Lands Far Away...

My absence and a few thoughts

2010-08-29T14:24:00.003-04:00

I would like to thank anyone who has shown up here in recent months for their patience and dedication, and please forgive me for trying that patience by disappearing once again. For those not in the loop, since just before my last post I have been working as customer service representative for a major television provider. The stability of having a job allowed me to recognize that I basically could not move forward with any of my dreams and ambitions until my book on the emergence of Polish and Ukrainian nationalism in the Habsburg monarchy was completely revised. So I have dedicated my days off to that whenever possible and deliberately avoided thinking too much about something that would fit here.

I have made considerable progress in that direction, enough so that I have decided to weigh in on the issue raised by Newsweek's new article How Wall Street Rolled Obama. While I don't think I have it documented, I have felt since the 2008 that despite hopes and expectations, Obama would find it difficult to do anything comparable to what FDR did to restore confidence in the economy. The fact of the matter is, the political and economic cycles did not coincide in the way necessary for radical rethinking of economics that is now evident to more and more people. FDR was elected president 3 years into the Depression and took power close to 3 1/2 years after the 1929 crash. By contrast, Obama was elected less than 2 months after the collapse of Lehman, which put an end to the notion that the mortgage backed security crisis could be ridden out. While the crash did upturn 20 years of dominance of market fundamentalism in the community of economists by reviving Keynesianism, the immediate solutions, ham-fisted as they were, were undertaken out an immediate panic rather than the long-term frustration and desperation that was leading Herbert Hoover to make suggestions to FDR during the interregnum that FDR would take full credit for during the 100 days.

None of this means that Obama could not have been tougher or been a bit more ready to break with the economic establishment of Larry Summers and Timothy Geitner, but I am not so sure such a break would have been as politically feasible as some critics seem to believe. After all, if you the Republicans on Capital Hill can cynically maintain that the bailout was not necessary imagine what would have happened if Obama had chosen to nominate Paul Krugman or some other economist who is not tainted by the economic reforms that made this mess possible. The Republicans might even have blocked that person's nomination with even more heated rhetoric about how a socialist was now in the White House.

Now three years on the Republicans will do what they can to make hay out of the continuing economic crisis, but they do not have a plan, and electoral success may well hurt them even more in the long-run because it won't take long for that to become apparent once the election campaign is over, although that may just mean the election campaign will just not end until after November 2012. I do hope not, because it is now clear as it was to anyone willing to look at the damage done by the mortgage-backed securities bolstered hosing bubble cannot be remedied quickly and will require new creative thinking that will both stabilize the country and reign in Wall Street in ways that people on Main Street will be able to see and appreciate.

CNN's Non-News Polling Unchanged in Twenty Years

2009-10-26T18:55:00.003-04:00

Alongside the news that newspaper circulation has dropped 10% we learned today that CNN, the originator of the Cable 24-news model has sunk by 50% year on year. There are undoubtedly many reasons for this, and as someone who has done CNN no favors in the ratings department for many years, I'm not especially qualified to name them all. Nonetheless, thanks to my new job I'm now watching more CNN in years, and I can identify one problem, the persistence of the non-news poll that ostensibly provides an insight into how Americans understand the world, but in fact offers no insight, and worse obscures information that might actually increase Americans' understanding of the world.

Back when CNN was the only 24 News network in town, these polls were one of the least appealing aspects of the format, and having moved on myself long ago, I had forgotten just how damaging they are to the concept of news until I was reminded early last Tuesday morning when CNN announced that some 80% or so Americans believed Iran was seeking to obtain nuclear weapons. I don't doubt the veracity of the data, I'm sure an overwhelming number of Americans do believe Iran is actively working to obtain nuclear weapons and to be honest, I would probably have to count myself one of them. Nonetheless, it is not like the vast majority of Americans are experts either on nuclear proliferation or Iran, and hence what we think tells us little about the intentions of Iran's leadership. Worse, given that there has been next to no reporting on Iran's nuclear program that has not relied in some way on U.S. government sources that have made the case that Iran is seeking to build nuclear weapons, all this poll tells us is that most Americans seem to believe what the government is telling them, at least on that issue, leaving the question of what Iranians hope to achieve by having nuclear weapons completely obscured. So while the assumption that Iranians chief concern is Israel is treated as axiomatic, the fact that Iran has a direct border with Pakistan, the only completely declared nuclear power in the middle East where as it would happen there is a strong current of anti-Shia violence. That fact, so easily ignored in all the handwringing about Iran's nuclear plans, would be far more useful information to the tens of thousands of CNN viewers, because it would have actually provided insight that many Americans have not gotten, and reporting like that would begin to renew and strengthen respect for CNN's coverage for more than a poll that can only be understood as a product and reflection of Washington's echo chamber.

The bizarre meaning of "choice" in American political rhetoric

2009-10-01T19:48:00.004-04:00

Americans love the idea of choice. It seems to embody the freedom that we value. We elect, or choose our presidents, and when we go to the store we see the variety of toothpaste or dish detergents as a emblematic of our deeper political freedoms. Politicians discovered this long ago, and it is hard to find a domestic issue that some do not attempt to frame in terms of choice on once side and government dictates, or lack of choice, on the other. Often as not those who succeed in framing a political position in terms of choice wins the day, especially when that position fits well with the right-wing agenda. But even when the left has successfully focused on choice, it has been relatively successful. Had it not been, the abortion debate unending as it may be would long ago have been won by anti-abortion activists because so many people, including this reader can't get away from the awkwardness of what abortion means, the ending of a life.

Why the right is more successful in shaping debates in terms where they are the supporters of choice is something of a mystery, though I think one reason is that with the exception of the abortion debate, politicians on the left seem not to think of it as theirs, while the right treats it as their birthright In so doing they have allowed, if not implicitly abetted a narrow consumerist understanding of choice that seems to focus more on enabling corporations than to enable Americans as individuals to make choices as they see fit. This is perhaps best exemplified by the way cable companies have succeeded in winning approval for a most limited system of cable options, in which the vast majority of Americans end up paying for with a multitude of cable channels they rarely watch just so they can have access to the handful they do. But it is in the healthcare debate that the concern about choice is talked about has its deepest and most perverse affects.

. During the campaign for health care reform in the 1990s the battle cry among opponents was the need to be able to choose one's physician, and on that point they have won for the most part, except for those of us who cannot necessarily access the doctor we would like because of our health insurance plan. Yet, if being able to choose one's physician makes sense, and fits in well with the American understanding of freedom to choose. After all we all want to have a doctor we feel is competent and seems to understand us and is preferably reasonably easy to access, and when we need a specialist that we can if needs be in the hands of the best qualified to deal with our problems. Yet, as the healthcare debate has unfolded this year, we have not heard much about choosing our doctors, the issue of choice has been focused on the choice of health insurance provider, and whether the planned reforms will somehow curtail the existing choice, or leave the existing choice limited to private health insurers, which according to reform advocates will prevent the real reform by keeping the huge bureaucracies that determine eligibility intact.

There are a number of problems with this. First, legitimate as anger at health insurers is, they are hardly the only ones at fault for our current mess. Indeed for a very different perspective from the one that has been at the center of the mainstream media narrative, I heartily urge people to listen to the two "This American Life" programs about America's healthcare system, sector is, especially chapter 3 of the second, where healthcare economist Uwe Reinhardt makes the case that the crux of our current crisis is the weakness of insurance company's vis-a-vis hospitals, not insurance company's near monopoly hold in many markets. Beyond the hospitals, the doctors, pharmaceutical companies, and even us and our demand for top care whenever and however much it costs. But at the heart of all this is fact that health care simply does not fit the normal assumptions of a economics, and focusing on choice, beyond the personal decisions we make to see a doctor we trust when we need to, will not solve the problem.

Unfortunately, the last thirty years have made it very difficult to talk about that, thanks to the Milton Friedman and triumph of the Chicago school because they got licking inflation right and because the choice they proclaimed the solution seemed diametrically opposed to the failure of communism. The notion that markets do not solve everything is so far out of the mainstream for most people, who are not already far to the left. Meanwhile, under the spell of Friedman's mentor F. A. Hayek the right has become so allergic to the notion that state involvement even when the importance of markets is a mantra that they are unable to process the contrary to Hayek's predictions the Western European social welfare state has not descended into Communism, and has remained thriving innovative economies.

Karzai Opens the Way for Early Withdraw of Western Forces

2009-09-04T20:59:00.004-04:00

This week's news that the vote in Afghanistan was close and that Karzai or at least some of his supporters were involved in ballot rigging set the chattering classes a buzz, with most concerned that Karzai might lose. When people talking about Afghanistan weren't talking about that they were noting that Obama appeared to be ready to okay an expected increase for more troops from the responsible generals, even as George Will was joining those on the left in suggesting that it was time to start pulling the troops out. Right now there appears little reason to believe Obama will buck the request for more troops. If Obama did the Republicans who are currently beginning to talk dovishly will change their tune and start talking about Obama not giving the generals what they asked for. But if Obama was looking for an excuse to show that he's not entirely beholden to the generals, Karzai, or his allies, have provided him a legitimate justification, and if the runoff election is as tainted as this election appears to be, then perhaps the best step Obama could take no matter what the costs is start withdrawing the troops, although keeping, if not extending other forms of aid. For while winning the war in Afghanistan maybe impossible, we should not make the mistake that happened after the Soviets withdrew and decide because the troops are out that there is no further reason for engagement.

The Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact and the Prospects for Containing Hiler

2009-09-02T14:27:00.004-04:00

Given recent comments by Russian President Medvedev, Prime Minister Putin’s comments yesterday marking the observation of the seventieth anniversary of the outbreak of World War II were a welcome step back from what was becoming an uniquely Russian view of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. In the coming days and months we will find out, if Putin’s words today mark the first step in a more honest Russian reassessment of Stalin’s role in making World War II possible, or if the differences were simply part of a Russian good cop-bad cop routine.

