What Makes Putin Tick?
(Andrei Illarionov, June 22, 2021)
Transcript available below
About the speaker
Andrei Illarionov is a Senior Fellow at the Center for Security Policy in Washington. From 2000 to 2005 he was the chief economic adviser of Russian President Vladimir Putin and the president’s personal representative in the G-8. Dr. Illarionov was the driving force behind the adoption of a 13% flat income tax, the Russia’s government’s creation of a Stabilization Fund for windfall oil revenues, reduction in the size of government and the early repayment of Russia’s foreign debt. At the end of 2005, he resigned from his post as a Presidential Advisor for what he said were three main reasons: the transformation of Russia into a politically non-free country, the capture of the Russian state by the corporation of secret police officers (“siloviki”), and horrific corruption within the Russian leadership. Earlier, in 1992, Dr. Illarionov had served as an Economic Advisor to Russia’s Acting Prime Minister Yegor Gaidar. And from 1993 to 94 he was Chief Economic Advisor to Prime Minister Victor Chernomyrdin.
Dr. Illarionov has written three books and more than 300 articles on Russian economic and social policies.
He received his PhD from St. Petersburg University in 1987.
Transcript
Introduction
Robert R. Reilly:
Hello and welcome to the Westminster Institute. I am Bob Reilly, its director, and today I am very happy to welcome for the first time as a Westminster speaker Dr. Andrei Illarionov. He is a Senior Fellow at the Center for Security Policy in Washington. From 2000 to 2005 he was the chief economic adviser of Russian President Vladimir Putin and the president’s personal representative in the G-8. Dr. Illarionov was the driving force behind the adoption of a 13% flat income tax, the Russia’s government’s creation of a Stabilization Fund for windfall oil revenues, reduction in the size of government and the early repayment of Russia’s foreign debt. At the end of 2005, he resigned from his post as a Presidential Advisor for what he said were three main reasons: the transformation of Russia into a politically non-free country, the capture of the Russian state by the corporation of secret police officers (“siloviki”), and horrific corruption within the Russian leadership. Earlier, in 1992, Dr. Illarionov had served as an Economic Advisor to Russia’s Acting Prime Minister Yegor Gaidar, and from 1993 to ’94 he was Chief Economic Advisor to Prime Minister Victor Chernomyrdin.
Dr. Illarionov has written three books and more than 300 articles on Russian economic and social policies.
He received his PhD from St. Petersburg University in 1987.
Today he is going to discuss with us, “What makes Vladimir Putin tick?” Welcome.
Andrei Illarionov:
Thank you, director Reilly, for such a kind introduction and for inviting me to speak at the Westminster Institute. Certainly, these topics that you invited me to talk about are huge, almost boundless. This topic is huge and definitely we will not be able to cover all aspects in all angles of this topic. That is why I will try to focus my attention to a couple of topics that I think would be of interest for our audience and especially for English language audience that might not be fully familiar with some aspects of the Russian life.
Putin is Capable
On this particular character, first of all, I need to tell something that is being downplayed here in the United States as well as many Western countries. Mr. Putin is a very capable person and objectively speaking, he is a very talented one, talented in many regards. He is very knowledgeable. He is working hard. He is reading a lot. He is talking to many people, and he is able to think fast, and he is able to find arguments and counter arguments in debating discussions that not very many people are able to do.
Sometimes we have been able to hear, especially at the eve of the Geneva Biden/Putin summit that, for example, American president grew through [the] democratic competitive process where he participated in many debates, and that is why he is much better prepared for debate unlike Mr. Putin, who never participated in the competitive election and in the debate and so on. And I need to say that I met not very many leaders of states, maybe not a one, not one who would be better prepared for debates of [a] different kind, and I am saying that because I met personally probably more than 50 heads of states, mostly when I was invited to [the] Russian President, and after that.
So once again, he is a very capable person. He is very reserved. He controls himself very well. He is very good in formulating his ideas, his messages, regardless of whether they are correct or incorrect or they are openly false. Nevertheless, he is very accurate in sending messages which he wanted to send to the audience but as part of his personal features and personal characteristics.
How Putin Conceptualizes Foreign Policy
What is important to know is how he is using those skills. We need to accept that he has outstanding skills in a number of areas. How is he using those skills in one particular area of foreign policy? And here we need to come to his worldview, his ideology, his understanding of the state of the world, and here I need to say a little bit about two concepts that he has been able to develop first of all by himself, even with the help of some other people, but at least he became the most articulate person who was talking about these two concepts.
A Divided Russian Nation
One of those concepts is this concept of the so-called divided nation or divided people, divided Russian nation or divided Russian people. At least for the last eight years he continues to talk about a divided Russian nation. What does it mean? It means according to Putin that there are no separate ethnic groups or separate ethnic nations like Russians, Ukrainians, and Belarusians. According to Putin this is one united nation or one united ethnicity with a little, just really slight differences in language and culture and attitudes, but essentially it is one nation which was artificially divided.
