Examination of Witnesses (Questions 120-139)
PROFESSOR MARTIN
MCCAULEY,
DR ROY
ALLISON AND
DR ALEX
PRAVDA
17 MARCH 2009
Q120 Mr Crausby: After such a show
of suspension, August last year, was it the right decision to
resume meetings of the NATO-Russia Council? What sort of message
did that send to Russia as a result of its conflict with Georgia?
Professor McCauley: Russia is
very, very sensitive to the penetration of NATO into the former
states, the states which are the successor states of the Soviet
Union. Georgia and Ukraine are two very important states to them
from their security point of view. It is their top priority to
prevent those states slipping into NATO membership. They do not
mind those states becoming part of the European Union, because
it is economic, but they take great exception to those states
possibly going into NATO, and therefore they have made that a
top priority. On the conflict in Georgia, one can say that the
consensus seems to be that it was provoked by Georgia, that they
were the ones who in fact initiated—although they deny this—and
it led to a situation where the Russians then penetrated Georgia.
The security situation there is still quite uncertain. There is
at least one Russian commentator who thinks that the prospect
of continued war and renewed war between Russia and Georgia, beginning
in May, is possible, but most Russian commentators do not think
that is possible. So Georgia is an allergic point, a very, very
sensitive one. They would like to see President Saakashvili go
and a more malleable president come to power.
Dr Allison: In my belief there
is no practical alternative for NATO to having a mechanism of
dialogue with Russia. The only one available is the NATO-Russia
Council—at least, that is the one which has a structure
underneath it to allow NATO to engage Russia in many areas. However,
there is a precedent, and that was the breakdown of NATO-Russia
relations after the beginning of the Kosovo campaign by NATO in
1999. That took years to be properly restored. In my view there
were two requirements of that, and we could look at this as some
kind of analogy. The first was that Russia demanded a jettisoning
of the structure that previously existed and claimed that the
Permanent Joint Council, which was the mechanism then existing,
did not allow Russia a voice of any consequence on matters essential
to European security. Indeed, that was sidelined and then dropped
in favour of the NATO-Russia Council set up in 2002. Crucially,
I think, also, the revival of relations at that time depended
upon the ability to find a consensus on a range of key security
issues, a new agenda for security relations post 9/11. If we look
at the contemporary situation, there are no plans to replace the
NATO-Russia Council that I am aware of at the moment, but Russia
has become increasingly disparaging about the workings of that
body, claming that it failed fundamentally last September and
that it has made little progress in implementing agreements in
the period since 2002, that much of its work has been fairly low
grade or public diplomacy relations without leading to any practical
results. So there is scepticism from Russia on that front, but,
in addition, we do not have a new agenda that is equivalent to
the post 9/11 one that would really galvanise the two sides, to
encourage them to bond together. In my view, common interest can
be found on such matters as non-proliferation or seeking to curtail
Iran's capacity to develop a nuclear bomb, some aspects of counterterrorism
or more mundane matters such as piracy and quite important transnational
threats such as narco-trafficking, and all of these are important
for discussion. At the higher strategic level, I think this discussion
is beginning already between the United States and Russia. But
it is not clear at all that the NATO-Russia Council is an adequate
and suitable structure for that discussion.
Q121 Mr Crausby: Are the Russians
right about the NATO-Russia Council? How effective is it? Is there
any point? Is that effectively why it was suspended in the first
place, because of its unimportance?
Dr Allison: It is important to
the extent that there is political will on both sides that infuses
the discussions. The institutional structure, as such, can be
as empty or as full as that which is brought into it. Really this
is an issue about the wider political climate of relations between
Russia and NATO states now, so we should not invest too high hopes
in the restoration of this relationship simply because of the
channels that have been reopened between NATO and Russia—the
institutional channels.
Dr Pravda: To comment on your
question on the wisdom of the restoration of those ties, despite
perhaps a feeling among some new East European members of NATO
that one should have held out longer in order to influence some
degree of influence for Russian thinking, I think that the restoration
was a wise move because withholding that is likely to increase
the very high levels of suspicion that tend to prevail between
Russia and NATO, and not likely to help in any sense to rebuild
degrees of trust. I think the dialogue, as my colleague has said,
may not bring any specific improvements early on in the day, it
is contingent on a whole climate of relations; however, having
that forum for dialogue at least reduces the chances of the kind
of rhetoric of distrust and mutual accusation that we have had
for so many years in the Russia security interchanges with NATO
members. I think the restoration is a useful and productive way
to go forward, therefore, particularly as we are likely to have
parallel forums and parallel channels opening up on security issues
of a wider kind between Russia and the United States on strategic
nuclear arms, the one platform where Russia, even in its diminished
economic stature, can claim to deserve a seat at the top table.
