Putin and Lavrov have Left Russia Without a Foreign Policy, von Eggert Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, June 28 – Russian diplomacy, Konstantin von Eggert says, has ceased to serve the national interests of the country and is only concerned with the defense of the ruling regime,” a development that means “Russian diplomacy has finally ceased to serve the national interests” of Russia.

            That is obvious from the pathetic comments in Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s latest article (kommersant.ru/doc/4877702) for which “his speechwriters should receive a prize,” the Russian commentator says (snob.ru/entry/208263/). Its content seems more that of a Comedy Club routine than a serious discussion of foreign affairs.

            As a result, analysts are asking themselves whom Lavrov’s words were addressed to “Russian society and foreigners” and whether this means the freezing or unfreezing of relations with the West or constituters “a signal to the EU or the Americans. But why guess?” von Eggert continues.

            “All articles of all Russian officials of such a level always are addressed to only one man, and you know his name.” The foreign minister takes his lead from his master in the Kremlin, and that is why his productions are “at one and the same time both funny and frightening,” the commentator says.

            In addition to his unfortunate joke about LGBTs, Lavorv reprises “the full set of propaganda cliches that have long set people’s teeth on edge – ‘NATO expansion to the East,’ ‘the aggressive Russophobic minority within the EU,’ ‘the demolition of monuments to the liberators of Europe’ and last but not least “the bloody coup d’etat in Ukraine in 2014.

            No one abroad is taking these seriously but one person still does and he is the only one in Lavrov’s universe who matters, except perhaps for the leaders of China, whom the Russian foreign minister spoke of in terms less fitting for a senior diplomat than of some businessman seeking a government contract.

            Those ruling Russia today “have transformed their relations with the international community into an instrument for political mobilization to maintain power and to continue to chase the ideological phantoms of their Soviet youth,” von Eggert says. It is clear in fact that “there is no price today’s ruling elite won’t pay to remain in power.”

            These very same people “once laughed at Kozyrev and Shevardnadze, labelling them “’romantics’ and even ‘traitors.’” They call themselves “’pragmatists’ and ‘patriots’ but saying so doesn’t make it true. Indeed, their words are neither pragmatic nor a defense of national interests.

Instead, von Eggert argues, they are part and parcel of “the current carnival of court loyalty and provincial bravado.” What is worrisome is just how great the gap between rhetoric and reality has become. “Russia no longer has a foreign policy.” It only has comedians playing to an audience of one.