He does not specify when and where or by whom, but it is divided, and he sees one of the most [important of his] duties as the President of Russia to unite all those nations under one roof. And he has even developed the formula for the so-called united, Russian nation. He said language, meaning the Russian language, and it is true that not only Russians but Ukrainians and Belarusians, almost everybody without exception, do understand, and many of them do speak, Russian very well. He said one religion. The Orthodox Christian religion, which is widespread in Russia and Belarus and in Ukraine. And he adds the third element to his formula: one prince. One language, one religion, and one prince. I hope it is not necessary to mention who exactly should be that one prince.
Alright, so this concept of one national, united nation Putin was able to spread around and it became almost official position of the Russian administration, the Russian government, in the last eight years and especially since the attack on Ukraine, the occupational annexation of Crimea and occupation of eastern Donbas.
Historic Russia
But there is another concept, an ideological concept that he has developed over the last two decades, and for the first time Putin was able to put it on a paper in his article in Nezavisimaya Gazeta on January 23rd in the year 2012. This is a concept of historic Russia. This is a very interesting term because those who studied Russia not only in the West, not only outside of Russia, but even within Russia would not find this concept in textbooks or in widespread literature. This is something that he put in, [that he] was able to develop with help of a few other advisors and assistants, mostly by himself.
The concept of historic Russia means that the current territory of Russian Federation and historic Russia are not the same, and it is also not the same as the former Soviet Union. And that is why to put equal sign between the today’s Russia and today’s Russian borders or former Soviet Union borders and imaginable or imagined historic Russia according to Mr. Putin would be incorrect. So that is why Mr. Putin spent some time explaining his understanding of historic Russia and he has put forward at least three criteria, how he understands historic Russia.
First of all, it is one language. This means territories where one language is being used. Not surprisingly, it is the Russian language. The second criteria, one religion, is not a very big surprise. It is an Orthodox Christian religion. And he adds one more element because the obvious question would arise where are the borders of this historic Russia? And in that article that I mentioned in year 2012, Putin identified the borders of the former Russian Empire at the end of 18th century as the borders of historic Russia.
Anyone who is interested in that topic can download the map of the Russian Empire at the end of 18th century, and would find that the western border of the Russian Empire then was going from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea along the river’s Neman, Western Bug, Zbruch, Dniester. Maybe not everybody who listens to us and who watches us at this moment is familiar with the geography of that particular region, but it would be helpful to just understand that the whole territory of the current Republic of Belarus, an independent state, according to Mr. Putin belongs to historic Russia. Almost all of the territory of Ukraine, with the exception of western Ukraine (Galicia, Volyn, Trans-Carpathian, Bukovina) all the rest belongs to historic Russia.
Transnistria, the part of the Moldovan republic which lies on the left bank of River Dniester, belongs to historic Russia according to Mr. Putin. Also, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania without a little strip belongs to historic Russia. So that is why we can see that the approach of Mr. Putin is towards historic Russia is very close to his approach to the so-called divided nation that should be united; one language, one religion, the borders of the Russian empire at the end of 18th century, and the final element of that concept is one prince.
And that is why what we have seen for more than 10 years since Putin’s aggression against Georgia in the year 2008, continuing with his aggression against Ukraine in the year 2014 with [the] occupation and annexation of Crimea, with war in Donbas are just elements, steps in full realization of his very well thought through program of recreating historic Russia, reuniting the so-called divided Russian nation, divided Russian people.
It means that what we have seen in the year 2008 and what we can see in Georgia and what we can see since year 2014 in Ukraine is not the final finish steps at which Mr. Putin decided to stop. No, it is just the very first steps in realizing and implementing his very close to his mind concept of restoration of the united people and restoration or creation because it never happened, existed before of the so-called historic Russia.
And that is why this revanchist approach to foreign policy to immediate neighbors for Russia is the crucial element of the real policy that is being implemented by Putin while he is the President of the Russian Federation at the moment. That is why nobody should sleep quietly, relaxing, not expecting that Mr. Putin decided not to bother his neighbors. It would be not the position as the one that has been advocated by a former U.S. ambassador in Moscow who said, okay, Putin occupied and annexed Crimea because he had a very bad mood that day when he organized Olympic games in Sochi in the year 2014.
No, this concept has been developed by Putin at least from year 2003 when he was on record talking about how it would be very good to have Kiev, the capital of independent Ukraine, to be within Russia because Kiev is a sacrosanct place for Russian Orthodox people that has many monuments, many churches, many cathedrals that are very close to Orthodox Christian minds, and that is why this part of territory with some little belongings should be given to Russia.
