International Affairs No. 3, 2017 – Table of Contents

Addressed to Armen Oganesyan, Editor-in-Chief

Dear Armen Garnikovich, …

Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation

International Affairs: This year will mark the 25th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations with the Central Asian countries. What are the main landmarks in the evolution of Russia’s relations with the independent states of the region? …

ON DECEMBER 1, 2016, at the end of the fifth year of his third (overall) presidential term, Vladimir Putin signed Russia’s new Foreign Policy Concept, which establishes the constitutional status of the state’s foreign policy.

Over the past 25 years, that is, since a new sovereign state entity appeared in the world arena in December 1991, this is the fifth document adopted by Russia’s supreme leadership that presents its views on the fundamental principles, priorities, tasks, and goals of Russia’s foreign policy. However, if this event is approached from a practical (businesslike), not formal, standpoint, then it turns out that it is in fact the first document on this scale and of this kind, as it drastically differs from the previous documents. When a new international entity emerged in the geographical territory of the RSFSR (Russia’s historical territory) on June 12, 1990, the leadership of this entity, as represented by Boris Yeltsin and his entourage, had no idea of what economic and political model they would propose to 145 million RSFSR citizens. The only thing that was somehow clear was that this model would not be a repetition of the Bolshevist state planning model. A foreign policy concept was not formulated. So, the first decade was spent in search of a concept. It was almost a blind search. …

ON OCTOBER 13, 2016, the UN GA unanimously approved António Guterres, a Portuguese statesman, whom the UN SC had nominated as a candidate for the post of the UN Secretary-General. The road to this “vote of confidence,” which looked natural and logical, was winding and tortuous.

Trump Card Reserved …

PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES Donald Trump called NATO an obsolete organization and demanded that the European allies should contribute bigger “fair shares” to European security. This includes, among other things, total fulfillment of their obligation to steadily raise their share of military expenditures up to 2% of their GDPs. This caused consternation among the European leaders and the fears that America’s role and guarantees would be eroded, transatlantic unity weakened and the role of NATO undermined. Trump’s unconditional acceptance of Brexit as the Brits’ wise move fanned doubts in the new American administration’s wholehearted devotion to the strategic alliance with Europe/EC and its ability to remain NATO’s responsible leader.

On the other hand, Brexit deprived the EU and Europe of the leader that ensured European interests in the relations with the United States, in the transatlantic alliance and within the NATO-EU cooperation. Trump’s declared readiness to revive cooperation with Russia despite the Ukrainian crisis questioned the earlier agreements and decisions to contain Russia. …

IN THE PAST FEW YEARS, almost all indicators of economic cooperation between Germany and the post-Soviet countries, including Russia, have worsened sharply against the background of Germany’s dynamically growing trade with the rest of the world.

The Russian Direction …

Today, it is no secret that the country is coping with the complex problems of the transitory nature. It remains to be seen whether this transition will succeed and what will come out of it if and when it succeeds. So far, there are not enough clear trends to answer these questions. At the same time, there are obvious attempts to revise the legacy of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, dominant in the country during the last 100 years.

Changes are inevitably painful; we all know that changes or attempts at changes inside the country affect its foreign policy in the form of new concepts, new friends, shifted accents, and revised reference points and priorities. President Erdogan’s course is not voluntaristic: he relies on the strata that want or even insist on changes in Turkish policies, and acts according to sentiments that are gradually taking shape inside the country. …

THE PRESENT-DAY FRAMEWORK of international relations includes quite a few regional organizations, which have proved their value and efficiency. There is among them, however, one that has always been holding a special place – namely, the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN), which was established in 1967 and in the fifty years of its existence has not only successfully confirmed its viability but has also been able to become a focal point for strengthening broad international cooperation, involving the participation of practically all leading world powers.

