But can he help it?  Authoritarian rulers elsewhere have tried to prevent democratic revolution against them.  Some have done this successfully—often for a long period of time—but have eventually succumbed.  Other authoritarian regimes, by contrast, have managed to face down any and all opposition, and remain firmly in charge.

Since he first came to power at the end of 1999, Putin has done a remarkable job of asserting his authority over Russia.  Recently, however, there has been an equally remarkable degree of opposition against him.  What, then, is the prognosis for Putin?

I will address this question through examining Putin’s strengths and weaknesses, and then discussing some of the key challenges he faces to his continued rule, as well as his options for dealing with them.

Putin’s Strengths

As a result of the poorly thought out reform policies of the last Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev (1985-91), the Soviet economy, communism, and the Soviet Union itself all collapsed.  Under its hapless first post-Soviet president, Boris Yeltsin (1991-99), Russia’s attempted transition both to a market economy and democracy foundered badly.  Under Yeltsin, Moscow fared so poorly in fighting against Chechen separatists in the North Caucasus that Russian forces actually withdrew from that region in 1996.

By the time, then, that Vladimir Putin came to power at the end of 1999, the Russian public was thoroughly disillusioned with the chaos and mass poverty which they associated with capitalism and democracy, and thus was ready for an authoritarian ruler who could restore order, stability, and prosperity.

And during his first two terms as president (2000-2008), Putin did just this.  Under his leadership, Russian forces re-intervened in Chechnya and this time succeeded in pacifying it (albeit at enormous cost to the people of this region).  Putin and Russia also benefited from the rise in oil prices during these years which underwrote a remarkable economic recovery.  In addition, Putin benefited from the fact that Russia’s fledgling democratic movement that emerged toward the end of the Gorbachev era was weak, divided, and thus easily marginalized.  Finally, Russian public opinion valued Putin for restoring Russia’s image as a great power—something which had been deeply undermined during the Gorbachev and Yeltsin eras.

Putin did, of course, scale back the free press and cracked down on his opponents.  But Russian public opinion did not seem to hold this against him.  Indeed, public opinion polls revealed Putin to be something quite rare:  a genuinely popular authoritarian ruler.

Although Putin could have easily had the Duma alter the Russian constitution to allow him to run for a third consecutive term, he “modestly” declined to do so.  The Russian public, though, quite genuinely supported Putin’s choice of his close associate, Dmitri Medvedev, to succeed him.  It also seemed pleased when Putin resumed the post of prime minister (which he had briefly served in previously during Yeltsin’s last few months as president) and was clearly still in charge.  While unpopular in the West, the Russian public was highly pleased by Russia’s victorious little war against Georgia in August 2008—which Putin, and not Medvedev, was seen as the driving force behind.

Putin’s Weaknesses

Putin, though, also has weaknesses—which have become increasingly evident in recent years.  One set of these relates to petroleum—the export of which his government has been heavily dependent upon for its revenue.  Shortly after Putin and Medvedev first traded places in 2008, the price of oil (which had steadily risen for several years) collapsed dramatically.  It has, of course, risen and fallen since then, but has not gone back to its 2008 high.  In addition, the European economic crisis has led to a dramatic decline in that region’s purchases of gas from Russia.  Further, the “shale revolution” in North America and (to a lesser extent) Europe as well as the increasing availability of liquefied natural gas (LNG) from Qatar, Algeria, and other sources have all served to lessen Western dependence on Russia. The reluctance of Russian oil and gas firms to invest at home combined with Russian government hostility to foreign investment in the Russian petroleum sector have also led to doubts about how long Moscow can maintain oil and gas production at current levels (much less increase them).  Finally, global warming has also taken its toll on the Russian petroleum sector:  petroleum rigs have been unable to function when the permafrost they were set up on has all too often turned into “tempafrost.”  All these factors combined have resulted in declining petroleum revenues for the Russian government even as it has become increasingly dependent on this source of income to fund its growing expenditures.

And increasing expenditures—especially in the form of corruption—are another problem for Putin.  Among Putin’s core supporters are the security services and other government bureaucracies, the huge state-controlled corporations (including those in in the petroleum, armament, and nuclear power industries), and the nationalist youth movement.  An important means by which Putin retains the loyalty of these core supporters is through allowing them to benefit from corruption and to act outside the law.  The problem that has arisen for Putin is that the greediness of these groups has only expanded even as state revenues have contracted.  Further, the actions of these groups have become increasingly unpopular with Russian society.  But despite frequently announcing campaigns to crack down on corruption and lawless activity, the Putin administration has done precious little to actually rein them in.  Indeed, Putin may well fear that if he attempts to seriously crack down on their objectionable behavior, his supporters will turn against him.  But his failure to crack down on them has resulted in his popularity declining—and hence his dependence on his corrupt supporters increasing.

Further, while Chechnya itself has been “pacified” through Putin’s having outsourced the region to the Kadyrov clan (former rebel warlords whom Moscow gave the freedom to do whatever they like in Chechnya so long as they don’t declare independence), the entire Muslim North Caucasus has become increasingly unstable.  Further, the brutality of Kadyrov rule in Chechnya may be setting the stage for further conflict there later.  But if Putin tried to replace the Kadyrovs, they might well become rebels once again.