I think the Russia-NATO Council is a way of trying to reduce mistrust,
to try to build some degree of confidence, and is a useful adjunct
forum working in parallel with others. However, I do think that
we need to open up new ways of exchanging both information and
opinion with Russia on broader security issues which bring together
energy, military security, political dialogue and therefore try
to take advantage of the apparent Russian willingness to think
in broader terms of a process which may lead to something approaching
a pan-European security arrangement. That process itself, not
the product—which is not going to be with us for many years—is
useful, and the Russia-NATO Council is part of that process.
Chairman: Clearly, you have all sparked
some interest here because four colleagues have caught my eye
wanting to ask more about the NATO-Russia Council.
Q122 Linda Gilroy: My question is
to Dr Allison. In your written submission you say, "It is
difficult to envisage the further development of NATO-Russia interoperability
exercises, given Moscow's characterisation of its war with Georgia
effectively as a proxy war with the United States." To what
extent was that a feature before the halt in the relationship?
How do you see the claim about a proxy war fitting? What does
it say about attempts to characterise the Georgia conflict as
something which was the result of Saakashvili being rash and him
starting it?
Dr Allison: I make that assertion
about the problematic nature of discussions and attempts at further
exercises to encourage interoperability because I consider this
is not just a military technical matter. It is very much a political
and diplomatic matter. In many ways I think those kinds of exercises
had more a diplomatic function to try and open out the security
relationship, to encourage the two sides to overcome the kind
of mindsets which were antagonistic or suspicious. Therefore,
I think that the war in Georgia, in the way it was characterised,
in particular on the Russian side, has seriously damaged further
the hopes to really overcome the lingering legacy of Cold War
thinking, the adversarial thinking. In Russian military planning
there is no doubt that the scenario of major, large-scale war
with the West or NATO still influences their force structure and
planning concepts, so in this sense we are working on two levels.
There is a surreal quality to it. There is the hope that through
interoperability one can develop forces which are able potentially
to work together in different kinds of scenarios for managing
conflicts in third regions, potentially even some kind of joint
peacekeeping, but the Russian military culture and attitude towards
the use of force has been a consistent problem here. That was
shown in the early operations in Chechnya. I think the way in
which the American role in the Russian—Georgian conflict
has been presented by senior Russian military officers makes it
very difficult for those kinds of interoperability exercises to
work to promote trust military to military. It may require a pause
of quite some time, and then to see if we can resume some of the
thinking that was developed earlier. For example, the NATO-Russia
Council has a working group on peacekeeping where the conceptual
aspects of peacekeeping were being jointly worked out and a joint
conceptual understanding of peacekeeping was worked out. This
kind of issue may be possible to return to in the future, but
when Russia characterises its military operations in Georgia as
a form of peacekeeping, a highly coercive form of peacekeeping
but some kind of peacekeeping, you will see the difference between
the Western and the Russian interpretations of those concepts.
The proxy war notion I think is more a political characterisation.
It feeds into a wish to present the United States as in some ways
adversarially reacting to greater Russian influence in the international
system. Among the Russian military, some have claimed that the
sharing of information, between the American and the Georgian
authorities, may have been a contributory factor to the onset
of the conflict. I think that there is not much substance to the
idea of a proxy war but it plays also into a Russian wish to view
the conflict as a test of the weapons systems on both sides. And
the extent to which Russian weapons, Russian forces, Russian tactics
can prevail in some kind of putative scenario of combat with Western
forces is one lesson, perhaps a false lesson, that has been drawn
in Russian interpretations of that conflict. There is a lot of
military writing along these lines and therefore there is a temptation
to view this in some way as a proxy war.