Over the past 50 years, the Association has become a viable mechanism of political, economic, defense, police, humanitarian, and other cooperation among the ASEAN member states both in the multilateral and bilateral formats. It is even more important, however, that despite numerous problems inherited by its member states from the period of their colonial dependency, they have been able to demonstrate political will and turn their organization into an effective instrument for overcoming their differences and conflicts. As a result, with the passage of time, ASEAN has become a major factor of peace, stability, and security in one of the formerly most turbulent and explosive world regions. …

UNTIL VERY RECENTLY, it had been a general mantra in the United States that it was wrong to put any restrictions on the Internet or bring it under any control. Silicon Valley innovators who designed social network platforms didn’t worry too much about how the latter might be used. They planned to organize online communities where members would have facilities for comfortable intercommunication and trade. They had in mind conflict-free, purely progressive development of U.S. digital society and assumed that their designs were far ahead of the resources of terrorists.

But the Internet hasn’t simply grown since it came into being a few decades ago. It has become a conflict zone. Today’s cyberspace is a site for fierce economic competition, for ideological struggles, and for measures against foreign cyber aggression, terrorism, and the theft of intellectual property and personal data. All this is a stark contrast to the former use of online networks solely by scientific and scholarly communities. …

INAUGURATED ON JANUARY 20, 2017 as the 45th President of the United States, Donald John Trump was well known to the nation as a businessman who had never filled any state posts and never craved the presidency. Back in 1990, he said: “I don’t want to be President. I’m one hundred percent sure. I’d change my mind only if I saw this country continue to go down the tubes.”¹ This means that by 2015 when he decided to run on his own money, without sponsors and lobbyists, to become the best American president he had been absolutely sure that the country was going down the tubes.

He won the election best described as an outcrop of a deep political crisis and a split inside the American elite into those who can be conditionally described as supporters of liberal globalism determined to follow the course of the George W. Bush and Obama administrations and those who sided with Trump and supported “paleo-conservative” American nationalism more concerned about the national interests of their country than about a “global democratic revolution.” The latter owed their victory to the “Silent Majority” of mainly white workers. This brings to mind the year 1968 and makes a comparison of two political situations and political styles of the 1968 and 2016 winners quite natural for those willing to guess what to expect from the new president. …

THE EUROPEAN UNION, one of the main load-bearing structures of the world order, is still in the process of integration; it has not yet reached its final form. From the very beginning, it was expected to become one of the most prominent initiatives of mankind and an attempt to create the most perfect system of relationships and cooperation between peoples. In many respects, the project was stimulated by the ideas and theories of the best minds of Europe from Victor Hugo and Giuseppe Mazzini, their ideas being developed by Richard von Coudenhove-Kalergi, Aristide Briand, the Mann brothers, and the contemporary authors of the European idea.

In significance and impact on the processes unfolding in the world, the project can be compared to the great and highly successful American experiment and the equally great, yet artificially discontinued for the gamut of reasons, Soviet experiment. The founders were probably inspired by the humanitarian aims of bringing peoples together to achieve peaceful coexistence. The practical realization is another matter. …

THE YEAR 2016 showed ever more graphically and forcefully the depth of the value crisis of the Western political system led by the United States and its allies, regional and European. The remaining community of non-Western states increasingly distrust and even reject the West-imposed “gifts” of neoliberalism, which, according to prominent U.S. philosopher Noam Chomsky, has changed since Adam Smith’s days only in terms of the scope of its expansion. Previously, these “gifts” were touted by traders and industrialists who used state power to serve their interests despite the painful consequences for others, including the British people (“others” are colonies, mandated territories and so on); now the goals are more wide-ranging and ambitious: entire countries and regions of the world, as well as the entire world itself.

