Foreign Correspondent
Inside Track On World News
By International Syndicated Columnist & Broadcaster
Eric Margolis <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
www.foreigncorrespondent.com
Taking care of business, Russian style
By Eric Margolis
September 12, 1999
GENEVA - The Clinton Administration has reacted to charges of massive
corruption at the Kremlin by doing a very good imitation of the
wonderfully cynical Claude Raines in `Casablanca� `discovering� that
gambling was taking place at `Rick�s Bar.� The White House piously
proclaimed itself `shocked, absolutely shocked� by charges its Russian
pals had stolen billions in western aid.
What the absolutely shocked Bill Clinton and Al Gore didn�t know is known
to every Russian child from Smolensk to Sakhalin, and by this column which
has regularly reported on the monstrous theft in Russia for the past
decade.
In recent weeks, two new scandals have cast more light on the greatest
theft in modern history. Swiss authorities are preparing a criminal
investigation of a Russian-owned firm, Mabetex, involving money laundering
and massive bribery.
According to Swiss investigators, members of Yeltsin�s entourage, known as
`the family,� and his two daughters received payoffs from the recent US
$1.5 billion renovation of the Kremlin, an incredible ostentation worthy
of stupid Czar Nicky Romanov. A Russian prosecutor estimated Mabetex had
accumulated at least $10 million in bribes from the renovation.
Meanwhile, American investigators have charged the venerable Bank of New
York, founded by Alexander Hamilton, with laundering what may amount to a
whopping $5 billion stolen by Russian officials and their gangster
cronies. And this is just tip of Russian iceberg. Ever since the Soviet
Union collapsed in 1991, Russian officials have been looting their
nation�s treasury and its shady banks, hawking its resources at below
market value, pocketing huge bribes, and stealing nearly all the aid
provided by the United States, the European Union, Japan, Canada, and the
International Monetary Fund.
My own estimate of the mega-theft to date is minimum $30 billion and could
well reach $100 billion or more if ever properly investigated, which is
doubtful. Virtually every import-export deal done with Russia goes
through shell companies in Switzerland, Cyprus, the West Indies, and the
United States, where the profits are skimmed off and concealed from tax
collectors. Billions earned from export of oil, timber, arms, furs and
minerals never touche Russia but are secreted abroad. Billions more in
western aid to Russia is instantly diverted abroad.
`You have to be insane to keep money in Russia,� a businessman-mobster
named `Crazy Vladi� told me. Who can disagree?
Not surprisingly, jewelry stores in Geneva and Zurich are filled with
tough- looking, 25-year old Russian men and their bimbo girlfriends buying
gold Rolex watches and gaudy baubles. In Russia, you can�t tell where
government leaves off and the mafia begins. Even the Kremlin admits two-
thirds of all business in Russia is run by the mob.
The Clinton Administration has simply extend the time-honored style of
Arkansas sleazy money politics to dealing with Russia. Washington,
Europe, and the IMF fork over billions each year to the Kremlin. Yeltsin
and his allies use the torrent of greenbacks to buy loyalty from key
military and security leaders, reward loyal bureaucrats, and feather their
own nests. In short, Russia is being bribed to be good � which means
maintaining a low profile abroad, letting the US have its way, and keep
the communists down. When a new prime minister gets uppity and tries to
flex Russia�s muscles, as Yevgenny Primakov did, the Kremlin gets an angry
call from the White House, and out he goes.
When Russia�s oligarchs and mobsters complained the old US $100 dollar
bill was too easy to counterfeit, Clinton ordered the Treasury to design
and print a new $100 note that has become the main currency of Russia.
Bribing enemies and paying off friends are time-honored tools of foreign
policy. It�s far cheaper to buy your foes than to confront them
militarily. The Byzantine Empire lasted for a thousand years this way.
But paying bribes tactfully, and knowing how to receive them discreetly,
requires sophistication and `savoir faire.� Stealing from the public
demands, even in Russia, a modicum of restraint.
But Russia�s nouveau-riche crooks simply don�t know the meaning of the
word. Their outrageous thievery, drunken-sailor spending, and utter
contempt for their country and fellow citizens will soon provoke an
explosion by Russians outraged at seeing their country raped and pillaged
with the connivance of Washington and the IMF.
American has managed to rent the Kremlin for a while, but it has not
bought Russia. When Yeltsin and his coterie are finally ousted from power
by nationalists, communists, or the army, there will be a fierce backlash
against everything western. All who favored good relations with the west
and democracy � particularly Russia�s Jews - will be branded traitors, and
hirelings of Wall Street, just as in bad old communist days, leaving
sullen, xenophobic `mouzhiks� to once again rule Mother Russia.
What will western taxpayers have gotten for their $150 billion or so in
bribes? A united Germany, a great deal, to be sure. But not much else,
save a lot of happy Russian fat cats living in cushy exile in the south of
France. I�ve heard the Cote d�Azur palace of the late Congolese dictator,
Gen. Mobutu, who stole his country dry, may bought by a Russian
`businessman.� Very fitting.
Copyright: E. Margolis, September 1999
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