New York Times
October 7, 2001
Editorial
>From Russia, With Realism
Russia's president, Vladimir Putin, has been quick to align himself with
American diplomatic and even military initiatives in the aftermath of
the
Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. For this, he deserves Washington's gratitude
and
respect. But any substantive changes in American policies involving
Russia
must still be evaluated on an issue-by-issue basis. In some areas, like
arms
control and combatting terrorism, Washington's interests and Moscow's
generally coincide. In others, like the defense of human rights in
Chechnya
and nuclear assistance to Iran, they do not.
Arguing that both countries face a common threat from radical Islamic
terrorism, Mr. Putin has taken dramatic steps that no recent Russian
leader
would have contemplated. He agreed, for example, to share intelligence
information on Afghanistan, and he approved the idea of America's
stationing
troops on the soil of Central Asia's former Soviet republics. In doing
so, he
has challenged the views of many Russian military officers and of
powerful
nationalist and Communist parliamentary blocs.
Mr. Putin clearly expects that his friendship will be rewarded down the
road
with more forthcoming American policies on a range of issues from
Chechnya to
missile defense to the future of NATO.
The Bush administration needs to be cautious about what kinds of
concessions
it will make. Already, Washington appears to be deliberately, and
wrongly,
downplaying the issue of Russian human rights violations in Chechnya.
Moscow
has long claimed that Osama bin Laden and his allies have been training
Chechen independence fighters, and it portrays the Chechen fighting as
primarily a battle against radical Islamic terrorism. But the conflict
between Russians and Chechens goes back centuries, and the two Russian
military offensives there over the past decade have been accompanied by
the
brutal and widespread abuse of innocent civilians. Washington should
continue
to protest this inexcusable behavior.
There may be more room for mutual accommodation on missile defense. The
prominence of this issue has receded since Sept. 11. But the idea of
Washington's moving on its own to abandon the 1972 Antiballistic Missile
Treaty makes even less sense now than it did a month ago. The
administration
should concentrate instead on a more modest plan to reach an agreement
with
Russia that would permit limited missile defenses without unraveling
valuable
arms control accords between the two countries.
Mr. Putin also wants to reconsider Russia's traditionally adversarial
relations with NATO, as he indicated on his visit to the alliance's
headquarters in Brussels last Wednesday. He suggested that Moscow may
drop
its reflexive opposition to former Soviet republics, like the Baltic
countries of Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia, ever joining NATO. Those
countries' applications should be evaluated on their own merits.
But Mr. Putin stated that warmer Russian relations with NATO depended on
changes in the nature of the alliance that would make it more of a
political
organization than a military pact. That will need to be carefully
explored.
The importance of NATO's military dimension was demonstrated in Kosovo
and
newly underscored when the alliance invoked its mutual defense clause in
response to last month's terror attacks on the United States.
Mr. Putin's strong support for America in the fight against terrorism
has
opened the way to a warmer, more constructive relationship between
Russia and
the United States. Much hard work will be needed, on both sides, to
fulfill
that hopeful promise.
Serbian News Network - SNN
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.antic.org/