Q123 Mr Havard: I would like to return
to this NATO-Russia Council. It has a utility, you suggest, and
you have suggested ways in which we might increase its utility
and that is fine; it opens a dialogue and it provides a forum
and it is an opportunity. That is fine. The truth of the matter
however is that Russia wants a bilateral relationship with United
States of America that is only partly invested in the NATO-Russia
Council and would prefer presumably America to get out of Europe
in some fashion in the longer term and have a relationship with
Europe, which we will come on to later. What I want to be clear
about is, the French are now joining NATO fully, apparently. That
might provide a change; it might not provide a change. I am just
wondering the extent to which really the deal is between Medvedev
and Obama on 2 April, the two mathematics or law professors, whatever
they are, come together, and that is the relationship that is
really important and, in a sense, the NATO-Russia Council is a
surrogate for the opening of those discussions. Is that right?
Professor McCauley: I would say
the Russia-NATO Council until a year ago was not treated very
seriously by the Russians. The Russian representative in Brussels
was Dmitry Rogozin—it still is. He is not a military person,
not a security person, and he was quite aggressive in his language.
Therefore, if the Russians are to treat the Russia-NATO Council
more seriously, perhaps if Rogozin were replaced by a much higher
person, because he is just a nationalist politician.
Q124 Chairman: You do not have to
use the word "just" in those circumstances.
Professor McCauley: Well, he just
does as he is told. He is not a decision maker and he is not a
very good diplomat in his language. If he were replaced by somebody
further up the security ladder, a more senior politician, perhaps
they will begin to take it more seriously, but you are absolutely
right; the Russia-NATO Council is small bread from the Russian
point of view. The key relationship, obviously, is the US one.
Q125 Mr Havard: Unless the US invest
in it.
Professor McCauley: That is it.
That is the key relationship. The decisions would be taken there
and then the NATO Council will just talk.
Dr Pravda: There is no question
that Russia has and continues to regard Washington as the key
to all matters western in the security arena, and in fact many
others too. It would like to, I think, concentrate very much on
that relationship for reasons we mentioned earlier, of status,
and only the United States can provide Russia with the assurance
that it really is playing at the top level of international affairs.
The Russia-NATO Council cannot do that. On the other hand, Russia
is, with some difficulty, taking major European states, the large
European states, more seriously as security participants, if not
the determinants of NATO security policy, with clearly the strongest
vested interests and clearly the greatest stakes in the area most
vital to Russian interests, which is the shared neighbourhood
with both NATO and the EU, overlapping institutions, which are
becoming increasingly overlapping in the sense of being concerned
with various dimensions of security. Russia, like ourselves, does
have a strong sense that security, not just for academics but
for practitioners, is now multidimensional, and Russia is well
advised to focus on the interplay between the various dimensions.
For that it needs dialogue with the Europeans sitting within the
Russia-NATO Council because they also sit within other councils
in other forums and they deal with energy issues and issues of
political relations and movements of people, which are just as
essential, arguably more essential to Russia's security interests
in places like Kaliningrad than purely military issues.
Q126 Chairman: I want to move on
from this subject as quickly as possible.
Dr Pravda: The conclusion is the
Russia-NATO Council in and of itself is not considered to be a
weighty body. However, given the increasing securitisation of
European issues, it is more worth the Russians' while engaging
with members of the European Community on that.
Q127 Chairman: Dr Allison, can you
give us one sentence?
Dr Allison: The basic problem
is that the Russian NATO representative, Rogozin, has said that
he does not envisage any more "small business as usual"
and much of the activity of the Russia-NATO Council in the past
could be described as in that category. But the big business,
on strategic questions mentioned, would be, as Dr Pravda described,
viewed as better undertaken with the United States. The further
problem is the Russian claim now that the NATO-Russia Council
is acting in effect as a consolidated NATO group in, the positions
it takes. It is "pre-cooking" the agenda and presenting
it to Russia, which is exactly what this body was intended to
avoid, particularly by the creation of a preparatory committee.
Russia believed that this kind of relationship had been overcome
in the first years of the NATO-Russia Council.
Mr Jenkin: Did the war in Georgia alter
your perceptions about how Russia is likely to behave, what kind
of Russian foreign policy there is, and were we right to break
off the Russia-NATO Council?
Chairman: That is enough.
Mr Havard: It is so important.
Q128 Chairman: We can come back to
it. Could you answer that question?
Professor McCauley: Very quickly,
last August Russia felt itself very powerful and very rich, and
it thought it could basically go ahead, but now its economic situation
is in fact deteriorating by the day, and Russian activities and
Russian power has declined. Therefore Russia's ability to project
its power and its perception of Russia as a great power is declining.
