Russia

Russia

            Being the enormous country that it is, many things happen in Russia everyday – more than can be covered in one paper, by one person.  With that said, we will focus on two recent events that have continued to garner international attention.  The first event, or rather a series of events, we will cover is the continuing protests against President Vladimir Putin and calls for fair elections, then we will cover the story with perhaps more international implications and attention, Russia’s support and continuing arms deals with Bashar al-Assad’s Syrian government.

            Originally beginning as a response to the alleged fixing of 2011 legislative elections, protests have continued through-out the country but mainly in the capital, Moscow.  At their beginning they caught nearly everybody off guard because of their size and the distribution of opinion within the protests themselves.  Normally many of the groups that are participating would be at odds with one another, some even with seemingly irreconcilably differences but now they are all united by one general outline of demands – the annulment of the election results (now including the presidential election results), freedom for all political prisoners, the registration of opposition parties, and, above all else, free and fair elections which would be the start of their ultimate goal of having a democratic Russia.  Implied in the calls for an annulment of the election results and expressed in their speeches and protest signs is the resignation of President Vladimir Putin.  Besides the variety of opinion within the protesters, the other reason the protests caught everybody off guard is the sheer size.  They have been the largest protest in Russia since Russia became Russia again after the collapse of the Soviet Union.  The protests started in early December with a few hundred and have grown significantly since then.  During the December 24^th protest, which was the largest up to that date, the estimated turnout ranged from 28,000, by the Russian Interior Ministry, up to 120,000, by the opposition.  It was then, on that day, that the world really took notice as did some inside Russia, former President of the Soviet Union Mikhail Gorbachev called for not only the legislative elections to be annulled but also called for (at the time Prime Minister) President Putin to resign and leave politics altogether, and he sent his greetings to the protesters.  Since then, the organizers, most just playing off of one another with no central leadership, have done what many organizers find impossible to do – sustain.   They have averaged between one and two large protests every month with all with the same goals, demands, and intensity as before.  However, the protesters are not just met with a cold silence from President Putin; indeed they have also been met with massive police arrests, harassment, and home searches and seizures of certain organizers and opposition party official’s property.  Prior to Putin’s re-inauguration on May 7^th there was, again, a massive protest with an estimated 20,000 people, the first so called “March of Millions” and it was at this rally when the largely peaceful protests turned violent.  The entire demonstration was declared illegal and there were reports that police were arresting people who were merely sitting on the street near the protest.  In a Gazeta.ru editorial they wrote “The efforts that the law enforcement [is] going to in order to provoke the protesters are so evident, it’s impossible to remain blind to the plan of radicalization of peaceful protests behind their actions.  The demonstration of force, the bottleneck [of] the protesters were put in to localize the protest on Bolotnaya square, the additional cordons of metal detectors – this is what bullfighters do to bring the bull to bay…This mutual willingness for violence has allowed both sides, with help of several provocations, to turn a peaceful march into a massive clash, the scale of which Moscow hasn’t seen since the 90’s.  Both sides of the barricades saw proof that their adversary understands only brute force, and has to be dealt with accordingly.”  There were over 400 arrests including some of the most important organizers.  However, this did not deter the activists nor their newly fashioned followers.  The organizers were released, most after serving a light jail sentence of 15 days, and then after two weeks of negations the government finally approved the protesters permit to march on June 12^th or as it is known in Russia – Russia Day, the day they declared their independence from the USSR.  However, the government still tried to deter them with a new law that, rushed through just in time for the June 12^th protests, raises the fines for an illegal demonstration 300%, from $30 to $9,021 for each individual.  The June 12^th protest was largely peaceful with an estimated turnout from 15,000 (by the police) to over 100,000 (by the opposition).

            This brings us up to the current state of things.  Another rally was announced for October 7^th calling for President Putin to resign.  And the date is symbolic and this is not lost on the opposition, its President Putin’s 60^th birthday.  After announcing the rally the followers were largely unhappy with the date, but not because they are tired of protesting but because it’s too far away, so they scheduled an additional rally for September 15^th.   I believe this is going to bring about a change in Russian politics.  Most protest fizzle out after a few months – if they even last that long – but they haven’t.  Indeed, as implied above, they want more protests and they are willing to do the footwork to make sure it happens.  I don’t believe they will force Putin’s resignation and, if past performance is any indicator of future intentions, I don’t believe they will stop him from running for a fourth term, but I do believe that these protests will continue and it might cause Putin to lose his bid for a fourth term, or if he wins through fixing the election, it will trigger even more massive protests than now.  The majority of the organizers and protesters are not old; they are young and therefore have plenty of time left to continue organizing the opposition.  These aren’t the future workers of Russia, I believe they are the future leaders of Russia, maybe not all of them, but through their continued protest they will keep their momentum and gather more support as time goes by and will force a dramatic change in the Russian laws, government, and society.

           When the Syrian crisis – some say, maybe correctly, civil war – started the world watched with bated breath.  The U.S. is not a friend of al-Assad and further more he is allied with Iran which we have an increasingly strained relationship with, so it goes without saying that it is in our best interest, politically speaking, that al-Assad is removed from power – politically isolating Iran in the Middle East.  However al-Assad has some very powerful friends and not just Iran.  Both China and Russia have vetoed, twice, UN Security Council Resolutions that could have possibly sanctioned Syria on a truly international level.  Russia’s stated reason for this is that Putin, and therefore Russia, believes that the Syrian people must choose their leader, that the world must respect a country’s sovereignty, and they have stated that they do not believe al-Assad will step down.  But Russia advocating democracy is not an argument that stands on its own for them.  They also have massive arms deals with al-Assad, indeed, they are the largest arms dealer to Syria and just because they have criticized al-Assad’s heavy handed tactics to put down the rebellion does not extend to them stopping arms deals.  They have war ships that are waiting to be deployed to Syria supposedly to protect Russian bases and citizens in the country however there is possibly some ulterior motive here, namely keeping al-Assad in power.  Just this past month a ship carrying weapons to Syria from Russia was stopped off of the British coast.  The ship was forced to turn around and sail back to Russia after the British insurance agency that covers the ship found out that it was carrying arms and immediately terminated their coverage.  This move was harshly criticized by Russia, of course, who claimed that the British government intervened, though Downing Street denies this. 

            Whether we are able to bring Russia around to the U.S. position seems unlikely at this point but as the picture at the start of this section states, we are already funneling arms to the Syrian opposition through the CIA.  Russia, and China for that matter, are both increasingly worried by the recent involvement of U.S. and European powers in other countries revolutions and rightfully so, after all I doubt if what was happening in Syria were to happen in Russia or China we would stand on the side lines – publically, maybe but covertly, I doubt it.  But this is more than that - Putin’s goal, whether stated or not, it to bring back the Russian super-power he grew up with and protected when he was in the KGB.  This is his way of flexing Russia’s muscle, and trying to show the world that they’ve still got it, so to speak.

            In conclusion, these two events – or series of events – that I’ve profiled provide a snapshot into a changing Russia, both domestically and internationally.  Russia is becoming more involved in international matters and at the same time changing domestically.  They are flexing their, now considerable, muscle with regard to Iran and Syria and are showing that they have a say in the way the world is shaped.  And the protests have the chance to rip Russia away from its past corruption and fixed elections and move toward a democratic society, however they design it, a true democracy nonetheless.  At this point only one thing is certain with Russia and that is change and we can only hope that its change that is driven by the Russian people and serves the best interest of the Russian people and by extension, the world at large.