and
authority,whence the termmultiple militaries. endangered democracy.

Transforming the civilian-military relationship Russia remains a government of men, not

is amajor part of the task but not thewhole task.
If the goal is democratic and civilian controls
throughout and not only atop themultiple mili
taries and police, those forces must be subject
ed to full legal and institutional accountability
to the legislature and judiciary, which must
remain truly(and not just on paper) independent
of executive interferenceand restrictionwithin
their legally designated domains. This does not
entail any particular democratic model as such,
but itdoes entail a democratic process and insti
tutional relationships under law.
Likewise, the defense budget must be maxi
mally transparent to the legislature,which must
have exclusive authority to authorize defense
spending and full access to the information it
laws. Institutions are powerful or possess bind
ing authority only to the degree that their lead
ers and officials are powerful. They do not
derive their power or authority from an elec
toral process.7 And thanks to Yeltsin there is
neither a lawful overall policy process nor a
specific institution legally ordained with regu
lar and general oversight and leadership of
national security policy. As a result,Russia still
lacks a reliable and consistent mechanism for
either making or conducting defense policy.
Those who claim otherwise, such as Ivanov, as
former secretary of the Security Council, must
hide or distort the truth.Like tsarist statesmen,
they pretend that a regular, law-governed
bureaucratic process or
"system" is occurring

needs for thatjob. Even secret spendingmatters in defense policymaking and that a regularly
can be discussed with cleared parliamentarians functioning institution is currentlymaking or
in camera. That also means thata large body of coordinating policy.8 InNovember 2000 Ivanov
civilians must exercise controls in theMinistry denied that the Council was supplanting the
of Defense and over the police, alongside and ministries involved in those policies, yet he
over uniformed personnel, and have full access unintentionally revealed that it can and does
to the relevant information needed to support a actually oversee and usurp those functions,
judicious defense and security policy while undermining his simultaneous claim of a regu
also being fully accountable to theDuma and larized policy process. Ivanov argued,
the judiciary. The Security Council is, first of all a constitu
tional organ, and secondly it is not an organ of
DOMESTIC MACROPOLITICAL AND executive power [this last point is clearly
STRATEGIC CONSEQUENCES false]. For that reason it cannot duplicate either
a ministry or one
department by definition. We
This is not likely anytime soon. Much evi do not have executive con
powers, but merely
dence a from the lim
signifies regression away sultative functions. But then questions of coor
ited democratization of the early 1990s. The dinating policy in the security sphere are
indeed the clearly designated task of the Secu
interaction of failed military reform and failed
rity Council. Moreover, you should not forget
democratization generates several negative that our president is like three persons in one:
macropolitical and even strategic conse he is in addition the Supreme commander-in
quences. The most and basic conse Chief, and Head of the Security Council. So
general
quence of the failure of democratization and of thecouncil is fulfillingthepresident'spolitical
will. We do not get into economics or executive
military reform is the perpetuation of the failed
functions, that is to say, the things the govern
democratization because the linked failures
ment does, and in fact, I do not think we
place the viability of theRussian state itself at should.But at thesame time,somemembers of
constant risk.Yet some of themost prominent the government,including theprimeminister
analysts of Russia omit control over the armed himself,aremembers of theSecurityCouncil
forces and the police as essential preconditions and attendall the sessions. Justas thehead of
thepresident's administrationdoes.9
of democracy.6
Failed reform of the power structures Obviously this portrait describes neither a
exempts large areas of political life from the regularly functioning governmental institution
influence of democracy and the rule of law and nor regular government. As events since
corrupts the rest. Perpetuating this situation Ivanov's departure show, the Security Council
allows the armed forces, police, and defense itself does not regularly function.
industrial lobby to obstruct reform and Likewise, the current strife among military
progress. The outcome is quite clear: continu elites who quite regularly and publicly contra
ing poverty, internalwars (Chechnya being the dict each other on major policy issues shows

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Vol. 165No. 2 Fall 2002
the absence of policy coherence in devising and
executing a truemilitary reform.The bitterpub
lic infightingbetween former defense minister
General Igor Sergeyev and Chief of StaffGen
eral Anatoly Kvashnin and their subordinates,
as well as Putin's own publicly voiced frustra
tion with defense policies, paints rather a dif
ferent picture than that portrayed by Ivanov.
Indeed, this public infighting is all too charac
teristicof the overall government and confirms
inmany details (e.g., mobilization of the press
and political elites like theDuma against rivals)
Western findings about the general crisis of the
10
state.
This situation reflects the broader crisis and
situation thatBoris Yeltsin bequeathed to Putin.
Indeed, theway thePresidential Administration
actually functioned allowed interested officials
many opportunities for frustratinga policy. For
instance,
a tradition begun in the Tsarist era
Continuing
and maintained by the Soviets, the Russian
president and prime minister circulate draft
decrees, directives, and other important docu
ments along a lengthy chain of executive offi
cials. Each bureaucrat must apply a stamp of
approval, known as a visa, before the proposal
can go forward to the next official in the chain.
This laborious procedure allows officials to
subvertpolicy initiativesby withholding the
visa, sitting on the proposal, or even
document.Although an impatientand willful
leader may "fast-track" some decrees, or over
ride the veto of a subordinate, the visa routine
represents an inheritance that-in
of party discipline-devolves
authority onto second-tier officials
and Government."
dency
Thus presidential capacity is hamstrung from
within and obviously not only on military poli
cy. Yeltsin, like his predecessors, consciously
employed institutional redundancy to discipline
his government since neither law, patronage,
nor convention sufficed to do so. Hence
Yeltsin's government lacked both executive dis
cipline and collective responsibility. By themid
1990s Yeltsin's presidential staff comprised
several thousand officials who duplicated the
prime minister's staff of 1,100 officials and
theirdeputies. Yet at the same timeYeltsin was
not interested in actively supervising any of the
bureaucracies he oversaw. Instead he ruled as a
traditional monarch, allowing bureaucratic
elites freedom to run their affairs until they
needed a presidential decision, at which time
theywould come to him in traditional fashion
as supplicants.12
Personalism and institutional degradation
93
under the rubric of "superpresidentialism" per
vaded all of Yeltsin's policies with disastrous
consequences across the entire scope of Rus
sian government.13 We not
only
saw a constant
and accelerating reshuffling or "ministerial
leapfrog" in key positions, Yeltsin also con
stantly revamped the Security Council or creat
ed new Defense Councils or other bodies and
reshuffled key personnel in defense policy.
Even without the general chaos of state build
ing and economic decline, those actions pre
cluded a coherent defense policy that harmo
nized with Russia's overall national security
policy. Yeltsin also reserved all aspects of
national securitypolicy, both internaland exter
nal, to the president thus freeing him, the vari
ous councils he set up, and his chancellery from
institutional accountability to anyone.
Consequently no stable institution has yet
emerged towork on a systematic basis tomake
and/or execute defense policy. Despite official
documents such as defense doctrines or nation
al in practice, Russia, even
security concepts,
under Putin, cannot or will not formulate pre
dictable policies and national interests that can
reassure its neighbors or enhance Russia's real
security.'4 This instability has not been lost on
eitherRussian or foreign observers, who are all
too aware that-just as happened under Nikolai
losing the
from nowhere," all
II-"people types of
schemers and are the
hangers-on, running
country or trying to do so with dangerous
the absence results.'5 At the same time, Russia has imple
considerable mented few, if any, of the earlier documents'
in the presi
policy prescriptions and has not tried to reas
sure its neighbors, partners, and interlocutors
about its stability.
Signifying the incoherence of the policy
process, tomorrow Putin could arbitrarily
revamp the entire structurewithout meeting any
serious obstacles. In fact, any sufficientlypow
erful player in defense policy can and does take
his case to the public, theDuma, or directly to
the president without submittinghis policy pro
posals to any kind of normal accounting and
examination. As there is no normal process for
such accounting and examination, every aspect
of defense policymaking can, therefore, be
decided arbitrarily and by unaccountable per
sonages or agencies, the essence of despotism.
Essentially the process remains largely outside
of any law or legal procedure, let alone public
scrutiny and accountability. And in some
respects it is becoming more opaque to external
and public scrutiny.'6
Therefore a military policy exists in which
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94 World Affairs

