As at End of Soviet Times, Moscow Triggering Conflicts inside RF to Heighten Western Fears about Russia’s Disintegration, Fyodorov Says

Paul Goble

          Staunton, May 7 – “The West does not want Ukraine to be defeated,” Yury Fyodorov says; but it “fears the defeat of Russia” because that, together with the looming succession struggle in Moscow, could lead to the disintegration of the Russian Federation and thus create a new situation with what it sees as unpredictable and dangerous possibilities.

          To heighten Western fears about what a new round of disintegration of the Russian empire would entail, the Russian analyst who now lives in Germany says, Putin just like some in Moscow at the end of Soviet times is sparking conflicts across the Russian Federation to suggest to some that any disintegration would lead to disaster (idelreal.org/a/yuriy-fyodorov-regionalnye-elity-skazhut-budem-deystvovat-po-svoemu-razumeniyu-/32847 357.html).

            But disintegration is possible whether Russia wins or loses in Ukraine, Fyodorov says, because the looming succession struggle in Moscow means that the center won’t be able to give orders to the regions and republics and the latter will have to look after themselves with some choosing independent statehood now just as the union republics did in 1991.

            But this disintegration is unlikely to produce any new Irans or North Koreas, he continues, because the new states would recognize that threatening the outside world would be a disaster for them and that the use of nuclear weapons would be absolute unnecessary in the border clashes that almost certainly will occur.

            In short, there will most likely be a repetition of what happened in 1991 and in the succeeding decades, paralysis at the center leading to declarations of independence by some    regions and republics, clashes between some of them over borders, and efforts by some in Moscow to rebuild the empire.

            But the more radical the disintegration is, the fewer chances the center will have to do that and to act aggressively as Putin is now doing in Ukraine and elsewhere, Fyodorov says. And that post-1991 pattern should lead the West to be less fearful of Russia’s disintegration than it currently is and more willing to be supportive of those who want to leave.

            Otherwise, as Fyodorov’s analysis suggests, there is an all too real danger that this second wave of disintegration will lead to the rise of new Putin’s and to much greater challenges to the West than would otherwise be the case.