Therefore it in fact is not now as belligerent or it does not
feel so confident now as it did last August. The economic decline,
I think, has radically changed the situation in changing their
perceptors. I think we will come on to this because it could be
quite dangerous: if they decline to a certain point, what will
they then do to protect Russia?
Q129 Chairman: Was it a mistake to
break off relations?
Professor McCauley: No.
Dr Pravda: Directly to your question,
I was not surprised by the direction of Russia's policy in Georgia,
even in August. I together with many of us was surprised by the
degree to which Moscow decided to disregard international opinion
by using the degree or proportion of force that it did and as
a signal of the disapproval of the amount of force used and the
way it violated undertakings on sovereignty, suspension was a
good move. I think in the past we have not made enough moves which
clearly signalled disapproval.
Q130 Chairman: Dr Allison, do you
have anything to add?
Dr Allison: On the interpretation
of Russian action. Russia, confirmed that it had the capability
to intervene militarily on its perimeter, to concentrate forces
for a small military engagement and prevail. This is nothing that
would surprise us. There was some evidence that the Russian forces
worked better than perhaps many expected. On the Russian side
they interpreted it as an operation overcoming a period of military
humiliation, a much exaggerated period of military humiliation
of the previous decade. But the question which remains unanswered
here is whether the result of this, of both the way in which Russia
carried out the operation and the way it interpreted the Western
reaction, has in some way lowered the threshold for Russia for
intervention, for when the use of the military instrument for
political or foreign policy purposes is considered appropriate.
Has Russia drawn the lesson that, as a state with global aspirations
and regional predominance in the CIS region, it can and should
use military force, as the United States has, in support of its
perceived interests? And is it more ready to do that than in earlier
years?
Q131 Mr Jenkin: Does a resuming of
the meetings of the NATO-Russia Council send a signal that we
have now downgraded ... Will Russia regard the Georgia crisis
is now less important to the West as a result of resuming the
Russia-NATO Council, in particular, the illegal recognition of
south Ossetia and Abkhazia?
Dr Allison: Russia chooses to
interpret the restoration of links as some admission on the NATO
side that it had mischaracterised the conflict last autumn. Russian
officials are talking about a significant re-evaluation in NATO
about the causes of conflict, the role of Saakashvili and so forth.
This is partly, of course, to justify on their side and domestically
the resumption of ties with NATO, given the way in which NATO
was vilified last autumn, but I think it does also play to a belief
in Russia that their actions have gained, if not international
approval, at least a measure of acceptance and tolerance and that,
with a new American administration in office, they are in a much
better position to wipe the slate clean and to set out a new agenda
for discussion. That is the way that they would like this to be
viewed.
Q132 Mr Holloway: Is it muddled and
woolly thinking to, on the one hand, see it as quite correct that
Russia should treat countries on its borders as independent states
but, on the other hand, to sympathise with Russia over Ukraine
and Georgia joining NATO?
Professor McCauley: Russia treats
the former republics of the Soviet Union as the "near abroad".
They would obviously like to treat Eastern Europe, the former
Warsaw Pact countries, as the near abroad. That is not now possible.
Their thinking is that Georgia is part of the near abroad and
that is very important to grasp. They do not see it as a country
which is separated from Russia and so on. They would like Georgia
to come back within the fold. They would like Ukraine to come
back within the fold. So you have this conflict about the sovereignty
of these states and President Medvedev has said that Russia has
the right to intervene in these states. He talks about a zone
of privileged influence, that Russia has the right to intervene
to protect ethnic Russians and Russian speakers in these states.
That may be rhetoric but it articulates a longstanding Russian
view; that is not a new view. They believe that they have the
right to do this and therefore their right should be respected.
They would like to get the Americans out of NATO, out of European
security, so it is only European states and they would become
a major player as well. In that way they will achieve their objective.
Q133 Chairman: But in their European
policy, how does that differ from the Cold War? Dr Pravda, you
described Russia as wanting to be a senior great power. How in
their European policy does their approach to their CIS neighbours
differ from the Cold War?
Dr Pravda: I think that the view
from Moscow of their relationship with what are now independent
states within the former Soviet space is extremely difficult because
of a residual set of both beliefs and emotions that those states
have something of a qualitatively different relationship with
Russia than, as it were, other truly sovereign independent states.