senior people are accountable only to theirper Now thereare only 3 open lines in themilitary
sonal superiors, not to law or legal institutions, budget with one (open) line accounting for
90% of the budget. Unfortunately, these three
and autocratic and patron-client relationships
lines are so general that they provide no sense
dominate the armed forces. Not surprisingly, to Duma members, or of how the
society,
Russian military leaders evidently have littleor armed forces are actually allocating their bud
no idea what civilian democratic control actu get. The closed nature of themilitary budget
ally means, even if theywanted to accept it. actuallyviolates the 1998Law on Budget Clas
sification,but theMinistry of Finance simply
And profound structural and even constitution
ignores the law, motivated by the desire to
al barriers could impede its development in the maintain the freedom to shift funds as it sees
foreseeable future. Thus they maintain that fit.... Moreover, Putin is unlikely to compel

presidential control over the armed forces

theMinistry of Finance to be more open about
themilitary budget. The military budget is
worked out largelyby theMinistry of Finance
in negotiationwith theMinistry of Defense.
The lack of accountability or democratic controls Although theMinistry of Defense is often
blamed forkeeping thebudget closed toDuma
over the armed forces both causes and extends of the Duma Defense Com
scrutiny, members
officers' appalling treatment of theirmen. mittee maintain that it is Lyubov Kudelina,
DeputyMinister of Finance responsiblefor the
power ministries, who has been the main
obstacle to a more transparent budget. Indeed,
the army has started to figure out how to use
theDuma as an ally in budget fights,sending
service chiefs to testifyin frontof theDefense
Committee. However, in the absence of strong

pressure for a more open military budget from

(although theydo not include theFSB for obvi a civilian minister of defense-an uncertain
ous reasons) now resembles theAmerican sys prospect at best-this policy of budget secrecy
tem because a civilian heads the country! is likely to remain in place.19

Allegedly at the same time civilians are enter

work force, thus supposedly
ing theMOD's
civilianizing it.The recent appointment of Fed
eral Security Service (FSB) veteran Mikhail
Meanwhile Chechnya and the continuing fail
ure to reform the armed forces highlight the
very limited scope of the armed forces' and the

Dmitriyev as deputy minister of defense in government's accountability.

Almost all of themany consequences of this
charge of arms sales, who reports not to the
minister but directly to Putin, supposedly government"
are bad. First, the use
"irregular
extends civilian control.17 of force, either at home or abroad, by military,
Second, the constitution does not give the intelligence, and police forces remains outside

chairman of theDuma's Armed Services Com the law, as these institutions remain under the
mittee or the Federal Assembly the right or president's personal, not institutional, control.

There has been no domestic accountability con

power to invite the chief of staff or defense
minister to testifyor to order an investigation. cerning the currentChechen war. In fact, Putin
remains unaccountable, either institutionallyor
Worse yet, according to members of the
Yabloko Party, the absence in the constitution financially, concerning the use of themultiple
or
of any provision of accountability to theDuma armed forces whether at home abroad.20

can be construed tomake any law demanding
such accountability unconstitutional and ille
gal, since accountability to and control by the
president is explicitly stated in the constitu
tion.is Even if the Duma has, as at least one
analyst argued, begun to make progress on
holding themilitary accountable, that process
is very tenuous and its progress moot. Certain
ly it is not discernible in themilitary budget.
Brian Taylor, an American expert on these
issues, notes that since 1998 a visible trend
toward opening up the defense ministry's bud
get with nineteen open articles and subarticles
listed has been reversed:
Therefore, arguably there is no such thing as
extralegal use of the armed forces, since there
is no truly legal use of them either.
In any conflict involving Russia' s armed
forces there is a constant tendency, therefore,
thatmilitary operations and war will escape
military control and descend into a realm of
violence conducted largely for its own sake.
This does notmean that thewar in question was
not undertaken forpolitical reasons, but that the
means available, political control among them,
are not congruent with the objectives. Another
way of expressing this idea emerges from a
recent study of the IRA inwhich itwas stated,

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Vol. 165No. 2 Fall 2002
No war has ever been the product of meaning
less violence, and for any belligerent to wage
war, itmust have some political rationale. That
rationale may not always be strong or even con
vincing, but
nevertheless, the war will
fought for a particular reason. So when we talk
about warfare as a continuation of policy, we
are not arguing the presence of a political
rather we are questioning the quality
motive;
the political control exercised.21
(my italics)
The example of othermilitaries corroborates
the utility and validity of thisway of approach
ing the issue. The institutional incoherence of
Russian policy invariably precludes synchro
nization between strategic ends and means as in
Chechnya. Equally important, the lack of syn
chronization causes strategic operations to
degenerate rapidly-as happened in Pristina in
1999 and in Chechnya-into wars and opera
tions undertaken as much for sectoral, factional
purposes as forany particular national interest.22
Consequently, there was insufficientmilitary
and political appreciation of the strategic risks
involved in using the army for such narrow pur
poses either inPristina or Chechnya.
The refusal to establish a "regular govern
ment," or what Russian analysts once called
pravovoye gosudarstvo (Rechtsstaat would be
the closest Western approximation), essentially
ensures thatruling factionswill resort towar out
of themindless pursuit of power for their own
benefit, or what Julian Schofield calls "interests
defined in termsof power."23 Schofield observes
that in a constitutional regime goals emerge out
of a balance of ends and means where the selec
tion of strategic goals or ends "gives purpose to
and puts constraints on themeans." Therefore,
Clausewitz's principle thatwar is the conduct of
policy (politik inGerman can also be translated
as "policy" or "politics") is not necessarily
descriptively accurate, but rather "it is a norma
tive demonstration of efficient civil-military
relations: the deliberative and executive leaders
of the state,with the advice of the armed ser
vices, provide a general policy outline that the
military is to uphold."24
Russia, where key institutions are regularly
omitted from these kinds of processes, provides
the opposing example of a state pursuing "inter
ests defined in terms of power," and thus con
stantly risks war.25Without sufficientpolitical
control, Russian military operations inherently
tend to lead to a dead end where no political
solution is foreseeable or achievable, as in its
peacemaking operations and Chechnya, or to
possibilities formuch greater and unanticipated
war as in Pristina.
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95
CORRUPTION, DEDOVSHCHINA, AND
OTHER PATHOLOGIES
The lack of accountability or democratic
be controls over the armed forces both causes and
extends or perpetuates officers' appalling treat
ment of theirmen. So much has been written
about Russia's officers' still treating theirmen
of
as "baptized property" that I need not repeat it
here. The pervasive cynicism, corruption, and
brutalization are entrenched in the system and
corrode the functioning of the state and the
army.The results are evident inChechnya's two
wars. One of themajor obstacles to ending the
war in Chechnya is the rather large stake that
officers have in holding onto a source of unsu
pervised plunder.26Russian generals fullyknow
that their troops are drunkards, criminals, and
so forth; at the same time, military crimes
against soldiers may be rising again.27 The
numerous atrocity stories, the discovery of
mass graves, accounts of Russian and Chechen
death squads that target civilians, looting, offi
cers' regular theftof theirmen's salaries and
bonuses, and reports that theyand officials have
stolen almost all the funds earmarked for
civil reconstruction confirm find
Chechnya's
ings concerning the quality of the forces in
Chechnya and throughout Russia.28 From the
reports one can only conclude that the forces in
Chechnya are not much better than an armed
gang or rabble.
The recourse to what is essentially anomic
behavior occurs during a particularly nasty ver
sion of the protracted ethnic wars of our times.
Atleast one observer suspects thatmore Rus
sian soldiers were killed by acts of brutality in
theRussian Army, dedovshchina (translated as
but a much broader in
"hazing" phenomenon),
the 1990s than during the war up to June
2001.29 Although such behavior is not uncom
mon in these wars, Russia's for
importance
Eurasian security and its government's preten
to a major role globally make the
sions security
implications of continuing disintegration and
its systemic origins quite frightening.As Alek
sandrGolts stated,
There's no question thattheftinRussia's armed
forces has reached a grandiose scale. But it
wouldn't be rightto lay theblame entirelyat the
feetof a demoralized officercorps.The whole
system of relationsbetween the state and its
armed forces incites theft.The state channels
over a quarterof its income intodefense, but
exactlyhow thismoney is spent is shrouded in
secrecy.Not only themilitarybrass,butgovern
ment officialsat thehighest levels are eager to
get theirhands on thedefensebudget.30
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96 World Affairs

