Commentary
A week ago President Medvedev was at the centre of an international sensation when he proposed a draft European Security Treaty. Russian foreign policy has never seen a more ambitious undertaking. Under Putin, Russia occasionally withdrew from international treaties, but it never proposed its own, especially such radical reforms of the world order. Under Medvedev, this is the second such attempt. In spring an updated version of the Energy Charter was unveiled. And now a plan for restructuring Europe.
The treaty proposed by the Kremlin would not only reform the whole world. More importantly, Medvedev effectively suggests that Russia and the CIS countries should be admitted to NATO. The draft treaty speaks about spreading the principles of the North Atlantic Alliance to all the countries "from Vancouver to Vladivostok." If any country which signs the treaty is attacked, all the other countries should take "collective measures." The parties to the treaty would include not only the nation states but also NATO, the EU, OSCE, CSTO and the CIS.
In his address to the Federal Assembly, Medvedev said that we would no longer puff up our cheeks, but neither will we join NATO. The document elaborates on this thesis. NATO actually ceases to exist as it becomes part of a larger global structure, a Conference of European Security Treaty Member-States.
So far, no one has taken seriously the document which Moscow had nurtured for a year and a half. Hillary Clinton and David Miliband did not even bother to attend the OSCE conference in Athens to discuss the Russian President's proposals. And the European ministers who did attend made no comments. This is likely to be seen as an affront. The Kremlin and the Foreign Ministry will probably say again that Russia is misunderstood and ignored. The real reason for such a reaction is that the Europeans, on the contrary, understand Russia too well.
Western diplomats pay no attention to Moscow's proposals and do not believe them if only because Russian diplomats themselves often do not believe them. Top Foreign Ministry professionals usually do not have the faintest idea of who, how and for what purpose makes key foreign policy decisions. Instead their constant job is to justify and explain the Kremlin's new ideas. One of the wiliest Russian Ambassadors recently bragged how he had wriggled out when asked about the unconfirmed Russian claims about genocide in South Ossetia. "Yes, we were mistaken. Congratulate us. We genuinely believed that thousands of people had died because these people were missing, they had gone to their relatives and into hiding. Now they have surfaced and we are happy," he told his European colleagues. But that was an easy escape. Sometimes diplomats have to explain decisions they hear about for the first time and do not understand. When Vladimir Putin announced in May that Russia would join the WTO only as a member of the Customs Union along with Belarus and Kazakhstan Foreign Ministry officials had every reason to feel themselves like idiots. At first, by inertia, they quoted President Medvedev who described accession to the WTO as a key priority at the Russia-EU summit in spring. Nobody had warned them that the concept had changed.
There is one more reason for not taking seriously the European Security Treaty proposed by Moscow: the Europeans do not believe that the threats Medvedev refers to are real. The draft treaty spells out what should be done if somebody attacks a European country - for real, with tanks and planes. The Europeans do not believe that is possible. They do not rule out an energy or a cyber war, but not a conventional war. At least not on their territories. What happened in Georgia last year is is dismissed as savagery and medievalism. They want to discuss with Russia energy, economics and human rights. To this President Medvedev says: let us first promise not to attack each other. Finally, one more problem is that the Europeans are not aware that Russia has risen from its knees. This propaganda pitch has been lost on them and they still believe that Russia is a commodity-based economy with a terrible demographic situation, rampant corruption, awful roads and nuclear weapons. But that is not enough to be a superpower. They reason that Pakistan, for example, does not propose a new Eurasian Security Treaty only because it has nuclear weapons.
Such doubts cut Russian foreign policy strategists to the quick. The Kremlin is used to all its initiatives being taken seriously inside Russia. But the Europeans for some reason are mistrustful.
Mikhail Zygar