Uncomfortable as it was for many other participants, and problematic as the comparisons between the Soviet-Nazi non-aggression pact with other questionable acts committed by other states in the run up to the war, I am glad Putin brought them up. For one of the most important facts about the path leading to World War II is that Hitler posed a peculiar challenge to European diplomacy, one that as Richard Overy has just shown old school diplomats used to the idea of balance of power had no experience with, so mistakes were bound to be made. Thus the real lesson of the path of World War II is the need for diplomats to be aware that the existing diplomatic order is not always the aim of all parties, and more controversially when a party shows an unhealthy readiness to go to war frustrating efforts to go to war with anyone should take precedence over any one state’s short term interest in peace.

Even if we accept that Stalin sincerely believed that the only way to buy time was to reach an non-aggression pact with Hitler, we should note that unlike other negotiations with Hitler, which were aimed at preventing war, the deal the Stalin had Molotov make implicitly opened the way for Hitler to go to war. In short, Stalin finally gave Hitler what he wanted the chance to use outright military force, and what is worse used the result of that war to annex Polish territory. (While this is close to what the Poles did in regard to Tešen Cieszyń from Czechoslovakia after the Munich Agreement, it was not quite the same and is a diversion. True the Polish government opportunistically, and in hindsight foolishly, played into the hands of Nazi diplomacy by ratifying the notion that the borders created by Versailles and associated treaties were illegitimate and subject to change by force or the threat of force.) The key is that Stalin’s cooperation with Hitler, both prior to the Pact, and with the pact made the war possible, and all the brutality that followed, and this gets to the great thought experiment every future diplomat should engage in, what happens if Hitler is not given the opportunity to go to war. While we can be sure that Hitler would have continued to seek to provoke the Polish government and work to keep his main potential allies from formulating a coherent strategy, had Stalin lent support to Poland in 1939 by joining France and Poland in declaring their readiness to go to war if Poland were invaded both those aims would have been made much more difficult. Furthermore, we might add it would have been a setback to Hitler, who up to that point could point to all his previous diplomatic ploys had gone his way, something that would have bolstered the hands of influential figures who had their doubts about Hitler. And just so we are perfectly clear on the significance of this, each day Hitler desire to go to war is a day that the circumstances that made the Holocaust possible would have been delayed.

How Not to Deal with the Birthers

2009-08-04T19:45:00.003-04:00

For the past two days this clip of David Shuster interviewing Orly Taitz, the leading figure in the campaign to convince Americans that Obama is ineligible to be president, has been available on a number of web sites including the Huffington Post and Talking Points Memo. It is a train wreck and the web-sites advertise it as such, but while many may delight in seeing their contempt for Orly Taitz confirmed, this is exactly the wrong way to deal with the so-called birthers. For while polls show that the number of people who believe Obama was not born in the U.S is too big to ignore, confrontational interviews will not resolve the issue it all. Rather they will confirm the birthers' belief that they are being shut out of the debate, while giving them enough of a platform to make sure the controversy won't go away.

Sadly, I fear that American 24 hour news programing does not provide the kind of atmosphere that will work, but here are some thoughts. First, let's start listening to the birthers in a way that gives them the sense that they are being heard. If and when you watch this clip watch how Orly Taitz gives a plausible explanation for why without any assumptions about Obama's future life path his mother might have not felt it advantageous to want Obama's birth to be recorded as happening in Hawaii. Yet, rather than follow up on that, David Shuster immediately poses a question intended to highlight the ex-post facto reasoning that is central to this, and most other conspiracy theories. As such Dr. Taitz was entirely correct in saying she was not being allowed to make her argument. Far better would be to have quietly asked about the claims that the current form of the birther conspiracy takes that assume that Obama's mother took a trip to Kenya which lasted so long that she had to remain there to give birth. From there the interviewer can patiently ask about the evidence that Obama's mother took this alleged trip based on journalistic research about ideas about traveling pregnant circa 1960, etc.. Slow and steady wins the race, and any news show that was ready to sacrifice their 7 minute block programing could give this story its proper due without necessarily lending support to the birther conspiracy.

A Matter Very Close to Home: Bottle returns in NYC

2009-07-26T14:03:00.004-04:00

Before coming out to New York City, I spent much of the 1990s living in Michigan, land of the ten cent bottle and can deposit. Being a frugal sort I've never been one to let spare money slip through my hands, especially when it adds up as quickly as it does in Michigan, and I brought that habit with me when I moved back east, even if the payout was half what it was in Michigan.

Even in Michigan I generally preferred to let a few six packs accumulate so that I got a couple of dollars back, but it soon became apparent that this was the only way for it to make sense in my neighborhood here in NY. Our main local store only accepts bottles during the week, and like everybody else in NYC has limited space, which bottles fill up quickly. What is more when the bottle station is open there is a line of can and bottle people who have scoured the neighborhood and filled up one or sometimes two carts with bottles and cans. A bit further afield there is a somewhat larger supermarket with a battery of machines that accept plastic bottles, cans, and glass bottles. Here too there is often a line and when the machine fills up it can take quite a while for the supermarket employee to empty it. Nonetheless, for these near ten years in New York I have put up with a growing pile of beer bottles until my wife could take no more and then going through the ritual of taking the bottles to the machines and hoping the line wasn't too bad.

My one concession over the years is that I stopped storing large beer bottles that I occasionally bought and dropped them off in our apartments recycling bins as a gift to the local bottle scavengers, but as of Friday, I give up. The scavengers will start getting all my bottles, because my experience Friday demonstrated that returning bottles here just isn't profitable unless you even when surviving on a very restricted income. On Friday, it took me over two hours and visits to both the above mentioned supermarkets to get rid of about thirty bottles, and still left me with about 12 bottles the machines would not accept and the other store had refused because they had no room. The net result $3.50 -- the extra fifty cents coming from a guy who lived one block away from the supermarket, who had given up on getting rid of the bottles himself long ago. So do the math, $1.50 an hour plus fifty cents in tips and a heck of a lot of waiting and frustration. It's just not worth it, and I'll just have to accept that my weekly six pack of beer is thirty cents more expensive than I've been reckoning comfortable knowing that I'm actually employing a local bottle scavenger with that surcharge.

The Hope that Survives in Ukraine

2009-07-20T17:20:00.002-04:00

I'm getting to this late, thanks to a plateful of activities, but in the July 11 edition of the Financial Times Chrystia Friedland had a most interesting article about the migration of veteran Russian reporters of the Glastnost/ Perestroika, and then Yeltsin years, to Ukraine, where they are enjoying and contributing to the open atmosphere in Ukraine. Coming at a time when there is a great deal of cynicism both within and outside Ukraine regarding the three main political factions' ability to govern in the interests of the country this story, which has been largely overlooked in the west, is a welcome tonic.

For all its muddling through over its near 18 years of independence, and there is much to be dissatisfied about, the most intriguing aspect of how history has unfolded is that Ukrainian has remained more pluralistic than any other non-Baltic former Soviet Republic. What is more, the Putin dominated efforts to draw Ukrainians back into the fold have generally had the opposite affect, as witnessed by Moscow's harsh reaction to the 300th anniversary of the Mazepa Uprising, which in eighteenth century Europe was a cause that carried comparable significance to the Tibet today.

Not long after Ukraine became independent I was speaking with an old college friend, who by then was making himself known as an important scholar of Pre=Petrine Russia. He was in disbelief about the prospects for Ukrainian independence, likening it to our U.S. state of Georgia suddenly breaking away. (Texas would actually have been a better analogy) A few years later, he was still shaking his head at what had happened. Perhaps even now he still does from time to time. To be fair to him, the autonomy of the early modern autonomous Cossack state, or Hetmanate, lasted over a hundred years, even if Russian interference after Mazepa's rebellion grew steadily, so in the long run there is ample time for Russia to reassert dominance, if not outright political control of Ukraine. Still each passing year the number of Ukrainians who have known no other state grows, and with them the likelihood that Ukrainians will willingly return to Moscow dims.

That said, while some Ukrainians may place primacy on the maintenance of independence over the survival of a democratic order in Ukraine, the real hope for Ukraine lies not in its independence, but in its development as a state with more than one locus of power in which different factions negotiate rather than seek total domination. This is what makes Friedland's story so interesting. It was not that long ago when people saw Putin as the force that would finally enforce something akin to the state of law, and now important journalists who worked in and believed in the values of a free press etc. have had to leave, and Ukraine is offering an alternative. This is something Putin certainly doesn't like. The existence of a democratizing East Slavic state on Russia's southwestern frontier undermines his own implicit view that Russians do not value Democracy -- though it was interesting to note that at least one of the journalists Friedland talked to still commutes to Kiev from Moscow, and did not suggest that his activities in Ukraine have caused him problems. But if there is hope in Ukraine, it must remain for Ukraine first. Apart from offering a potential sanctuary for those dissatisfied with political life in Russia, it can do little to affect real change in Russia. Indeed, the very freedoms that Ukraine's newest journalists find exhilarating, appall many Russians. Until Russians en masse decide to rethink how they look at politics, and the economic power becomes more diffuse the hope that Ukraine inspires applies to Ukraine alone.

's effortscitizens are as a whole more comfortable with independence than they are with a revival of the Soviet Unionnot to mention the huge inequities between rich and poor, the most intriguing aspect of Ukraine has been how the divide between East and West has ended up having a stabilizing affect

Not a Color Revolution

2009-06-24T12:57:00.004-04:00

We are told that the Khamenei-Ahmadinejad camp has spent much time and worry about the possibility that they might be toppled in a so-called color revolution, as happened in Serbia, Georgia, Ukraine, and Kyrgyzstan. I have to say so far having watched how Khamenei and his supporters have dealt with the challenge posed by the protests over the elections, they appear to have done their homework. The bloodiness of encounters towards the end of last week and again on Sunday had no precedent in those revolutions, and we can be sure that the Basiji and Revolutionary Guard will be out in force again tomorrow and the day after that, and as such the neither the suddenness and quick-passed drama that marked the overthrow of Milosevic in Serbia, Shevardnadze in Georgia, and the Tulip revolution that overthrew Akayev in Kyrgyzstan or the sustained non-violent demonstrations in Kyiv that led to the re-run of the 2004 elections in Ukraine.