Golts also grasps how thismechanism of cor effort. Here the lack of legal standards and
ruption from the top down breeds thebrutaliza accountability reaches its zenith or perhaps its
tion and literal enslavement of soldiers by their nadir.
officers: Secret police penetration of society is also

Commanding officers in the armed forces are particularly visible in themilitary. Putin's poli
to this day in a situation like that of serfs, hav cies and his past suggest thathe emphasizes the
ing to carry out any orders coming from their armed forces' internal security role as much as
bosses, even ones, if want to keep
illegal they their nominal task of defending the integrity
their chance of climbing the career ladder.
and sovereignty of the Russian Federation.
They know, too, that it's better not to tire the

topbrasswith complaintsabout lack ofmoney Indeed, the official documents published since
to feed soldiers, purchase supplies, and so on. he came to power and his domestic policies to
The Army still liveson theprincipleof stealing
reorganize the government and quash dissent at
to survive. Sooner or later, any regiment com
home assign to internal threats as much if not
mander comes to the conclusion that the only
more than to external ones.33
to get money is to use his soldiers as importance
way
slaves. Sooner or later, the commander starts Putin's emphasis on fusing the power struc
renting them out to the local grain-processing
tures' internal and external security roles and
plants or state farms. Of course, the comman
increasing their scope clearly emerges from
der knows he's breaking the law, and if he's
these texts.34 For example, Ivanov wants to use
caught. he knows he'll never be able to prove
the joint regional grouping of Russo-Belarus
thathe spent the illegallyearnedmoney not on
sian forces in Kaliningrad to strengthen "the
himself, but on the soldiers. Since he's going to
have to steal anyway, then, he starts siphoning verticality of central power" against purely
money into his own pockets and soon becomes domestic threats in that notoriously criminal
a banal criminal. So long as reform of the ized province.35 Because those doctrinal docu
armed forces hasn't begun, allocating state
ments and actual policy have emphatically
money for combat preparedness or new arms

purchases is more or less a senseless enter approved the use of the armed forces, even in a
prise. Without a transparent reporting and commanding role in internal conflicts such as
accounting system, the money will just disap Chechnya, Yeltsin and Putin have rhetorically
pear without a trace.31 (my italics) and actually erased the line between domestic
An army so constituted cannot defend Russia's and foreign threats confronting the various

integrityand vital interests,let alone democracy.
TOWARD A POLICE STATE?
The macropolitical and economic conse
quences of failed defense reform and democra
tization do not end here. A major
of the absence of legal controls is the trend
toward a police state.Although Yeltsin used the
FSB sparingly, by leaving it essentially unre
formed and above and outside the law, he left
the field open to Putin who has energetically
used the FSB and its cadres to create the out
lines of a classic police state and instrumentof
repression against potential opponents and crit
ics in politics and themedia. The use of the
military in internal wars, and its conduct in
Chechnya, also suggest how those forces could
be used to affect Russian domestic politics.
Indeed, in Chechnya, the result has been not
only an unwinnable war, but the creation of the
nearest equivalent toHobbes' state of nature.32
Here the brutality of theRussian army, itself a
collection of brutalized men, let loose upon the
population, surpasses thatof the Serbian forces
inKosovo in 1998-99, and its corruption is on
an equally grand scale as it has sole effective
control of monies spent to further the war
police and military forces. Putin has extended
Gorbachev's and Yeltsin's policies that split the
armed forces into many domestic formations
that assumed new internalmissions, primarily
to preserve theirpower.36
consequence Worse yet, the use of police and/ormilitary
instruments often seems to be the only way to
face the seemingly universal threats thatRussia
perceives. Putin in February 2000 ordered the
FSB, Russia's domestic intelligence agency, to
restore surveillance over thepolitical allegiance
of military personnel and become, once again,
a centralized organization unifying both coun
terintelligence and the political police within
the army. By restoring the FSB 's special
departments and ordering them to prevent any
activity "by individuals aimed at harming Rus
sia's security" and all mutinies and plots
against the established constitutional order,
Putin also let the FSB recruit informers from
within the army "on a confidential basis."37
This was not an innovation, since in
1996-97, FSB members publicly bragged
about their political surveillance of the officer
corps, another sign of Yeltsin's failure to
democratize the police and armed forces.38
However, since theFSB answers exclusively to

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Vol. 165No. 2 Fall 2002
Putin, this action, although itmight result in
better political control over themilitary, further
enhances undemocratic and ineffective super
presidentialism and tendencies toward a police
state. Indeed, it increasingly seems as if service
"in the organs" is the prerequisite for attaining
high state office and thatformerKGB and FSB
personnel now pervade the senior ranks of the
administration.39
POLITICIZATION OF THE POLICE
AND MILITARY
Yeltsin furthered politicization of the mili
tarywell beyond being a conscious instrument
in the domestic struggle for power after 1991.
Putin has extended that policy still further.
Politicization entails more than officers' acting
inpartisan political roles where they could pub
licly critique the government, although that is
bad enough. The military were and are called
upon to roll out the vote for the president.40 In
lightof recent revelations ofmassive vote fraud
in the elections of 1999-2000, it is easy to
imagine what measures were contemplated
and/or employed.41 Earlier, in 1995, theMin
istryof Defense tried to field a slate ofmilitary
or pro-military candidates for the Duma.42
Prominent generals such as Lev Rokhlin who
won election to theDuma used the opportunity
to organize "military opposition" movements to
Yeltsin. Rokhlin's murder under suspicious cir
cumstances also suggests the politicization and
use of internal violence to resolve domestic
issues, and ties between the armed forces and
Russia's criminal world.43
Nor did politicization stop there. In March
1999, Kvashnin publicly appealed to theDuma
against Sergeyev and blasted his, and implicitly
Yeltsin's, policies while standing alongside
members of the Duma Defense Committee.44
He also connived with theDuma to draft reso
lutions stating that because of NATO's cam
paign theTreaty on Conventional Armed Forces
in Europe did not meet Russian national inter
ests.45This comprehensive attack on all aspects
of state policy went unpunished, indicating that
such phenomena seem quite normal in a situa
tionwhere military politicization has long been
tolerated as the rule, both by officers and by the
government.
Thus the armed forces can now play a legiti
mate and open role in partisan political strug
gles. This option opens up too many possibili
ties and temptations to both commanders and
politicians for political action while they are
also potential key players in internalcrises. One
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97
such temptation, aggravated by the lack of con
trol mechanisms, is that the Ministry of
Defense and the General Staff have pursued
and still are pursuing sectoral or factional, per
haps even personal, policies at the expense of
the state. A second, even more
dangerous
potential outcome is either for the armed forces
to launch what amount to coups d'etat or for
civilian politicians, enjoying military support,
to do so. Yeltsin's penchant for doing so suc
cessfully and the opportunities he has left to his
successors are not lost on them, and this poten
tial has dire consequences forRussian democ
racy and security.Although the army may or
may not eventually launch a coup, major parts
of themilitary and police forces have clearly
made themselves available to political figures
such as Yeltsin and Putin, and perhaps others
who are willing to experiment with using force
in domestic politics. A civilian-led coup cannot
be excluded, andYeltsin, by his own admission,
often contemplated such a coup.46
For example, in October 1999 theMinistry
of Defense and General Staff published for the
firsttime a draft defense doctrine thatwas sup
posed to "concretize" the precepts laid out in
the national security concept thatwas not pub
lished until January 2000.47 Arguably themili
tary acted to preempt and dominate the debate
on national security policy to ensure that no
other approach to potential threat assessments
and policy recommendations would command
a public platform. Signifying this possibility,
the draft doctrine's section on the leadership of
the armed forces says that thepresident "heads"
(Vozglavlyayet) the armed forces, connoting a
rather formal but not close supervision in prac
tice.48 While that description may have accu
rately depicted the nature of the infirm
Yeltsin's
oversight, it also represented a conscious
attempt to enlarge the sphere of professional
military discretion at Yeltsin's and Putin's
expense, and Putin quashed it. Therefore the
April 2000 defense doctrine states that thepres
ident "directs" or "leads" (rukovodit) the armed
forces, a much stronger formulation that signi
fies Putin's determination to rule in fact.49
While this episode confirms Putin's control
over themilitary it also shows what he must
contend with.
Meanwhile he also is extending the politi
cization. The Kremlin is trying to get "top
dogs" from the defense and security organs to
run for gubernatorial seats to create a phalanx
of "aggressively loyal" governors who will
unhesitatingly obey Moscow's commands and
98 World Affairs

