The dramatic confrontation between the politically powerful Mayor of Moscow, Yury Luzhkov and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev is far more than a Russian corruption scandal. It is the latest move in a global chess game of power between the faction increasingly lined up behind former President Vladimir Putin and current president Medvedev. At stake is whether Russia becomes an integrated part of a global NATO or it remains independent.
Nominally, Medvedev stated he fired the Mayor, on the grounds of “having lost Mr. Medvedev’s confidence.” The nominal trigger was the accusation in public in September by Luzhkov that Medvedev had blocked progress on a new highway linking Moscow and St. Petersburg. The deeper background according to our Russian sources is a deepening power struggle between former allies Putin and Medvedev over the future of Russia. Under the Russian Constitution the President has legal powers to fire local and state officials for sufficient grounds.
Because of the barrage of attack launched by state media under Medvedev’s control against the Major, Putin has been forced to appear as supporting the purge. Luzhkov was a key Putin supporter and as Mayor of Moscow, an indispensable ally in preventing Putin’s own dismissal and possible arrest according to these sources.
The reality is that Luzhkov as political boss of Moscow, Russia’s largest city of some 18 million, potentially could determine the next President in the 2012 elections. Under the Russian Constitution, Putin, who was forced to step down after two terms, is eligible to run again. The Moscow purge by Medvedev is aimed at destroying Putin’s political machine in order to block that. The purge of Luzhkov is expected to be followed by purges of other Putin loyalists in coming weeks including regional governors Boris Gromov (Moscow), Dmitry Zelenin (Tver), Leonid Polezhayev (Omsk) and Viktor Kress (Tomsk), before going after Prime Minister Vladimir Putin himself.
Medvedev veto of S-300 to Iran
The recent veto by Medvedev of the agreed sale of anti-aircraft advanced S-300 defense systems to Teheran as we indicated earlier (Fraktionskampf im Kreml gewinnt an Scharfe uber Iran), was a significant part of the growing power split between the two factions inside Russia, the one seeing Russia in nationalistic eyes as a sovereign if weakened former power with significant resources and positioned to play a key role in international politics. The other, Medvedev’s appears determined to dissolve Russia along with Poland, Georgia, Hungary and the former East-bloc into the NATO Atlantic alliance.
According to General Leonid Ivashov of the Russian Academy on Geopolitical Affairs, and former Chief of the Department for General Affairs in the Soviet Union’s Ministry of Defense, and member of the Russian Joint Chief of Staff, Medvedev’s decision to veto the Iranian delivery of S-300 missiles “undermine Russia’s prestige and erode its security, making the world less safe for every one of us. At the moment the Islamic world has reasons to believe that Moscow has switched to the camp of its foes. Given the facts that Russia is locked in a protracted conflict in the Muslim part of the Caucasus and that over a million Muslims reside in Moscow, antagonizing Muslims worldwide is the last thing the country needs.” Recently Medvedev as President has moved to back a dramatic reform of the Russian military proposed by Defense Minister Serdyukov, as well as the acquisitions of Israeli and NATO weapons, joint Russia-West exercises in the US and in Europe, and closings of military colleges. Ivashov declares these moves all “lead watchers to conclude that the broader plan behind it is to build what still remains of Russia’s army and navy into the US and NATO expedition corps.”
F. William Engdahl is the author of Gods of Money: Wall Street and the Death of the American Century, Contact at www.engdahl.oilgeopolitics.net
I am worried about Medvedev and the rumours that he wants Russia to join NATO. But now he has just chosen a very close ally to Putin for Moscow mayor:
http://en.rian.ru/russia/20101015/160971768.html
Quote:
“The nomination for Moscow mayor has been watched closely ahead of the 2012 presidential elections, and it seems likely that the appointment of Sobyanin will strengthen Putin’s position should he make a bid to return to the Kremlin.”
@Carlo: I still don’t know what to think of all this. Do you know anything about opinion polls in Russia about Medvedev’s and Putin’s popularity?
In february Medvedev’s popularity was almost the same as Putin’s:
http://gazeta.ru/politics/2010/02/09_a_3321756.shtml
I don’t know if it changed lately, I am looking for more recent polls.
I’m a bit nervous about Medvedev too. A moment ago it just occured to me that the stuxnet worm may in fact be Russian in origin. In this hypothesis, Medvedev agreed with the west to halt both the S-300 as well as Bushehr, but he didn’t want to take the heat for both and make Russia look completely unreliable to future business partners. So a Russian scientist smuggled the worm and stories were planted to point at Israel.
That is pure guesswork. I hope I’m wrong.
The only two possibilities in Russia are
1) Power struggle where Medvedev seeks the west’s help in getting rid of Putin.
2) The classic good cop bad cop game with Med as the good cop.
The worst scenario seems least likely, that both Putin and Medvedev are selling out. I suspect if Putin wanted to sell out, he could have done so years ago.
By the way, there were lots of contracts signed between Russia and Venezuela in Chavez’s visit to Moscow. It seems that, despite Russia having abandoned Iran, Chavez still trusts Putin and Medvedev.