Finally, there was a surprising outburst of public opposition to Putin beginning in late 2011 after the announcement that he and Medvedev would trade places once again with Putin resuming the presidency in 2012 for a six-year term (under Medvedev, the Duma voted to increase the term of office for the Russian president from four to six years beginning in 2012).  What aroused the protest was not only the prospect of Putin remaining in charge until 2018 or even 2024 (if he decides to run for a second consecutive term), but that the Russian voters had no real say in the matter since it was clear that the regime would not tolerate the emergence of a serious challenger to Putin.  Putin, quite unsurprisingly, won the March 2012 presidential elections without serious challenge.  Nevertheless, the strength of the protest movement against him, as well as his party’s poor performance in the December 2011 parliamentary elections after the Putin/Medvedev trade had been announced, appears to have seriously rattled the Russian leader.  Indeed, Putin seemed to be in earnest when he ridiculously claimed that the opposition against him was somehow instigated by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

Public protest against his regime has declined considerably in recent months, and Putin once again appears to be firmly in charge in Russia.  He is, however, no longer the genuinely popular authoritarian ruler that he used to be.

Challenges and Choices

The very fact that Putin remains in power is clearly an indicator that his strengths outweigh his weaknesses.  But his weaknesses are serious—especially since he seems to be unable or unwilling to prevent them from getting worse over time.  While Putin greatly benefited from the steady rise in oil prices from between when he first came to power and mid-2008, the increased petroleum supplies coming onto the market as a result of the shale revolution makes it doubtful that there will be another prolonged oil price increase any time soon.

Putin, of course, is powerless to prevent this increase in oil supply to the world market.  He could, though, act to halt the decline in (or even increase) Russia’s own petroleum reserves by creating a more welcoming investment climate to encourage foreign as well as Russian firms to invest in his country’s petroleum sector.  This, however, would require him to act to counter to Russian xenophobic attitudes toward foreign investment which Putin himself has exploited up to now.

Even more importantly, Putin would have to reign in the corrupt practices that have limited both foreign and domestic investment but which his principal supporters in the security services, the state-controlled corporations, and the bureaucracy have all benefited from.  But doing this risks undermining their support for him—something that Putin may (understandably) not be willing to risk.  This is an example of how doing what is good for Russia as a whole would not be good—and may well harm—the Putin regime.

In addition, while Moscow’s apparent defeat of the Chechen insurgency in the early 2000’s served to bolster Putin’s image as a powerful leader, the increasing Muslim unrest throughout the North Caucasus more recently is serving to undermine this.  While Russian public opinion is hardly sympathetic toward Muslims in this region, a military campaign to suppress them which incurs high casualties among Russian soldiers (which is, of course, the type of campaign that the Russian military leadership usually undertakes) could increase opposition to the Putin regime among Russians.  The impending U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan at the end of 2014 could well serve to exacerbate the Muslim challenge to Moscow if this results in Islamist forces in that country supporting their brethren who are working to undermine the Moscow-backed ex-Soviet governments in Central Asia.

So long as he controls the Russian security services, of course, Putin may well be able to withstand any and all challenges—including the return of large-scale domestic protests in Moscow and other major cities.  There is no guarantee, of course, that he will be able to do this.  The security services in Russia, as elsewhere, are not immune to the forces affecting the rest of society.  There have been many countries where the security services, having reliably supported the regime for years or decades, have suddenly and surprisingly either refused to suppress or have actually become supporters of large-scale opposition movements.  Indeed, what makes unarmed but large-scale opposition movements so dangerous to authoritarian rulers like Putin is not so much what these movements themselves can do, but the opportunity they provide for the security services (or significant elements within them) to choose among supporting the ruler, supporting the opposition, or doing nothing (which is effectively a decision to support the opposition).

Putin’s use of the violent nationalist youth “movement,” Nashi, to intimidate or silence his opponents and critics may be designed to avoid putting the security services in a position where they can (or even must) make this kind of choice.  Such violence-prone groups, however, are themselves difficult to control and risk creating even more oppositionists than they suppress.  And if the security services ever decide to turn on Nashi, it is not likely to stand and fight.  Such groups much prefer unarmed to armed opponents.

All of this indicates that even though Putin’s strengths outweigh his weaknesses at present, his weaknesses are both significant and growing.  Further, they are only likely to become more difficult for him to deal with over time.  This does not mean that his regime is destined to be overthrown and replaced by democratic opposition forces.  But if indeed the difficulties Putin faces increase, so will the prospects for a Russian Spring to finally occur.

Speech given to the World Affairs Council of Dallas/Fort Worth on Friday, March 8, 2013.

http://www.golos-ameriki.ru/content/yakovlev-law-russia-adoptions/1574162.html

It really is extremely sad that the Russian government has retaliated against
American legislation sanctioning corrupt Russian officials with the “Dima
Yakovlev” law banning American adoptions from Russia.