reinstall a centralized (and idealized) vertical is not ruled out thatby the end of thisyear 60
vacant seats in the Federation council would be
chain of command fromMoscow downward.
taken mostly by officers and generals, who
Ivanov's remarks about Kaliningrad epitomize
would be nominated by the regions themselves.
Putin's systematic policy to create a disciplined Meanwhile to gov
promoting loyal generals
loyal administration in Russia, organized ernmentbodies is only part of he policywhich
around a military-police model. These candi the Kremlin has been carrying out. The point is
that many from the president's
dates come from the army, the FSB, and the supervisors
inner circles consider that military personnel
navy and follow in other ex-officers' footsteps. should form the core of lower-level official
They also complement Putin's past efforts to dom. According to our military sources a
install centralized control over the regions by whole "regiment of professional soldiers, who

appointing seven plenipotentiaries from are assigned to the federal authorities, is quar

to rule over a concentration of the tered among state officials.51

Moscow
eighty-nine provinces into seven regions. Five
of the seven namestniki (the tsarist term for
governor-general) are from the army and FSB.
Such moves further legitimize and extend the
tendency toward politicizing the armed forces
and police, toward circumscribing democracy
and enthroning police rule over Russia, and
militarizing Russian politics.
This politicization not only applies to the
elections but has a broader significance as well.
The open politicization of themilitary and the
public and very shrillKvashnin-Sergeyev feud
encourage subordinates to do the same and
legitimize politicization throughout the system.
Second, recruiting officers to run for election
for provincial governorships gives open sanc
tion to the idea that serving officers can legiti
mately participate in partisan politics. An esti
mated 1,500 officers and generals now serve on
Putin's staff, the Russian government's staff,
the staffof the Federal Assembly, the account
ing office, and various ministries and depart
ments. As reported by Andrei Korbut,
500 officers and generals
Approximately
have jobs in the presidential administration,
the Federal the State
government Assembly,
Auditing Commission, ministries and depart
ments. Moreover over a 1,000 officers are
assigned to the Russian organization for
Defense Sports and Techniques
(ROSTO),
state-owned company,
Rosoboroneksport,
preparat Russian joint-stock company,
Aeroflot-Russian InternationalAirlines Inc.
field institutionsof theCentral Bank of the
Russian Federation.50
There is no doubt that this politicization has
deliberately been sponsored by Putin and his
government. Thus Korbut also reports,
At present,military senators are making the
active basis of the"party inpower" in theFed
erationCouncil. They do not conceal theirmil
itarybackground, and, according to reports
from themilitary sources, theyhelp the per
sonnel departmentsof thepresidentialadmin
istrationlook formilitary candidates for per
manent jobs as senators in theupper house. It
The spreading inclination to engage in pub
lic intra-service or inter-service political quar
relsmakes themilitary even more unwieldy as
a defense policy instrumentand encourages the
formation of alliances among officers and with
various politicians, above and beyond ties that
have been cemented with regional governors.
Consequently, public or partisan political activ
ityhas become increasingly legitimate for these
politicized officers. But what is much more
ominous is not only themilitarization of gover
nance throughout the entire "power vertical"
but the essential disregard for and ignorance of
civilian control and accountability. Thus Gen
eral Vladimir Shamanov, who earned a record
for great harshness inChechnya, campaigned at
Putin's request, and was elected governor of
Ulyanovsk as a serving general. Shamanov
stated,
The algorithms of managing an army and a
. . What
.
civilian are almost identical.
society
you in civilian life call a "problem" we in the
army call the "enemy." The rest is similar. The
only difference is, when you make a decision
now
in the army, you can control it and make sure
the
it's been realized in life. This is lacking in
civilian life.52
Finally, there is an ever more overt expres
sion by officers of a mood thatevokes the stab
Bio in-the-backmentality of theWeimar Republic.
For example, major military figures such as
retiredGeneral M. A. Gareyev, president of the
Russian Academy of Military Sciences and a
major military theorist, openly stated that the
government is the enemy of the country.
Gareyev writes, "For 150 years the political
leadership of this country has placed themili
tary into extremely unfavorable and intolerable
conditions from which it has had to extricate
itself.Moreover, eventually themilitary winds
up 'guilty' of everything."s3 Sergeyev echoed
this sentimentwhen he asserted that the under
lying cause of theKursk submarine disaster in
August 2000 was lack of funding of themili

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Vol. 165No. 2 Fall 2002 99

tary, which had led to lack of equipment, and admitted to be, beyond Russia's capabili
resources, and so forth.54 The Ministry of ty. He wrote,
Defense's wastefulness and strategic incompe As long as theRussian military does not get
tence were nowhere mentioned as being equal beyond its threatperceptiondeveloped during
WorldWar II, itwill continuetohold the image
ly culpable.
This twin failure of reform also manifests of a hostileworld and tryto compensatewith
itself in excessive and rising state expenditures military force for its inferiority in other
spheres. Given the fact that themilitary force of
on the armed forces. Putin knows this in gener Russia dwarfs that of every other state in the
al terms.However few realize that (using a pur region, Russia's lack of a clear commitment to
a defensive military posture can jeop
chasing price parity) Russia spends (according develop
ardize military reforms in many other states
to estimates of theBritish Ministry of Defense
both in the near abroad and the countries of
and the International Instituteof Strategic Stud
Eastern Europe.... It seems, nevertheless, that
ies) $50-57 billion a year, about 5 percent of the purpose of restructuring the military indus
GDP and 25 to 33 percent of the budget, on the tryof Russia is not only tomaintain itsglobal
armed forces. This figure is both in itself competitiveness in the world market, but also
to modernize its own armed forces in a way
opaque and probably hides other kinds of fund
that would make global power projection pos
ing.55Certainly this shows that themilitary and
sible also in the future.... It [also] seems clear
the defense industry are more wasteful and that themilitarymakes and will continue to
inclined to threat inflation and lack of account make efforts to increase Russia's influence in
thenear abroad; itsmilitary potential is possi
ability than they are to responsible manage
bly the most effective means to achieve
ment. But it also strengthens themilitary and goal.
There are clear tendencies of reintegration in
defense industry lobbies who are thereby
the former Soviet area made possible by a con
encouraged to create ever more fanciful threat roleplayed by the
flictresolution/peacekeeping
scenarios and demand more money, even Sovietmilitary.This functionis retained in the
though they cannot efficiently invest those
new [i.e., 1993] military doctrine.57