I think it is much easier for Russia to think of sovereignty in
the case of the former East European member states of the Warsaw
Pact than it is of course of the states of the Soviet Union itself.
I think the whole notion of sovereignty within what has been correctly
described as "the near abroad"—and although Russian
officials do not use that, they are used to refer to it and it
gives a sense of the distinction—the whole sense of sovereignty
and the whole notion is rather unclear. This particularly came
out in the Georgian crisis, where you saw the unilateral recognition
of two parts of a sovereign state and yet still a commitment to
international law on sovereignty on the other hand. To explain
that or to try to bridge that gap, there has been much talk, of
course, of the conditionality of sovereignty on the exercise of
responsible policy by the state towards its populations. This
is not, of course, exceptionally only a Russian view of the qualified
nature of sovereignty; it is part of a debate about sovereignty.
To turn to the European policy—
Q134 Mr Holloway: Really the question
is about whether or not the two are incompatible. The question
is whether or not Russia is reasonable to be wound up about Ukraine
and Georgia joining NATO and, on the other hand, the fact that
we should treat these as independent countries. In my ignorance,
I think both are reasonable positions. How do you square that?
Dr Pravda: They square it by stating
that they of course recognise—and they do this repeatedly—the
right of all sovereign states, including Ukraine and Georgia,
to join whatever organisations they wish to join. They always
accompany that statement with another one which says of course,
this affects Russia's vital security interests and Russia has
the right to be concerned with exclusive security organisations,
such as NATO, extending their reach to its borders. They do not
question, in other words, the notional right of Ukraine or Georgia
or Belarus to join NATO. They point out, however, exactly at the
same moment that this has serious security consequences for Russia
and Russia's responses to those security concerns might lead to
the diminution of security on the border with one of those states,
which is a perfectly fair set of parallel statements by any state
in that particular position. I do not think from their point of
view it is something which contradicts their notional belief in
sovereignty but of course qualifies it, and in practice, we see
with the Georgian crisis that their understanding of what is sovereign
in a legitimate way from a Moscow point of view is conditioned
by the threat it presents to the security of Russia and the threat
it presents to Russian citizens or Russian passport holders. That
particular lever, of Russians living beyond Russia's borders,
which Russia has often talked about but rarely pulled, is something
it holds in reserve. So there is a very fragile recognition of
sovereignty, conditioned on Russian security perceptions and that
is why the best way to respond to the fragility of both those
statements is to try and overarch the problem with some kind of
inclusive organisations which make it easier for Russia to accept
the fact that these are truly independent states with their own
security.
Q135 Chairman: Like perhaps a new
European security architecture, such as they suggest. How should
we react to that?
Professor McCauley: I am just
going to make the point that the problem of sovereignty and Ukraine
and Georgia joining NATO also has a political aspect. The elites
in Moscow know that they are not really democratically elected.
They fear a democratic revolution. We saw this last year. Therefore
the penetration of American ideas, of American power, into Ukraine
would in fact make them very nervous. They see this as a long-term
strategy to overturn them, the elites in power in Moscow, and
to make Russia subservient to the United States. Therefore it
is these political elites that wish to keep power. We are now
in a situation where the economy is going down very fast. Will
they become more amenable and how will they react to economic
decline is another question.
Dr Allison: The imagery of Cold
War is to some extent there in the way that NATO is characterised
and NATO objectives are characterised in Moscow, particularly
the way in which it is viewed as representing some kind of offensive
policy of containment. As far as the arguments against expansion
are concerned, Russia points to problems within those countries.
In particular, in Ukraine that the public support base for NATO
accession is low and has remained consistently low; indeed this
is something accepted on the NATO side. It would have to be changed
significantly if accession were to be regarded as a realistic
prospect. In the case of Georgia the argument is that the prospect
of possible eventual NATO accession has acted to encourage policies
of non-negotiation over the separatist territories, of military
solutions to those problems, and that this would mean importing
security problems into NATO and therefore be unjustified. So there
are some Russian claims of this kind, which are taken seriously
in a number of NATO states, but the underlying problem I think
is the change in Russia-Western relations since the time when
this large accession process began in the 1990s. At that time
the hope, if not assumption, was that some kind of meaningful
partnership, if not integration, and shared strategic goals, was
a realistic track and that NATO would be working with Russia as
a partner. The divergence between the two sides since then has
meant that Ukraine and Georgia have effectively positioned themselves
on one side of a significant political divide.