Nonetheless, that preparation and anxiety about counter-revolution also reflects a rather narrow understanding of those revolutions on the part of Khameni, Ahmadinejad and the Republican Guards, Judging from what we have heard they seem to have interpreted those events as the primarily driven by outside meddling i.e. the CIA. Indeed, George Soros's Open Society Institute famously did provide opposition groups with logistical support, but dwelling on that is to miss the salient feature of the main color revolutions in Serbia, Georgia, and Ukraine (though not in Kyrgyzstan) all had well developed opposition movements with increasing popular support thanks to quasi-open political systems that far exceeded that in Iran, where the Guardian Council has systematically prevented opposition movements from coalescing around key personalities capable of broad support. Of course that still didn't prevent Iranians from rallying behind Mousavi which gave recent events the look and feel of a color revolution. Yet, until now the Iranian reformers have regularly been a step behind the opposition. In the last election, they failed to anticipate the possibility that the Revolutionary Guard might resort to electoral fraud. This time Iranians were prepared for that, they were not prepared for the brutality with which their protests were met. Thrilling as it was to see how creative Iranians were in circumventing restrictions to organize, that organization was impromptu and the lines of communication between Mousavi and Kourobi and their supporters not nearly as well developed as necessary to confront as determined and entrenched an enemy as the Republican Guard and Khamenei have demonstrated themselves to be. At this point though I think reformers are at last under no illusions about what has become of the Islamic Republic. In short if we have not seen the beginnings of a successful revolution in the past few weeks, we have at the very least seen a clarification in the minds of Iranians about what they are up against. Just as 1968 exposed the inability of Soviet communism to reform itself, a reformed Islamic Republic no longer seems intellectually plausible, something that now seems to be an essential realization in order for Iranians to confront the current regime.

Walking Back from the Brink -- The Old Magic isn't Working

2009-06-21T18:34:00.006-04:00

The news in today that Iranian State television has broadcast that the Guardian Council has admitted that there are instances in 50 cities where the number of votes reported exceeded the number of eligible voters. This along with the announcement that Rafsanjani's daughter has been released suggests that the Khamenei/Ahmadinejad camp is quietly backing down from what seemed yesterday seemed like a commitment to brave out the challenge posed by the Green Movement and Mousavi.

This seems to be good news, and seems to suggest that Khamenei has been forced to recognize that he is up against more than he had reckoned with. This is not to say we know where we are going. Khamenei, Ahmadinejad et. al are now bereft of support. The continued readiness of the Basij to beat up protestors is a reminder of another key difference with the revolutions of 1989, where the riot police knew they had little in the way of public support. Nor should it go unnoticed that earlier today the protestors were called terrorists, no report on whether that continues to be used, but I suspect that will continue. For while whatever negotiations go on behind closed doors, the authorities will still do whatever they can to frighten the demonstrators.

Yet, some of the actions taken yesterday by the Khamenei/Ahmadinejad camp suggests that they are not adapting well to the changing political environment, and are playing trumps that would have been held in reserve by more confidentplayers . The alleged suicide bombing at the Khomenei Mausoleum the deliberate mistranslation of Obama's speech regarding the Iranian election, and the arrest of Rafsanjani's daughter all seemed pretty extreme, and more importantly quite risky steps. At least according to one observer who saw the Iranian Television report (See 1:19 pm)there was no sign of serious damage of the kind that would have been caused by a suicide bombing that killed two people, not even any blood. Thus if viewed by an audience with any skepticism doubts were going to surge, especially when seen in light of other suspect information aired in recent days. Nor did it have the desired effect of leading enough Green movement supporters to stay at home to suggest that a further crackdown would frighten still more --even Mousavi braved the risk of being explicitly linked to the demonstration.

Similarly, while English is not as widely known as in much of Europe, there are plenty of English speakers, so playing games with what Obama or any other English speaking person strikes me as risky. Now whether Iranian State Television tried to do the same for domestic television is something I haven't heard, but it seems likely they would. In so doing the press and authorities will open themselves to further charges of lying, because well connected Mousavi supporters will make sure the accurate version of what Obama said gets out. That is hardly going to help Khamenei and his supporters regain the upper hand in the p.r. war. Indeed these manipulations may well be the nail in the coffin. The old magic of linking dissent to terrorism and outside intervention is not working anymore.

Iran's Revolution Enters a New Stage

2009-06-20T16:28:00.008-04:00

When I first began commenting on the Iranian election I argued that the Polish experience in 1980-1 and then 1988-9 offered a useful comparison. That was already getting doubtful yesterday, but is most definitely true after the violence reported today. Today's crackdown appears to have been bloodier than anything that happened when Jaruzelski declared martial law. Nor does it seem likely that Mousavi and Khamenei will be able to sit down at a round table and work things out. All that remains applicable is that Iran's economy is a mess and cannot be used as a basis for buying off the people as part of a post crackdown normalization process. Interestingly as this was beginning to become clear, Andrew Sullivan posted a comment drawing parallels with the Revolution that ousted Slobodan Milosevic. When I first began considering possible comparisons, I did think of that Serbian Revolution, but dismissed it for reasons that seemed good at the time, but do not now. I will say though that the apparatus behind the Iranian Revolution is much deeper than it was in Serbia, where once Milosevic was toppled the infrastructure that had supported him fell apart fairly quickly. That does not seem to be happening in Iran. Indeed the resistance put up by the regime is a reminder that it has considerable support to draw on, though whether that support is sufficient to keep Khamenei and Ahmadinejad in power seems doubtful though how long the battle of wills that has now come into the open will last is an open question.

Will this Revolution in Iran be Self-Limiting?

2009-06-19T09:37:00.006-04:00

Revolutions all too often get out of hand, and for those who see them as necessary for change, but wish to avoid the extremism that so often takes hold the desire to limit the revolution's goals has been always been strong. In the 1970s, Adam Michnik articulated this idea most directly, when he proposed that any revolution that took place in Poland would have to be self-limiting in order not to provoke a Soviet invasion. (This was a reason why the Solidarity agreement of August 1980 explicitly acknowledged the leading role of the Polish United Worker's Party for example.) Remarkably, even when the threat of a Soviet invasion disappeared, all the European revolutions of 1989 did not get out of hand. (Even in Romania, where things turned violent, the revolution was more or less ended with the removal and subsequent execution of the Ceaucescus from power, though arguably for less noble reasons than the faith Poles, Czechs, Slovaks, and Hungarians put in liberal democracy.) The so-called color revolutions in Ukraine and Georgia have likewise managed to avoid the trap of revolutionary radicalization. The question now is whether those who have joined the Green movement behind Mousavi will be satisfied with a rerun election, providing its clearly and accurately reflects the sense of the electorate that Ahmadinejad could not have won last Friday's poll and now given his intransigence, the removal of Ayatollah Khamenei as Supreme leader.

The limited original goals of the Mousavi campaign, and his strong credentials as a supporter of the revolution, as well as several leading supporters were clearly aimed to promote reform rather revolution. Even now the call for a fair vote embarrassing as it is to those in power is in line with the demands of other recent revolutions. Nonetheless, the situation is already precarious, and every move Khamenei makes seems to make the complete rethinking of Iran's constitution plausible. Consider that for the past several days we have been told that Rasfanjani has been lobbying other members of the Council of Experts, who choose the Supreme Leader, to revoke Khamenei's mandate and choose someone more in line with the people. Yet let us assume that this is true, and that Rasfanjani is successful. Nothing Khamenei has done so far has suggested he would acknowledge and act on the Council's decision. Thus, the Council would lose credibility as a source of power. By the same token, deciding not to act is hardly going to endear the Council to supporters of the the Green movement. (Indeed, though I am no Iran hand, it seems quite likely that this calculation can explain the hard-line tone of Khamenei's speech at Friday's prayers today, especially when one considers the soft line taken towards Rasfanjani (Hat-tip Nico at the Huffington Post.).

If such brinksmanship convinces Rasfanjani and the other currently dissident leadership that carrying on with protests is too risky he has won an important battle. Yet, he will not necessarily have won the war even if the current unrest fades away. At that point, though few thinking critics of the current regime will believe in the possibility of reforming the Islamic Republic. From that point on all efforts will be put on a complete overthrow of the existing regime, and thus a far more radical revolution sometime down the road. If Rafsanani, Mousavi, Karoubi, Khatami and others stand firm though it seems less and less clear to me whether the main institutions of the Islamic Republic will survive even long enough for alternative permanent or quasi-permanent structures are created to replace them. Everyday Khamenei continues to support Ahmadinejad the question of how much change will satisfy the desires and interests of those who are currently lining up behind Mousavi grows more complicated. A quick disavowal of the originally proclaimed Ahmadinejad victory a couple of days ago would have kept that question fairly simple and could conceivably even been sufficient that Khamenei remained in his current position. Now the answers to the question of how much change is enough is growing by the day, creating the key phenomenon that creates radicalization -- hundreds of thousands of people united in what they are against, but not necessarily in agreement about the solution. This will reach its most extreme conditions if Khamenei and his allies successfully repression of the current challenge by brute force.

Andrew Sullivan still sees the events in Iran as leading to a limited revolution that ends tyranny because the demands are still limited and grounded in the existing traditions of the Islamic Republic. For the sake of minimal chaos, I hope that optimism is borne out as Khamenei refuses to budge. There are some real reasons to worry though. First, Mousavi may be an effective governor, but he is, at least in Gary Sick's knowledgeable view lacking in charisma, something I have heard about Karoubi as well. In short, if and when Khamenei and his allies are pushed out of power, they may not last long in the post-revolutionary environment, especially if charismatic figures emerge during the coming struggle, as may well happen. Another sign of the growing options that seem to be opening up in the minds of Iranians is a return to secularism. Yesterday a secular patriotic song "Ey Iran" was song publicly see Nico at The Huffington Post 6/19 12:21 AM).

None of this means that protestors won't be satisfied with a more limited agenda, or that even if the revolution takes a more radical turn it will not still create more flexible political structures that help maintain political stability.

Finally, coming back to my post of two days ago, I note that the eminent journalist Robert Fisk seemed to make it clear today that he does not think what has happened so far is a revolution, though it seems to go against his headline yesterday that fear was gone from the streets. Conceivably his assessment today is right, especially if now that tomorrow's planned demonstration has been not been granted permission to go ahead, and hence will be illegal, only a small number of die-hard Mousavi supporters show up. Frankly though from what I have observed so far from my admittedly distant perch in New York I am doubtful that will happen. As Juan Cole notes today, Khamenei and his allies do not appear to have gotten their head around the fact that this is a bottom up movement rather than one directed by Mousavi and Karoubi. There are already martyrs to the cause of greater freedom, and they will be remembered again in a month's time and then at 40 days too. Sadly, there I fear there will likely be more tomorrow.