funds in usable military forces tomeet the often The national security and military doctrines
invented threats. in
published 2000 fully articulated the tradi
tional threat perceptions, added new domestic
EXTERNAL MANIFESTATIONS AND
and external ones to themix, and explicitly pos
CONSEQUENCES
tulated military reintegration of the CIS as a
The second macropolitical consequence of
goal.58 The security concept openly states as
the failure of military democratization is that it follows:
perpetuates Russia's moral-political isolation
The interests of Russia's national
from theWestern European world it so desper ensuring
security predetermine the need, under appro
ately craves to join.Moreover, as NATO and the priate circumstances, for Russia to have a mili
EU move East, each possessing some military tary presence in certain strategically important
function,which makes the question of control regionsof theworld. The stationingof limited
over theuse of armed forces a vital one forboth military contingents [the same term used to

to an
organizations, Russia's adherence
tially pre-modern system widens the gap
between it and Europe. This isolation also
affects security policy because it remains a
prime cause for the insecurity thatCentral and
East European states feel emanating from a
revisionistRussia where the armed forces are or
can easily become the political equivalent of a
rogue elephant.56 That fear and sentiment still
pervade the region even though an invasion
anytime soon is inconceivable.
Writing in 1994, theHungarian analyst Pal
Dumay articulated the fears and the conse
quences of the unreformed military's adhesion
to archaic threat assessments for the entire
post-Warsaw Pact area. Dumay's observations
still contain much validity, although global
power projection beyond the CIS is clearly,
essen
describe forces inAfghanistan-SB] (military
bases, naval units) there on a treaty basis must
ensure Russia's readiness to fulfill its obliga
tions and to assist in forming a stable military
strategic balance of forces in regions, and must
to react to a cri
enable the Russian Federation
sis situation in its initial stage and achieve its
foreignpolicy goals.59
Another tangible outcome of failed reform is
thatmuch of Russia's conflict resolution/peace
keeping/peacemaking role in theCIS was explic
itlyundertaken to enhance the role of theMin
istry of Defense and the army in formulating
policy at the expense of thatof civilian agencies
such as theMinistry of Foreign Affairs. Thus
todayRussia is embroiled in numerous ongoing
conflicts that it cannot terminate,even if shoot
ing has stopped, and itsmilitary plays a most
dubious role inGeorgia and Tajikistan.60