As many Russians have pointed out, this new Russian law primarily hurts Russian orphans.  Perhaps Putin and those who supported this bill have calculated that by banning American adoptions from Russia, they will encourage potential adoptive parents in America to lobby the U.S. government against taking actions which “offend” Moscow.

But if this was their calculation, it is not likely to succeed.  There are many
other–less prickly–countries that Americans can adopt from (I personally know
of two American couples who adopted from Kazakhstan just because doing so from there was much easier than from Russia).

The passage of this new law just makes the Russian government–and all those Russians who support it–appear petty and vindictive.  This is not in Russia’s interests

Although Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov stated on November 6 in Amman, Jordan that, “we have no plans to change” Russian foreign policy toward Syria, three days later an unnamed “high-level” Russian diplomatic source told the Russian daily newspaper Izvestia that “Assad’s departure” was one possible outcome of the ongoing conflict.

During Lavrov’s visit to Saudi Arabia on November 15, he insisted that, “Russia does not defend Assad.”  He also stated that the Syrian internal opposition should be involved in the settlement process in Syria.  In his press conference in Riyadh, he noted that, “We…advocate the unification of the Syrian opposition and we are meeting with all its representatives—of the internal and external opposition.”

Lavrov further stated on November 28 in Moscow that, “Russia’s involvement in the armed conflict is just out of the question.”

It has not just been the Russian foreign minister who has made statements such as these.  In his December 3 visit to Turkey, President Vladimir Putin noted that Russia and Turkey have differences over Syria, but insisted that, “We [the Russians] are not attorneys of Syria’s current government.”

Statements such as these from Russia’s top leadership can hardly be welcome to the Assad regime and its supporters in Syria.  Even less so was the statement reported by The Moscow Times by Russian Middle East expert Alexander Shumilin that, “Putin likely traveled to Istanbul with a serious proposal, possibly including the evacuation of Syrian President Bashar Assad to Russia.”

What explains this increasing Russian diffidence toward the Assad regime?  There are several possible factors.  One is an increasing sense in Moscow that the Assad regime is going to collapse at some point in the near future.  While Moscow may not welcome this, it will want to try to establish good working relations with a new Syrian government in order to retain Russia’s naval facilities at Tartus, arms contracts, petroleum investments and other interests in Syria.

Another factor is that the Obama Administration (I was told by a senior Defense Department official) has launched a quiet diplomatic campaign to persuade Moscow that Washington is willing to allow Russia to retain its military and economic interests in Syria after the downfall of Assad.  While such assurances are not binding on a new Syrian government, Moscow does not have to fear that the U.S. will actively attempt to exploit the downfall of Assad to expel Russia from Syria.

In addition, Moscow has grown increasingly concerned (as Russian observers have noted) about the highly negative impact that the Kremlin’s support for Assad has had on Russia’s image in Arab and other Muslim countries.  Lavrov’s November visits to Jordan and Saudi Arabia in particular appear aimed at restoring the cooperative relations that Moscow had built up with these two governments before the Syrian uprising.  Similarly, the hope expressed by Putin and Turkish President Erdogan that Russian-Turkish bilateral trade would grow from an already large $32 billion last year to an ambitious “$100 billion in a year” is an indication that they have no intention of allowing differences over Syria to undermine this profitable prospect.

These changes in the Russian approach toward Syria do not mean that Moscow is about to repudiate Assad and join with America and others in actively seeking his ouster.  What they do suggest, though, is that Moscow is now more realistically assessing the prospects for the survival of the Assad regime, and is more pragmatically preparing to pursue Russian interests in both in Syria and the broader region in the increasingly likely event that Assad does fall.

After the address, he took four questions from the audience before calling an end to the session.  In answer to three of them—one on why he didn’t put former President Saleh on trial, another on why he had appointed so many members of Islah (an Islamist party) to office, and a third on what he was doing to ensure the progress of Yemeni women—he indicated that he was acting (or not acting) in accord with the provisions of the GCC-sponsored democratic transition agreement.  When asked about the efficacy of the U.S. drone missile attacks on terrorist targets in Yemen, however, the President offered a spirited defense of them.

The U.S. Government was undoubtedly well pleased with everything President Hadi had to say.  Indeed, his address appeared especially designed to please the U.S. Government.  Still, though, it seems doubtful that Yemen will become completely democratic under the plan sponsored by the GCC since none of its member governments (Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, and Oman) is democratic or even aspires to be.  Further, blaming Iran for Yemen’s problems risks drawing attention away from—and not addressing—their primary causes:  Yemen’s deep-seated poverty and internal divisions.  Tehran certainly did not create these.

Compared to the problems currently being experienced by Egypt, Libya, Bahrain, and Syria, the political transition in Yemen appears to have gone rather well so far.  But things have a way of going badly in Yemen.  Concerted efforts on the part of the new Yemeni government, Yemen’s GCC neighbors, and the West will be needed to make sure that they do not.

Thus, the Obama Administration’s decision to withdraw American forces first from Iraq (completed at the end of 2011) and then from Afghanistan (to be completed by the end of 2014) have been popular both at home and abroad.

