Sergei KARAGANOV: If NATO expansion is inevitable, we must try to join
“What is your vision of relations between Ukraine and Russia today and in the near future from the viewpoint of philosophy, ideology, and practice?”
“From the viewpoint of philosophy, these relations should be patterned on those between the US and Canada, but with a stronger cultural element. From the practical standpoint, the answer depends on how successfully the both sides develop. If we begin to develop at last, this will mean joint movement toward Europe, and all these problems of borders and the like will be solved. For Russia is today better prepared in some respects for EU membership, although we do not formally raise this question.”
“And informally?”
“And informally, we raise it fully. Some time later, it will be possible to raise it formally, but on a semi-official level. We simply don’t raise it now to avoid a negative reaction from the other side.
“And then we must go to the EU together. This will be far easier than trying to compete. The more so that the whole concept of rivalry between Russia and Ukraine over Europe is, in my opinion, absolutely unsound. It is futile for the simple reason that we have different types of relationship with the EU, we trade different goods. That we try to compete hampers both us and you. At least we perhaps are not trying to compete but pretend to do so. We say we do so. For this is also a matter of philosophy.”
“What is your attitude toward the assumption that a part of the Russian political elite now believes it is worth paying more attention to Ukraine precisely within the European context?”
“No, changes in the attitude of a part of the Russian political elite toward Ukraine have been caused by other circumstances. I do not think this factor plays the most important role here. For, paradoxical as it is, the Russian political elite so far regards Ukraine as a certain obstacle for only one reason: Ukraine, unfortunately, is unable to invest in the modernization of the energy transport infrastructure that links us with Europe. This is why we are afraid this will eventually jeopardize our energy flow. Under President Putin, Russia has come out strongly for rapprochement with the EU, Europe, and the West as a whole in a broad sense. We have lately been nothing but quasi-allies. Hence, it seems to me Ukraine and Russia have today still fewer possible technical differences over this issue.”
“In this connection, another simple question is whether Russia need a Ukraine dependent on it.”
“You see, the dependence of Ukraine on Russia and of Russia on Ukraine depend on certain circumstances. This is an objective reality rather than something imposed. I would rather speak about interdependence.”
“Or would it be better to speak about partnership?”
“From the philosophical angle, partnership relates primarily to politics and interdependence to the economy.”
“Incidentally, what could really cause Mr. Putin to say the other day that it would be a good idea to think about the conditions under which Russia could join NATO?”
“This is connected with the fact that Russia is beginning to understand that Europe is building a unipolar security structure. The OSCE is in reality slowly and quietly declining if not dying. The European Union, taking into account its political and military-political components, might or might not become a serious foreign political and military-political entity in the future. It is also becoming clear that, as the European Union speeds up its expansion, it will be simply unrealistic to turn it into a quasi-federal state. With this in view, Russia is interested in the European Union as an association of European economic integration, and it wants to join precisely this kind of entity.
“As to NATO, we have begun to understand that if we cannot curb its expansion (NATO is going to expand if only to survive), we must try to join this NATO and make it an effective Europe centered organization, an organization that could become a center of international political and military-political stability in the world.
“At present, NATO, as a military-political organization that defends European security, has become largely outdated because there are no issues in Europe now that require the existence of this kind of machine. One can certainly bomb Kosovo a little, but this is a somewhat funny and, moreover, ineffective application. And, as it is now clear, a counterproductive application of the relatively effective machine created by NATO.”
“And if NATO turns down this proposal?”
“Then we are going to witness another lost historical opportunity to finally overcome the Cold War legacy. In constructive terms, Russia, Ukraine, and many other countries lost an opportunity to reject confrontation and create something positive in the early 1990s.
“Now the question is whether it is possible to make a breakthrough in building a post-confrontation world and establishing an organization that can meet the new challenges.
“We are all focusing now on the problem of terrorism, for the spread of which all of us are responsible...”
“Including Russia.”
“Yes, including. Actually Russia has been struggling more than the others. Yet the problem is that in the past decade the Americans, who were and still are the undeniable world leaders, have been busy with other matters and permitted the proliferation of nuclear weapons. They have paid no attention to the new challenges to stability, for example, in Asia, to the upsurge of national self-identification now underway in Asia. It is not ruled out that we will find ourselves living in a far more dangerous world than in the late Cold War years.”
“If we assume hypothetically that Ukraine, not Russia, has been admitted to NATO, what could this lead to?”
“I think this is impossible for the simple reason that Ukraine is a less valuable partner for NATO than Russia is. And on the other hand, this could cause new difficulties in our relationship, which we don’t need at all.”
“What makes Russia so valuable for NATO?”
“The fact that Russia is close to the world’s most unstable regions, where we observe the spread of nuclear weapons, other weapons of mass destruction, and long-range missile systems. And Russia still possesses quite an effective, if somewhat weakened arsenal to thwart these processes. It is impossible to adequately respond to all these challenges without Russia.
“In this respect, Ukraine is not so valuable a state, which is perhaps to Ukraine’s advantage, for it does not face the threats that exist in Russia and are common to all European countries and the United States of America. In this sense, you are in a more comfortable situation.”
“And what are the other examples of our comfortable and uncomfortable situation?”
“You are in a comfortable situation as a transit route.
“And the uncomfortable situation is that your political and managerial culture lags several years behind Russia’s. But Russia is completely uninterested in Ukraine being backward. If we are going to be partners and closely cooperate in the economy, it is much to our advantage to have an affluent Ukraine, as it is today to Ukraine’s advantage to have a somewhat richer Russia, if only because four million Ukrainians work in our country and send money home. We would also like to go and seek jobs in Ukraine. But this is now much more difficult to do than for you to go to Russia. And, incidentally, if you have noticed, in spite of the hard-currency drain, we never raise this question at the political and economic level. There is no discrimination toward the Ukrainians employed in Russia.”
“There is now a strange interest in the problem of the Russian language in Ukraine.”
“We indeed think it advantageous to have a neighboring fraternal country with which we have no language barrier. Moreover, in Ukraine, too, the ousting of the Russian language is not being compensated for by massive learning of English. By doing so, you can create an additional modernization problem for yourselves. For the main problem for our two countries is not joining Europe but modernizing our societies and economies.”
“Incidentally, when Ukraine really becomes rich, it could develop some new national interests which run counter to the Russian ones.”
“This can occur in any country. The question is how to settle such differences. Yet, we have so far been trying rather ineffectively to achieve the goal of societal modernization. We have lost a decade. In reality, we have lost a century, but that is a different story. I am talking about the past decade.”
“In this context, will the situation in other post-Soviet countries also have to be reduced to the common denominator?”
“One of the factors that caused the current wave against globalization is that the Western world tried to reduce each and every to a common denominator. This triggered a very strong reaction. So one must remember that Belarus, Moldova, Ukraine, and Russia all have histories of their own: standardization is impossible in some respects and simply unnecessary in others. ”