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100
A second practical manifestation of the con
sequences is thatRussia seeks to gain access to,
integration with, and ultimately control over,
key CIS armed forces. Belarus is the most
advanced but hardly the sole case. In Belarus,
as prospectively throughout the CIS, Russia's
program for themilitary integration of theCIS
appears as an opposing model toNATO's pro
gram. Certainly nothing like NATO's integrat
ed military structureexists inRussia's blueprint
for theCIS, nor is there a community of values
among the states that could precede the forma
tion of an acceptable and trulyactive command
and controls system. The 1999 CIS decision to
create a common headquarters for coordination
between Central Asian and Russian militaries
against terrorismowed as much to the possibil
ity of interstate warfare among the Central
Asian states as it did to the terrorist threat.61
And for all Russia's promises of assistance and
threats to the Taliban, little tangible assistance
has come. What has happened is thatRussia
and China induced the transformation of the
Shanghai-Five, which originated mainly as a
confidence-building mechanism, into a six
member collective security system that now
allows for the projection of Chinese and Russ
ianmilitary power intoCentral Asia to combat
separatism and terrorism.
Russia's plan of integration resembles a
hegemonic systemwhere Russia retains control
over those states. Russia's repeated invocation
of the Afghan-based threat of insurgency in
Central Asia and desire to respond militarily to
it appears as an attempt to bind nascent Central
Asian militaries toRussia, thereby stifling their
autonomous growth. Attempts to integrate
CIS on the basis of police and military officers
who reflect and share a pro-Moscow view and
can also be vetted by Moscow illustrate this
trend.62The nucleus of the futurecollective CIS
forces or "Euro-Asian alliance" grows out
previous exercises conducted by the CIS mili
taries with Russia and reflects trends toward
economic integration,ormore accurately hege
mony, in thatRussia will now make arms avail
able to those states at below market prices.
Hence Russia is subsidizing its arms industries
and theirmilitary growth even as it does not
have enough money for its own armed forces,
which itmust cut.63Likewise Russia is trying
to legislate and create a unified air defense sys
tem for theCIS.
While this trendmust be stopped to preserve
Eurasian and Russian security, in many
respects this counter-model to NATO remains
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World Affairs
very much a paper armed force. Paradoxically
the effort to preserve the imperial and unre
formedmilitary dimension actually entails less
security for the entireCIS region, hardly some
thing Europe or Russia can be complacent
about. Moscow will have to drastically subsi
dize much of this force's development and sim
ply cannot afford to do so. National parliaments
must ratify thedecision to send forces to a third
country.And although Russian officials, off the
record, expect President Lukashenka of Bela
rus to be able to circumvent his constitution's
prohibition of dispatching forces to foreign
conflicts, despite his claims thathe will uphold
Belarus's constitution and not send any troops
to "hot spots," other presidents might not be so
compliant.
But thispoint already displays the democrat
ic deficit inherent in the counter-organization
Moscow is building to against NATO and other
threats since the essence of NATO's decision
making is democratic consensus. Likewise,
Article IV of the Tashkent Collective Security
Treaty of 1992 states that aggression against
any one signatory is viewed by other signato
ries as aggression against all of them, implicit
ly resembling Article V of NATO's founding
Washington Treaty. But Moscow has already
violated that understanding vis-a-vis Armenia
and Azerbaijan in Nagorno-Karabakh. Insur
gency cannot easily or always be viewed by
non-involved parties as outside aggression.
Moreover, a decision tomove collective forces
to a state's territory to take part in another
Chechnya could be adopted only subject to
consent by the country towhich the troops are
the being moved. In other words, a repetition of
Kosovo inCentral Asia or theCaucasus is hard
ly possible.
The new military-political alliance, for that
is what this represents, is still too vague in its
of mechanisms-and the CIS to date has hardly
been a model of fidelity to its declarations-to
count as a really functioning alliance. Certainly
its command mechanism remains unclear.Will
Russia really allow Kazak generals to com
mand its forces, as even theUnited States final
ly acceded to in Kosovo? Certainly Russian
leaders are now trying to prevent Central Asian
governments from exercising their sovereign
decision-making right to cooperate militarily
with theUnited States in its campaign against
terrorists originating in Afghanistan.64 There
fore, even though the new alliance represents
themilitary analogue to theEurasian Econom
ic Community created in 2000 inAstana, itself
Vol. 165No. 2 Fall 2002
a counter or prototype Russian-inspired EU, all
there is in favor of the new military organiza
tioan is the oft-repeated and often violated
assurance of functionaries that the principles
governing its operation resemble those in use
around theworld.
Finally, a concrete decision on themobiliza
tional readiness of this "coalition's" forces and
their funding has yet to be made. While forces
will remain on their home territories, in the
event of a threat forces will be relocated, pre
sumably by the governments involved, to the
scene of the threat. Thus the coalition lacks
command, funding, and defense integration
structures.Certainly it currently is not a vehicle
for trulycollective defense a la NATO.65
The transparentpurpose behind thismilitary
political alliance and the accompanying eco
nomic community is another attempt to reshape
the CIS into an instrument for perpetuating
Russia's hegemony in the CIS. But it appears
that this barn is unlocked, and the horse has
bolted, given the globalizing influence upon
these states' militaries of the Partnership for
Peace program and the key NATO allies-in
this context the United States and Turkey
extensive programs formilitary integrationwith
CIS members. The coalition as planned rests on
Russian subsidies that it can ill afford and lacks
any true vehicle for becoming an effective
instrumentof collective defense. Furthermore,
the refusal of Georgia, Azerbaijan, Ukraine,
and Uzbekistan to play along with Moscow
and Uzbekistan even sought its own deal with
theTaliban-calls the viability of this operation
intoquestion, notwithstanding Russia's concur
rentmilitary retrenchment policies. After the
terror attacks on the United States, Central
Asian governments' open courtship ofWash
ington further reflects their unwillingness to
depend exclusively on Russia.
Only with Belarus has there been any true
military integration, and even that is inmany
respects problematic.66 Russian and Belarus
sian security services have preceded their gov
ernments by finalizing theirunion and creating
a joint structuremade up of members of both
states' Justice, Interior, and Security Ministries
(among themost sinister of government agen
cies in both states). This organization also high
lights the democratic deficits involved in Rus
sia's model of military-political integration
because it precedes the governmental and leg
islative unification of both states and will there
fore be beyond any true democratic or institu
tional accountability. Indeed, this structurehas
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101
yet to explain itsmission, which appears ini
tially to be to guarantee both presidents' power
against theirdomestic opponents.67
Boris Bikknin, the deputy chairman of the
new organization, the Scientific Consultation
Board, and Belarussian deputy minister for
emergencies, stated that themajor obstacle to
this integration is theWest, particularly the
United States. He stated further the two states'
principal task is to disrupt plans for a buffer
zone between Europe and Asia under the aegis
Because ofNATO's advance enlargement and the
possibility ofNATO's militarization of Poland, a
union with Belarus has loomed large inRussian
politics.
of NATO, a task that overrides any considera
tion of economic cost and therefore,he implies,
merits Russian subsidization.68 Belarus frankly
advertises its intention to be a "free rider" in
this alliance. Clearly, however, for theRussian
military the deal, at least up to the present, is
worth the costs. Prime Minister Mikhail
Kasyanov recently stated that the doctrine for
this formationwould be drawn up byMoscow,
not Minsk.69 Ivanov's statement cited above
concerning theKaliningrad forces reveals that
for him, and presumably his colleagues in
Moscow, neither Belarussian nor Russian sov
ereignty or democracy counts formuch if for
eign troops are to be brought intoKaliningrad
to suppress democracy and the devolution of
power.
Because of NATO's advance enlargement
and the possibility of NATO's militarization of
Poland, a neuralgic point in Russian military
planning, a union with Belarus has loomed
large in Russian politics. Integration with
Minsk is not only deemed a critical geostrategic
or military-political goal, it is also the firststep
in the dream of an integratedCIS and a matter
of the survival of theRussian state as idea and
reality.The economic and military "unions"~ are
openly advertised as being a response toNATO
enlargement.70 However, this unity is not
restricted solely to the armed forces.
If Belarus is a model, therewould also be
substantial FSB penetration of the secret and
regular police forces directed fromMoscow.
102
More recently. the FSB has helped Ukrainian
police arrest the opposition's leader, former
energyminister Yulia Timoshenko, on the basis
of five-year-old bribery charges. As one
Ukrainian analyst told me, such arrests are a
card available to any CIS leader who is anxious
about his domestic opposition. Unfortunately
theFSB does notwork pro bono, and itsbill for
these "services" reinforces the states'
dence onMoscow and theFSB. Certainly Putin
has tried to establish such control over CIS
police, security, and military organizations and
replace their current leaders wherever possible
with pro-Moscow figures.71That "foreign" pol
icy is the flip side of the same policy being
employed throughout Russia, where intelli
gence services are funding the right-wing
nationalist Eurasian movement.72
The use of police and even criminal forces
abroad as the avant-garde of Russian influence
is known and acknowledged across Central and
Eastern Europe as well as theCIS. Throughout
the region, but especially in key states such as
Lithuania and Bulgaria, FSB personnel, orga
nized crime, and Russian firms like Gazprom
and Lukoil work to gain control over the ener
gy industry, fund local political parties, and
compromise local politicians, all in an effort to
inhibit these states' integrationwith theWest.73
Were this tactic to succeed, the targeted states
would be unable to integrate with European
security organizations, globalization, and west
ernization. But only such integration offers
them a chance for prosperity and democracy;
to Moscow's exclusive
consignment
influence ensures their poverty, authoritarian
ism, and most important, endless armed
flicts in and around Russia.
At the same time, the attempt to compel
Ukraine to join a military-political bloc has
grown stronger and clearer. In Ukraine,
price of supplying gas is the removal of pro
Western officials from key security positions
and their replacement by more neutral types
who must then groom overtly pro-Muscovite
figures to succeed them, a classic Stalinist tac
tic.74Another accord obligates Ukraine to con
duct joint military exercises with Russia under
terms thatwould preclude its armed forces and
government from joining with NATO under the
Partnership for Peace, an essential step toward
integrationwith theWest. Putin's new ambas
sador, former prime minister Viktor Cher
nomyrdin, publicly decried Ukraine's policy of
nonalignment with NATO and Russia, calling
for a public choice on behalf ofMoscow.75
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World Affairs
Thus the external aspect of this failure or the
great exception to European practice has as its
manifestations and consequence an enhanced
likelihood of Russia's being dragged into a
conflict that it cannot afford as itvainly tries to
resurrect a facsimile of the Soviet empire and
war economy that are beyond itsmeans. The
uncontrolled military and the government's
depen atavistic threatperceptions and proposed solu
tions not only overtax Moscow's economic
resources and capabilities and extend its isola
tion from Europe into the future, they also
mean war abroad and at home, as inChechnya.
CONCLUSIONS
Russia presents a virtual paradigm of Samuel
Huntington's "subjective" control over the var
ious or multiple militaries, whose net results
are a series of unwinnable domestic wars, and
an armed force thatwas seriously tempted to go
towar again against Afghanistan and yet can
not defend Russia, care for itsmen, or provide
them quality weapons. Meanwhile thismilitary
also remains beyond effective political control.
When Yeltsin gave the military uncontested
control over itsown administration and internal
policy-making processes he created the condi
tions for this stalemate. The outcome eliminat
ed any real possibility for creating an organiza
tion to provide a balance or alternatives to the
military's recommendations on defense issues
or hope of genuine military reform.
Therefore we cannot count on the officer
corps's inherited professionalism to be a basis
sphere of either for domestic reform and democratization
or for external integration. That professional
con ization was a Soviet one, alien to the values of
democratic control over the armed forces. And
its corruption and deformation in the last fif
teen years have probably distanced it farther
the thanwe would like to admit from democracy
and from the ability to integratewith European
armed forces.76Certainly the pervasive brutali
ty,corruption, and criminality of Russian mili
tary lifepresent formidable obstacles to democ
ratization and European integration.
But Yeltsin's legacies to Putin and the trends
in the Russian armed forces also signify that
probably no military reform proposals of real
consequence can emerge from within the
armed forces.And outside of Sergeyev in 1997
none has emerged. Therefore it is not surprising
that Putin invited NATO into this arena. The
military leadership has constantly stated that
military reformmeant that the state, not the
armed forces, had to take the lead in a sweep
Vol. 165No. 2 Fall 2002 103

