In the first half of the 19th century the Caucasus was a source of constant exasperation in Russia’s relations with the European countries. Britain was trying to turn the region into a barrier that would prevent Russia’s advance on Iran, Turkey and India, while Paris would regularly play the Caucasian trump card in the standoffs between Britain and Russia in a bid to attain its own imperialist colonial goals in the Middle East. Political quarters in St. Petersburg [Russia’s former capital] and Tiflis [the former name of present Tbilisi] watched with suspicion the activities of the Western powers, reckoning that developments might take any course. International tensions over the Caucasian issue persisted until the 1860s, and in 1837 they drove the Anglo-Russian relations to the verge of conflict. Ultimately, they formed the necessary ingredients which would grow into the Crimean War, a conflict that could well compare to the later world wars in terms of its content and consequences. The war erased the foundations of the post-Napoleonic Viennese system of European order and ended the period of “long peace” on the Old Continent.

Imam Shamil’s defeat in Chechnya (1859) and the suppression of the anti-Russian resistance in Cherkessia (1864) made the West realize that staking on internal forces in the Caucasus was not rational anymore. The Europeans de facto recognized the Caucasus as a possession of the Russian Empire, and European policies there moved to a primarily economic dimension. This reduced the conflict potentiality of the Russo-West-European relations to a safe minimum, and noticeably changed Russia’s perception of a Western presence in the Caucasus. The confrontational model gave way to a cooperative one. Since the Europeans no longer challenged the international legal (i.e. political) status of the Caucasus, St. Petersburg began extending support and patronage to the British, French, German, Belgian, and Dutch businesses that explored the economic space of the Caucasus. The situation remained the same until World War I.

The upheavals of 1914 through 1921 delivered the Caucasus back to the domain of an acute geopolitical contest, and highlighted the region’s military and strategic significance for Germany, Britain, and France. They played on heterogeneous interests of the diverse local social, ethnocratic, religious, and cultural elites, on the one hand, and the equally heterogeneous aspirations of the popular masses, on the other. Moral or ideological considerations were wiped out by absolutely pragmatic goals of the warring states, that is, to win whatever the cost.

The October 1917 revolution in Russia, and the collapse of the Germanic bloc, propelled international calls for dissecting Russia’s imperial heritage in the Caucasus to the top of the agenda. The Civil War and armed interventions plunged the Caucasus into chaos. Eventually, the Entente ran out of the courage and resolve to tidy up the local political situation, ridden by complex political alliances, caricature states and self-proclaimed leaders. The truth is that Britain, France and the U.S. did not have a clear answer from the very beginning as to what should be done in the Caucasus or with the Caucasian problems.

In the meantime, the Bolsheviks did have an answer which finally brought them victory over the interventionists and internal foes. The result was that the Caucasus vanished from the list of world policy problems for decades.

INDIGESTIBLE REALITY

In 1991, an expanding Europe once again turned its attention to the Caucasus. The situation at the time there was unprecedented – never in the past had the countries of the region enjoyed so many opportunities to formulate their national goals as full-fledged members of the international community. Nor had Europe ever identified itself so powerfully as an independent subject of international policy boasting unanimous policy goals. Nor had the concert of European nations ever expanded so fast.

Until fairly recently, the European Union mostly admitted to its ranks the countries and nations belonging to the European cultural, historical and geographic space. The Caucasus has never been part of the Occidental civilization, and its integration into the EU – something that officials in the regional countries often mention today – will be problematic even on the conditions of associated membership, especially if the problem of European identity comes into the limelight.

Yet this is not the main problem. What is more important is the actual capability and readiness of the Europeans to untangle the many Gordian knots of the Caucasus – Nagorno-Karabakh, Abkhazia, South Ossetia, etc. – given the situation where no one can see exactly which knot poses the greatest menace. Who will venture to settle the conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia – and how? What is on the cards for Georgia’s ill-conceived mini-empire and what price or method, or reason, is there to breathe new life into it? Can the democratic institutions implanted from the outside take firm root on soil that has never known democracy? And will they be instrumental in maintaining at least a minimum of stability and security?