No Matter the Outcome there is a Revolution Going on in Iran.What they are: a Revolution

2009-06-17T13:38:00.010-04:00

Scholars and journalists are not ones to use the word revolution lightly. There are good reasons for this. There are numerous examples of uprisings that come to naught and are two small to warrant the name, and calling something a revolution when it proves not to be is not going to win a scholar many brownie points. So there is a temptation to adopt the word only after there has been a clear triumph of the revolutionaries. Yet, at the beginning of the age of revolutions, people were far less cautious even though the idea of a revolution was arguably far less a part of people's understanding of the world than it is today. Within a couple of days after the storming of the Bastille, people in Europe were speaking of events in Paris as a revolution, and that was nearly a month before the Revolution's most important event, the renunciation of traditional group rites by the nobility and the clergy.

In the Iranian case I think it is fair to take that step for several reasons. First, there can be no doubt that the movement supporting Mousavi is widespread across the country and cuts across class lines as Juan Cole made clear a couple of days ago, and a report by another scholar who specializes in rural Iran has also criticized the much referred to urban-rural split. Second, Mousavi and his allies have clearly risen to the occasion and shown himself ready to go head to toe against the Supreme Leader Khamenei and Ahmadinejad by making the complete annulment of the election his main demand, and today has made mourning of people killed part of the plan, as was key to protests against the Shah in 1979. Gary Sick and Juan Cole both doubted this would happen. As Cole reasonably put it in his post of 13 June:

My own guess is that you have to get a leadership born after the revolution, who does not remember it and its sanguinary aftermath, before you get people willing to push back hard against the rightwingers.

At this point for Mousavi and his allies to back down may still be theoretically possible, but it might even bring about the end of the protests after significant government suppression. Yet, in the long-term the effect would be counter-productive by reinforcing the illegitimacy of the entire Islamic Republican order in the eyes of the millions of people protesting in favor of Mousavi. Under that scenario, which I think is increasingly unlikely, the Green Revolution would go down in history as a failed revolution that continues to resonate in the way that the revolutions of 1848 did in Europe, and more recently 1956 in Hungary. 1968 in Czechoslovakia and the 1980-81 Solidarity period in Poland.

As I suggested a couple of days ago, I think the Polish analogy is especially useful. While Martial Law would never have been conceivable without the threat of a Soviet invasion, it was nonetheless an internal affair as anything that happens in Iran will be. More importantly, Iran's economy is not in the kind of shape that a reinforced Islamic regime could buy off the majority of the people with consumer goods. This was a serious problem for the Jaruzelski, especially since the economic grievances that had given birth to Solidarity had been precipitated by Gierek's efforts to buy off Polish workers during the 70s -- I can't tell you how many times I heard my Polish university student friends lament that in 1985-86 that there was a generation growing up that had not tasted a banana. By contrast, Hungary and Czechoslovakia, and more recently China all had the economic where-with-all to keep people materially satisfied. Iran's economic problems have to be dealt with, and keeping Ahmadinejad in power will only make them worse. The money he has to buy off people now may well not be there in 5 years, even if oil prices do go up as the world economy picks up.

The Culture War on our Cars

2009-06-15T13:47:00.003-04:00

The culture wars are waged on many fronts. One of the oldest is our cars, since the first spate of this phenomenon happened at the beginning of the 1970s when so many of the issues that defined the culture wars emerged. It is also one of the most insidious because even at this time when there is a relative lull the extremes live on on our cars. Moreover, and most destructively they reinforce an us them view of the world that while providing virtually no means to promote dialogue between people of different viewpoints. In fact, even when witty they actually encourage the tribalism that undercuts the fabric that allows people with different beliefs to recognize our common bonds as members of the same nation, or more broadly humans.

The ongoing non-verbal shouting match between people with Christian fish on their cars and evolution salamanders is exemplifies this problem. It began innocently enough when Christians revived the fish symbol and began putting it on their cars. Now I don't know many people inclined to put a Christian fish on their cars, while my understanding is that this symbol has become especially popular with Evangelists and Fundamentalists, but I can well imagine that some of those people have no big problems with evolution. Nonetheless a few years later, I think the mid-1990s, the Christian fish evolving into a salamander began to appear. To my mind this was rather clever, and I personally think it is entirely possible to be a Christian and put that on one's car, though one of course need not be one.

Now for several years a response has come in the form of a big Christian fish eating up the salamander, and in a variant I saw last week the fish has the word TRUTH on it. It too is clever, but unlike the other two, there is no plausible ambiguity about what a person with that on their car thinks about. Indeed true to life as such a picture of a big fish eating a salamander may be, the image strikes me as quite aggressive, and as such not in the spirit of loving one's enemy that is so central to Jesus' teaching. To be sure, it is also clear that someone with this image on their car has found the fish into salamander image no less aggressive, which is unfortunate, but of course neither person has probably ever had the chance to talk to the other about what they believe and why.

Whether such a dialogue would immediately resolve the issue is another matter -- I know it won't. Still as it stands right now, as people drive down the road and see any of those images, they do not see other human beings or co-nationals so much as those who are their kind or not their kind. I don't expect miracles, but if we were all to consider the value of making such statements of identity on our cars, or our clothing we might help tone down the tensions elsewhere.

Returning to Ryszard Kapuściński's _Shah of Shahs_

2009-06-14T08:17:00.024-04:00

Ryszard Kapuściński, who died last year, was an extraordinarily

gifted journalists. So much so that he became known in the

West for his coverage of events, especially in Africa, even

though he was (until 1981) a member of the Polish United

Workers' Party and reported under the strictures of the Polish

Press Agency (PAP).

His specialty was revolutions, and in 1979 the revolution of the moment was in Iran, which he recounted in his book The Shah

of Shahs (1983), which again seems pertinent given what is

going on in Iran right now, not just because it is about Iran, but

because it gets at the anatomy of revolutions more effectively

than any book I know. For example he reminds us that a

revolution is not just a large political event it is one experienced by individuals, who when faced with the threat of the violence

by authorities suddenly change their standard behavior by not

being afraid. At the same time, even as revolutions are about

high ideals, individual expectations about the meaning of change are also far more mundane, like an expectation of a better job or new shoes. Finally, he points out that when revolutions succeed there is all too often a lack of practical vision, or helplessness

among the supporters, which makes revolutions vulnerable to

suppression by the powers that be on the one hand and hijacking by zealots acting in the name of the new revolutionary order on

the other. (My paraphrases do not do justice to Kapuściński's

presentation of these points, so if you haven't check out the

book).

In as much as Kapuściński was writing about a successful

revolution, the explicit story is how the Iranian Revolution

came about, and more obliquely how how the Islamic

radicals ended up taking power. Yet implicit throughout the

book is a story of what happened in Poland in the 1970s that

led to the Solidarity revolution of 1980-81, and the

disorganization among Solidarity's supporters (though I hasten

to add, not necessarily its more realistic leadership) that created

conditions that made the proclamation of Martial Law possible

without widespread active resistance.

As I write, it is very much unclear whether supporters of reform

in Iran have the power to turn anger at the stolen election, for

which a very knowledgeable observer has shown there is ample

empirical evidence, can be turned into a successful revolution.

Juan Cole (link above) seems to think Mousavi's experience of

the aftermath of the 1979 Revolution makes him unlikely to be

ready and willing to lead an outright rebellion. At the same

time, the hard-liners who are backing Khamenei cannot shut

down cell phones and internet access for very long without

disrupting the lives of their supporters. What is more the

prospect of a serious and organized rebellion once

communications blackouts are lifted may yet lead more

pragmatic conservatives to find dealing with Mousavi preferable

to continuing to back Mousavi and Supreme Leader Ayatollah

Khamenei. That result would then be akin to the Polish

roundtable talks which were provoked by the Polish Communist

leaders' decision that talking to Walesa and Co. was better than

facing the radical leaders of the wave of strikes in the Spring of

1988. At the same time, Mousavi should not be confused with

Walesa, who lead a reform movement from the outside. If there

is a comparable figure, it is probably Alexander Dubcek, who

had been an insider and leader, but as a link to the reform

movement of Prague Spring was useful to the leaders of the

Velvet Revolution, but then easily discarded, a fate that could

befall Mousavi if his opponents hold off on dealing with him

too long. But that is the optimists scenario, at least for those

on the west. The alternative is the path chosen by the Chinese

in 1989, hoping that support in the countryside and relative

lack of awareness of what supporters of Mousavi really want

will allow a the crackdown to be successful, but then

Ahmadinejad and Khamenei do not have the same positive

record on economic development to fall back on.

Lands Far Away... Relaunch

2009-06-14T06:03:00.003-04:00

People who have checked into this blog over the past several months have noted that it had become moribund. I am now going to try again. At the time I began the blog, I deliberately decided to focus rather narrowly on Central and Eastern Europe because it is something I know a great deal about, and as I mentioned in my original blog launch, it is a part of the world that Americans do not know know as much about, and which has a history that can like the history of any other place offer insights into our own world. Unfortunately, it became apparent over the past several months that my model was flawed. Requiring that every post relate to Central and Eastern Europe in some way was restricting. While I have definite views on what is going on in the region, I don't always have something that has to be said.

Based as I am in New York, more often than not, I do not have the on the ground perspective about events in that part of the world to keep blog posts coming regularly, and that cannot be made up for be keeping tabs on the press in the region. For those who want more, my blog roll, small as it is, offers some links to other bloggers more clued in on the ground. Besides, much as I love Central and Eastern Europe I have other things to say about things closer to home, and on a number of occasions I decided not to pursue ideas or did only preliminary writing on them because they fell out of the framework I had set for this blog. As a result, I got out of the habit of checking in and making an entry even when there was something relevant to say about Central and Eastern Europe.

So I am starting again with a larger brief of going where my mind takes me on a regular basis, which undoubtedly will still mean forays into Central and Eastern European affairs, but will go in other directions as well.