However, perhaps for the first time since 2008, when the global financial and economic “golden billion” credit model cracked so horribly, the world has come face to face with the crucial issue of international relations: the issue of trust. …

THE POLITICAL CRISIS in Ukraine that erupted in March 2014 sparked tensions between Russia and its Western partners, with the United States and then the European Union imposing sanctions on Russia that year. The sanctions mainly targeted key Russian banks and energy companies, which were denied access to long-term loans. Russia’s defense industry was also sanctioned: the West in effect embargoed exports to Russia of armaments, dual-use goods and materials used in manufacturing weapons, and U.S. and European companies and individuals were prohibited from doing business with major Russian defense companies.¹

Similar sanctions were imposed on Russia by allies of the United States. These included Canada and Japan, which are members of the Group of Seven (G7), Australia, New Zealand, and even the poorest European country, Moldova. Ukraine also completely banned its defense sector from having any dealings with Russia. …

THE NEW (2016) FOREIGN POLICY CONCEPT of the Russian Federation is based on fundamental trends in the international system of the 21st century. This, without any doubt, predetermines the axiology and applied orientation of the document approved by Russian President V.V. Putin. Its adoption reflects Russia’s geopolitical responsibility for the progressive development of the world order. Russia’s international legal position is an essential component of this intellectual, conceptual approach, ensuring the harmony and dialectics of international and national sovereign interests. Its presence is logical and objective, proceeding from the premise that the international agenda includes a wide range of strategic problems that can be effectively resolved only on the basis of the principles and institutions of law and democracy.

Let us recall that matters related to international law and its effective development have always been among our foreign policy priorities. From this perspective, the Russian document significantly differs in a positive way from similar acts in other countries, including the United States and EU members. Its leitmotif is enshrined in Paragraph 21 of the concept: “Russia conducts an assertive and independent foreign policy course guided by its national interests and based on unconditional respect for international law.” This creative and pragmatic thesis is spelled out through a diverse terminological, normative and practical lexicon. …

CULTURAL AND CREATIVE INDUSTRIES (CCIs) are increasingly seen as an important driver of economic growth as they enable many countries and companies to become integrated into global value chains and help solve social problems such as unemployment.

UNESCO, a major international organization, which studies and monitors CCIs, defines them as sectors specializing in the production of goods and services of a cultural or innovative nature. The term “creativity” was put into use in its economic meaning in the mid-1990s and implies generation and commercialization of new ideas.¹ …

SOUTH KOREA is one of the world’s top ten exporters. As of 2015, it was the world’s sixth-largest exporter and ninth-largest importer. That year, South Korean products accounted for 3.2% of global exports and for 2.6% of world imports compared with 0.85% and 1.07% respectively in 1980.¹ Hence the country has played an increasing role in the international division of labor.

BEFORE THE 1960S, South Korea pursued an import replacement policy in a bid to industrialize its economy by organizing labor-intensive sectors – the country had cheap and relatively skilled labor. However, it had to radically change this policy, shifting the focus onto exports, because of the limited size of its domestic market and its accession in 1967 to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT). Membership in GATT enabled South Korea to make use of the advantages of the system of generalized, non-reciprocal and non-discriminatory preferences, which was one of the GATT mechanisms, in its industrial exports and simultaneously use forms of domestic market protection that its status as a developing country made necessary. The nation mainly exported commodities and light industry output. …

THE SCIENTIFIC and technological revolution (information revolution) that started in the 1960s became a catalyst for globalization with its concomitant processes, which continue today and involve practically all spheres of public life, including diplomacy. “Today,” says Jürgen Habermas, “globally dispersed media, networks, and systems in general necessitate increasingly dense symbolic and social interrelations, which lead to the constant reciprocal influence of local and far distant events.”¹ According to Habermas, this is a distinguishing mark of today’s world.

It is gradually resulting in network-based interaction between actors, with increasing use of new types of diplomacy – public diplomacy, paradiplomacy, e-diplomacy, and “net diplomacy.” To better understand the degree of influence of network interaction on diplomacy, let us dwell on each of these types in some detail. …

IN 2016, Russian expert and scientific communities continued research focused, as before, on elucidating processes going in the Baltic countries, primarily concerning Russian-Baltic bilateral relations. The researchers concentrated on defining the influence of internal and external factors which form the policies of the Baltic countries and determine the trends of their economic development.