But despite the popularity of the Obama Administration’s decisions to withdraw—and despite the unlikelihood that a Romney Administration would be willing or able to reverse them—these withdrawals are not going to bring about a happy resolution to the conflict situations in and around Iraq and Afghanistan.

Indeed, the withdrawals from Iraq and Afghanistan cannot help but remind those of us old enough to remember what happened after the U.S. withdrawal from Indochina.  American forces completed their withdrawal at the beginning of 1973—and communist forces took over South Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos just over two years later in the spring of 1975.

And as much as we abhorred the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, the withdrawal of Soviet forces over the course of 1988-89 that was followed by the downfall of the Marxist regime there in 1992 and the rise of the Taliban in 1996 does not bode well for what might happen following the departure of Western forces at the end of 2014.  Indeed, it is entirely possible that the Taliban or a similar group could again overrun Afghanistan.

As for Iraq:  it was surely not the intention of the Bush Administration to put into office there a government that would become friends with American’s adversary, Iran.  Yet that is exactly what has happened.

So what do we do now?  Indeed, can we do anything at all to prevent disaster short of massive re-intervention—which, of course, would also be disastrous?

I would like to suggest that there are policy options between massive intervention on the one hand and doing nothing on the other, and that these “in-between” options might be better suited both for advancing long-term American interests as well as promoting security in the region.  Understanding what these options are, though, requires an understanding of two things:  1) what is it that we are afraid of? and 2) what factors are likely to continue or arise in the region as the U.S. withdraws from the Iraqi and Afghan conflicts that the U.S. can work with either to prevent that which we fear from occurring, or mitigate it if we can’t?

Describing what we fear is easy.  In Afghanistan, it’s the return to power of a vengeful Taliban regime (or a reasonable facsimile) bent on supporting Al Qaeda and other jihadist movements.  In Iraq, it’s the prospect of seeing that everything we did there has only succeeded in installing a pro-Iranian regime in Baghdad which will work with Tehran to undermine America’s oil rich but militarily weak Sunni allies in the Gulf—as many see the ongoing Shi’a unrest in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia’s Eastern Province as evidence of.

There are, though, three tendencies that the U.S. can take advantage of to prevent or mitigate these negative scenarios.

The first is that regional rivalries will continue whether the U.S. stays or goes.  Even after the departure of U.S. forces, then, neighboring countries will act to oppose the return of the Taliban to power in Afghanistan or the rise of Iranian influence in Iraq.  The U.S. can support these efforts.

The second is the tendency for those whom we oppose to overplay their hand once they think they have beaten us, behave in an authoritarian manner whenever they have the opportunity to do so, and thus alienate the people of their own country as well as neighboring ones—whom we and our allies can help.

The third is the tendency for radical forces opposed to the U.S. to also oppose one another—especially when, once again, they think that American power is on the decline.  When the opportunity arises, the U.S. can exploit these rivalries—but only if it recognizes opportunities to do so when they arise.

Taking advantage of these three tendencies is the theory, if you will, advanced in my book, “Leaving without Losing.”  But can the U.S. do this in the specific cases of Afghanistan and Iraq?

Let’s start first with Afghanistan.  As noted earlier, what we fear here is that the U.S. withdrawal will be followed by the return to power of the Taliban or a similar group.  But there are others who fear this too:  India, Russia, and the Central Asian Republics.  Indeed, all these actors may be more highly motivated than the U.S. to prevent the return of a Pakistani-backed Islamist regime to Afghanistan.  The U.S. can do much to help them in this.  At the very least, we should not hinder them.

In addition, the Taliban established a strong record of misrule during its first period in power from 1996 to 2001.  Unlike before the first time they overran most of the country, then, Afghans are under no illusion now about what their rule will be like if they take over again.  The Haqqani Network—a more vicious as well as more pro-Pakistani group—are even more feared.  The prospect of groups such as these coming to power should provide a powerful incentive to Afghans to oppose them.  Even after withdrawing its own forces, then, the U.S. can—and should—continue to assist those Afghans willing to resist them to do so.

Now some might ask, “If Afghan government forces are doing so poorly against the Taliban while U.S. forces are still in Afghanistan, how can they be expected to resist them once the U.S. leaves?”  The model those who ask this undoubtedly have in mind is Indochina four decades ago when the U.S. withdrawal in early 1973 was followed by the downfall of the governments it was protecting in the spring of 1975, or even when the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan in 1989 was followed by the downfall of the Marxist regime there in 1992.

But this sequence of events is not inevitable.  The withdrawal of foreign forces fighting an insurgency is not always followed by the downfall of the government they were protecting.  In some cases, the government being protected has actually survived the withdrawal of the foreign forces and brought an end to the conflict with its internal opponents.  This happened in North Yemen following the withdrawal of Egyptian forces in 1967 and in Angola following the withdrawal of Cuban forces at the end of the Cold War.  Other examples could be cited.  The key thing to keep in mind is that—despite how unflattering to them this might be—the presence of foreign protectors often negatively affects the legitimacy of the governments they were sent to protect.  The withdrawal of the foreign forces, then, can actually increase the legitimacy of beleaguered governments—especially when they can point out how it is their opponents who are the ones linked to foreign governments (as the Taliban is with Pakistan).