If the desire behind the EU’s penetration into the Caucasus is to establish control over the energy resources of the Caspian Sea, does it make sense then to go to such great lengths as to make the region a part of the European community? And if oil and gas are not the sole issue at stake, it would be worthwhile to do a thorough political analysis of the potential gains and unavoidable costs.

Whatever the projects designed for the Caucasus, they are doomed if they ignore Russian interests. The immediate neighborhood of the South Caucasus is of automatic concern for Russia’s national security. The last thing the Kremlin will be ready to part with is the right to defend Russia’s southern borders from the variegated threats emerging from sections across the Caucasian Range, and there are signs that Moscow is toughening its stance on the issue. Retreating from this stance does not seem to be a likely scenario in the foreseeable future – such is the historic tradition and geopolitical reality.

Europe is an entirely external player in the Caucasian geopolitical theater, and the EU in its current structural and institutional condition is an entirely new player. It may make any declarations about its goals, but its presence in the region that used to be part of the Soviet Union will continue to keep Moscow on alert. As for the possible deployment of NATO and/or EU military infrastructures along Russia’s southern flanks, the reaction from the Kremlin would be even more predictable. Citing the protection of pipelines and/or the prevention of ethnic conflicts as explanations for such a deployment would mean overstating the degree of patience, complacency and naïveté of the Russian leaders.

Presently, it is difficult to outline the contours of a compromise that Moscow would be ready to make with the West in Transcaucasia. Obviously, it will not object to a mutually beneficial business partnership and honest economic competition. But the idea of turning Azerbaijan, Georgia or Armenia into a military and political affiliation of the EU will inevitably encounter Russia’s resistance with all of the negative consequences concerning peace and stability in the South Caucasus. This, in turn, will directly affect the guarantee of reliable deliveries of Caspian energy resources to the West.

Naturally, any discussion about a European military presence in the Caucasus as an accomplished fact would be misleading. However, an epoch of pleasant and unpleasant surprises continues in Transcaucasia and elsewhere on the former Soviet territory, and the Europeans must be prepared to face them, too. This necessitates mutual understanding, credibility and close partnerships that are based on an a priori recognition by the West of bare reality, namely, that Russia will always maintain its interests in the South Caucasus and those interests will demand tangible, and not verbal, respect.

“EVERYTHING HAS BEEN PAINTED NEGATIVE”

Meanwhile, it is more frequently heard these days that Russia has ostensibly lost the ability to be responsible for what is happening in the post-Soviet South Caucasus, and that is why the West must assume the burden of that responsibility. The West has developed a voguish thesis that Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan need new ideas, new teachers, and new patrons. Western experts remain faithful to the belief that the imported “right” democracy and a self-organizing market economy offer a panacea for all post-Soviet problems. Moscow’s re-integration efforts, mostly quite ineffective, provoke strong resistance; this, in turn, promotes destabilization precisely where it should be avoided.

Members of the European expert community declare the imperial phase in Russian history a thing of the past, while stressing that the West is ready to nip in the bud any Restoration impulses coming from Moscow. No one seems to be dismayed anymore by the thesis that suggests: “We don’t need a strong Russia,” or its byproduct idea that argues: “We don’t need a united Russia.”

Many analysts do not deny today that the idea of sovereignty and territorial integrity has ceased to be axiomatic, and the West is apparently reluctant to renounce the practice of double standards in that area. When priority was given to breaking up the Soviet Union and weakening Russia to the limits, the West waved the banner of national self-determination. The need to build some sort of a containment barrier around Russia only emerged later, and now the West is ready to build it from anything that comes in handy, including failed states. No consideration is being given to the inconsistency of those countries, the low level of democracy and political culture of their leaders, nor the problem status of their ethnic minorities. Furthermore, encroachments on human rights, as well as the degree to which their economies are able to conform to market principles, fail to be brought into focus. What really matters is their willingness to line up with other post-Soviet malcontents in an opposition to Russia. With regard to these countries, the West proclaims that the principles of state and territorial integrity are sacred and supports the struggle of their governments with de facto independent provinces, their decisions to liquidate autonomies, and other revolutionary novelties aimed at ousting undesirable regional leaders. This is done under the pretext that the separatist authorities allegedly defend the freedom of robbing their peoples, committing financial machinations, plundering funds from the treasuries, taking bribes from criminals, and creating administrations based on clans and mafias. This is mostly true, and yet it is also undeniable that the federal governments of those states live by the very same rules, except the level of corruption and moral degeneration is much greater due to the increased availability of opportunities. The civilized West tolerates the outrages of the Caucasian “democracies” in the name of its geopolitical goals.