Quite a few Russian research centers are dealing with the Baltic agenda. They include the Russian Council for International Affairs (RCIA), the Alexander Gorchakov Public Diplomacy Fund, the Historical Memory Research Foundation, the Center for European Studies at the Ye.M. Primakov National Research Institute of World Economy and International Relations, Russian Academy of Sciences (IMEMO RAS), the Russian Institute for Strategic Studies (RISS), the Center for European and Baltic Studies (CEBS) at the Institute for International Studies at the Moscow State Institute (University) of International Relations (MGIMO), M.V. Lomonosov Moscow State University, Immanuel Kant Baltic Federal University, St. Petersburg State University (SPSU), Pskov State University (Pskov SU), the Institute of Language, Literature and History of the Karelian Research Center at the Russian Academy of Sciences (ILLH KarRC RAS), the Interdisciplinary Research and Educational Center for the North European Studies NORDICA, annually publishing the “Nordic and Baltic Studies Review” in cooperation with Petrozavodsk State University (PetrSU). …

Armen Oganesyan, Editor-in-Chief of International Affairs: This year marks the tercentennial of the establishment of diplomatic relations between Russia and France. It is believed that official bilateral relations were established because of Peter the Great’s visit to Paris. M. Asselin-eau, how do you assess the potential for Russian-French relations? How important can it be not only for our two countries but also for the international community?

François Asselineau: I have great respect for M. Lavrov, whom I consider to be a major Russian statesman and one of the best foreign ministers in the world. It is also very important for me that the Russian foreign minister always cites norms of international law. For my part, since I created my own political movement, I have always prioritized the need to follow these norms. As far as I am concerned, the very concept of law is what separates barbarism from civilization. …

IN JULY OF LAST YEAR, people living in apartments in Vladivostok that face Amur Bay could have witnessed a whole chain of strange events.

First, someone wearing rather casual clothes instead of the uniform jacket of a hydrographer climbed Tokarevsky Lighthouse on the spit separating Amur Bay from Golden Horn Bay and shouted something when a Far Eastern Shipping Company (FESCO) vessel was passing by. Meanwhile, a mini-copter with a video camera on board was circling over the lighthouse. The guy on the lighthouse was getting commands from a vigorous young woman down below and was apparently obeying them unquestioningly – he would turn left and right, wave his arms, and so on. …

THE CENTURY-LONG HISTORY of Finland’s independence and its relations with the Soviet Union/Russian Federation can be conventionally divided into four periods: the beginning (early 20th century to 1917); formal sovereignty and de facto dependence on Germany (1918-1944); cooperation with the Soviet Union as a guarantee of independence, “Eastern Trade,” Finnish Initiatives (1945-1991); good-neighborly relations with Russia, integration with the West (since 1992).

The Beginning …

DESPITE 100 YEARS that separate us from the time of Nicholas II, his role as the autocratic ruler of Russia’s foreign policy remains practically ignored, let alone studied in any detail, by Russian and foreign historiography. In Russia, meanwhile, foreign policy was invariably the prerogative of the man on the throne, Nicholas II being no exception. According to Anatoly Ignatyev, “by law, tradition and convictions he was the sovereign ruler of Russia’s foreign policy while he remained on the throne.”¹

He ascended the throne without any clear foreign policy program, partly because his father Emperor Alexander III had never introduced him into the details of his foreign policy course. Meanwhile, contrary to the common opinion, Nicholas II had inherited a far from simple foreign policy from his father and had, therefore, to develop his own opinion about many foreign policy issues based on their detailed studies. …

Flipping Through the Pages of the Collection Foreign Policy Documents of the USSR (1943)

