Michael Stuermer - Putin and the Rise of Russia

But Russia has to be careful in assessing the damage, including the damage to its own national interest. Support from its Central Asian friends was slow in coming. The Chinese signalled open disapproval. The impact on all those inside Russia dreaming of self-determination is not difficult to guess. The wider repercussions across the whole of Asia will become clearer as time goes by.

There is no need to look for a repeat performance of the Cold War. At best what could and should be restored is a healthy respect for the other side, its instincts and its needs, including face-saving, inspired by nuclear weapons and resulting not only in the vast and complex arms-control architecture but also in a sense of global responsibility. Moreover, ever since the dual crisis over Berlin and Cuba in 1958–1962, an exercise in brinkmanship if ever there was one, both superpowers were united in an informal but effective cartel of war avoidance. This also included respecting security distances and zones of influence.

Today, a new Great Game is taking shape. The new rules, however, are not fixed. The new players are inexperienced, ignoring at their own peril – and at everybody else’s peril – the rules so painfully learned at the time of the great confrontation. The so-called ‘post-cold-war’ period has come to an end. A new era of limited confrontation has begun. Confrontation and competition, but also cooperation in an uncertain mix, are on the agenda. US neo-containment meets Russia’s imperial instincts and uncertainties. Where does the US democracy mission find its limits? And where does Russia’s Near Abroad end? Maybe at the border posts. Maybe where Russians live, many on the other side of those posts. Two uncertain giants are moving in uncertain directions, sure of where to draw the red lines which the other side must not cross, but unsure about self-restraint and that brutal discipline which, at the time of the Cold War, nuclear weapons imposed on those in power.

Will the Europeans pull themselves together and finally, in the face of mounting danger, translate economic power into international muscle? This is hard to believe, given the recent experience when Europeans where faced with the Caucasus imbroglio: the East Europeans firmly on the side of the US, the West Europeans including Germany trying desperately to steer clear of a new Cold War. All in all, the Europeans, without a coherent energy strategy or a concept of how to deal with a resurgent Russia, did not cut a dashing figure. Those differences, today still in the early stages, could well develop into a serious rupture – almost irrespective of the future course of NATO enlargement.

The stand-off between the superpowers of the Cold War taught them a harsh lesson: negotiate, or perish. The drama in the Caucasus also holds some lessons. But so far it is doubtful that those involved are willing to understand what is at stake.

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