That is why if you would like to understand what the next move might be from Mr. Putin, you need to study his mindset, his ideas, his ideology, his interests, and frankly, he is not hiding those views. He has been open over the last almost 10 years. He has used this concept and this term, the very historic Russia or divided nation, many, many times, and that is why when he would have such a chance to implement this policy, in reality he would do it. And the Biden/Putin summit in Geneva that finished just yesterday gives an enormous opportunity, gives a green light to Mr. Putin to implement this policy in reality because unfortunately the U.S. president did nothing to confront Mr. Putin, did nothing to stand up to Mr. Putin, did nothing to defend either Ukraine or Belarus or human rights in Russia, in Belarus from Putin’s pressure.
Putin understands very well strength and weakness, and he saw the weakness of the U.S. leadership at the distance of his hand. That is why no doubt he would try to do everything possible to use this weakness to implement his strategic, darling goal for him, to create the so-called historic Russia and to attack Russia’s neighbors, trying to establish control over Ukraine, over Belarus, over part of Moldova, and maybe over other territories.
Q&A
Robert R. Reilly:
Well, that takes a moment to digest, but let me ask you what are the conditions under which he might make his next move? You say he can discern weakness and that he saw a weakness in Geneva, but does he have a strategy and if so there must be conditions for implementing it? I mean, for instance, in the Spring there were more than 80,000 Russian troops gathered not far from the border with Ukraine and fully deployed field hospitals, everything that the Russian military would need for a conflict, and of course, President Putin said this is just a standard military exercise, but [it was] close enough to the border that the NATO members were alarmed that he might move. Then slowly the troops are dispersed. He has done this more than once. Is the idea there to sort of wear down NATO to the point at which he does decide to move they are caught unaware and flat-footed and really can’t do anything about it? In other words is his next move military?
Andrei Illarionov:
Okay, first of all in March and April this year when there was this high concentration of the Russian troops along the Ukrainian borders and in the occupied Ukrainian territories like in Donbas and Crimea, Putin was not ready to launch a large-scale intervention into Ukrainian territory. Why? We know it for sure. The concentration of troops itself does not mean necessarily that Putin was ready to attack, to organize incursions because for that to do so it is necessary to have conditions, those conditions that you were talking about.
So the question arises what kind of conditions Putin needs to start a full scale operation. First of all, we have to look into how this concentration was going on. It was going on openly in the day time. In many cases all these troops were moving towards the border absolutely unmasked while in the downtowns or villages or cities hundreds of people were able to see it and to take pictures and videos, which they posted on social media. Only even that would be a very strong indication. It is not the case when Mr. Putin is going to attack.
When Mr. Putin attacked Georgia in August 2008 almost nobody was able to detect this concentration of over one hundred thousand troops on the borders of Georgia. When in the year 2014 in February and March Putin attacked Ukraine and occupied Crimea even U.S. intelligence publicly said, ‘We are not expecting that Putin is going to occupy Crimea.’ They had not seen it because they were hiding. In August 2014 none of the intelligence [analysts] were able to see a concentration of Russian troops to attack Ukrainians near Iloveisk. In January and February yet 2015 once again neither Ukrainian intelligence nor U.S. intelligence were able to see Russian troops that were going to attack near Debaltseve, so we can say that if Putin shows his troops, it means he is not going to attack. When he is going to attack, at least so far, intelligence on the ground is unable to detect it. At least it is not able to detect sufficiently enough to send a signal, yes, this is an alert to something, really, so this is the first one.
Second one, Mr. Putin did not concentrate enough forces near the borders. Just to start a really serious operation he needs more, even 80,000 or some people say one hundred thousand. It is not something that he is looking for. He is looking for something bigger than that.
Third and maybe the most important fact: in March [and] April this year there were American troops in Europe because they were preparing and participating in the military drills Defender Europe 2021. Putin has never attacked his neighbors when American troops are in Europe, never. He is waiting until American troops will finish their drills and will come back to the United States. That is the time for Putin.
Putin is a very calculating person. He has taken into care into account all the important conditions and the most important factor is that Putin himself is planning his own military drills, which is called West 2021, and those military drills will be organized together with Belarusian troops, and they will happen in September this year. And the military reels of such type allow so-called legitimately to concentrate a much larger military force than even what we have seen in March and April. We do not know how much, but based on the previous experience of Vapad or West 2017 and Center 2019 – I am using these names for military maneuvers that Putin was organizing four years ago and two years ago.
In the first case there were one hundred thousand troops who participated and the other one [had] one hundred and twenty-seven thousand, so that is why it cannot be excluded that it could be one hundred and fifty thousand troops, especially with better Russians at this moment plus about four hundred forty thousand in occupied Donbass, so that is why it might be that the total amount of troops that Putin can move towards Ukrainian borders might be one hundred and ninety thousand or even maybe two hundred thousand.
That is something serious that can he can use for large-scale interventions against Ukraine, but this time it will be not much. In April this year it would be a much higher risk of such operation. Later this year probably in September once again it is not a guarantee and we nobody can produce a guarantee, but we need to say that the risk of such crisis such operation in September this year is higher than this Spring.
