A Question or Two for Yats and Obama Tomorrow

To get a sense of the Bizarro World that the United States presently occupies take a peek at its wish list, intended to resolve the Ukrainian crisis, that Kerry delivered to Lavrov this past weekend:

In a Saturday morning call with Mr. Lavrov, Mr. Kerry emphasized that Russian steps to annex Crimea would close the window for more diplomacy. Later that day, the State Department sent Mr. Lavrov a page-and-half document with a series of questions that were intended to see whether the Kremlin was receptive to the United States’ proposals before Mr. Kerry traveled to meet with Mr. Putin.

American officials wanted to know if Russia would cease its military advances in Crimea, rein in Crimean militias and also work with the contact group on steps like an International Monetary Fund program to stabilize the Ukrainian economy and a countrywide election. They also wanted Russia to halt moves to annex the Crimean Peninsula, and were looking for signs that Russia would be willing to return their troops to their barracks, allow international monitors to work in Crimea and, importantly, meet with new Ukrainian government, either directly or as part of a contact group. 

Russia never responded officially to the questions. Yet an answer of sorts came on Monday when, to the surprise of the State Department, Russian television carried the short video clip of Mr. Putin and Mr. Lavrov. 

Mr. Putin said that he had authorized Mr. Lavrov to invite Mr. Kerry to Russia. Mr. Lavrov responded that he had expected Mr. Kerry to arrive as early as Monday for talks that could involve Mr. Putin himself. 

“But then on Saturday he called and said that he would like to postpone the trip for the moment,” Mr. Lavrov added, referring to Mr. Kerry. 

The Russian foreign minister went on to complain that the paper Mr. Kerry had given him on Friday cast Moscow as a belligerent and treated the establishment of the new Western-backed government in Ukraine as a “fait accompli.”

This appears in "U.S. and Russia Hit Diplomatic Roadblock Trying to Start Ukraine Talks" by Michael Gordon and Steven Lee Myers. As a first proposal, the Obama administration must know that it is a non-starter. For it to be anything but an intentional non-starter would mean that there is no one in a position of authority in the Obama administration who can interpret the obvious -- that Russia is deadly serious about what is going on in Ukraine and is not going to settle for some sort of accommodation with the putschists. This is from a good story by Ellen Barry, "Titans in Russia Fear New Front in Ukraine Crisis":

Russia’s tycoons have been silent since the crisis began, apart from approving messages on social media. Many inside Russia’s large corporations are no doubt supportive of Mr. Putin’s moves in Crimea, which are widely seen here as correcting a historical error made by the Soviet leader Nikita S. Khrushchev, when he transferred Crimea to the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. Mr. Putin’s approval ratings are at their highest point since he returned to the presidency in 2012. If corporate leaders are complaining, they are doing it quietly. 

“Of course they’re upset, but it doesn’t mean they are prepared to challenge Russia’s foreign policy,” said Mikhail E. Dmitriyev, an economist whose research group, the Center for Strategic Research, was originally founded to shape Mr. Putin’s economic platform. “This is a new reality. Even if somebody has reservations with regard to the policy’s effectiveness, I strongly doubt they would express it. This is a policy which, for the moment, is backed by the vast majority of the public. It’s not an exaggeration.”

Kerry and Obama enjoy no such support. Citizens of the homeland see only more war games and billions spent overseas while their rents are raised and a couple bags of groceries add up to a $100. European allies have already made clear their reluctance to slap economic sanctions on Russia.

Then there is the unstable situation within the putsch government itself. It is a business-as-usual, Orange-Revolution-redux oligarchical structure that came to power by means of Svoboda and Right Sector muscle. At this point it is not clear that this pairing is anything more than an evanescent marriage of convenience. Right Sector has promised to reformulate itself as an electoral organization that will vie for power in upcoming elections. Right Sector, at least from what I have read, is to the right of Svoboda, does not support greater integration with Europe and its decadent values, and currently is riding a crest of popularity for its role on the Maidan.

In the near term, the United States continues to lose the information war. And the reason it is losing the propaganda battle is the insistence that the putschists are legitimately democratic. In order to make this stick, a tremendous feat in perception management is required, given that we are indoctrinated in the West from the time we learn how to read that democracy means elections. And Yanukovych was the legitimately elected leader of the country, who just happened to be run out of town by armed goons -- not what most normally consider to be a legitimate, democratic process.