Finally, we already know that relations between the Taliban and its Pakistani supporters are fraught with difficulty.  As the U.S. withdrawal proceeds, the more likely it is that these differences will increase.  This may provide opportunities for the U.S. to exploit.  One could be arranging for an internal Afghan settlement that includes the Taliban and thus liberates it from dependence on Pakistan.  Or, if the Afghan Taliban (which has gotten help from Pakistan) gives aid and support to the Pakistani Taliban (which opposes the Pakistani government), the Pakistani government may finally realize that supporting radical Islamists is not in its interests and seek American assistance against them.  Whether either of these situations will arise is unclear.  But we can’t take advantage of them if we refuse to acknowledge that they are possible.

Let’s turn next to Iraq.  Even with the U.S. having withdrawn, there are others in the region seeking to prevent Iran from gaining influence in Iraq and beyond.  These states include Turkey, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and the other oil rich monarchies.  Israel shares this interest with them.  The U.S. can help them in these efforts.

In addition, the democratically elected Arab Shi’a-dominated government of Prime Minister Maleki that the U.S. intervention made possible has not just made friends with Iran, but has been ruling in an increasingly autocratic manner.  The U.S. intervention, though, also benefited the Kurdish minority in the north and allowed it to establish a regional government, relatively independent from Baghdad, which has established a remarkable degree of stability and prosperity in this area.  Continued American support for this de facto Kurdish state serves American interests through enabling a people strongly motivated to keep both Tehran’s and Baghdad’s ambitions in check to do so successfully.

Another accomplishment of the U.S. occupation of Iraq was how relations between the U.S. armed forces on the one hand and the Sunni Arab minority on the other went from extremely hostile to very good (thanks, in part, to Al Qaeda in Iraq’s bad behavior).  What the U.S. did not succeed at, however, is reconciling the Shi’a Arab majority with the Sunni Arab minority (or the Kurdish minority).  And since the completion of the U.S. withdrawal, the Shi’a-dominated Iraqi government’s behavior toward the Sunni minority has become increasingly oppressive.  What this means, of course, is that (like the Kurds), the Sunni Arab minority in Iraq is also strongly motivated to keep Baghdad’s and Tehran’s ambitions in check.

We must not, though, just write off the Iraqi Shi’a.  They are divided among themselves.  What this means is that if Maleki or other leaders lean toward Iran, at least some of their Shi’a rivals are likely to seek American support.  More importantly, it must not be forgotten that Iraq and Iran have historically been rivals.  Just because Iraq has gone from being ruled by a Sunni minority regime to being ruled by a Shi’a majority one may not change this.  The division between Arab and Persian appears to be much stronger than the common tie of Shi’ism—as the Iranian government’s failure to spark a revolt by the Iraqi Shi’as against Saddam Hussein during the Iran-Iraq War showed.  Further, the Iraqi Shi’a ayatollahs do not accept the authority of Iran’s Supreme Leader.  If and when differences between Baghdad and Tehran emerge, this will provide an opportunity for Washington.

What all this means, though, is that dealing with Iraq will be tricky.  The more that the U.S. and its allies support the Kurdish and Arab Sunni minorities, the less likely that the Arab Shi’a government in Baghdad will move away from Tehran.  But the more that the U.S. and its allies support the government in Baghdad, the more likely it is to feel that it can treat the minorities harshly—thus creating opportunities for groups such as Al Qaeda in Iraq.  Thus, whatever else America does in Iraq, its long-term interests would be best served through patiently promoting what would also be in the best interests of all Iraqis:  the establishment of a true federal democracy that keeps Iraq united, but respects the autonomy of its principal communities.  Unless and until they are all on board with this, however, it is not going to come into being—but their differences will allow the U.S. room for maneuver against any which ally with Iran.

The foreign policy approach I am proposing here for the U.S. to pursue toward Iraq and Afghanistan after withdrawing from them is—I freely admit—not big and bold.  Nor do I apologize for this.  It was the Bush Administration’s big and bold foreign policy approach toward Afghanistan and Iraq, after all, which got us into the mess we’re now in.  But this is not the first time we’ve been in such a mess.  It was a similar big and bold foreign policy approach that got us into a similar situation in Indochina which we also ended up extricating ourselves from through withdrawal.  And then when America went to the other extreme of being completely unwilling to intervene afterward because we wanted “no more Vietnams,” the Marxists took advantage of this to seize power in several more (what were then known as) Third World countries during the 1970s.

Back then, though, the U.S. adopted a three-part foreign policy approach, similar to the one I’m advocating here, of exploiting the opportunities provided by regional rivalries, the opposition generated by our adversaries’ authoritarian rule, and the seemingly inevitable hostility that arises within the ranks of radicals.  And it was this prudent and pragmatic foreign policy approach that contributed to a dramatic change from an overextended America being taken advantage of by its adversaries in the late 1960s and the 1970s to a seemingly weakened America being able to take advantage of its Marxist adversaries’ overextension in the 1980s.