Robert R. Reilly:
Let’s step back for a moment in order to ask you [about the concept of historic Russia]. You say that President Putin is very open about his vision of historic Russia and divided nation and obviously reuniting this divided nation. To what extent do you think do the Russian people or the peoples of Russia (because they are not all Russian) share this vision? Is this a source of popularity for Putin?
Andrei Illarionov:
Definitely, to some extent, yes, and he could capitalize on support of some part of the population on this revangelist or neo-imperialist vision and we have seen that after the intervention against Georgia his popularity jumped up very substantially and after the occupational annexation of Crimea it jumped up almost to 90 percent. It was 85, 86, even 87 or even 88 [percent] for some time and [the poll was] done by an independent sociological company so that is why at least some level of trust of confidence for such polls can be given. So that is why it was extremely popular and even such a term has been invented, ‘Crimean consensus,’ meaning that the support of this intervention and occupational annexation among the Russian population was extremely high.
So we do not know what will happen next time, if that next time will come, if Putin will organize another intervention but it cannot be excluded that such an operation would enjoy substantial popularity by the Russian population. But having said so I once again would underscore that with all due respect to this popularity issue, Putin has his own vision and his own vision for him seems to me is even more important than this popularity support because he feels himself – even sometimes he mentioned it, that he now is so high in his self-esteem that there is no one in the world that he can talk to except for Mahatma Gandhi, but Mahatma Gandhi is not with us anymore. So that is why he is kind of talking to the higher authorities in the skies or even maybe above the skies, and that is why he is trying to fulfill the sole God-given agenda to him regardless [of] what all those people around him are talking about.
Robert R. Reilly:
Does this mean that he takes the Russian Orthodox faith seriously himself or is he just using that as a means through which to exercise control as the Russian state has for so many years?
Andrei Illarionov:
Some observers are saying that okay this is really some kind of cover-up, that he is pretty cynical and he is just using [religion] to portray himself as a Christian person, but he is not. I have seen him in a number of situations that I can say, no, he is really some kind of devoted to this. But I would not say that the Christian religion – at least as I understand it and probably as many other people understand it because Christianity is also to not produce harm to others and to respect the dignity of other people. It is not such a Christianity. It is a very different type of Christianity, according to Mr. Putin, but when you can see him in some churches, when he is doing some prayers, yes, you would not have any doubt that it is something very deep in him. But once again it is something different from traditional or [the] very widespread understanding of Christianity.
Robert R. Reilly:
It is very interesting to hear you explain this grand vision and the extent to which Vladimir Putin is animated by it because many analysts of Russia here portray him as simply a Machiavellian opportunist whose principal concern is the preservation and augmentation of his power and the protection of those close to him whom he needs, and the protection of their assets as well so that there is nothing much to see there beyond this narrow self-interest. But you are painting a very different picture from those who say that kind of thing.
Andrei Illarionov:
Now, that is why you have invited me to the Westminster Institute and that is why I am saying what I have seen with my own eyes, and what is a result of my own analysis, and that is why thank you for this comparison to some American pundits who, frankly speaking, have a very limited understanding of Mr. Putin and of modern Russia, of the contemporary Russia. They are very popular here. Probably it is much more convenient to think about Putin as you have described, but it has a very, very big difference between that description and what Mr. Putin is himself.
Robert R. Reilly:
Can you then relate President Putin’s foreign policy to this grand vision? Help us understand his moves in Syria and Libya, his discrete uses of force there to gain a great deal. How do they relate to historic Russia or the divided nation thesis?
Andrei Illarionov:
It is not necessarily [that it] should be attributed to a historic Russia vision or some kind of re-unification of the so-called Russian people, including Ukraine because [there are] not many Ukrainians and the Russians in Syria, and Libya, and in other places.
Now, here he is doing his foreign policy of a much more traditional, imperial character, supporting the context with the brotherly tyrants and dictators around the world who are in need of support from Putin (political, diplomatic, military), from political police, and so on, sometimes financial, sometimes it is a kind of business-like relations, Venezuela, or something like that.
But there is one more element, which is also partially business-type relations and partially [an] ideological one because in all those cases [with] those countries, those regimes are authoritarians, dictatorships, and that is why he feels himself absolutely necessary to support them. This is some kind of dictators international and he understands if one of those dictators fall, it means the next one will be a next one and finally [it] will be him. So that is why by keeping them alive and on the floor it means he is strengthening himself. He does not allow them to fall, and that is why he supports the whole international.
And then in that particular business he felt that he has essentially only one serious adversary, the United States, and everybody understands that only one country in the world is physically able and [is] the right person at the top. The United States is able mentally to stand up in reality against Putin and able to crush his troops as it happened in year 2018 in Syria, yes, when the United States troops kind of destroyed private military company Wagner, which is essentially crazy Russian troops in Syria. That was the first time for any U.S.-Russian military contact that ended with total elimination of this particular group, about 200 troops.
