From Ariel Cohen in the Washington Times:
Vladimir Putin's visit to Saudi Arabia Feb. 11 was the first ever for any Russian or Soviet leader. Mr. Putin also visited U.S. allies Jordan and Qatar.Coming from Munich, where he delivered his most bellicose anti-American speech, Mr. Putin further delineating a Russian Middle Eastern policy at odds with Washington in an interview with Al Jazeera.
Mr. Putin reiterated Russia's opposition to the Iraq war, and disputed the justice of Saddam Hussein's execution.
He was also critical of U.S. democracy promotion in the Middle East, citing the empowerment of Hamas and Hezbollah as a result of parliamentary elections promoted by Washington.
He may have a point there.
Mr. Putin summed up Russia's new foreign policy and Middle East policy as follows:From the viewpoint of stability in this or that region or in the world, the balance of power is the main achievement of these last decades and indeed of the whole history of humanity. It is one of the most important conditions for maintaining global stability and security. This realpolitik talk was praised in Arab capitals, where the old Soviet anti-Western and anti-Israel stance is still remembered fondly. King Abdullah I of Saudi Arabia bestowed the King Faisal Award on Mr. Putin, calling him "a statesman, a man of peace, a man of justice." Quite a turnaround from the jihad funded against the Soviets by the Saudis 20 years ago during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. It is also worth noting that Saudi Arabia officially decries the 100,000 killed and 500,000 displaced Muslims in Chechnya, while private groups in the Gulf support terrorists there.
A number of factors drive Mr. Putin's recent rhetoric and Middle East actions:
(1) By embracing monarchies and Iran's Islamist authoritarianism, he signals Russia's continuous distancing from Western norms of internal political behavior.
(2) Russia is following the Soviet model of opposing first British and then the U.S. presence in the Middle East by playing to anti-Western sentiment in the "street" and among the elites. Mr. Putin solidified the Kremlin's public diplomacy message, emphasizing its differences with Washington.
(3) The Russian leadership is concerned with the high Muslim birthrates in Russia, especially as the Slavic Orthodox population is declining. Russia is facing an increasingly radicalized Muslim population along its southern "soft underbelly", particularly in the North Caucasus, where two Chechen rebellions, though effectively crushed, led to the spread of Salafi Islam. Many young Russian Muslims view themselves more as members of the global Islamic Ummah (community), than as citizens of Mother Russia. Keeping Muslim powers such as Saudi Arabia and Iran at bay, preventing them from supporting insurgencies in Eurasia, and toning down radicalization through Islamist education and propaganda is an unspoken but important item on the Kremlin's agenda.
(4) Finally, Russia is a high-cost oil producer, the largest oil producer in the world, the largest oil exporter outside of OPEC, and the largest gas producer. As such, it is interested in maintaining a high-energy price environment, usually generated by tensions and conflicts in the Middle East. Russia is perfectly willing to sell weapons to both sides of the growing Sunni-Shia divide. As one Russian observer put it, weapons sales create allies. Russia is using weapons and nuclear reactor sales the way Imperial Germany used railroads -- to bolster influence and to undermine the dominant power in the Middle East.
[...]
After a 20-year hiatus, Russia is forcing its way back through the open Middle East door. Washington decisionmakers had better take note.
Why now? Doesn't his term as president end this year? Or is he planning to make himself permanent?
His hand picked successor will be 'elected' and Puty Put's power will continue unabated as the power behind the throne. He is a throwback to Commie Days and is a Russian nationalist who trusts nobody. Patton must be rolling over in his grave.
No, in the Commie days, they temporarily had a rule about age limits for the General Secretary of the CPSU, which was applied to Kryuschyov, and was repealed by the CPSU to allow Brezhnev to serve for life. So far, under the Russian constitution, Yeltsin served for 8 years, and Putin's reign ends I think this year.
He is already a supremo - if he wanted to be president for life, he can.
From item 4 above, looks like Russia is doing what Hugh keeps urging us to do - keep that fight alive.
putin is just furthering the policies of soviet union which is causing harm to america and west and ignoring the threat that islam poses to russia itself.if putin is thinking that by making islam as its ally,it will defeat usa,then he is living in a fool's paradise as islam has no friends.see what taliban did to usa after america helped taliban to expel soviet forces from afghanistan.russia should take lessons from american experience because islam has the tendency to stab in the back as islam is deceitful and barbaric.islam does not consider anyone as its friend but only the expansion of ummah as the main aim.russia with its inherent hatred of america will be doomed to defeat.russia will lose any remaining power it has by allying with islam.remember islam is all about deception.
russia knows how to deal with the koranimals, I have yet to find a russian that says nice things about muslims.
Behind over, USA, here it comes again...
Long ago in my days in the academy in foreign affairs, we who were studying Soviet foreign policy used to joke-- in a sinister way -- that the West was largely safe as long as the Soviets had a communist/Marxist economy. They would stagnate, and no matter what happened, we could triumph.
But the other side, of course, was the proverbial elephant in the room....now you have the worst possible scenario for the US....an authoritarian, market economy (Russian style complete with mafia and corruption that is also a throw back to their pre-Leninist days), again wholly manifesting their usual inferiority complex internationally...and VOILA...you have a menace of unimaginable proportions. And yet, NOW with the elements of real success.
Of course, the morons running our Western countries don't get it. Putin has the EU by the short hairs in terms of gas and oil, and not really wanting to fight their way out of the Eurabia they themselves have created, what can now be the outcome? Squaring off the Russians against the Chinese? Letting Europe slide into Islamic oblivion? A pro-Russian Middle East? And who stands with the West? Who REALLY?