The publication of the latest volume (No. 26) in the fundamental series “Foreign Policy Documents of the USSR”* has been a long-awaited event for experts and all those interested in the diplomatic history of World War II. The previous volume was published six years ago, and the readers were looking forward to the new publications in the above series, which has long become the main source of documents on the foreign policy history of our country. And their expectations have been fully justified. The History and Records Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in cooperation with some leading Russian researchers, has presented in two omnibus volumes a noteworthy continuation of a high-profile series. …

TRADITIONALLY, and rightly so, a course of history of Russian diplomacy is offered to first-year students at all higher educational establishments across Russia that train diplomats and experts in international affairs as an introduction to a vast layer of knowledge of international relations. The adequate knowledge of this subject is indispensable for those who plan to work in the system of the Foreign Ministry of Russia. Indeed, professional and efficient Russian diplomats are well versed in the history of Russian diplomacy from its beginning in the form of the Posolsky Prikaz (the first official structure dealing with foreign relations) and know the names of all outstanding figures responsible for Russia’s foreign policy at different times. This is why the future graduates start their long road along the history of Russian diplomacy at the School of International Relations.

Notwithstanding the traditions and the place the course of history of Russian diplomacy occupies in the curriculum, there is no textbook which is very much needed to offer comprehensive, rather than fragmentary, knowledge of the history of Russian diplomacy even if there is no shortage of relevant academic and popular writings. …

RECENTLY, a presentation has been held of the latest issue of Diplomatichesky vestnik (Diplomatic Journal)* for 2016, an annual publication of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation. The publication has been prepared by the Information and Press Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The Department’s staff members have been meticulously working through the mountain of information, collecting and preparing data and analytical materials for the past year in order to capture the essence and dynamics of Russia’s foreign policy. Diplomatichesky vestnik (DV) has been designed to publish official information materials on international relations and world politics, thus reflecting the Russian diplomatic service’s contribution to the implementation of the country’s foreign policy strategy.

This twelfth issue, along with the preceding one, differs significantly in its content from other volumes of DV: Maria Zakharova, Candidate of Science (History), Director of the Information and Press Department of Ministry of Foreign Affairs and DV’s executive editor, suggested to include in the publication all addresses, interviews and articles by Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov for 2016, dealing with the key issues of Russian foreign policy. Overall, O.A. Melnikova, who compiled and edited the collection, has included in it a total of over 2,000 different materials. It is noteworthy that all the documents are published in both Russian and English. …

THE COLOSSAL HISTORIOGRAPHY of World War I has been augmented by another study by a Russian historian – S.E. Tsvetkov, lecturer at the Moscow International University – entitled “The Last War of the Russian Empire.”* Perhaps it would not be an exaggeration to say that in terms of coverage and historical outreach, this book does not have many equivalents not only in Russian but also in foreign literature. From all indications, the author is aware of that, modestly noting in the preface: “I have set the task of creating a memorable image of that war, which is practically unknown in our country.”

Granted, in my opinion, the remark about World War I being “unknown” comes a little late. Since the centennial of this landmark event, which took place in 2014, Russian historiography of this so-called forgotten war has significantly expanded and the number of publications continues to increase. However, what really matters, of course, is whether the author has contributed something new to the subject under consideration. It seems to me that he has. …

GEORGE FRIEDMAN is an important figure in Anglo-Saxon geopolitics and political science, and founder and former director of Stratfor1 (about Stratfor see: // https://www.stratfor.com/about, retrieved: 11.02.2016). In 2015, he left his post at Stratfor (which he had occupied for many years) to set up Geopolitical Futures // https://geopoliticalfutures.com (retrieved: 11.02.2016), a private intelligence and analytical company that issues geopolitical information bulletins, scientific works, and social and economic forecasts.

The talent and charisma of its founding father earned Stratfor the fame of a shadow CIA not only in the professional circles of political analysts but also among the wide public interested in foreign policy. …