And Mr. Putin learned this lesson very well, that if somebody is in the White House (and it the time President Trump was in the White House) who either can give an order or he would not resist using force by the American military, his troops can be destroyed within minutes or hours. And that is why the most important thing that he is looking for [is] the level of readiness of the current U.S. president to use force to defend freedom, liberties, rule of law, independence of different countries around the world, so that is why he tested each president one by one, whether they [are] able or not. He thought that George Bush would not use American force and that is why he moved Russian troops into Georgia.
And it was [at that] moment that there was a very big, very serious debate in the White House, in the Bush White House, whether to use U.S. force or not. And on August 11 year 2008 George Bush appeared near the White House flanked by his Secretary of Defense and his Assistant for National Security and he said, ‘Okay, I would not recommend Mr. Putin to make another step.’ And [the] U.S. Navy moved to the Black Sea and the U.S. Air Force moved to bases in Turkey and Romania. The next day, August 12th, Mr. Medvedev, who was officially President of Russia, announced that [the] operation in Georgia [was] finished. That was a decision [that] was affected, influenced by [the] decision of George Bush, President of the United States.
Then Putin tested Mr. Obama in year 2014 when he moved his troops into Crimea, and we remember what Obama answered. He said publicly, ‘I am not going using American troops to defend Ukraine.” What Mr. Putin said [was], ‘Thank you very much, Mr. Obama, I suspected that you would not use troops, but thank you very much for telling openly that you are not going to use troops, but I will.’ And he did use troops and he occupied Crimea and an accident and he moved troops into eastern Donbass.
When he met President Trump, he could not figure out whether Trump would use troops or not in the year 2018. It became clear when the ChVK, or the private military company Wagner, was destroyed in Syria. And Mr. Putin understood probably it is better not to try to test Mr. Trump anymore because nobody knows what will happen after that, but when Mr. Biden appeared in White House forum posting [it] became absolutely clear that Biden would never dare to stand up to Mr. Putin, and that is why [the] next day after inauguration [there] was a substantial jump in hostilities on the Russian-Ukrainian line in Ukraine in Donbass. Five days later Putin started to put pipeline Nord Stream 2 in the Baltic Sea, and so on, and so on.
And especially now, after the Geneva Summit for Mr. Putin [it] became absolutely clear, one hundred percent clear, that Biden would not use any force against Russia, not [use] any force to defend Ukraine, not even to supply necessary weapons or whatever to defend Ukraine. It means Biden gave a green light for new adventures of Putin against his neighbors.
Robert R. Reilly:
In his various contestations with the United States does that also increase Putin’s popularity at home?
Andrei Illarionov:
It is hard to see it so simply because definitely there are some people who are happy with that, but there are some people [who are] unhappy. When there [are] some material results like [the] acquisition of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, with occupation, that is very visible, our troops moved to another territory. Another was the acquisition, [the] so-called ‘acquisition’ of Crimea and eastern Donbas, okay, Russian troops again moved there, so this is [a] visible [triumph]. It is not necessary to have any propaganda campaign because this is a fact of life. Al these details, all this peculiarity in diplomacy are not so visible, and that is why it is not very clear what is going on, but when there is something that can be presented, that is a different story.
Robert R. Reilly:
Now, just to go back to Syria and the American troops, wiping out the Wagner Group in 2018, would you extrapolate from that on the quality of [the] Russian military today, that when you said wherever [there is] the potential of American military force being used, then Putin will back [off] because he thinks those American forces are militarily superior or more capable? Is that [correct]?
Andrei Illarionov:
No, for that purpose we definitely need to have a serious, good military expert and maybe not one, who would provide us with information, with the approaches, and as we all understand this is actually [a] crucial element for any military preparation and any military analysis. We cannot do it, but let me say that at least equally important on the quality of troops on the ground, maybe even more important than the quality of troops on the ground, is the quality of the leadership, military leadership and political leadership, because even if this strong army has as we call it, ‘a sheep at the top, even they have lions in the ranks, that army would lose to the army of sheep if the leader is a lion.’ It is an old saying, but essentially it says if the military and political leadership is cowardly [and] weak, they, not by definition, but in many cases, would lose to the more aggressive, more organized, more determined adversary even if that adversary has wicked troops.
Robert R. Reilly:
Well, just as a side note, the military modernization undertaken by Russia with President Putin is impressive. They have developed some very impressive weaponry as well as nuclear modernization. Now, how does President Putin see the ‘historic Russia’ or the vision of a reunited, divided nation play into the behemoth to his south, China, and the closer relationship and what appears to be a developing strategic partnership with China, which is obviously a far larger economy and military power than Russia?