Q136 Chairman: Thank you. How should
we react to the European security architecture proposed?
Professor McCauley: How should
we react to it? We should welcome it because—I come back
again to the situation in Russia today—we are getting to
a situation where Russia may become more amenable. Russia needs
the outside world more than it did before. It is possible by the
end of the year they will need foreign loans and this, I think,
would then make a more reasonable scenario for a debate and discussion
between Europe and Russia. Of course, the Germans, Frank-Walter
Steinmeier, the present Foreign Minister, who may become Chancellor
in the elections later this year, is for Russia becoming very
close to NATO, perhaps Russia even possibly joining NATO, and
Joschka Fischer, who is the Green candidate and may become the
new Foreign Minister, is very keen on Russia joining NATO. Therefore,
at the end of this year you may have a different scenario where
you have a very powerful state, Germany, which is keen really
to exclude to a significant extent the United States from European
security and to make European security the responsibility of European
states, with Russia playing a much more important role in this
pan-European strategic and military relationship.
Dr Pravda: I think we should welcome
the opportunity of discussing greater European security with Russia
on a more equal basis institutionally and politically than has
been possible with NATO enlargement and EU enlargement, where
Russia never can be regarded as a founder member of the exercise
but has to respond to momentum and developments from elsewhere.
While welcoming the opportunity, and I think it is something which
will help those within Russia trying—and they are a minority
often—to put the case for greater interaction and perhaps
even partial integration with Europe. While welcoming the opportunity
to do this, we should of course be wary, and Russia will be conscious
of our wariness, of talk of a greater Europe being exclusionary
in terms of the United States' role both in European security
and political and economic matters. We want to make sure, I think,
that Russia understands the fact that this is a complementary
process of dialogue to that in major international institutions,
the UN, and also complementary to its own bilateral talks with
the United States. I do however think that, even with the inbuilt
dangers of excluding the United States, which exist, the advantages
far outweigh the costs of engaging in such a dialogue. I do think
that continuing merely to conflict over the expansion of Western
institutions closer and closer to Russian orders is not the most
fruitful way forward and it would lead, I think, to a strengthening
of the kind of insulationist, nationalist arguments that still
have quite a lot of purchase in debates in Moscow. The global
economic crisis, after all, can both induce greater co-operation
and greater participation in forging a new economic global architecture.
On the other hand, it can also, as we know, increase the pressure
to protectionism and to political defence and insulationism. I
think we should grasp the process offered to us ever since last
summer of a dialogue on European security architecture and inject
into it our own content and ideas, because classically, and quite
typically of Russia, this is a framework without content, an invitation
to contribute and to give them ideas. Last and not least, a dialogue
of this kind, although unappealing perhaps to officials already
engaged in multiple dialogues, is an opportunity to try to forge
our own coherent policy towards Russia. So it is not just an opportunity
for Russia to get content on its thinking about its relations
with the greater Europe; it is also a further opportunity for
the European states to get together and try to work out something
approaching a coherent policy in its relationship with Russia.
Q137 Linda Gilroy: Is the Organisation
for Security and Co-operation in Europe the right place to have
this debate? Is it an organisation that should be thinking about
the shape of its own future? Do any of you study the OSCE and
the contribution it has to make, or not?
Professor McCauley: In general,
one can say the OSCE has been downgraded. It is less and less
effective because the Russians have pursued a policy which is
to ensure that it does not take any decisions against its own
security, political and economic interests. So OSCE has become
rather toothless, I would say, and therefore, if you are going
to have a real dialogue with the Russians, it has to be something
like the Russia-NATO Council or some other grouping or a conference
where you bring the Security Council thinking into it so that
both sides feel that they are going to gain something from the
relationship so that confidence is built on both sides—but
not the OSCE.