The most importants were the building of a nuclear power plant, investments in oil and fruits (very important for Venezuela, as its agricultural sector is largely undeveloped). The Russians also suggested selling to Venezuela the five S-300 batallions that would be delivered to Iran.
@Lysander:
1) Power struggle where Medvedev seeks the west’s help in getting rid of Putin.
2) The classic good cop bad cop game with Med as the good cop.
Yes. And both of them are really bad for Russia and any country attempting to resist the Empire.
How on earth does a Jewish convert (not that there is anything wrong with that : ) become the President of Russia? Are the oligarchs that powerful or are the Russians that stupid? I guess history has a habit of repeating itself.
Russia joining NATO wtf! I guess smashing Iran as an energy competitor might have something to do with it.
Perhaps you are not considering the power alignment in the US.
That Russia would side with a pro-Israeli faction on Iran so Israel will sell drones to help Russia fight Islamic incursions now that NATO have re-established the drug trade and base of operations in Afghanistan against the Brzezinski/Rothschild/British/Saudi faction who want to fully implement there Eurasian war agenda.
Reading how Brzezinski’s first puppet president Carter and Georgia had ties to BCCI and Saudi businessmen same type of pattern can by found with Obama and Turkey.
http://www.fas.org/irp/congress/1992_rpt/bcci/16ga.htm
“That Russia would side with a pro-Israeli faction on Iran so Israel will sell drones to help Russia fight Islamic incursions”
This is not the case. The Israeli drone technology will help improve their own military industry, but it is not something that the Russian industry couldn’t do on its own, it just you take more time and money.
I think we underestimate the significance of fireing up Busher here. We can divide the history of Iran on the pre Busher and after Busher era. By turnining it on the Russians did a lot more for the Iranian security than any amount of S300 would do. There has not been a precedent of a military action against a state that would have official nuclear facilities of any kind on it’s territory. Something very extroordinary should happend now to make the Jews or the States to strike at Iran. And they will have NO support whatsoever from any part of Europe even the UK at that. And even if they will strike there is no way they will touch Busher which would make the strike pointless since the Iranians can now put all their reseach facilities under it’s roof and kick the inspectors out. And should a strike happen now the Russians would have a good case for suppliyng any kind of air defence to Iran to protect Busher and no country would oppose that since we would be talking about possible nuclear disaster here. So – what was more important in trading with the US – pushing ahed with Busher or S300? Unfortunately one can’t get all.
As for Medvedev versus Putin – I wouldn’t worry about that. Medvedev wouldn’t survive as an independent player in Russia he would get chocked with a pillow in a few weeks without Putin’s back up so it’s just bad cop good cop game for the West.
alibi
“Recently Medvedev as President has moved to back a dramatic reform of the Russian military proposed by Defense Minister Serdyukov, as well as the acquisitions of Israeli and NATO weapons”
A dramatic reform – jeez, this guy would definitely like it stay as it used to be – uncontrolled corruption, total incompetence, huge army of free labor slaves in uniform, the drones he is so worked up about were invented in the Soviet Union back in the 70th, but the idea was turned down as uninteresting by the very generals who are now crying bloody murder about a deal to buy some drones from Israel.
alibi
@Carlo: but it is not something that the Russian industry couldn’t do on its own, it just you take more time and money.
Correct. In fact, Russia already has drones. Many of them are currently deployed in the military (in the North Caucasus MD mostly). The Airborne Forces have also recently been equipped with drones.
Alas, this purchase of Israeli drones is probably in the same vein has the purchase of French warships – at best a way to cut costs (if you want to believe the government), at worst, a way to contribute to further weaken the Russian military-industrial complex (if you want to believe the opposition). I tend to agree with the latter.
Alibi, you made a very good point about Bushehr. I read recently in RIA Novosti that Russia has 2,500 people working in that plant when it goes fully operational: it will be very difficult for the US and Israel to attack it, as Russia probably wouldn´t accept the death of so many of its own citizens.
Saker, I agree more with Alibi, and think we shouldn’t care much about Russia buying weapons abroad. The Russian armed forces are the only one in the world which buy everything – from boots to ICBMs – domestically (except for a few things made in Ukraine or Belarus), and many times it can be faster and cheaper to procure abroad than to develop and produce domestically. I am against the purchase of the Mistral-class ships, as I think they are pretty useless for the Russian navy, but I don’t think the Russian military-industrial complex is at risk (there are quite a number of very ambitious programs going on, like PAK FA, PAK DA, Borei, Bulava, among others).
Carlo: “The Russian armed forces are the only one in the world which buy everything – from boots to ICBMs — domestically»
exactly – the Russian military industries had been isolated from the world technologies for a very long time so if there is a chance now to get access to new ideas and technologies from other payers why not use it. The drones that are built in Russia now are inferior to the Israeli’s due to lack of interest and thus lack of funding from the army until the August 2008, but they realized that the army needs them now so why wait till the local industry will learn how to build good ones when you can buy some abroad take them apart and learn faster. I have no doubts that the Russians will improve whatever weapons they will buy from abroad and will make better ones and I see no threat for the local industry here. It’s suppose to be just one Mistral built by the French and the other 4 should be built in Russia according to the plan – no problem here either.
alibi