Andrei Illarionov:
For Putin, it became one of the most important decisions that he has taken. In [the] year 2000 when he became Russian president for the first time, he did not have such a vision and he did not have such an approach. In [the] early days and years of his presidency, he wanted to develop relations with the West. He wanted to develop relations with the United States. He wanted to develop relations, strategic relations, [a] strategic partnership with the United States and NATO. Not once, [but multiple times], Putin said both publicly and privately at diplomatic negotiations with the Western leaders that he would be interested if Russia would become a full-fledged member of NATO. He said it not once, [but multiple times] to George Bush, Jr. when he was the President of the United States.
Probably, historians of [the] future [will] devote to this particular story, not a single volume, [but multiple volumes], trying to understand what happened and why the Western leaders rejected Putin, why they refused to take him, why they said Russia will not be taken into NATO, and after March [of the] year 2003, after launching [the] operation in Iraq against Saddam Hussein, that honeymoon between Putin on one hand and Bush on the other hand ended. That was probably one-and-a-half years from 9/11 up to March 2003, when the issue of Russia potentially joining NATO was really on [the] table of Putin, and he was absolutely serious in discussing these options with his Western colleagues.
Robert R. Reilly:
What did he think he had to gain by joining NATO?
Andrei Illarionov:
Security. Everybody in this world, [every] responsible leader of any country, is looking for security, and Putin at that time considered China as the main threat to Russia.
Robert R. Reilly:
I see. Okay, that is the perfect answer.
Andrei Illarionov:
And that is why he considered that Russia as a member of the Western alliance would guarantee, would provide the best security for the country and for himself. The only decisive answer known given by the West to Putin forced him to think what other options are available, and he found that he could develop relations with China, and it took years for him. It was not overnight, it was years of difficult, lengthy conversations and negotiations with China, developing [a] new level of trust between two former adversaries. Finally, it reached some particular level that [had] never been achieved in the history of Russia-Chinese relations. And now, as Putin himself said in his recent interview to NBC, it is late for you, trying to destroy our union, our strategic partnership with China.
Once again: this is a topic of enormous interest and enormous analysis. What might [have been] achieved in [the] early 2000s if the Western leaders [had said] yes to Mr. Putin, [had started] to work in this direction, to set criteria, to set conditions, and so on. What kind of world might be and what kind of Russia might be in this particular situation?
Robert R. Reilly:
Well, Russia was given an office in NATO headquarters.
Andrei I;larionov:
No, it is a joke, no, no, no. We are not talking about this kind of story, we are talking about really serious relations, about [a] serious partnership. This office was a kind of compensation for not inviting Russia as a potential full-fledged member in the alliance.
Robert R. Reilly:
You might talk a bit about why Iraq was so important to Putin and why that was the point at which he forsook any close development with NATO or with the United States. I had thought previous to that the U.S. actions in the former Yugoslavia created a huge amount of damage in the relationship with Russia.
Andrei Illarionov:
Probably, yes, but it was Yeltsin’s Russia, it was not Putin, who was taking the most important decisions at that time. He was already in the in the higher echelons of the Russian government, but it was not him who was taking the most important decisions, but the story with Iraq was a different one because he did have personal conversations and negotiations with George Bush many times, and they had developed a substantial level of trust, personal trust between each other, and that is why Putin himself felt, if you allow me to say so, betrayed because he thought that based on this level of trust he would be consulted about Iraq, and he was not. And he even tried to contact and to talk to Bush. I do not know details.
Maybe only these two persons can say what exactly happened, but it looks like Bush decided not to share some important intelligence or data or his intentions or his plans. And Putin, for himself, started to feel that if in this particular situation he could be betrayed as he thought, it could happen any in any other situation.
Robert R. Reilly:
That is strong language, betrayal. Is it because Iraq had been a Soviet client state?
Andrei Illarionov:
Correct, yes.
Robert R. Reilly:
Okay, well, then thinking back to what you call a historic opportunity to have developed a closer relationship with Russia or even allowed it inside of NATO, today in the United States as you well know there is a bipartisan consensus that the greatest challenge the United States faces today is China, just as in years past it was the Soviet Union, and thus this relationship between the United States and Mao Zedong took place. And it would be in the great interest of the United States if it was able to lure Russia away from this strategic partnership with China today, but from what you say, the train has left the station and Putin has indicated it is too late.
Andrei Illarionov:
Yes, it is true.
Robert R. Reilly:
Do you not think though, in the long run, speaking of history, that that decision may come back to harm Russia because China is by far the senior partner in that relationship and there are many Chinese in Siberia now. They may have a dream of a historic China that includes parts of Russia.
Andrei Illarionov:
All of this is very well known in Russia. It is very well known to Putin. It is not the problem. The problem is trust and this is a very important issue. It is [a] very important issue in international relations, in diplomacy, and especially in interpersonal diplomacy. If there is no interpersonal trust, it is impossible to build any serious relations. The problem with the current leader of Russia [is] he does not feel that he is being trusted by Americans or Westerns, and it is not a very big surprise [because] he is not trusted. Everybody says, including the current U.S. President, that he does not trust Mr. Putin.