The events of 9/11 in the U.S. produced a brief lull in the ideologically induced pressure on Moscow in connection with Chechnya, but the West quickly recovered from the shock. Then, the “terrorists” and “gangsters” once again turned into “rebels,” while Russia’s domestic affairs took on international dimensions. Human rights became absolute to the degree that the rights of the average person paled in comparison. Finally, any move by the Kremlin triggers criticism. Everything has been painted negative – the creation of viable agencies of power and control in Chechnya, the intentions to restore its economy and put peace back on track, the plans to disarm the population by buying out its weapons, the provision of amnesty to the militants, the system of organizing local elections, the return of refugees, etc. One may get the impression that the bigger the Kremlin’s achievements, the less appealing the West finds them. The situation is bad not because the Chechens’ life is returning to normal, but simply because this is being done by Russia.

Meanwhile, a certain kind of status quo, though not yet quite reliable, has been preserved in Chechnya. There are tentative signs that the West has sensed

this development, and as a result there has become a deficit or, rather, an absence of a positive reaction from it. And who knows – maybe the rising wave of discontent with Russia’s activities is a harbinger of the ultimate success of Russia’s normalization efforts in Chechnya.

The pragmatic West realizes only too well that whoever brings peace and affluence to the post-Soviet territories will have (overtly or covertly) the dominating positions there. This realization has produced a demonstrative obstructionism against Russia’s peacemaking initiatives. By way of justifying that line of conduct, European analysts argue that the West has misgivings that Russia, failing to become a civilized state, may succumb to the temptation of following a neo-imperial policy. They interpret the results of Russia’s post-Soviet development over a tiny historical period as a total flop, arguing that it is not yet clear whether the market system has emerged victorious, while announcing that democracy has been defeated. Russia has preserved the culture of violence but has not acquired the culture of administration. Its inability to find a worthy self-identity and a self-comprehension scares the West and compels it to grope nervously for the tools of defense. Meanwhile, Western countries do not make the slightest hint that they also have a share of responsibility for the situation.

The rhetoric regarding the absence of alternatives to the policy of ’erasing the borderlines’ ceases when it comes to Russia’s interests in the Caucasus. The idea of turning the Caucasian Range into a “sanitary cordon” is given tacit recognition, and the question of who will benefit from it has also received a clear answer. Moscow, too, will have an answer if it delves into the considerations concerning the importance of installing barriers in the Caucasus against terrorist and other threats from the South.

The events are proceeding with the accompaniment of calls to build up the EU defense capabilities since the U.S. is slashing its presence in Europe.

REALPOLITIK A LA CAUCASIEN

Yet, it would be a mistake to believe that the Western politicians and the intellectuals servicing them form a monolith corporation of fellow-partisans. Some analysts do not see any sense in wasting effort on the risky strategy of squeezing Russia out of the traditional zones of its influence. Since the West is unable to substitute for the Russians for a number of reasons, it had better leave some things the way they had been historically formed. Moscow will always be able to come to terms with the former Soviet provinces where Western leaders are incapable of even opening a dialog. That is why cooperation, and not contention, with Russia offers many more benefits – the results will be better.

The idea that a power vacuum cannot be permitted to appear on the post-Soviet territory is also met with understanding, since it will be immediately filled with extremist ideologies and aggressive policies. In comparison with the regional and global consequences of such a phenomenon, the contradictions between Russia and the West will seem little more than childish pranks then. The probability that the vacuum will emerge is high enough if the EU takes responsibility for the situation and security in the newly independent states – together with the U.S. or separately – and then pulls back from its pledges after running into problems of the Afghan or Iraqi type (like the Americans did). Moscow has a long historical record of making good political contacts in the South Caucasus and Central Asia. It also has peacekeeping operations there to its credit. Policymakers in those countries have grown accustomed to the Russian style of conduct: it is short of elegance and delicacy, but possibly its straightforwardness makes it fruitful.