ing reformof the entire national security policy Russia List, davidjohnson@erols.com, 24 June 1997,

and policymaking framework. Indeed, much 5; William E. Odom, "Realism About Russia," The
National Interest65 (Fall 2001): 56-66.
military writing and complaining since 1991 8. George Yaney, The SystematizationofRussian
about military conditions attribute all responsi Government IL.: University
(Champaign-Urbana, of
bility for everything thathas gone wrong to the Illinois Press, 1973) and idem.,The Urge ToMobi
state, absolving the armed forces from any lize:Agrarian Reform inRussia, 1860-1930 (Cham
responsibility or need to act. paign-Urbana, IL. Universityof IllinoisPress, 1982).
9. Nezavisimaya Gazeta, 29 November 2000,
Russia's failed military reforms threaten its
Foreign Broadcast Information Service, Central
own and itsneighbors' security,peace, prosper
Eurasia, (HenceforthFBIS SOV), 29 November
ity, and democracy. Numerous foreign 2000.
observers also note that Russia still isolates 10.Eugene Huskey,Presidential Power inRussia
itself from theEuropean Community's political (Armonk,NY: M.E. Sharpe& Co. Inc., 1999), 44.
11. Ibid., 8-9.
norms, and its civil-military issues exemplify
12. Ibid., 41-42, 50.
that.77Indeed, Russian military-political figures 13. Eva Busza, "State Dysfunctionality, Institu
are still all too ready tomake military threats tionalDecay, and theRussian Military,"Building the
and actually undertake extraordinarily risky and Russian State: InstitutionalCrisis and theQuest for
foolish moves such as bringing tactical nuclear Democratic Governance, Valerie Sperling, ed.
(Boulder,CO: Westview Press, 2000), 113-36, and
weapons into Kaliningrad.78 As long as this
many of the essays in Victoria E. Bonnell and
twin failure persists, Russia can neither be a fit W. Russia in the New
George Breslauer, Century:
partner for the rest of Europe, nor can we say StabilityorDisorder (Boulder,CO: Westview Press,
that it conducts a trulyEuropean security poli 2000) .
14. Olav "Introduction: A General Per
cy. Any serious Russian interest in NATO Knudsen,
spectiveon the Securityof theBaltic Region," Sta
membership, apart from the strategic questions
bilityand Security in theBaltic Sea Region: Russian,
thatapplication raises, must be met by NATO's and European Olav
Nordic, Aspects, Knudsen, ed.
insistence on both internaland external reforms (London: Frank Cass, 1999), 14; Frederic Labarre,
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like this answer at all, but as Putin's request to Defense Review 5 (2001): 59-71.
15. Alexander "The Dark Forces: Pop
NATO and thehistory of the last ten years sug Zaslavsky,
ular Analogies in Russian Politics," Demokratizat
gest, Russia has no alternative.
siya 9, no. 1 (Winter2001): 79, where he adds the
conclusions of then Under-Secretary of State Strobe
NOTES Talbott tohis own analysis.
1. Stephen Blank, "Map Reading: NATO's and 16.Brian Taylor, "The Duma
and Military
Russia's Pathways toEuropeanMilitary Integration," Reform," Program on New Approaches to Russian
Occasional Papers of theWoodrow Wilson Center, Security 154 (December 2000).
No. 61, February 2001. 17. Conversations with Russian analysts and offi
2. JudyDempsey, "Moscow Asks NATO for cials, Carlisle Barracks, PA, and Alexandria, VA,
Help inRestructuring,"
Financial Times,26 October December 2000.
2001, 2. 18. Taylor, "The Duma and Military Reform,"
3. Jenonne
Walker, Securityand Arms Control in passim.; Walter Parchonomenko, "The State of Rus
Post-Confrontation Europe (Oxford: Oxford Univer sia's Armed Forces and Military Reform," Parame
sityPress, 1994), 6-7; Daniel Nelson, "Definition, ters24, no. 4 (Winter,1999-2000): 104-06.
Diagnosis, Therapy?A Civil/Military Critique," 19. Parchonomenko, "The State of Russia's

unpublishedpaper, 2001. Armed Forces," 104-06, Busza, "State Dysfunction

4. For the Soviet period seeWilliam E. Odom, ality," 133, and IgorKhripunov, "Russia and Global
The Collapse of theSovietMilitary (NewHaven, CT: Security:Approaches toNuclear Arms Control and
Yale UniversityPress, 1998); for thepost-1991 peri Nonproliferation," NBR Analysis 1, no. 4 (August
od see the essays inMichael H. Crutcher, ed., The 2001) : 7-8, present opposing sides of theDuma's
Russian Armed Forces at the Dawn of theMillenni ability to supervise themilitary.
um (Carlisle Barracks, PA: Center for Strategic 20. Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Uncivil
Leadership,US ArmyWar College, 2001). Societies, 25 July2001; Taylor, "The Duma andMil
5. "RussianMilitary Paper Reports on Defense itaryReform"; StephenBlank, Russian Defense Leg
Minister's News Conference," BBC Monitoring from islation and Russian Democracy (Strategic Studies
Krasnaya Zvezda, 30 May 2001, retrieved from Institute, U.S. Army War College, Carlisle Barracks,
Lexis-Nexis. PA, September 1995).
6. Archie Brown, "Russia and Democratization," 21.Michael Von Tangen Page andM. L. R. Smith,
Problems of Post-Communism46, no. 65 (Septem "War By Other Means: The Problem of Political
ber-October 1999): 3-13, wholly omitsmention of Control in IrishRepublican Strategy," ArmedForces
these issues of control over themultiple militaries and Society 21, no. 1 (Fall 2000): 81.
and police forces. 22. Stephen Blank, "From Kosovo to Kursk:
7. Stephen Holmes, "What Russia Teaches Us: Russian Defense Policy from Yeltsin to Putin," Kore
How Weak States Threaten Freedom," Johnson's an Journal ofDefense Analysis 12, no. 2 (Winter

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2000): 231-73. and Robin Winks, eds. (New York: Palgrave, forth
23. Julian Schofield, "Militarized Decision-Mak coming).
ing forWar inPakistan: 1947-1971,"Armed Forces 37. Guy Chazan, "PutinOrders SecurityAgency
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Military's Deeper Problems," Russia Journal, 26 February 1995, FBIS-SOV-95-033, 17 February
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1999, FBIS SOV, 10 August 1999; Dale R. Her Russia's Elections," Russia Journal, 15 November
spring,"The ContinuingDisintegration of theRuss 1999; Moskovskiy Komsomolets, 23 November
ianMilitary," The Russian Armed Forces At The 1999,FBIS SOV, 23 November 1999.
"
Dawn Of The Millennium, Michael H. Crutcher, ed. 41. See the storiesbyYevgenia Borisova, Baby
(Carlisle Barracks, PA: Center for Strategic Leader Boom or Dead Souls?" Moscow Times, 9 September

ship,2000), 133^6; StephenBlank, "Preconditions 2000 http://www.moscowtimes.ru/stories/2000/09

for a Russian RMA: Can Russia Make theTransi /09/116.html>, Idem., "And theWinner Is??Part 2"
tion?" National Security Studies Quarterly 6, no. 2 Moscow Times, September 9, 2000, <http://www.
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at a TurningPoint,"Brown Journal ofWorld Affairs idem.; "And the Winner Is??Part 3," Moscow
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for International Peace's Conference on Russia After cers,"Post-SovietAffairs 12,no. 2 (1996): 157-60.
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9 April 2001, VII. of General Rokhlin," Europe-Asia Studies 52, no. 1
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Their Comrades-in-Arms:The Army: Cruelty in the 44. RIA, 31 March 1999, FBIS SOV, 31 March
Barracks Remains a Problem," Kommersant, 24 1999.
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Security: The View From Moscow (CarlisleBarracks, 48. Ibid.
PA: Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army War Col 49. FBIS SOV, 24 April 2000.
lege, July2000). and also thekey Russian national 50. Andrei Korbut, "The Military to Become

security documents, "Voyennaya Doktr?na Rossi Officials," Nezavisimaya Gazeta, 31 August 2001,
iskoi Federatsii: Proekt," Krasnaya Zvezda, 9 Octo 1-2, retrieved from Lexis-Nexis.
ber 1999, 3-4; "Kontseptsiya Natsional'noi 51. Ibid.