In the wake of the U.S. withdrawals from Iraq and Afghanistan, I feel confident that the adoption of the prudent and pragmatic foreign policy approach outlined here will also prove more successful than the extremes of massive intervention on the one hand doing nothing on the other.

This is a slightly revised version of a speech I gave at the World Affairs Council of Northern California in San Francisco on August 16, 2012.

There are several reasons for this.  First of all, there is one extremely important difference between Yemen and Syria.  One of the reasons why President Saleh stepped down was because he was severely injured in June 2011 and has had to spend long periods of time outside his country for medical treatment since then.  He has simply not had the strength to rule as he had previously.  President Assad, by contrast, has not been injured and is able to continue devoting his full attention to remaining in power.

Second, Russia did not play a significant role in the transition from Saleh to his vice president in Yemen.  It was the United States and the Gulf Cooperation Council countries—especially Saudi Arabia—that were the most important external powers that facilitated this.  Some in the West hope that because Russia provides important support to Damascus, Moscow is in a position to persuade Assad to step down like Saleh did.  Leaving aside whether the Putin administration would even be willing to try doing this, it is by no means certain that Moscow has the ability to do so.  Russia, after all, is not the Syrian regime’s only external supporter.  Iran is another—and an arguably more important one.  Tehran will back Assad whether or not Moscow continues to do so.  Moscow understandably fears that if it tries to persuade Assad to step down at the West’s behest, Damascus will simply expel the Russians from their naval base in Tartus and turn all the more toward Iran and possibly China.

Third, the Western expectation that Russia will now seek political change in Syria because it is somehow embarrassed by the number of people that the Assad regime has killed is completely unrealistic.  It must not be forgotten during Putin’s first term as president, Russian security forces killed over 150 people to end the Chechen takeover of a Moscow theatre in 2002, and over 380 people to end the Beslan hostage crisis in 2004.  The Putin administration, then, does not share Western outrage over the killing of large numbers of civilians, but sees this as just part of the cost of defeating armed opponents.  Moscow’s support for the Security Council condemnation of Syrian actions does not signal that it is moving toward the Western view of the Syrian government, but may instead be an attempt to show the West that Moscow is “reasonable,” and that its prevention of Security Council action against the Assad regime is not partisan but “considered” and “balanced.”

Finally, the “Yemen solution” doesn’t seem likely to work in Syria when it hasn’t even worked out yet in Yemen itself.  It is true that Saleh stepped down, but much of his regime remains intact.  His son is still in command of (partly thanks to American support) the best armed and trained security force in the country.  Although the new president has dismissed some of them, Saleh loyalists remain in many key positions.  Whether there will be a true political transformation in Yemen, then, remains to be seen.

At least in Yemen the armed forces are divided with important elements supporting the transition.  In Syria, though, the leadership of the armed forces largely belongs to the same minority Alawite sect as the Assad family.  Even if Assad steps down, then, the security forces will act to preserve Alawite minority rule in Syria.  Indeed, the Alawite leaders of the military and security forces very much fear that they will be treated much like they have treated the Sunni majority if the latter ever comes to power, and thus are determined to prevent it from doing so.

 The “Yemen solution,” then, is simply not an option for Syria.  Russian leaders are undoubtedly aware of this, even if their Western counterparts are not.

Leaving without Losing:  The War on Terror after Iraq and Afghanistan

(Johns Hopkins University Press, 2012)

http://jhupbooks.press.jhu.edu/ecom/MasterServlet/GetItemDetailsHandler?iN=9781421405582&qty=1&source=2&viewMode=3&loggedIN=false&JavaScript=y

But is it really?  The level of Russian-American recrimination over Syria has certainly increased dramatically.  The Kremlin, however, may have several reasons to believe that the Obama Administration does not actually want to see the downfall of the Assad regime—and that Washington thus finds Russia’s opposition to Security Council resolutions against Syria, which the U.S. supports publicly, to be quite useful.  There are three reasons why Moscow might well think this:

First, America’s ally, Israel, is extremely wary of what the downfall of the Assad regime would mean for it.  Israeli leaders are fearful that the Arab Spring will not result in a friendly democratic government, but a hostile Sunni radical regime arising in Syria instead.  And Israel, as Moscow well knows, has considerable influence in Washington.  An Interfax report of February 15 about Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Gennady Gatilov’s consultations with Israeli Foreign Ministry and National Security Council officials suggested that Russia and Israel do not disagree on Syria.  Indeed, Gatilov’s insistence that the settlement of the Arab-Israeli conflict “should not be neglected amid political changes ongoing in the Arab world” is a viewpoint that the Israeli government strongly agrees with.

Second, the Obama Administration has made clear that it does not want to intervene militarily in Syria.  Obama has withdrawn U.S. forces from Iraq and has announced that they will leave Afghanistan in 2014.  Although Moscow loudly complained about the degree of U.S. intervention that took place in Libya last year, it undoubtedly saw that Obama, under the guise of “leading from behind,” handed the mission off to Britain and France as soon as he could.  Especially in an election year, Obama does not want to risk getting bogged down in a conflict in Syria.  Republican politicians on the campaign trail might say that they are willing to intervene—but when it comes down to making a decision to do so would probably be even more sensitive than the Obama Administration to Israeli concerns about destabilizing Syria.

