Анджела Стент - Putin's World - Russia Against the West and with the Rest

In the aftermath of the Soviet collapse, Germany was a major source of economic support as Russia embarked on its difficult post-communist transition. Moscow realized that German gratitude for unification and concern that Russia’s weakness had the potential to disrupt European security were two key sources of Russian leverage. Moreover, Germany believed that it understood Russia’s situation better than other countries, drawing on its own experiences after its defeat in 1945. Unlike the United States, which initially hoped Russia’s transformation from a socialist to a democratic, free-market state would happen fairly quickly, the Germans realized it would take many decades. During Yeltsin’s tenure as president, Germany—despite having to deal with the daunting economic and social challenges of its own unification—was the stronger partner, supporting the Yeltsin administration politically and economically, and acting as Russia’s advocate in European structures. It was an asymmetrical interdependence that Russian leaders recognized and sometimes resented. Four major bilateral issues dominated their relationship in the 1990s: troop withdrawals, ethnic Germans, economic ties, and Germany’s support for Russia’s domestic evolution.

In 1990, there were 546,000 Soviet troops and their dependents in the GDR. As a result of the negotiations that ended Germany’s division, Russia had agreed to withdraw its troops within four years, but the process was not only a logistical challenge for both Russia and Germany but enormously confusing. To which country would these “Soviet” soldiers return? Once the USSR split into fifteen independent countries, how would these military personnel determine where they belonged (for instance, 30 percent of the officer corps was ethnically Ukrainian)? Who would provide housing for them? Withdrawing such a huge military machine held many potential pitfalls. As they withdrew from their military bases, the soldiers took with them anything that was not chained to the floor. Yet despite these challenges, all the soldiers had left by 1994. Given the obstacles, it is remarkable that the operation proceeded as smoothly as it did. 37

The situation of ethnic Germans in post-Soviet Russia also caused consternation after 1990. Many of these descendants of settlers—brought over by Catherine the Great and deported to Kazakhstan and Siberia from the Volga region after the German invasion of the USSR in 1941—had sought to emigrate to the Federal Republic during the Soviet period. At that point they sought to leave an oppressive political system and pursue better economic opportunities in Germany. After unification, with all the economic burdens it faced, Germany tried to encourage ethnic Germans to remain in post-communist Russia but was largely unsuccessful. These people wanted to escape the chaos in Russia and no longer faced the same barriers to emigration as they had in Soviet times. Altogether, 1.2 million ethnic Germans have emigrated from the former Soviet states to Germany since unification, and ironically, many of them now form a reliably pro-Putin bloc.

Germany became Russia’s most important economic partner after unification. Russia anticipated that Germany would be a major source of economic assistance, trade, and investment for its emerging market economy. The complementary character of the economic relationship continued, with Russia exporting oil, gas, and other raw materials to Germany and importing German finished goods. The German private sector remained involved in the Russian economy but was cautious about investing during the Yeltsin era, given the absence of the rule of law and the paucity of an enforceable legal structure to protect investments. Indeed, the most dynamic period of Russia-German economic ties began only after the Russian financial crash of 1998, when the economy had begun to recover. In the 1990s, Germany also contributed to and supplemented American programs designed to help secure and dismantle Russian nuclear weapons and materials and reduce the dangers of proliferation by providing safeguards for nuclear facilities. Germany offered training to unemployed nuclear scientists in the Russian Federation so they could find alternative jobs instead of selling their skills to countries or terrorist groups seeking to acquire nuclear weapons.

While Germany supported US security programs, German policy toward Russia during this time—and since then—has differed from US policy in one major area: democracy promotion. Promoting democracy abroad often has been part of US foreign policy—albeit selectively applied—but it never has been a central element in the German foreign policy tool kit. During the Clinton administration (1993–2001), a variety of NGOs—some allied with the two main American political parties—participated actively in democracy promotion in Russia after the Soviet collapse. All the German political parties had their foundations open offices in Moscow and work with different political groups, but they eschewed overt democracy promotion and direct interference in the way groups were organized.

As one representative of a German political foundation put it, “We see the Russians as partners with whom we must work and take a long-term approach, which features continuous dialogues and bringing younger Russians to Germany.” 38Chancellor Schroeder was quite explicit about the inadvisability of overt democracy promotion: “The Russian reality of a multinational state demands different rules than Holland does.” He told George W. Bush, “In Russian history (including the most recent) no real foundation for democracy has been laid.” But, he added, he was convinced that Putin really wanted to democratize. So two decades later, when Putin closed down all the US NGOs actively working in democracy promotion, the German political foundations were able to remain in Russia. 39

From 1998 to 1999, the German-Russian relationship experienced strains. The Russian economic crisis, the succession of five prime ministers in Moscow between March 1998 and August 1999, and Yeltsin’s failing health and erratic behavior adversely affected ties. Moreover, other European developments caused further strains in bilateral relations, most notably the 1999 enlargement of NATO to include Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic, as well as the Kosovo War—both of which Germany supported and Russia opposed. By the end of 1999, therefore, with Yeltsin on his way out, a fragile economy, and growing Russian alienation from the West, the Germany-Russia relationship appeared to be on a downward path.

In his essay “Russia at the Turn of the Millennium,” published on December 30, 1999, meant to introduce him to Russians and to the world as he entered the Kremlin, Putin laid out his vision for his time in office. He acknowledged the myriad of economic, social, and political problems Russia faced—a year after the ruble collapsed—and promised to rebuild the state and make Russia a great power again. Although he acknowledged Russia’s European roots, he also highlighted the exceptionalism of the Russian Idea—based on people’s desire for a strong state and patriotism. Putin’s definition of what that meant in 1999 is notable: “A strong state power in Russia is a democratic, law-based, workable federative state.” 40

Putin was largely unknown outside the small circle of foreigners who had met him in Saint Petersburg in the early 1990s; after spending a year looking for work when he returned from the GDR, Putin’s former law professor and the mayor of the city, Anatoly Sobchak, had hired him. At the beginning of Putin’s presidency, Chancellor Schroeder, like his other European counterparts, was cautious about him, with his dual biographies of KGB officer in East Germany and assistant to the reformist mayor of Saint Petersburg. Although Putin had committed himself to pursuing economic reforms and further modernization of Russia, he had also launched the Second Chechen War in 1999. Nevertheless, his initial commitment to greater economic integration with the West, to more effective governance, and to battling corruption found a sympathetic ear in most of Europe. Early on in his tenure, Putin concentrated on cultivating ties with Germany as the first step to restoring Russia’s position as a great power.