Dr Pravda: I do think the OSCE
is the natural starting place, at least, for thinking about the
forum within which this dialogue on Europe could take place. After
all, the Russians themselves and many western commentators have
seen the new proposals being a kind of "Helsinki plus",
not a replacement but a follow-on to the Helsinki process, including
a structure of particular clusters or baskets of issues which
could be discussed in parallel, between which linkages could be
made. So I do think the OSCE, much maligned for being inclusive
and rather weak and losing out in functional terms to NATO and
the EU, is the natural starting place precisely because of its
inclusive structure and because of its historical inheritance
from the Helsinki process. I think a European summit of a kind
based on OSCE, and then a long process of complex negotiation—one
hopes not quite as long as the first Helsinki process, 2,500 meetings
of some kind—a long process, which would itself yield benefits
in terms of the climate of confidence and understanding. It is
this climate of confidence, the degree of mistrust, misrepresentation,
lack of understanding, conspiratorial theory, which has really
very badly affected our relationship with Russia ever since the
end of the Cold War. Milieu matters.
Q138 Linda Gilroy: Is that not understandable?
The way it was put to us when we were in Russia by some people
was: "The Warsaw Pact has gone. How can you expect us to
accommodate ourselves to NATO, an organisation that was set up
to effectively oppose us?"
Dr Pravda: There is long recognition
that there is a fundamental asymmetry there which we have not
been able to correct and which the Russians have grappled with
rather unsuccessfully. I think the chance of recasting it, relocating
it, in a forum which is one which includes not just Russia but
all the former members of the Soviet space and of the Warsaw Pact,
together with their European counterparts, is a good start. Obviously,
it has to be not over-ambitious in achieving specific goals but
again, it is the health of the process that is probably the main
thing about it, and I think the OSCE is the natural starting point.
Dr Allison: I think the Russian
proposal is driven by the claim that you hear frequently made
that the existing framework in the Euro-Atlantic region based
on NATO is inadequate to the security requirements that countries
face, and Russia links this to the events in the south Caucasus
last autumn. This gives rise, of course, to concern that the underlying
motivation is to displace NATO, and indeed, Russian proposals
going back to the early 1990s or even before on reform of the
OSCE seem to be aimed at boosting the security framework of the
OSCE at the expense of NATO, to displace NATO as the primary security
organisation in the European continent. However, we should not
forget that the CSCE process when it was initially mooted was
received with great suspicion as well in the West, and over many
years of negotiations in effect that concept was adapted and developed
in ways which then worked very much to the benefit of security
on the European continent, and that process is what my colleague
Dr Pravda was referring to. It is necessary to go into this with
wide eyes open. It is clear that Russia has an interest in downgrading
the so-called human dimension in these discussions, as indeed
it considers that the current OSCE emphasis on this, and on electoral
monitoring and so forth, has skewed the original purposes of that
body. But this does not mean that we cannot bring this dimension
to the table and insist on it being integral to an understanding
of security—that it is not simply a military defence definition
of security at issue. Another concern in the West is the this
notion of "Greater Europe" could in some way act to
reinforce Russia's claims for a controlling influence in the CIS
region. If you look at some of the definitions by senior Russian
officials, they suggest that you have two parallel poles and two
parallel integration processes, one centred around Brussels and
the other around Moscow, and that these two should be interacting
in a greater Europe but that Moscow should have the pre-eminent
influence within the CIS region. That is certainly not, I think,
how the EU views its relationship with those CIS countries, nor
indeed how Western countries in general would.
Q139 Linda Gilroy: Before we move
on from there, I want to ask what the implications are of what
you have just said to the Committee about the Russians undermining
the democratic part of the OSCE and its role in encouraging democracy,
given that the very least one can say about Russia is that its
progress towards democracy has stalled and it does not have any
effective democracy. What does that mean for defence? NATO is
very much about democratic countries which have their military
under some varying levels of democratic control.
Dr Allison: This is a fundamental
issue concerning the normative dimension of these institutions
and the expectations in the West of those institutions acting
to advance normative agendas which are ones which are held dear
by Western states. Of course, NATO membership does assume a certain
consensus around basic principles of conduct for Member States.
This is not built into the NATO-Russia Council structure however.
It is built into EU relations through partnership agreements and
through the European Neighbourhood Policy—one reason why
Russia has been reluctant to engage with that programme. With
the OSCE, Western states believe that this cannot function without
giving due weight to the human dimension but Russia has been seeking
to develop, in some senses, counter-processes within the CIS region.
I mentioned, for example, election monitoring; the election monitoring
process under the OSCE, in ODIHR, is now paralleled by CIS election
monitors, which invariably give a clean bill of health to elections
within CIS states.
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