Why should he develop any serious long-term relations if he is not trusted? And, by the way, Putin himself does not trust Western leaders, so that is why at least until Putin is [out of the] Kremlin, it is impossible to expect anything like that regardless of what might be [the] consequences of that level [of] trust or mistrust. It is just impossible.
But when Mr. Putin [goes] and instead of Mr. Putin it will be somebody else in Russia, the same question will arise again: how to develop trust between future Russian leaders, future Russian leadership and the leadership of Western countries. Without that trust, it would be impossible to build [a] strategic partnership or union or to include Russia into [a] future NATO or any other security alliance. It would be impossible. That is a very important element.
Robert R. Reilly:
But the trust has to be based upon on something and if Mr. Putin’s successor would be as animated by a vision of historic Russia as you say he is, that leader might be very hard to trust, as well.
Andrei Illarionov:
We do not know who will be the next leader.
Robert R. Reilly:
We do not know or whether they will share that.
Andrei Illarionov:
And we do not know what kind of views the next leader will [have] towards historic Russia. This concept is developed by Putin. It does not necessarily [mean] that other people even in his close entourage would share his views in this regard.
Robert R. Reilly:
Is that right?
Andrei Illarionov:
Some of them, yes, might be, but some of them not, and definitely, in Russia there are many people who are Western-oriented people and who do see [a] future Russia in the union with Western countries.
Robert R. Reilly:
Let me ask you a couple of questions in our closing moments that pertain more to the character of Russia in terms of its past. If we have time we will go to the corruption issue, which was one of the three main reasons you said you resigned from the Putin administration. Many deeply observant people, some of whom were Russian, [like] Vladimir Bukovsky [and] the American David Sander, have said that Russia is still not a normal place because it has not met the character of its Soviet past and the tremendous evils that were visited upon the Soviet peoples at that time.
You may recall that Bukovsky tried to persuade Yeltsin to have the equivalent of the Nuremberg trials except in Moscow, not with the intention of hanging people or engaging in severe punishments, but just a public admission of the evil that had taken place in the Gulag and the terrible repression of the Soviet state. And Bukovsky was extremely discouraged that that did not happen, and, of course, it still has not happened.
And David Satter in his books on Russia, on both the Soviet Union and Russia, speaks very deeply about this, that you cannot be normal until moral reality is publicly restored and you cannot just whitewash it with, well, we are all Russian Orthodox right now. Now, President Putin definitely does not seem to be one who has looked in that direction at all. First of all, do you agree with that that analysis?
Andrei Illarionov:
Yes, definitely.
Robert R. Reilly:
You do, yeah? But you do not see any hope for that happening?
Andrei Illarionov:
Under Mr. Putin? Definitely no chance.
Robert R. Reilly:
Andrei Illarionov:
Definitely not, okay. I remember a very electric moment when Yakovlev made a statement in the Soviet press, and I had met him about a year prior to that in Moscow, where he was just giving us the standard Soviet propaganda line in the meeting we had with him, but he made a statement that he had come to see that that Leninism was based upon class hatred and that this was evil. And I was working in the government at that time, and I faxed his statement to everyone, saying it is over, you know, the head, really the number two fellow in the Politburo, has said this is evil, and he is now using Ronald Reagan’s language, “evil empire.” He is saying it is evil.
And I thought that there was a real turning of the soul in Yakovlev as he dedicated the rest of his life to the terrible religious persecution that had taken place in Russia. It was very impressive. I never had the sense Gorbachev had that turning of the soul, and obviously a Putin has not had such a turning of the soul.
Well, sorry for that little speech.
Andrei Illarionov:
Let me just to comment a little bit on what you are saying. You are absolutely right, and this is a very important background, some kind of preliminary step. First of all, you need to have some kind of moral cleaning, some kind of coming back with moral grounds before you can make next steps. If in [a] moral sense your soul is rotten, you cannot build anything really healthy and free and promising, something like that, so that is why it is absolutely necessary to do it. And we know that all cases of flourishing, whatever, personal freedom, human liberties, rule of law, real equality in terms of legal equality of people, and so on, all these cases were based on very clear moral standards that [were] followed by those people who were in the power.
And we see how when we are looking not only in the kind of third world countries, but even looking in the first world in the most developed part of the world, when we see the pillars of the free society crumbling, why [is that happening]? We understand that those people who are at the top do not have these moral principles. They do not follow these moral principles, they follow some other principle, and it is not in the laws, it is not in constitutions, it is not in so-called institutions of the society. It is in the moral grounds of individuals internally, and if those individuals are lacking those moral principles inside of them, then everything is possible, and that is why the moral foundations of free societies, of Western societies are started to crumble.