Names, Multiculturalism and Nationalism

2009-03-29T22:26:00.004-04:00

I've been quiet here much longer than intended. Plenty has been happening in Central and East Central Europe. I don't have currently have access to the kind of information that would give me special insight into the effects of the world financial crisis on various countries in the region beyond what can be gathered elsewhere. So I have not felt the need to clutter cyberspace on those points. Besides as I have said before this blog was never intended as a purely current events blog. There is so much more to Central and East Central Europe than this or that crisis, which is why I turn now to an issue that recently sparked the most traffic on HABSBURG, the H-Net list dedicated to those regions. -- the problem of name choice when writing in English about places in the region that are known by different names depending on what language one is using.

The multiplicity of names for this or that city and they disputes they pointed to was one of the things that intrigued me about East Central Europe, and enhanced my sense of the region's exoticism. the Italian writer Claudio Magris touched on this briefly in his delightful book Danube as his narrative reaches the Slovak Capital Bratislava:

Bratislava, the Slovak name, Pressburg, the German one, or Poszony, the Hungarian name derived from Posonium, the ancient Roman outpost on the Danube. The fascination of the three names bestowed a special glamour on a composite, multinational history, and someone's preference for one or the other was, in a childish way, a basic stance taken towards the Weltgeist. That is to say, we had to choose between the instinctive celebration of great, powerful cultures such as the German, the ones that make history, or our romantic admiration for the exploits of rebelliousn, chivalrous and adventurous peoples such as the Magyars, or else our fellow-feeling for what is more subdued and hidden, for the small peoples such as the Slovaks, who remain for a long time a patient, unregarded substratum, a humble, fertile soil waiting centuries for the moment of its flowering. (p.220)

For the most part Europeans tend to accept the coexistence of these names. While the use of Danzig on official documents or the postal addresses is deemed unacceptable by the Polish government, it has not sought to curb unofficial use of the German name in the public sphere. Even more remarkably Ukrainians raise absolutely no objections when Poles use the conventional name of Lwow for the main city in what is now Western Ukraine and which Ukrainians call Lviv, even though possession of the city was contested until fairly recently. But woe to an English speaker who uses the wrong name in the wrong context.

So why is the choice of name in English so contentious? The great problem for English is that with the exception of a few of the most important citie, there are no generally accepted English names for the towns, and yet in the twentieth and now twentieth-first centuries English has been a world language, so the choice of name has been seen as legitimizing a nation's claim to that city. Thus during the negotiation of the Polish-German border after World War I Polish and German delegations would not even begin to discuss the fate of Danzig/Gdansk until the archaic English name for the city Dantsick was deemed acceptable. The problem became even more acute after World War II with the border changes that were not universally recognized as legitimate, at least not at the time. Nor is this problem unique to Eastern Europe. Indeed, one of the key steps in undermining the use of customary English names came when some Americans rejecting the long-standing name Peking for Peping, because that was the form used by Chiang Kai-Shek. Now, however, at the insistence of the Chinese government English language newspapers are reuired to use the form Beijing, and today about the only time one still encounters Peking is on Chinese restaurant menus.

Back to East European names, there too the general tendency has been for people to use the English name that best approximates the name as heard in the official language of the state within the boundaries of which a city now finds itself. It is not a bad solution for the most part, even seeming to encourage instability in a part of the world that suffered so much during the twentieth century just to make a point by using a different name just does not seem right. Still, even if there is no way to go back to a time when the choice of names were not so clearly determined by poliics, if should not go unremarked that the sense of security this policy provides also covers up a complexity not contained in any single name. Indeed while this development is completely in tune with our modern world view, which even in its multi-cultural variant remains shaped by nationalism, as English speakers accept that change, we are losing a little bit of the diversity that was a part of our post-tower of Babel world when peoples lived side by side speaking different langauges.

Sunset of Russian Influence in Ukraine?

2009-01-28T22:48:00.008-05:00

Tuesday's Financial Times included a very short news item noting that the Russian government has decided to build a new base for its Black Sea fleet in the Abkhazian port of .

It is difficult to know what to make of such announcements. Eight years is far enough away that anything could happen. Still, a timetable of eight years to build a huge military complex in ... certainly seems reasonable to suggest that Russia is seriously considering the prospect that it will be easier to evacuate Sevastopol than negotiate with Ukraine to continue using the Crimean seaport as the base for the Black Sea fleet after 2017.

Undoubtedly, the announcement will spur anxiety in Crimea, where many jobs are dependent on the Russian base, and where nostalgia for the Soviet times is strongest. That may indeed be what Russia wants, having already stirred up the waters by offering to grant Russian citizenship to Crimeans and create anxiety in Kyiv and Lviv, as well as among the professional worriers about resurgent Russia. Yet, if this announcement is serious and building begins in ... then we will have to greet this as the Putin circle's first timid and grudging step towards recognizing the reality that they are gradually losing the ability to influence Ukrainian affairs, and further grounds to be skeptical of those who seem to that Russia under Putin is an inexorable force at least within the boundaries of the former Soviet Union. Furthermore, we may want to consider if it is a coincidence that the announcement was made a week after the new Naftogaz-Gazprom agreement ended Ukraine's dependence on subsidized gas and Russia's good will.

Still, the thought that Russia is even considering the possibility that into into If work has begun on site, it only involves the most preliminary tasks, though that is unlikely at this time of year. So time will only tell how serious this talk is. Right now it is just as plausible that this is another game of cat and mouse with Georgia. Yet, if this is more than bluster, Work surely hasn't yet begun on site, and time will only tell if it does. As such it may simply be part of

Remembering the Revolutions of 1989

2009-01-24T20:54:00.004-05:00

It seems hard to believe, but we are approaching 20 years since the end of Communism in East Central Europe. Here is a link to a flickr slideshow primarily of Berlin, but with a few contributions from Poland and Hungary that may refresh memories and give those who don't remember it some sense of what went down. (Hat-tip Daniel Antal)

The Russian-Ukrainian Gas Settlement

2009-01-19T21:22:00.003-05:00

And now the dispute is over, as we knew it would be. At first glance the deal looks pretty good to me, although some I've not seen reference to some important details, most notably what will happen to transit fees in 2010, after the 20% reduction for keeping the transit fees at 2008 levels concludes.

Key points:

1) Rosukrenergo is out of the picture. In short, transparency, which is a good thing, and if Kyiv Post's information is correct that Yushchenko got backing from the Rosukrenergo oligarchs, then another sign that Yushchenko is on his way to oblivion

2) Gazprom conceded flexibility regarding the market rate rather than trying to lock in today's current price around 450 per 1000 cubic meters for the entire year, as it had appeared to be angling to for even though all expectations are that gas prices are set to drop markedly to about the $250 per 1000 cubic meters that Tymoshenko had been talking about earlier.

3) The deal lasts for ten years, a time frame that is likely to help reassure customers in the rest of Europe that Russia and Ukraine can be reliable.

Winners and Losers:

I think Tymoshenko is the big winner here, and her reputation as a reformer who has used her previous experience getting rich in the gas trade to use for the good of the country. As mentioned above she appears to have managed to weaken Yushchenko further, while showing it is possible to deal with Russia realistically without following Moscow's line as Yanukovych ultimately did. And in the sphere of presidential politics nothing succeeds like success, so there is little incentive for those like the Litvin bloc and the growing renegades from Our Ukraine (hat-tip Taras Kuzio) to look around for someone other than Tymoshenko to lead the opposition do battle against Yanukovych and the Party of Regions.

True the new gas prices will be proportionately quite high and in the current state of the Ukrainian economy will likely create some real stress. That said, since decline for steel is already declining, the effects on steel producers will not be quite as great as they might have been. The situation might also finally create conditions that would lead Akhmatov and other big in steel production to develop more efficient smelters and such.

The biggest loser here though is Gazprom and Putin. Only the willfully blind (i.e. Gerhard Schroeder) can now hide from the notion that Gazprom is being used as a vehicle for Russian foreign policy and is not a normal company. But perhaps more important is the fact that Tymoshenko and Naftogaz successfully avoided falling into the traps Gazprom hoped they would fall into.

In my earlier entry, I expressed some doubts about the wisdom of Tymoshenko denying that any gas had been "stolen". Not knowing as much about gas and the gas pipelines as I wish, I remain a bit skeptical about that. Indeed the decision not to let the so-called "test-run" of gas run through an alternative route using because it could not be done without cutting off Ukrainian supplies seems to be an admission that there are inconsistencies in many pipelines, if not the druzhba pipeline itself. Yet, in so doing Naftogaz preserved Ukraine's and Tymoshenko's reputation, and further showed to the world the extent to which Russia was prepared to do anything to push the blame for the stoppage onto Ukraine, when the decisionto cut Europe off had come from Moscow.

To be sure, Putin, Gazprom, Tymoshenko, and even Yanukovych, if not Yushchenko will all live to fight again, so the dispute will not radically changed the playing field in the short term. The question now is whether the new transparency in the Ukrainian gas business will provide an impetus for similar trends that will enhance the rule of law within Ukraine. If that happens, it could help se the stage for a new Russian revolution that refocuses on democracy and the rule of law.

Gas Dispute Solution 0.5

2009-01-09T23:15:00.003-05:00

The agreement to have European representatives monitor the flow of gas through Ukraine seems a step in the right direction. If nothing else it sets up a means to create greater transparency in the gas trade which is the key to weakening the dynamics that allow this crisis to recur. Although in as much these representatives will only be present as long as the negotiations over gas transfer fees Ukraine will receive from Gasprom and the price charged Ukraine for its gas, so if Gasprom succeeds in keeping RosUkrEnergo alive that transparency will disappear quickly.

Still, even if the European delegation is only temporary it could at last help pin down some of the holes in the network that local officials have carved out to benefit themselves and their local business long ago during the corruption of the Brezhnev era. My own small insight into that problem comes from my first apartment in Lviv, which was heated by gas, but had no meter to measure gas usage. Thus, while I think Yushchenko and Tymoshenko are being sincere when they say that Ukraine is not stealing gas, at least systematically, I suspect they are likely to be embarrassed by issuing such blanket denials. Of course, I think it is just as likely that the folks at Gasprom are also going to have to finally acknowledge the holes in the gas pipelines within Russia.