Third, however effective they sometimes may be in the long run, the Russians are well aware that economic sanctions imposed by the UN Security Council are unable to induce authoritarian rulers to halt the use of force against their opponents in the short run.  Therefore, they regard the call by the U.S. and other governments for economic sanctions against Syria as being largely symbolic and not substantive.  By Washington calling for economic sanctions and not military intervention, Moscow understands that the U.S. wants to be seen as “doing something” about Syria when in fact it really does not want to do anything.

It was not surprising, then, that Sergey Karaganov, chairman of Russia’s Council on Foreign and Defense Policy, told Interfax on February 10 that, “It is the Sunni Arab regimes, and not the West…who are trying to ‘overturn’ Syria.”

For if the U.S. was serious about toppling the Assad regime, Russian observers have noted, it would assemble a “coalition of the willing” to intervene in Syria without waiting for UN Security Council approval—just as it did in Kosovo during the Clinton Administration and Iraq during the Bush Administration.  A Nezavisimaya gazeta editorial of February 14 speculated that if Russia and China had vetoed the UN Security Council resolution authorizing a no-fly zone in Libya last year instead of abstaining on it, the U.S. and some of its allies would have intervened anyway.

While fully aware that Russia cannot block the U.S. from taking stronger measures to oust the Assad regime, Moscow is happy that the Obama Administration cites Russian (and Chinese) opposition as an excuse for not doing so.  For this public American deference makes Russia (and China) appear stronger and more influential than if the U.S. acted unilaterally instead.

This Russian view of the Obama Administration’s policy toward the Syrian crisis is highly cynical.  Most unfortunately, it may also be highly accurate.

The Obama Administration seems to think that no matter how much Iran’s leaders may want to acquire nuclear weapons, Washington has finally succeeded in raising the costs of their attempting to do this so high that the only rational choice Tehran now has is to give up the attempt.  This is because the economic costs that these sanctions impose on them increasingly threaten the survivability of Iran’s Islamic revolutionary regime.  And surely the rulers of Iran would prefer giving up their nuclear ambitions to falling from power.

Rationality, though, has a way of appearing differently in different places.  I last visited Iran in May 2005, before Ahmadinejad was first elected president.  Even then, I was told that Iranians had noticed something about American foreign policy:  the U.S. invaded Afghanistan and Iraq which were countries that did not possess nuclear weapons, but the U.S. has not invaded North Korea—a country that does possess them.  The lesson they drew from this was that America was likely to behave far more circumspectly toward a nuclear Iran than to a non-nuclear one.

But surely, I argued, there was far more at stake for Iran than whether the U.S. behaved circumspectly toward it.  I pointed toward the then recent example of the Libyan-American rapprochement in 2003 in which Libya gave up its nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction programs in return for close collaboration with the U.S.  The Iranian scholars and journalists I met with all laughed derisively at this, saying that Tehran would never kowtow to the U.S. like Qaddafi had done.  Besides, one of them asked, what was to prevent America from turning against Qaddafi once he had given up his nuclear program?

In 2011, this is exactly what the U.S. did.  While the U.S. did not cause the uprising against Libya, actions taken by the Obama Administration and several U.S. allies prevented Qaddafi from quickly crushing his opponents and greatly helped the latter bring down his regime. 

This, of course, was a good thing for the Obama Administration to have done.  The lesson that Tehran undoubtedly drew from this experience, however, was that giving up its nuclear ambitions at America’s behest will not stop the U.S. from acting to bring down the Islamic regime later should the opportunity ever arise.

Just as the Obama Administration wants it to, Tehran understands that the U.S. will continue trying to weaken it for pursuing its nuclear program.  But the unintended consequence of Obama’s successful policy toward Libya is that Tehran also believes the U.S. will continue trying to weaken it even if it gives up its nuclear program.  So what incentive, then, does Tehran have to cooperate with America and others on the nuclear issue?

The Obama Administration is so dedicated to increasing sanctions against Iran for not giving up its nuclear program that it might not be able to acknowledge even to itself how what happened this past year in Libya might make Tehran even more fearful of cooperating with the U.S. than defying it.  President Obama’s success in inflicting genuinely painful economic sanctions against Iran, then, may result not in Tehran renouncing nuclear weapons, but seeking to acquire them all the more quickly.

If this is indeed the lesson that Tehran has drawn from what happened to Qaddafi, then the lesson that Washington needs to learn is:  in formulating a policy designed to affect how an opponent calculates the costs and benefits of continuing actions that the U.S. does not like, American foreign policymakers must also understand how that opponent sees the costs as well as the benefits of complying with the U.S. vs. continuing to defy it.