Bezopasnosti Rossiiskoi Federatsii," Nezavisimoye 52. Ana Uzelac, "General Wages War for Gover

Voyennoye Obozreniye, (Internet version) 26 norship," Moscow Times, 22 December 2000.

November \ 1999, (henceforth cited as "Kontsept 53. General M. A. Gareyev (translated by Robert
siya"); Nezavisimoye Voyennoe Obozreniye, 14 Jan R. Lowe), "ApplyingZhukov's Command Heritage
uary 2000, FBIS SOV, 14 January2000; Nezavisi toMilitary Training and Reform inToday's World,"
maya Gazeta, 22 April 2000, FBIS SOV, 24 April Journal ofSlavicMilitary Studies 12,no. 4 (Decem
2000; "Russian National Security: A Hard-Line ber 1999), 83.
Interpretation," Current Digest of the Post-Soviet 54. Patrick E. Tyler, "Budget Cutbacks Blamed
Press (henceforthCDPP) 52, no. 11, (23 April byRussian inFiasco With Sub,"New YorkTimes, 22
2000): 7-9; and the information
doctrineof Septem August 2000, 1.
ber 2000. 55. PresentationbyChristopherHill of theBritish
34. Ibid. Ministry ofDefense at theCenter for Strategic and
35. "Russia Involves Belarus in Its Military International Studies, Washington, D.C., 31 January
Plans," Baltic News Service, 13 October 2000. 2001; InternationalInstitutefor Strategic Studies,
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Soviet Domestic Operations and Forces, 1989-91," University Press, 2001), 115-17.
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Vol. 165No. 2 Fall 2002 105

as a Polish deputydefenseminister toldme in 1995, 72. John .

Dunlop, "Barkashov and the Russian
Poland seeks (at that time)NATO membership in PowerMinistries, 1994-2000," Demokratizatsiya 9,
order to deprive theRussian General Staff of the no. 1 (Winter2001): 60-74.
three century old option it has had of invading 73. Conversations with American diplomats and
Poland. analysts inVilnius andWashington inMay 2000 and
57. Pal Dumay, Adversaries All Around? September 2001. (Henceforth Conversations).
(Re)NationalizationofSecurityand Defence Policies 74. Conversation with James Sherr, Carlisle Bar
in Central and Eastern Europe (The Hague: Nether racks, PA, December, 2000.
lands Institute of International Relations, Clingen 75. Charles Clover, "Ukraine Looks East,"
dael, 1994), 45-46. FT.com, 21 2001, at <www.ft.com>;
January
58. FBIS SOV, 14 January2000, FBIS SOV, 24 Charles "Kiev Warned on Neutral
Clover, Policy,"
April 2000. Financial Times, 12 July2001, 2.
59. FBIS SOV, 14 January2000.
76. Marybeth Peterson Ulrich, Democratizing
60. Dov Lynch, Russian Peacekeeping Strategies Communist Militaries: The Cases of the Czech and
in theCIS: The Cases ofMoldova, Georgia, and ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Russian ArmedForces (AnnArborMI: Universityof
Tajikistan (Royal Instituteof International
Affairs,
Russia and Eurasia London and New
Michigan Press, 2000), 108-53.
Programme,
77. Monika Wohlfeld, "A Survey of Strategic
York:Macmillan and St.Martin's Press fortheRoyal
Interestsof theCountries of theEuropean Security
Instituteof International
Affairs,2000).
Space," The European Security Space, Working
61. Renata
Dwan, "Armed Conflict Prevention,
Management, and Resolution," SIPRI Yearbook Papers by the European StrategyGroups and the
2000: Armaments,
Institutefor Security Studies ofWestern European
Disarmament; and International
Union, Guido Lenzi and Laurence Martin, eds.
Security (Oxford:Oxford University Press, 2000), Institute for Security
105-06. (Paris: Studies, Western Euro

62. Stephen Blank and Theodore Karasik, pean Union, 1996), 12; SergeiMedvedev, "Power,
Space, and Russian Foreign Policy," Understandings
"'Reforms' That Hark Back to Stalinist Times," Los
ofRussian Foreign Policy, Ted Hopf, ed. (University
Angeles Times, 20 July2000; Russian Public Televi
sion ORTI, 10March 2000, FBIS SOV, 10March Park, PA: Penn State University Press, 1999), 46;
Henrikki Heikka, The Evolution of Russian Grand
2000.
63. Vladimir Mukhin, "KollektivnayaOborona," Strategy?Implicationsfor Europe 'sNorth (POLSIS,
Nezavisimoye Voyennoye Obozreniye, 20-26 Octo University of Birmingham, Programme on the
ber 2000, 3. NorthernDimension of theCFSP, Finnish Institute
64. This is despitePutin's apparentconcessions of of International
Affairs and InstitutfurEuropaische
Politik, ND); for confirmation, note the recent state
air space for humanitarian and search and rescue
ment by Vladimir Lukin, chairman of the Duma's
operations.
65. Arkady Dubnov, "Sily Kollektivnoi Bezopas Foreign Affairs Committee, "Russia's negative atti
tude towards NATO to the East is condi
nosti SNG," VremyaNovostei, 12 October 2000, 1; expansion
tioned by the fact that theAlliance's can
Mukhin, "KollektivnayaOborona," 3; for a fuller enlargement
discussion of themechanisms of CIS military inte lead to theviolation of global balance on the conti
nent,"ITAR-TASS, 31May 2000, FBIS SOV, 31May
gration see Irina Isakova, "The CIS and Europe:
2000; also Yuri E. Fedorov, "Baltic Security in the
Evolving SecurityRelationships," London Defence and Wider Context," in
Studies 45 (1998). Regional European Security
the Northern European Region, 1999 PfP Interna
66. Blank, "Map Reading."
tional Research Seminar, Stockholm, 8-11 Decem
67. Andrei Stepanov, "The 'Power' Organ,"
15 September 2000, 3, retrieved from ber, 1999 (Rome: NATO Defense College, 2000),
Izvestiya,
35-37; Finnish Institute of International Affairs,
Lexis-Nexis.
68. Ibid.
Russia Beyond 2000: The Prospects for Russian
Developments and Their Implications for Finland
69. Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Newsline,
30August 2001. (Helsinki, 1999), 1-2.
70. The Jamestown "The Creeping 78. Bill Gertz, "Russia Transfers Nuclear Arms to
Foundation,
Baltics," Times, 3 January 2001, 1;
Satellization of Belarus," Prism 4, no 1, pt. 1 (30 Washington
December 1997); Belapan, 12November 1998,FBIS Tabassum Zakaria, "Russia Moved Nuclear Weapons
into Kaliningrad-U.S.," 3 January 2001
SOV, 12November 1998. Reuters,
71. Blank and Karasik, '"Reforms'"; FBIS SOV, reprinted in Johnson's Russia List 5505, 3 January

10March 2000. 2001, davidjohnson@erols.com.

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