The Russian-Ukrainian Gas Dispute Again

2009-01-07T23:07:00.005-05:00

I had not initially thought I would make a post about the gas dispute. It has become a predictable event and the outcome that a deal will be reached probably sooner than the apparent intransigence of both parties suggests. Moreover, it has become something of a truism that this dispute is an effort by Russia and Putin to use gas as a weapon to keep Ukraine as much a part of the "near abroad" as possible. It is heartening therefore to see an op-ed article by Jerome Guillet and John Evans published in today's Financial Times. Guillet, who on the internet goes by the name Jerome a Paris, is probably the most knowledgeable expert on Gasprom -- his comments posted at Daily Kos during the 2005 crisis were eyeopening -- and his point in that piece is that the real issue is not so Russian and Ukrainian relations as it is the continued influence of oligarchs in Russia and Ukraine. That point gets to the ugly truth about post-Soviet states that is so easily obscured when we people try to dig up old geopolitical models some dating back to the nineteenth century and the "Great Game." Indeed every time people write about Putin creating a new energy based superpower that will allow the Kremlin to wield incredible power over its neighbors, they are helping Putin retain his popularity. A more democratic Russia depends on Russians understanding that the ability to be a player and stability are not one and the same thing. Indeed, the current economic crisis is closer to revealing the extent that Putin's Russia is close to being a giant Potemkin village.

By the same token, treating Ukraine as a fragile state that will soon be brought to its knees by Putin's maneuvering distracts from the truth that however lacking it may be compared to its western neighbors, let alone western democracies, Ukraine continues to be better positioned to become more democratic and more stable than Russia in the mid-term. But it can only do that if the Ukrainian state's ability to enforce and insist on the rule of law in the economic sphere increases. In this light, the great question is what happens to RosUkrEnergo. If as Tymoshenko has called for RosUkrEnergo's role as transfer agent is curbed and the gas transfer becomes more transparent. If it continues to become the conduit then Ukraine will be held back, which will of course help Putin, because it will help keep Russians from asking the questions they might ask if they see a more transparent economic and political system emerge in Ukraine.

In short this dispute matters, but if European states would look beyond the immediate interests of needing energy, they will see that a deal at any price that allows RosUkrEnergo to continue to act as an intermediary will only insure that further crises will occur down the line. If they come out on the side of transparency, it will be a step towards providing greater energy security for all of Europe than any additional pipeline routes.

Getting Real about the Threat of Rusyn Separatism in Ukraine

2008-12-29T22:21:00.007-05:00

On 1 December RT the Russian 24 news network gave backhand recognition to the seventeenth anniversary of the Ukrainian independence referendum by announcing the unilateral establishment of an autonomous Rusyn state in Transcarpathia, the western-most region of Ukraine. The story was not really that new. On 25 October the "Second World Rusyn Congress" had announced its intentions to proclaim an autonomous government on 1 December if the Ukrainian state did not bow to their demands for the creation of an autonomous Republic in Transcarpathia. Three weeks later on 22 December STRATFOR, the private intelligence firm, issued a report following up on the announcement suggesting that Rusyn (Ruthenian in the text) separatism provided a perfect wedge through which Russia could undermine Ukrainian sovereignty. The well respected expert on Soviet nationalities, Paul Goble, has also chimed in noting that the main Druzhba gas pipeline, flows through Transcarpathia, although he also notes that Russian support of Rusyn separatists is not universally supported within the Russian foreign policy elite. (Hat tip Taras Kuzio)

For anyone not familiar with the ins and outs of Europe's smaller ethnic groups, STRATFOR's report is alarming, especially coming on the heals of this summer's crisis in South Ossetia. Moreover, in a world where Putin has shown a strong desire to reassert control over other former Soviet republics, it can seem entirely plausible that yet another ethnic group one has never heard of before will provide similar leverage in Ukraine to that offered by the Ossetians and the Abkhazians in Georgia. Despite Russian attempts to make Rusyn separatism seem a serious threat to Ukraine, people would be well advised to be skeptical about the level of support for separatism among the Rusyns of Transcarpathia as well as Russia's ability to manipulate the situation, however strategically advantageous it might seem.

The first problem with such analogies, is that unlike the Ossetians and Abkhazians, the Rusyns never had the advantage of being declared a distinct nationality in the Soviet Union and have their territory granted any nominal autonomous status. In fact, from the moment of annexation at the end of World War II Soviet policy towards the Rusyns of Transcarpathia was to classify them as Ukrainians. a decision that is generally understood to have been widely accepted by the Rusyns in the area. Indeed, the American scholar Paul Magocsi, who is the main expert on and advocate for the Rusyns, maintained in his first major book that Rusyns had accepted Ukrainian identity. Beyond that, unlike South Ossetia and Abkhazia, or even Eastern Ukraine Transcarpathia is not territorially contiguous with Russia so the prospect of sending in Russian troops into the region is highly unlikely, especially since doing so would involve violating Ukrainian airspace, or alternatively gaining assistance from Poland, Slovakia, Hungary or Romania, none of which have a particularly friendly attitude towards the Russian military.

That said, there are just enough inconsistencies within the situation in Transcarpathia to give the threat of Rusyn separatism some plausibility. Glastnost and perestroika created conditions where interest in Rusyn distinctiveness in Transcarpathia has revived, something that coincided with Paul Magocsi's efforts to promote Rusyn pride among its immigrant population in America and Canada. Yet, exactly what that means politically remains unclear because no one has been concerned enough to investigate it empirically which has left something of a half full glass for people to analyze according to their own preferences. Even so estimates based on what little empirical data is available suggests that only about 10% of Transcarpathia's million inhabitants identify strongly as Rusyns. So the Rusyn separatists that Russia has been calling attention have a long way to go to convince their compatriots to take their cause as something worthy of their support. As it stands, the main body of the World Congress of Rusyns has condemned the separatists.

If anything Russian support for the Rusyn separatists comes off as a farcical replay of events prior to World War I when the circumstances of living under Hungarian assimilationist policies and tensions between immigrant communities from Transcarpathia and Greek Catholic priests from Galicia created a degree of sympathy for Russia -- Some communities in the United States even went so far as to convert to Russian Orthodoxy, a decision some sought to encourage with modest success back in the homeland. Soon Russian nationalists, were seeking to make use of that opening. Russian scholars began taking an interest in the region and just before World War I Russian agents did their best to promoting pro-Russian sentiment. Their success, however, was marginal, and there is little to suggest that this time Russian nationalists will be any more successful this time. Indeed, rather than setting the stage for the collapse of Ukraine at the hands of Russia as STRATFOR suggests, these events may finally put the issue of Rusyn loyalty to Ukraine to rest.

Why Did Georgia Attack South Ossetia? Redux

2008-12-28T20:53:00.003-05:00

As always Thanksgiving and Advent have stressed my organizational skills, but I can now return to some issues that have been wanting to address.

The first of them is the still murky origin of the Georgia's attack on South Georgia. Reports that have come out since my original post on this subject have not yet fully disabused me of my original hypothesis that Georgia had acted as they did based on information leaked to them that suggested Russia would acquiesce. Still, it does seem clear that the Georgians expected more concrete support from NATO than they got. Moreover, the Pentagon's assessment of the Georgian military, which the New York Times reported on in its 18 December edition, casts doubt on its ability to assess and act deliberatively:

Georgia's armed forces, the report said are highly centralized, prone to impulsive rather than deliberative decision making, undermined by unclear lines of command and led by senior officials selected for personal relationships rather than professional qualifications.

That does not come as a surprise, as I suggested originally a more deliberative command would have sought to avoid war at all costs. Moreover it suggests a command that could easily fall into the trap of group think, whether that was assuming the rest of the world would come to Georgia's aid or the wishful thinking that Putin was secretly prepared to let Georgia reassert control over South Ossetia and Abkhazia.

90th Anniversary of The Making of Eastern Europe as We Know it

2008-11-22T10:24:00.002-05:00

November is full of important anniversaries ending in symbolic 5s and 0s this year. 11 November marked 90 years since the end of World War I with the predictably dwindling handful of living veterans being photographed and honored in ways they were not until the war had been surpassed by a second World War II. Meanwhile Ukrainians are marking the 75th anniversary of the famine hoping that it will get greater notice among non-Ukrainians than did the event itself. Outside of East Central and Eastern Europe, the broader impact of the end of World War I has likewise been largely neglected, and yet the events of November 1918 are key to shaping that part of the world for the rest of the twentieth century because the marked the moment when nationality finally replaced the tradition of imperial power as the source of legitimacy for states in the region.

National histories have presented that shift has been seen as beginning much earlier although the establishment of nation states was prevented by inertia and a European state system that saw the continued existence of Austria-Hungary as preferable to the chaos that would occur in its absence. Yet, even as a few more radical nationalist were more than ready for the change, most citizens of Austria-Hungary were not until efforts to reconcile competing interests of various nationalities collapsed during the last year of the war. Unfortunately. the winding up of the war did not really resolve the problems politicians in Austria-Hungary had been working on before 3 November 1918, as became clear the day before when Ruthenian (that was their official ethnonym in Austria-Hungary) troops in Galicia mutinied and seized control of Lemberg, (Lviv) which Ukrainian nationalists in Galicia planned would become the capital of the Western Ukrainian Republic.

The Ukrainian gambit was a risky one. While Lemberg lay within Eastern Ukraine, where Ukrainians were the dominant nationality, they were a minority in the Galician capital, where Poles held a slight majority with Jews the second largest ethnic group. What is more Polish nationalists had spent the previous 20 years building up the idea of Lemberg's Polishness in the minds of Poles in Galicia and other parts of historical Poland. Meanwhile the unofficial, but de facto Polish diplomatic contacts with the Entente powers was far better developed than the Ukrainians, which paved the way for the French decision to allow General Haller's army to cross into Galicia and wrest Lemberg from the Ukrainian forces.

Haller's army succeeded, although not before numerous Polish soldiers, many mere boy scouts had died. Then on 22 some Poles started a pogrom against Jews, who had calculated that the best thing to do was to remain neutral. Initial reports were of casualties in the thousands were made, but today the accepted number of 73 victims. Within the broader scheme of things the numbers do not matter so much as the event, which made put paid to any real expectation that the concept of minority rights would play a serious role in limiting state power in what would become the Wilsonian world order. A fact that was further borne out by the punitive measures taken on Ukrainian civil servants and railway workers.