No matter how you think of what the next ten years will be, it will be ugly....when the extreme movements in the world -- totalitarian Islam, Maoism, the vicious Leftish movements worldwide unite as it appears they are -- what exactly is out there to help who remains? The morons running the US, I can tell you, are too busy trying to invoke some "let's hold hands and sing koombaya" platitudes to understand the magnitude of what we face as a civilization.
Our dear "public servants" are soooooo busy picking up checks for their campaigns from these same monsters -- Chinese, Arabs, big corporations controlled by the above -- and so forth. They spend more time trying to avoid campaign financing laws than worrying about what might happen next week that it's sickening. It's sounding more and more like the decline of the Roman Republic all over again....after all, when the barbarians were pouring down over the Roman walls all over the Roman Empire, there really wasn't anyone left to fight them off, was there? Sounds like Washington.
I think at the end of the day, Russia is going to play the pivotal "wildcard" role in the war against Jihad.
One the one hand, slow Jihad is going to overtake them before most other European countries. Russia is capable of brutality that the West is not. Russia does not suffer from any type of PC illness.
On the other hand, their foreign policy is actively seeking to cause trouble for the west.
My bet is that they will cause a lot of trouble in the near to medium future, and will only be helpful after the problem gets a lot worse.
For someone who likes to make analogies to famous characters in movies/literature/etc.---Russia is Anakin.
Infidel Pride said
Hugh has recommended exploiting the internal conflicts within the ummah, that is true, but I don't remember him recommending that we infidels should sell weapons to them. You never know who those weapons will eventually be used against.
And does anyone, besides this reporter, really think that Russia is gaining control of the Middle East? Putin is being used, whether he knows it or not.
What's the matter? Russia doesn't make enough billions from its oil, that it needs to earn extra cash form weapons sales to the same Muslims who pose a demographic threat?
By collaborating with Islam, Putin is effectively forcing Russia to commit national suicide.
Keeping Muslim powers such as Saudi Arabia and Iran at bay, preventing them from supporting insurgencies in Eurasia, and toning down radicalization through Islamist education and propaganda is an unspoken but important item on the Kremlin's agenda.
If this is what they really think that the saudi's are going to "tone down islamic progaganda", they are delisional..
If the saudis ever get a foothold in the real islamic sleeping giants (Kazakstan, Turkmeinistan, Tajikistan etc.) and turn them radical, they are in serious trouble... Chechnya is just the begining...
Please read Spenger's article (from Asiatimes) entitled "Russia's Hudna with the Moslem world" here.
He was also critical of U.S. democracy promotion in the Middle East, citing the empowerment of Hamas and Hezbollah as a result of parliamentary elections promoted by Washington.
Of course, it would never occur to anyone that maybe the Moslem voters are the ones at fault.
Kafir Nonbeliever brilliant article by Spenger. I wholly agree with the article. Russia is fighting for its life and America does not feel the urgency. The russians know how to fight Islam america does not. There is no appeasement in Putin's trip this is just diplomacy. The Russians crushed the chechnyan rebels and are welcomed in the middle east while the US is trying to establish a democracy and are hated. And I agree with Spenger that Russia is a naturaly ally as he puts it they are real men while the europeans are emasculated remnants of a dying civilization and that the europeans don't have the stomach to fight off their eventual assimilation into the muslim world.
Putin is being a fool. His country is collapsing all around him. The Russian "growth" rate is already negative, thanks to an abortion rate of ca. 50% (i.e. half of Russian pregnancies end in abortion). Russia is projected to lose 1/4 of its population by 2050. And it is virtually unique in having a decreasing life expectancy, thanks to rampant alcoholism. He should be doing everything possible to reverse the situation. The Russian energy billions should provide enough revenue for any number of social programs. Instead he wastes his time acting like a big player in world affairs. Get your own house in order first, Mr. Putin.
Putin is no fool. While Bush runs around appointing Muslims to his cabinet (UN Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad) and spouting absurdities about "Arab Democracy" and the Religion of Peace, Putin is engaging in old-fashioned real-politik. So who's the fool? I'd trust Putin over Bush any day.
Infidel Pride:
Or is he planning to make himself permanent?
Yes, very likely. The Russians have mastered the art of taxidermy and embalming - so it would dead easy to turn Putin into a stuffed dummy
Or is he planning to make himself permanent?
Not as president. After his term is up, most likely he will become CEO of Gazprom, the Russian oil and natural gas giant.
Putin is definitely a far more savvy leader than George Bush can ever dream of being. I see varied opinions here, but the ones that perplex me the most is questioning Russia's selling arms in the mid-east.
I see more logic in selling arms to both sides that want to annihilate each other, than what the US administration has been doing for decades; giving free arms to their enemies and supplying monetary aid which has been used against American and western interests.
How many jizya payments to Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Turkey, Egypt, Bosnia, and now Kosovo are needed before we see the problem lies on this side of the world. Pissedoffcanadian is right the Russians are brutal, they have basically wiped Chechnya off of the face of the earth, and quite simply would do it again. Meanwhile in the west we still can't come to grips with what is needed to be done to win this war.
Putin in the end will show his cards, and one day we'll see he had his game right, while we here may just be waking up wearing funny looking pyjamas, beards and listening to some strange chanting over a loud speaker.
Kafir Nonbeliever thanks for the link, very telling and true.