Some Western experts continue to advise the EU and the U.S. that the Caucasus has a sophisticated and highly flammable texture and handling it requires much care. No one can guarantee that the political technologies successfully tested in other parts of the globe will be as productive there. In this sense, proposals by some observers to comprehend the specific features of the situation in the Caucasus, which are deeply rooted in history, are samples of realistic thinking of the highest degree. Those observers realize that, in essence, the elite political quarters in the region deem Russia as a priority partner, and attempts to reorient them to others will only add fuel to the flames in the Caucasus, as well as on the international plane.

Incidentally, it is important to remember that the terrorist organizations based in the Middle East keep a close watch on the North Caucasus, and their activity in that region may spread far and wide should Russia provoke them with its feeble and inconsistent policies.

Other variations on the subject occasionally surface, namely: “How should we [the West] organize the post-Soviet area and catch the historic chance that is now available?” The destiny of the Russian and Soviet imperial heritage is contemplated differently, but invariably from the perspective of Western national or supranational interests. Whether they coincide with Russia’s own interests is not a consideration of the first order. Naturally, that coincidence would relieve the West of many problems, but its absence will not make anyone there grievous. After all, the gist of any state policy is to care for one’s own wellbeing, is it not?

Nor do the Russian intellectuals display signs of unanimity. The inertia of their ideological servility before the West is waning, while the Realpolitik trend, based on the esteem for the values of a strong state, is rising up. The Western community is watching it with an understandable alertness, although it was thanks to the West that the Russians developed the skills of discerning the things that are bad or good for their country.

Recent events in the Caucasus have illustrated fairly well the difference of approaches toward Russia’s policy in the Caucasian region. Some analysts described the Kremlin’s stance on the Adzharia conflict as a breakthrough, saying it had shown to the civilized West an example of selflessly serving the cause of peace and stability. However, others responded with bewilderment, asking how the Tbilisi government had won Moscow’s disposition: by the unending efforts to fan an anti-Russian hysteria in Georgia? Or by conducting a pro-Western and pro-NATO course? Or by toiling to create anti-Russian alliances all along the perimeters of Russia’s state borders? Whatever the answer, the “young Georgian reformers” would have hardly succeeded in staging the “revolution of roses” in Adzharia without Moscow’s support; otherwise, the whole story could very well have ended in disaster for them.

Expecting gratitude tomorrow for the help you gave yesterday does not seem rational. Therefore, is it not much better to make others realize that Russia’s voluntary or forced pullout of the South Caucasus will entail Moscow’s decision not to make any efforts to “velvetize” dangerous revolutionary processes there? It will also relieve Moscow of moral and legal obligations to keep the territorial integrity of the regional countries. If Moscow decides to pull out, it will – with all of the ensuing consequences. The post-Soviet agglomerates, unable to defend their sovereignty and national integrity, deserve what has happened to them, or is yet to happen.

* * *

Russia’s top political milieu is growing restive over the amassed Western penetration into Transcaucasia. Attempts to create an adequate response to that challenge could be seen in the endorsement of a legal international status of the Caucasian Quartet – Russia, Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan – as the chief instrument for solving regional problems and facilitating regional integration.

No one can foresee all the momentary fluctuations – the ups and downs of the global, regional and local political situation. This is the reason Russia and Europe must agree on the rules of the game and methods of averting the worst possible scenarios in a region where explosive tendencies will exist in the future.

Russia does not need Europe’s default, while the Europeans do not need Russia’s default. The EU will not receive any other proxy on the post-Soviet territory, nor another more natural partner in settling the post-Soviet conflicts than Russia. These two neighboring civilizations are facing a tough challenge of destiny, the destiny that has more than once punished both of them for their unwillingness to walk hand in hand so as not to perish in loneliness.