These events were not unique in the Habsburg successor states, most notably the Communist revolution in Hungary and its overthrow were far more dramatic. Yet at the center of all these lay the highly problematic task of applying the principle of national sovereignty to peoples living in close proximity to each other who had been allowed to establish distinct national identities within Austria-Hungary.

To be sure the events of 1918-1920 did not insure subsequent developments including the extermination of Jews and the ethnic cleansing of Poles and Ukrainians, who were deemed on the wrong side of post WWII Polish-Ukrainian border. Nor are such wounds permanent. Much to the chagrin of Moscow, Polish-Ukrainian relations since the end of the cold war, and there have been serious efforts to resolve remaining tensions regarding Lviv. Most notably, the cemetery Poles built to honor the dead of the 1918-19 war has been restored, with a site that includes a memorial to Ukrainian dead as well.

Local Polish forces including a large number of scouts defended the city,

Putin's Dreams Go On Hold

2008-10-23T20:56:00.005-04:00

Just a couple of months ago people were still talking about with great anxiety about Russia's resurgence on the back of high oil and gas prices and Putin's apparent aim to bring oil and gas under state control. These fears were reasonable, and potential threats to the post-Soviet order, as exemplified by the war with Georgia and intimations of what the Russian leadership might try to do to Ukraine if they got the chance.

It now looks like the war with Georgia will mark the high water mark for the resurgent Russia for the foreseeable future. In the wake of that event, western investors began to lose their appetite for investing in the non-energy economy. Then came the credit crunch, which has hit the heavily leveraged oligarchs hard, and led Russian stock markets to halt trading, and finally rapidly declining oil and gas prices.

The first signs of the longer-term consequences of Putin's strategy are becoming clear. The Financial Times reported today that Gasprom has announced that it may not buy TNK-BP's stake in the Kovytka natural gas field in Irkutsk after all as a result of tightening credit and declining gas prices. This ought to be good news for BP, and yet one has to wonder if TNK-BP will be particularly eager to renew investment in the Kovytka gas fields given that once prices begin to rise and Putin and Gasprom again have cash at their disposal they will return to their original plan.

In short, the already badly underdeveloped Russian oil and gas fields, will likely remain underdeveloped for some time to come as long as credit is tight and western companies are unwilling to spend their money and use their technology. As long as this obtains Putin's dreams of firmly reestablishing Russia as global power will remain elusive. Meanwhile, it will interesting to see how Putin's problems will affect regular Russians' opinion of their fearless leader.

Bronislaw Geremek (1932-2008)

2008-10-11T10:28:00.003-04:00

As I was checking Gazeta Wyborcza this week I noticed several remembrances of Bronislaw Geremek, and discovered I had entirely missed his death in a car accident in July. I didn't know the man, but in a blog dedicated to history and East Central Europe, Geremek's life deserves comment because he is that rarity, an historian who became an influential politician, but even before coming to adulthood he became wrapped up in history, as a Jewish boy who was smuggled out of the Warsaw ghetto in 1942 along with his mother, and sheltered by Stefan Geremek who ultimately married Bronislaw's mother and became his adopted father. As such, Bronislaw Geremek exemplified the fact that despite the near annihilation of Poland's large Jewish community during World War II it was not quite so ethnically homogenous as Polish nationalists imagined, even after the anti-semitic campaigns of 1968 when most of Poland's remaining Jews were forcibly asked to leave.

Sometime in the 1980s when I began my love affair with Poland and Solidarity I learned about Geremek as a leading intellectual advisor/member of Solidarity and that he was an historian who had specialized in medieval France. His focused on social economic history, which fit in with the post-WWII Marxist pre-requisites, but was not really new Poland as the annals school had already been influential in interwar Poland. To be honest, I never read his stuff as my academic interests took me in a different direction, but while working as a teaching assistant for a leading medieval historian, I saw one of Geremek's books on her bookshelf and we talked briefly about it and she clearly respected his work.

Like other Polish intellectuals and scholars coming of age immediately after World War II, Geremek joined the Polish United Workers Party. Despite his Jewish heritage, he does not appear to have been chased out of the Party during the anti-semitic campaign of early 1968, but resigned later that year following the Polish cooperation in the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia. His path to becoming a political figure in his own right however occurred during the turbulent 1970s when intellectuals and workers began to find common ground. Geremek himself founded the Society of Scholarly lectures, which revived the tradition of the underground flying university of wartime Poland, from which he became an advisor to the Solidarity trade union in 1980, and eventually a participant in the 1989 roundtable talks that laid the groundwork for the transition from Communist rule. In the new environment Geremek became an active leader of a series of economically liberal centrist parties along with another leading. When the Law and Justice party tried to impose more rigorous disclosure of politicians' contacts with the Communist era secret police in 2007 , Geremek refused. As such he will remain a hero of those of us who valued truth and human rights.

Misremembering Reagan's Willingness to Meet With Soviet Leaders

2008-09-30T06:43:00.008-04:00

During last Friday's debate McCain invoked Reagan when arguing for the necessity of setting pre-conditions before meeting with Iran. This led Brad Delong to point to an article in Pravda from 1982 in which Brezhnev declined an offer by Reagan to meet informally, which Matt Yglesias picked up on his blog. The discussion in the comments to the latter's post got me thinking about how the American right has allowed Reagan's aggressive rhetoric to overshadowed the reality of his diplomacy, and how this has led to the neo-con right's absolutist stand regarding negotiations with Iran and other states that have been longstanding security threats.

Brezhnev's refusal has been a boon for American right's view of Reagan because it meant that Reagan ended up not meeting with a Soviet leader until the Geneva summit with Gorbachev in November of 1985. Yet, the reality is that far from shaping events through steadfastness Reagan was a hostage to the poor health and age of the CPSU politburo leadership. Meanwhile, Gorbachev's association with glasnost and perestroika has been used as an ex-post facto justification for Reagan's readiness to meet with Gorbachev. Yet contrary to how the neo-cons construe it, when Reagan initially invited Gorbachev to come to Washington in March 1985 and ultimately met with the Soviet leader in Geneva that November, Reagan was not rewarding Gorbachev. While Gorbachev had already introduced the terms glasnost and perestroika as necessary for reform in speeches, there was little sign in his first year in office that apart from curbing alcohol consumption his reformist talk was more than window dressing. Thus, were the neo-cons to apply the standard they do to talk with our current enemies to the Geneva summit, they would be bitterly disappointed. If anything Reagan's willingness to meet Gorbachev, as well as the latter's readiness not to over react to Reagan's harsher anti-Soviet rhetoric intended for domestic consumption, seems to back up the view that even when the results are not certain diplomacy is worth the risk.

(Blogger's note: This entry had its origins in a comment made to the post at Matt Yglesias's blog linked to above.)

Lessons from a Republic in Decline

2008-09-17T09:26:00.002-04:00

As America's founding fathers were holed up in Philadelphia working on forging a more perfect union one of their greatest anxieties was the poor record of republics from enduring over time. In fact at that very time, what had been the largest republic in history, the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, was in its death throes after coming into existence in 1569 just over two centuries earlier.

Most Americans know little about the Commonwealth and its collapse beyond the fact that it ceased to exist at the end of the 1700s -- if they know that. That negligence can in large measure be explained by wise decisions the founding fathers made based on their observation of why earlier republics had failed. Thus, they made a strong executive -- something the Commonwealth lacked, and created the checks and balances system. In addition they insured the basis for a strong military explicitly under civilian command, even if the army of the early American republic was miniscule. Thanks to such forethought our republic has endured. Nonetheless as proud citizens of a republic it behooves us to pay attention to how republics go into decline, so that we avoid this fate.

I first started thinking about the relevance of the Commonwealth's decline during the 1990s when it struck me that the culture wars and increased partisanship seemed to reflect an alarming complacency about the resilience of the Republic based on the notion that we had the greatest military and were the only remaining superpower. It reminded me all too much of the complacency that followed after the Commonwealth survived a series crises (including a civil war and foreign invasions) in the middle of the seventeenth century. True, the situation in the Commonwealth was not quite the same. It did not come through those wars unscathed -- it lost all its longstanding claim to territory east of the Dnipro River -- something that ought to have provoked some serious soul searching about the need for structural reforms to strengthen the executive. Instead, the Commonwealth's nobles, who ran the Republic, retreated into Catholic orthodoxy and a cult of Polish noble exceptionalism, which included a blatant disregard for towns' and the enserfed peasants' role in the importance of the Commonwealth's economy.

Today thank goodness anxiety about the health of our Republic is a regular part of political discourse again, although sadly it has taken the excesses of the Bush-Cheney administration to bring that about. But we are not out of the woods yet by any means. Although I take great heart that neither a Clinton nor a Bush is on the ticket in this years presidential race, the selection of Ms. Palin as McCain's running mate has reminded me of another aspect of the Commonwealth's decline: the readiness of many nobles to put personal ambition above the national interest.

Once again the analogy is far from exact. At the heart of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth political difficulties lay two factors that have no clear parallels in our America. The first is the constitutional requirement in the Commonwealth that the Sejm reach consensus for the decisions of that session to become legally binding, which gave birth to the so-called liberum veto, which allowed a single noble at the Sejm to block any decisions being reached even if they merely objected to one item. The second was the curious combination of huge socio-economic differences and the rhetorical insistence on the equality of all nobles that made it possible for a magnate to lift up the status of impoverished nobles, who did not meet the official qualifications for full noble status, so that they could take part in a session of the Sejm by gifting them possession of a few villages in exchange for obstructing its proceedings by exercising the liberum veto.

The Polish Enlightenment figure and ally of Tadeusz Kosciuszko, Julian Ursyn Niemcewicz, depicted just such an instance in one of his poems, parodying the impoverished noble's short-sightedness and his delight in suddenly being a player who could disrupt the Sejm because it was his constitutional privilege to be able to do so. This poem recently came to mind as I thought about Sarah Palin's rapid political ascent. To be sure, unlike the impoverished noble Niemcewicz described, Sarah Palin has become a political player through her own efforts. Still, McCain's decision to invite her to join his ticket and her ready acceptance strike me as very much akin to the self-serving bargain between a magnate and a petty noble described above.

