In the appendix of Kenneth Timmerman's book, Countdown to Crisis (page 353), we find a secret 1995 Russian document acquired by Congressman Curt Weldon (R-Pa.) through sources in Moscow. "This chilling document," writes Timmerman, "confirms in black and white the suspicions the Israelis expressed about Russia's missile transfers to Iran. There was nothing arbitrary or accidental about the sales; they were Russian state policy." Besides missiles, the Russians have sent nuclear technology to Iran as well. But Moscow says this is entirely unintentional. So what are we to think?
In the service of plausible deniability, Russia's disinformation specialists have devised a cover story: Iran's uranium enrichment owes its success to "the breakaway region of Adjara" and its president, Aslan Abashidze (described by critics as a "commie stooge"). Piling misdirection upon misdirection, Adjara is a breakaway region of a breakaway Soviet republic (Georgia); self-described as a model democratic government with a vigorous economy, "beautiful, successful and secure." The convenience of "breakaway regions" governed by "stooges" is that they can serve as cut-outs in WMD tech transfers to rogue states and terrorist organizations. Russian nuclear experts, armed with bogus passports, filtered through Adjara to Iran. The rest is history, as Iran is about to become a nuclear power (if it isn't already). After the necessary tech and material transfers were complete, President Abashidze was conveniently overthrown by an angry mob (probably organized by the Georgian Interior Minister). Now Abashidze resides comfortably in Moscow, protected by "powerful friends."
Journalists, Academics and the U.S. government will believe the Abashidze alibi. "It's doubtful anyone in the Kremlin ... knew what Mr. Abashidze was up to," wrote Tsotne Bakuria, a former Georgian lawmaker and visiting scholar at George Washington University's Elliot School of International Affairs. Bakuria's words are soothing and useful for those who wish to maintain their illusions. But Timmerman's secret document tells the real story. Prepared for the Russian General Staff, it is titled "CONCEPTUAL PROVISIONS OF A STRATEGY FOR COUNTERING THE MAIN EXTERNAL THREATS TO RUSSIAN FEDERATION NATIONAL SECURITY." According to Russia's strategists, the United States is the main external threat to Russia. Not Islamic terrorists. Not Chinese communists. Not Iranian clerics.
According to the Russian strategists, "As a rule, the United States implements its policy in the Russian direction in coordination with other Western countries, Israel, and Japan." The Western coalition seeks to advance "the processes of democratization and of [Russia's] transition to a market economy...." Democratization and economic freedom are regarded with horror by Russian policy-makers. Nothing could be more disastrous for Russia's KGB leadership. From first to last, democratization in Russia has been a sham. As Russian investigative journalist Yevgenia Albats explained more than a decade ago: "In its new incarnation ... the KGB lost virtually none of its former functions. It keeps a close watch on joint ventures with the West, still monitors every area that affects state interests. It still bugs whatever government lines in chooses." And now a top KGB official is president of the Russian Federation. Such an outcome should have been expected from the moment Mikhail Gorbachev declared his program of reform.
The Kremlin has a grand strategy. It is the grand strategy of Nikita Khrushchev, Yuri Andropov and Vladimir Putin. As KGB defector Anatoliy Golitsyn explained in his 1984 book, New Lies for Old, Moscow seeks to undermine Western unity while building a new anti-American bloc of countries in a post-Soviet world. (Golitsyn anticipated the collapse of the Soviet Union by several years.) Russia's new anti-American bloc presently includes Iran, China, South Africa, Cuba, Venezuela, North Korea, Vietnam, Syria, Brazil and now Bolivia. The secret Russian document published by Timmerman plainly outlines Russia's strategy of selling "military nuclear and missile technologies to such countries as Iran and Iraq, and to Algeria after Islamic forces arrive in power there."
How can Russia be America's ally against Islamic extremism when Russia's strategists are working to arm the Islamists with nuclear weapons? As if to clarify this matter, the secret document further admits: "Russia's direct military alliance with some of the countries mentioned also should not be excluded, above all with Iran, within the framework of which a Russian troop contingent and tactical nuclear weapons could be stationed on the shores of the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz."
The story of Iran is also the story of Iraq. Russia was training Iraqi intelligence agents and supplying Saddam with weapons for killing Americans from the start. And now comes another scandal. A Pentagon report says that Russia's ambassador to Iraq was feeding Saddam Hussein intelligence on U.S. military plans during the Iraq invasion. It seems that the Russians, as one might expect, penetrated the U.S. Central Command and gave vital intelligence to America's enemy. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice intends to ask the Russians whether they officially authorized this underhanded play. But don't expect U.S.-Russian relations to collapse. Secretary of State Rice believes the Russian government may be innocent of the charge, since "independent operators" abound in Russia; and it has long been Washington's policy to regard hostile Russian actions as unintentional.
As a Russia expert Condoleezza Rice ought to know better. Duplicity is a Russian national trait, long ago described in the Marquis de Custine's book, Empire of the Czar: A Journey Through Eternal Russia. "The Russians are still persuaded of the efficaciousness of falsehood," he wrote. "In Russia, secrecy presides over everything; a silence that is superfluous insures the silence that is necessary; in short, the people are Chinese disguised...." According to Custine, the Russians are great imitators and therefore great observers: "This talent, which is proper to a people in its infancy, often degenerates into a mean system of espionage." At the risk of boring the reader, I will again point out that Russia's head of state is a KGB officer. This is no accident, since chance could not have produced a result so perfectly in accordance with historical experience. A country does not flip. It cannot turn into its opposite. A country, like a person, remains true to its nature. The individual is free to be what he is, but national character is never free. Its stamp is deep and indelible.
"A barbarian jealousy," wrote Custine, "an envy, puerile, but impossible to disarm, influences the greater number of the Russians in their intercourse with the men of other lands." The Russian mentality, he explained, was shaped by centuries of tyranny. "I do not reproach the Russians for being what they are," he added, "what I blame in them is, their pretending to be what we are." The Russians are better diplomats, better liars, better manipulators than their rivals in the West. They give lip service to Western ideas without believing in them. They pretend to be your friend. They extend the hand of friendship. But do not believe them. According to Custine, "We [in the West] suffer all the evils of idle talking, they have all the advantages of secrecy." Russia's heart is a secret place, inaccessible to outsiders. "That nation," wrote Custine, "essentially aggressive, greedy under the influence of privation, expiates beforehand, by a debasing submission, the design of exercising a tyranny over other nations: the glory, the riches which it hopes for, consoles it for the disgrace to which it submits. To purify himself from the foul and impious sacrifice of all public and personal liberty, the slave, upon his knees, dreams of the conquest of the world."
Russia has based itself on lies and secrecy for hundreds of years. According to Custine "Social life in that country [Russia] is a permanent conspiracy against the truth." In Russia, he writes, "whoever is not a dupe is viewed as a traitor." Custine further explained, "The Russians are nothing more than a conquering community; their strength does not lie in mind, but in war, that is, in stratagem and ferocity."
Russia dreams of America's fall, and actively supports America's Islamic enemies. Any denial of Russian activities in support of Islamic terrorism cannot be plausible and doesn't make sense. But the West wants to maintain its comforting illusions. And so the game continues.