Robert R. Reilly:
I could not agree with you more about that, but that brings us to the question of corruption in Russia, which is, of course, a moral problem, and it creates enormous economic problems, as well.
Andrew Illarionov:
You mentioned one of the reasons of my resignation. I can give you just a little story, which was behind that. I was invited to the meeting of Putin with a very close group of people. It was a dozen people there, and they were discussing how to steal $12 billion U.S. dollars from the Russian government assets. Because I was a latecomer to this discussion, I was the last person because as I learned from this meeting, they already agreed about this and just by some kind of coincidence, by mistake, they invited me. I never participated before, and there was Putin there. There was Mr. Medvedyev. Then he was the head of administration, and lately he became for some period of time President of Russia, as well. There was the Minister of Finance, the Minister of the Economy, the head of the central bank, the head of the presidential administration, and many other people, just kind of a dozen of them.
And they were talking [about] what would be the best way to steal $12 billion U.S. dollars. When I happened [to be] there and I listened to them, I said that it is illegal, it is criminal, it is against the criminal code of the Russian Federation. I was the only person, among these dozens of people, who said those words. And only one person understood me immediately and well. It was Mr. Putin, who in his body language immediately took it back and said, hey, it is not me, it is them, they discuss that, and we talked about that, but from this discussion [it became] clear that they [had] already decided.
And Putin for the first time he did not support me. Usually, he supported me and became neutral, and it became clear that he is part of this group. And the only one time that he intervened that I disclosed because I studied this case. And I said that just one of them was trying to steal out of this $12 billion dollars, $1.5 billion for himself, not sharing this money with others, and it was some kind of betraying this group of people, that they are not only kind of sharing this amount, but this part he is taking for himself. And it angered Putin. He started to reprimand that person, saying come on, how is it possible?
For me, it was enough. What was the force that was driving me? Legal issues, constitution, law, friendship? No, moral basis for myself. There was nobody around who would kind of judge whether [it was] right or not. For me, it was impossible to participate in this business, unlike others. For others, it was normal. Okay, that day they discussed $12 billion U.S. dollars, another small amount. The next day it will be a large amount. It does not matter.
For them, there were no more problems because there were no cameras, TV cameras. There were no journalists. Nobody would even have any knowledge about this stealing operation, especially in such [an] authoritarian regime or dictatorship. Nobody would know this, so they were absolutely sure that it would be absolutely hidden, and they could easily do it. Why? Because when they did not have moral limitations for undertaking [such corruption], who can stand up to them? Those who follow it, not only whatever official institutions or laws, but [people] who [have] different moral foundations.
Robert R. Reilly:
So is it too extreme to call Russia a kleptocracy?
Andrei Illarionov:
I do not like to make such a generalization because it depends on people. There are some kleptocrats and there are very honest people even inside of the Russian government
Robert R. Reilly:
Still?
Andrei Illarionov:
Even in the Russian administration, yes, definitely, so that is why, yes, you can say so, but it does not produce additional, new meaning. You do not have nothing. Okay, you would find kleptocrats in the U.S. government, you know, people who are corrupted.
Robert R. Reilly:
Well, not who can take a billion at a sitting.
Andrei Illarionov:
But the problem is not about size, the problem is about the effect.
Robert R. Reilly:
No, no, I undertand, it is about character.
Andrei Illarionov:
Yes.
Robert R. Reilly:
So, I will close with just this because the other reason was the consolidation of the Siloviki. So, at what stage did you see Russia had sort of reached the point of no return in terms of the control by this group?
Andrei Illarionov:
The crucial point was in 1999 when Yeltsin appointed Putin as a Prime Minister because that time he appointed the head of FSB, the political police, at the position of the Prime Minister. And later that year on December 31st, he gave the power, acting president’s power, to Putin. That was the turning point. After that it [was] impossible to change.
Robert R. Reilly:
But you did not realize that until 2005 or there was still hope?
Andrei Illarionov:
No, that just you need to acquire information and just I studied this information, who did what because not all these actions were visible.
Robert R. Reilly:
I see.
Andrei Illarionov:
Some people now claim, okay, they saw it. Okay, they were so smart, not like me, but I was also busy with economic program. You mentioned some of the acts that I was doing with Michael like that, but when I studied when there was a turning point, I came to a very firm conclusion it was 1999.
Robert R. Reilly:
Andrei, thank you very much for that insightful and, indeed, provocative talk and series of reflections. We most appreciate it.
Andrei Illarionov:
Thank you, Robert, for inviting [me]. It was a pleasure to be with you.
Robert R. Reilly:
And thank you those of you who have joined us for this program, which is available on the Westminster Institute website, and it appears along with our other videos on a variety of subjects, including about Russia, China, the Middle East on our Westminster YouTube channel, so I hope you will join us in the future for other such programs. I am Bob Reilly, your host.