It is painfully clear that despite McCain's chosen slogan "Country First" he picked Palin for short-term political advantages her feisty social conservatism would bring to his flagging campaign just as Polish Magnates used the liberum veto for their own self interest rather than that of the Cmmonwealth as a whole. Similarly, Palin's apparent immediate acceptance of the offer and confidence of her ability to fulfill the duties of the Vice-President reminds me of the petty noble Niemcewicz parodied. Like him, there can be no denying that Palin meets the legal qualifications to be Vice-President. Yet, it is also clear that she accepted the role as VP candidate because it appealed to her vanity as a rising star in the Republican party, rather than through a sober consideration of whether her present qualifications are a sufficient basis to take over that post, let alone the presidency, a fact now implicitly acknowledged by leading Conservative intellectuals.

It is most probable that our Republic will survive should a McCain-Palin administration thanks in no small measure to our founding fathers' foresight, at least in name. Perhaps conservatives are right that once seasoned Palin will be a competent leader. Yet, our republic, in its current constitutional form, is now over 200 years old. As the case of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth illustrates proud as such an achievement may seem it is a dicey position for a Republic to be in. Our success makes it easy to think republic will be here for eternity, and at the same time our connection to the times which forged the our republic is so tenuous that we no longer necessarily appreciate the priorities and anxieties that caused our founding fathers to think as they did.

Why Did Georgia Attack South Ossetia?

2008-09-16T16:49:00.003-04:00

Two weeks ago, in my first substantive entry, I suggested that the only way to understand why Georgia had risked going to war was if Russia had deceitfully led Georgia to believe that Russia was prepared to let Georgia regain control of South Ossetia.

Today the New York Times reports that Georgia is making a case of provocation almost entirely opposite to the scenario I speculated about. The articles states that over the past week Georgia has been informing allies about intercepted Russian phone conversations that suggest Russian troops had actually moved into South Ossetian territory before Georgia went on the offensive. The Russians, not surprisingly deny this.

I have no idea about who is telling the truth here, and it is fine with me if my own rampant speculation is eventually proven false, but I'm not yet ready to concede I was wrong either. At this point I would like to know why Georgia found these troop movements so troubling. From what these documents purport, however, I think that even if entirely genuine they will not exculpate Georgia as much as Saaskashvili would like. It still seems implausibly rash for Georgia to react to just the reported Russian troop movements into South Ossetia by attacking South Ossetia, unless there was something else that made retaking South Ossetia a real likelihood. Admitting to rashness, however, will not win many converts to Georgia's speedy accession to NATO, so it will be some time evidence crops up that definitively proves Georgia's leaders acted rashly either out of fear or because they believed false intelligence.

Remembering the Polish Strikes that Ended Communism

2008-09-06T21:27:00.002-04:00

The end of August saw the 28th anniversary of the accords setting up Solidarity and ending 1980 strikes at the shipyards in Gdansk, Gdynia, and Szczecin. It also marked the 20th anniversary of the last wave of strikes before the leadership of the Polish United Workers Party moved to initiate roundtable talks with the Solidarity opposition. The 1988 strikes have always been overshadowed by the events of 1980-81 and the end phase of Communist rule in early 1989. Yet without those strikes the end of Communism in Eastern Europe might not have had a model for the orderly transfer of power from Communism to democratic opposition, which made the revolutions of 1989 so successful and peaceful.

Nonetheless, incorporating the 1988 strikes into the official narrative of the transition from Communist rule to democracy in Poland has proven difficult. According to Gazeta Wyborcza while over 2000 people are known to have participated in the 1988 strikes, only 41 people were recommended for presidential recognition for their efforts. President Kaczynski, however, only ended up honoring 17 (of which only 3 were on the list of known 1988 strikers). It is unclear why the president was so stingy about recognizing he veterans of the 1988 strikes, although the 1988 strikers did not have the same kind of organizational backing as the 1980 strikers. In fact the old Solidarity leadership was nearly as surprised by the strikes as the government, and had little direct influence on the 1988 strikers.

Having experienced the events of 1980-81, the 1988 strikers were radicalized, and ready to challenge authority in ways the Solidarity leadership of 1980-81 would not have done. Realizing that the government began to reach out to the established solidarity leadership rather than risk dealing with more uncompromising 1988 strikers, and the solidarity leadership reciprocated. That tactical decision has put the 1988 strikers in a state of limbo ever since. Not only were they were unrepresented at the roundtable talks, they did not have a chance to develop as a cohesive group through the common experience of persecution.

Ironically, given the Kaczynski twins disenchantment with the roundtable compromises, one would think they would be eager to champion the radicalism of the 1988 strikers. Yet, clearly they do not quite know what to do with a group that made their own decisions rather than deferring to the traditional Solidarity opposition.

The Georgia Crisis and the Collapse of the Orange Coalition

2008-09-06T11:51:00.004-04:00

If you don't follow Ukrainian politics, you may not be aware of the fact that the two heroes of the Orange Revolution, President Viktor Yushchenko and Prime Minister Iulia Tymoshenko have long been bitter rivals, so much so that they have difficulty being in the same room with each other. As such, with presidential elections looming next year and both planning to run, it was only a matter of time before the current coalition fell victim to political maneuvering. That finally happened this week when ministers from Yushchenko's Our Ukraine/National Self- Defense bloc walked out of a cabinet meeting. Of course they were not unprovoked, when parliament began its new session Iulia Tymoshenko's Bloc joined with the Party of Regions headed by the Orange Revolution's nemesis Viktor Yanukovych and the Communists in voting to limit the president's powers.

Had that sequence of events not killed the coalition the two blocs would soon have contrived to find another way to formalize their divorce. Yet coming when it did, the end of the coalition has been framed in terms relating to the crisis in Georgia and Ukraine's response to the crisis and anxieties about Russia's growing assertiveness. Yushchenko, no doubt with an eye to Washington's response to the war in Georgia, adopted a belligerent stance urging Ukrainians to go to fight in Georgia as volunteers and threatening not to allow Russian navy ships that participated in the war to return to Sevastopol. Tymoshenko did not, and Yushchenko is now accusing Tymoshenko of a engineering a rapprochement with President Medvedev.

Sadly, the whole affair has once again demonstrated why Yushchenko has become one of the least popular figures in Ukraine, because it revealed how poor his strategic thinking is. There was no way he could effectively enforce his threat to keep Russian ships out of Sevastapol, making Ukraine look weak --hardly what is necessary in the changing political climate Ukraine operates. Tymoshenko and all Ukrainians must all live with the consequences, which in and of themeselves are not likely to prove pivotal in shaping Russian-Ukrainian relations in the long run. Still, it is worth remembering that had Yushchenko recognized Ukraine's limited ability to affect the outcome in Georgia as Tymoshenko did Ukraine would not have looked weak unnecessarily. All this does not bode well for the once popular president's reelection prospects next year.

Why Did Georgia Attempt to Reassert Control over South Ossetia When it Did?

2008-08-28T17:50:00.000-04:00

Georgia and the Caucuses are a bit out of my expertise, though less so than many of the people talking about what America should do. But since the moment Georgia tried to reassert control over South Ossetia I've been wondering why the decision was taken to launch the operation when it did. Yes, I know there had been provocations on the border in recent months, and much has been made of the strong support hawks in the White House have shown Georgia, but this does not strike me as sufficient. A country of Georgia's size does not take on like Russia lightly, unless its leaders are mad, which Saakashvili for all his faults does not seem to be, or the Georgian leadership had reason to believe Russia was not going to react. Given that Russia has been ascendent on the world stage in the past few years the latter seems improbable, but what if Georgia was suckered into making its move by false security information. That would not have been difficult to do given that there are doubtless plenty of "friendly" contacts between Russian and Georgia security agencies, through which duplicitous information that Russia was ready to let Georgia regain control of South Ossetia could be passed.

This is pure speculation, but even if I'm wrong about Saakashvili basing his decision on bad intelligence, supporters of a more aggressive push for expanding NATO further east now had better remember that the so-called Siloviki (those involved in the former Soviet security and military services) have not all broken ties with Moscow. That means incorporating countries like Ukraine and Georgia in NATO could be the biggest boon for Russian intelligence services since Aldrich Aimes and the Walkers. Is that really what former Cold War hawks want? Nice as it is to be seen supporting democracy in Georgia and Ukraine, let's think intelligently about the costs. After all one of the great successes of America's cold war policies in Europe, as opposed to elsewhere, was the cold-hearted awareness of what America could and could not do to support people opposed to Soviet domination.

For those interested in learning more about the conflict in Georgia and its broader implications, I recommend checking the archives at Josh Marshall's Talking Points Memo for the period Auguest 10, 2008 -- August 16, 2008

The Irony of the US-Polish Missile Defense Agreement

2008-08-27T14:11:00.000-04:00

For years the Bush administration rigorously maintained that the plan for a U.S. defense shield base in Poland should not concern Russia, because the base was not intended to threaten Russian missiles, but was to counteract a possible missile launch by Iran. Poles were sufficiently divided on the US plan that negotiations dragged on and on, despite the fact that Poles are generally deeply pro-American. Polish opponents of the plan pointed to two key points: first, the desire not to antagonize Russia unduly; and second, the fact that Poles bear no grudge against Iran. Then came the crisis in the Caucuses, two weeks ago and within days the Polish premier Donald Trusk finalized the missile defense agreement with the U.S. much to the delight of the Bush administration. That agreement only reinforced the view that the missile defense system is in fact seen as a way to challenge Russia, and the rhetoric about Iran merely a fig-leaf, not that such a gap between rhetoric and behavior is anything new for the Bush administration.

First Thoughts

2008-08-27T14:02:00.000-04:00

Welcome! The title of this blog comes from Neville Chamberlain's description of the Sudentenland and Czechoslovakia as a far away land of which we know little, and it is my hope that visitors will leave knowing a bit more than they do about Central and Eastern Europe and the issues that affect those countries and those regions. I am particularly knowledgeable about Poland and Ukraine, as well as the complex relations countries in the region have with the two dominant powers in the region -- Germany in the west and Russia in the east.