Paul
Goble
Staunton, December 9 – Ever more
people are drawing parallels between Vladimir Putin and Joseph Stalin, but
there is one parallel that has attracted less attention than it should, Irina
Pavlova suggests, and that is this: Putin now is using his anti-terrorist
campaign in the same way Stalin used his anti-fascist one, not to defeat an
enemy but to expand Russia’s influence abroad.
In a blog post yesterday, the
US-based Russian historian argues that “the goal of Russia’s military operation
in Syria is gradually becoming ever more clear” and the parallels between what
the Kremlin is doing now and what Stalin did in the 1930s and early 1940s ever
more obvious (ivpavlova.blogspot.com/2015/12/blog-post_8.html#more).
“If Stalin in the 1930s had the goal
of the sovietization of Europe under the flag of broadening ‘the front of
socialism,’ then the present Russian leadership has as its goal the broadening
of ‘the Russian world’ in the Middle East under the flag of the struggle with
terrorism and the preservation of Orthodox civilization,” Pavlova says.
Sergey Stepashin, former Russian
prime minister and now head of the Imperial Orthodox Palestinian Society, has made
that clear in two recent interviews, one with the Russian television channel “Dozhd’”
(ippo.info/news/the-chairman-of-the-iops-sergei-stepashin-for-us-syria-is-our-culture-more-than-chersonese-an-interv/)
and a second with Israeli journalists (newsru.co.il/israel/17nov2015/stepashin_int_201.html).
In his “Dozhd’” interview, Stepashin
said that “for us, Syria is our culture and historical memory, more than
Khersonese. Tehre a genocide against the Syrian people and Christian
civilization is taking place. Russian Orthodoxy came from Syria.”
“There are not simply words,”
Pavlova says. “The Russian powers that be for a long time have had an ambitious
plan for expanding their influence in one of the most ancient cities of the
Middle East – Jerusalem – a plan which they are now carrying out.”
“It is no accident,” she says, that
a Russian Spiritual Mission operates there and that “the Imperial Orthodox
Palestinian Society (IPPO) not long ago received official status in Israel”
even though it traces its origins to tsarist times. During his visit to Israel
last month, Stepashin outlined its current agenda.
“IPPO,” he said, “has structures
both in Palestine and in Israel which already are carrying out on these
territories unique ideological work. However, the Russian leadership considers
as spheres of its influence not only [their] territories but also the
present-day states of Syria, Lebanon, Jordan and also Saudi Arabia.”
“A Russian school has been built in
Bethlehem,” Stepashin continued. “The construction of schools in East Jerusalem
is planned.” Russia has regained the territory in the city that Khrushchev gave
up in 1964 just as it has regained Crimea. Russian influence is returning: “One
of the streets of Bethlehem now bears Putin’s name,” Stepashin said.
But Moscow’s campaign to spread its
influence is not limited to IPPO, Pavlova says. Instead, in order to oppose the
US, Russia’s special services “intend to cooperate further with such
organizations as Hamas and Hezbollah. And in order to expand Russian influence,
it is taking a long-term view.
Moscow has just announced that its
own economic problems notwithstanding, Russia has offered Egypt a 25 billion US
dollar credit for the construction of its first atomic energy station, money
likely to recycle back to Russia because Russian firms will be involved in this
project (rueconomics.ru/129753-shhedraya-rossiya-vyidast-25-mlrd-egiptu-na-aes/).
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