As if to underscore this, today Yanukovych was trundled before the cameras. Steven Lee Myers has the story, "Ukraine’s Ousted Leader Urges Military to Resist New Government":

Mr. Yanukovych has mostly remained in hiding since he fled Ukraine, and his public role in the conflict has been so marginalized that he began his remarks by dismissing rumors of his ill health and even death. “I am alive,” he said, going on to dispute the legality of the actions the Parliament took after a European-brokered agreement on Feb. 21 collapsed. “And I have not been impeached, according to the Ukrainian Constitution.”

This is a shrewd move by Moscow, preempting tomorrow's White House meeting between putsch president Arseniy Yatsenyuk and Obama. If there is any reporter worth his or her salt allowed to question the putschist and his sponsor, this question will be asked: "Was President Yanukovych impeached as set forth in the Ukrainian Constitution? And, if not, how is the current government legal?"

What Kosovo (Not to Mention Western Business Interests in Russia) Reveals About the Crisis in Ukraine

There is a price to pay for backing a putsch. Hopefully that is a lesson that elites in Western capitals will have learned once the dust settles in Ukraine (though right now it is unclear when that will occur).

An important historic parallel for what is happening today is the 1999 NATO war against Yugoslavia. President Vlad Putin brought it up today in connection with Russia's defense of the Crimea: This from "Citing ‘Coup’ in Ukraine, Putin Reserves Right to Use Force" by Steven Lee Myers, Ellen Barry and Alan Cowell:

[Putin] said Russia is not considering annexing Crimea, but said Crimean citizens should be allowed to determine their own future, presumably as part of Russia or Ukraine. 

“We are not considering this possibility,” he said. “It’s up to people living in a certain territory, if they can exercise their free will, and determine their future. For example, if Kosovo’s Albanians were allowed to do that, self-determination, which according to U.N. documents is a right, but we will never instigate it, never support such trends.” 

“Only the people who live in a certain territory have the right to decide their own future,” he said.

Hence, one destabilizing U.S. precedent come home to roost, and not just in terms of international norms; Obama should be mindful of the fate of the Democrats post-Kosovo. Clinton took his high approval ratings coming out his Republican impeachment trial in the Senate and used them to mobilize support for bombing a European capital, Belgrade, on behalf of a criminal organization, the Kosovo Liberation Army. The result? Approval of Clinton quickly dropped and his vice president, Al Gore, lost to the scion of a none-too-popular conservative political family dynasty, and this despite Gore being able to boast of a leadership role in an administration that presided over the creation of a full-employment economy.

Obama should be very careful. He has neither the support of European allies nor the public that Clinton had. In terms of the former, consult this passage at the end of Peter Baker's story, "Top Russians Face Sanctions by U.S. for Crimea Crisis":

Russia is effectively the world’s biggest energy supplier, exporting more natural gas than any other country and more oil than any other nation after Saudi Arabia. Russia is also the biggest exporter of industrial metals and the fifth-biggest consumer market globally. 

“The biggest argument for severe economic sanctions not being imposed is that the European countries don’t have much of an alternative to Russian energy supplies,” said Jens Nordvig, the New York-based managing director of currency research at Nomura Holdings Inc. 

Several of the biggest Western energy companies have major investments in Russia, including B.P. and Royal Dutch Shell. 

It may also be difficult for Mr. Obama to sell sanctions to the American business community if it is being cut off while competitors still have access to Russian markets. Russia is Pepsi’s second-largest market and a significant market, too, for companies like Boeing, General Motors, John Deere and Procter & Gamble. 

ExxonMobil, the largest American oil company, has a joint venture deal with the state-controlled oil company, Rosneft, to explore what may be a very rich Arctic area called the Kara Sea. ExxonMobil is also working with Rosneft on drilling in the Baltic Sea and on other projects. 

But congressional leaders said they would move forward with sanctions as well as aid to Ukraine. A Senate Foreign Relations Committee bill would use $200 million in aid and loan guarantees to leverage $1 billion in international economic assistance. An additional $50 million would be steered from existing State Department accounts for electoral administration.

While governmental elites are immune to the entreaties of their constituents asking for an end to constant foreign wars, they do listen to their corporate benefactors, many of whom have their snouts in Mother Russia's lap. The PepsiCo and ExxonMobil connections lead one to draw the conclusion that for all of Obama's tough talk about economic reprisals nothing substantive will come of it. Maybe a few Russian officials will be banned from travel to the United States. Also, don't expect Europe to join the tough talk charade. Even if the EU embraces fracking immediately, it will still be dependent on Gazprom for decades to come.

I continue to believe that time is on Russia's side. Obama's approval will continue to drop. The putsch government will fracture as soon as the IMF austerity mandates are publicized.