In what was then a rare public appearance for him, Prince Turki Al-Faisal bin Abd Al-Aziz Al-Saud, Director of General Intelligence in Saudi Arabia from 1977 to 2001, spoke to a large audience at Georgetown University’s Center for Contemporary Arab Studies on Sunday, February 3, 2002.  Prince Turki, who was an undergraduate at Georgetown in the mid-1960s, is a son of the late King Faisal (assassinated in 1975).  Prince Turki made his remarks at a time when Saudi-American relations appear under stress, and amidst persistent criticism that it was Saudi support for the Taliban and failure to take action against Osama bin Laden in the mid-1990s which led to the tragedy of September 11.

Osama bin Laden, Prince Turki noted, inherited money from his construction magnate father.  Like a number of other young Saudis during the 1980s, bin Laden went to Afghanistan to help the mujahideen fight against the Soviet forces occupying that country.  Also like most of those young Saudis, Prince Turki insisted, bin Laden was not a fighter, but played more of a supporting role instead.

Prince Turki said that he did have contact with bin Laden during these years—mainly at receptions.  At the time, bin Laden seemed like a pleasant but shy individual who did not talk much.  Bin Laden remained in Afghanistan following the completion of the Soviet withdrawal in early 1989, but returned to Saudi Arabia the following year after becoming disillusioned with the mujahideen for fighting with one another.

Back home, bin Laden appeared to be searching for a new cause.  One that he sought support for, Prince Turki noted, was the liberation of Marxist South Yemen, which bordered the Kingdom.  Prince Turki turned him down, as did other senior princes.  (Marxist South Yemen would disappear in May 1990 when it merged with the more powerful and populous non-Marxist North Yemen.)

The Iraqi invasion of Kuwait later that year provided bin Laden with another cause.  He argued against allowing American forces into the Kingdom, claiming that he and other Arabs who had served in Afghanistan could defeat the Iraqis.  As is well known, the Saudi government turned down his offer (which was hardly credible) and invited American as well as other foreign armed forces onto Saudi territory.

It was at this point, Prince Turki said, that bin Laden turned against the Saudi government.  He left the Kingdom, going first to Afghanistan, but leaving there relatively soon thereafter for Sudan.  During the early 1990s, the revolutionary regime in Sudan actively pursued anti-Western and anti-Saudi aims, and so welcomed bin Laden.  By 1996, though, Sudan sought to improve its relations with the Kingdom and offered to return bin Laden to it.

It has been reportedly recently in the Western press that the Saudi government turned down this offer from Sudan, thus allowing bin Laden to go to Afghanistan and plot a series of attacks against the U.S.  According to Prince Turki, however, the Sudanese offer was made only on the condition that the Saudis promise not to put bin Laden on trial.  Riyadh refused to do this, and so the Sudanese let him go to Afghanistan in 1996, where he linked up with the Taliban shortly before their capture of Kabul.

Saudi Arabia not only recognized the Taliban as the government soon thereafter, but provided it with aid as well.  The Kingdom did so, Prince Turki stated, for three reasons:  1) the Taliban did indeed rule most of the country; 2) it established a degree of peace where there had previously been fighting and chaos; and 3) the Saudis hoped to influence the new government.

The presence of bin Laden in Afghanistan, Prince Turki reported, was one of the subjects that he and other Saudi officials talked about with the new government.  The Taliban promised that they would not allow bin Laden to work against Saudi or American interests from Afghanistan.  In 1997, however, bin Laden gave an interview to a Western reporter in which he threatened to attack both countries.  Saudi officials immediately complained to the Taliban about this, reminding them of their promise.  The Taliban assured Riyadh that they would not allow bin Laden to make any further threatening statements or actions.  In 1998, however, bin Laden granted another interview to a Western journalist in which he again threatened both Saudi Arabia and the United States.

In June 1998, Prince Turki went to Kandahar to discuss the extradition of bin Laden with Taliban leader, Mullah Omar.  According to Prince Turki, Omar was willing to negotiate on this.  Riyadh received word from the Taliban the following month that his extradition was in the works, but it did not occur.  (What occurred instead was the bombing of the American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in August—apparently the work of bin Laden.)

Prince Turki returned to Kandahar in September.  This time, however, Mullah Omar described bin Laden as a pious Muslim, accused the Saudi government of acting on behalf of the United States in seeking his extradition, and insulted the Saudi royal family.  Prince Turki then broke off the meeting, telling Mullah Omar that he would regret this.  Riyadh cut off its financial assistance to the Taliban and expelled the Taliban’s ambassador from Riyadh.  However, Riyadh did not break off diplomatic relations completely, he said, because it hoped to revive some sort of dialogue with the Taliban.  But this never occurred.

At the end of his talk, Prince Turki described how he had visited Ground Zero in New York on Thursday, January 31, 2002.  Becoming emotional, he said that he felt the grief of all those who had lost relatives in the World Trade Center, and that he knew how intense the grief they felt was because he had experienced it himself after the assassination of his father, the King.  He stated that Saudi Arabia had suffered too, and that the Saudi people felt America’s pain.  Whatever their differences, both countries must work together to combat terrorism.

Revised version published by Eurasianet.org, February 13, 2002, under the title, “Former Saudi Intelligence Official Defends Country’s Dealings with the Taliban.”  This Eurasianet article, though, appears to have been subsequently pulled from the Eurasianet.org website.