“Russia’s Limousine Liberals,” Anatol Lieven’s June 10 article for The National Interest Online, triggered the Moscow-based Center Television Network to run a June 16 broadcast on Russian liberals’ criticism of the Obama administration’s efforts to improve America’s relations with Russia. The program’s transcript is reproduced below.

(Presenter Aleksey Pushkov in the studio) In a month’s time Barack Obama and Dmitriy Medvedev will meet in Moscow. And as the time of the meeting approaches, attempts are growing to prevent it from achieving good results. Recently American opponents of “resetting” (of relations between Russia and the USA) have been joined by representatives of the Russian right-wing liberal opposition. Moreover, the latter have picked as their main targets prominent American politicians who want to help improve relations with Moscow.

Coordinated publications in the Western media by this group of people does smack of a well-orchestrated theatre production. And here is our version of what is happening.

(Pushkov, speaking in video report) It is a two-act production. Act 1 is being written now, while Act 2 has already been written. The cast consists of Dmitriy Sidorov, Washington correspondent of the Kommersant newspaper; Georgiy Satarov, former aide to President Yeltsin and now head of the Indem foundation; Liliya Shevtsova from the US Carnegie Endowment; Lev Gudkov, head of the (public opinion) Levada Centre in Moscow; Andrey Piontkovskiy, ex-adviser to (former Yabloko Party leader) Grigoriy Yavlinskiy who now works for the US Hudson Institute, and Igor Klyamkin, a liberal political analyst.

In private, Satarov is known for pushing Boris Yeltsin towards dissolving the State Duma, which was in opposition to him, and Liliya Shevtsova is known for calling for making the Chechen conflict international, i.e. bringing US and their allies’ troops into Chechnya.

So, Act 1. On 31 March 2009 an article by Sidorov was posted on American Forbes magazine online. It was headlined “Why the rush to engage Russia?” Its key point was an attack on those in the United States who support the idea of “resetting”, and above all such prominent figures in American politics as Henry Kissinger and James Baker. Both are former US secretaries of state. According to the author of the article, they were recruited to promote a certain policy. And, naturally, it was the Kremlin that recruited them.

Sidorov did not say who exactly may have recruited these authoritative figures. According to him, we know that Kissinger’s consultancy, Kissinger Associates, according to some information, provides advice to the Kremlin. This unmasking as such is not really an unmasking because Kissinger’s meetings with Putin and Medvedev are widely known and it cannot be ruled out that during these meetings Kissinger did express his views to them on some issues, in other words provided advice. But the author provides no evidence that it was the Kremlin that recruited Kissinger.

In the same way, he provides no evidence to this effect as regards James Baker who is greatly respected in the USA. There are just some general words about his company’s links with Russian concerns. But the article was written not in order to prove anything but to smear and cast a shadow on those who want better relations with Moscow.

After that it became even more interesting. On 4 June 2009 the English-language newspaper, The Moscow Times, published an article by Andrey Piontkovskiy. The article contained the same message against the “resetting” of relations. But, most importantly, it was very similar in its contents to Sidorov’s article. The same targets were attacked: Kissinger, employee of his company Thomas Graham, who used to be senior director for Russia at the US National Security Council, and James Baker. The impression is that the article was dictated by the same people as Sidorov’s article - there are too many coincidences.

Judge for yourselves: (reads an except from Piontkovskiy’s article, which is shown on the screen) “US President Barack Obama’s policy on Russia is being nurtured with advice from people who have no official position in the administration but have close business ties to Russia and the Kremlin: former US secretaries of state Henry Kissinger and James Baker, Kissinger Associates senior director Thomas Graham and Nixon Centre president Dimitri Simes. They all write key reports for the administration, shuttling between Moscow and Washington, and coordinate the parameters of the Obama administration’s effort to “reset” the bilateral relationship.”

Thomas Graham is singled out in particular for his too soft attitude to Russia. And, again, no evidence is given of so-called business contacts between the afore-mentioned persons and the Kremlin.

And, finally, three days ago, on 9 June 2009, the Washington Post newspaper published an article by Lev Gudkov, Igor Klyamkin, Georgiy Satarov and Liliya Shevtsova (screen caption shows the headline: “False choices for Russia”).

The article is banal and intellectually primitive, but it contains the same attack on the so-called American “realists”, i.e. those in favour of improving relations with Moscow, a sharp criticism of the aforementioned Thomas Graham as a supporter of seeking common interests with Russia and a call for toughening rather than improving policy towards Moscow.

The two-party Hart-Hagel Commission (on US Policy toward Russia chaired by former US senators Gary Hart and Chuck Hagel), which recently visited Moscow and had a meeting with Dmitriy Medvedev, is the target of particular attack. Admittedly, the authors of the article did not dare to accuse prominent Democrat Gary Hart and Republican Senator Chuck Hagel of financial links with the Kremlin but they still accused them of supporting Kremlin propaganda and repeating, I quote, “Russian nationalist rhetoric”.

Let’s sum up the results. A rather active group of opponents of the “resetting” of relations who hold Russian passports have declared war on people in the USA who support the idea of “resetting”, and the latter are people who carry much more weight, authority and potential than the former. The fact that someone is standing behind the former is obvious. The same text and contents are in part repeated in the articles and, hence, the unmistakable conclusion can be reached that these efforts are being coordinated and directed, and probably even from the same centre.

We have already covered in one of our programs the story of the US agent Smith who exists in many incarnations and who is professionally against an improvement of relations with Russia. It is becoming clear that the American agent Smith now has supporters in Russia. They use the same arguments and the same tricks and have exactly the same face.

(Pushkov back in the studio) I have just a few words to add. Isn’t it amazing that a group of Russian nationals who - like Shevtsova or Piontkovskiy - work for American organizations and receive money from these organizations attack influential American politicians? To say the least this shows that quite serious forces are standing behind them inside the USA. It also shows that our right-wing pro-American liberals, who have totally lost all political battles in Russia and who are needed by very few here in Russia, have understood nothing and learnt nothing.

British professor Anatol Lieven read these articles with a profound feeling of depression, on his own admission. (Pushkov reads passage also shown on screen) “There is something bizarre and twisted about pro-Western Russian liberals attacking the recommendations of the Hart-Hagel Commission or statesmen such as Henry Kissinger and James Baker,” writes Anatol Lieven. “It is also because their criticism serves as a mouthpiece for the agendas of the most bitterly anti-Russian and geopolitically aggressive liberal interventionists and neocons who help maintain tensions between Russia and the West—and actually between the United States and the rest of the world.”

The assessment is quite exhaustive but it is still not clear what support this political group expects in Russia. Or, perhaps, this is not the point—it is about fulfilling some political commission. In this case everything becomes clear.

The president’s Cairo speech made nice soundings about Arab-Israeli peace. But if Obama really wants to accomplish something, he needs to get tough on Israeli settlements.

President Barack Obama’s speech on U.S. relations with the Muslim world in Cairo has already been labeled “historic” by MSNBC, though with no justification other than the fact that it was an hour long. Indeed, while Obama said a lot of the right things in the right style in the right place, he announced no major new initiatives or significant substantive departures from previous U.S. foreign-policy positions. Every American president, including even George W. Bush, publicly challenged the legality of Israeli settlements in occupied territories and described them as an obstacle to peace. Yet every Israeli government disregarded these declarations without encountering serious consequences. So it is not what President Obama says, but what he does on the Arab-Israeli dispute, and particularly on the settlements, that will shape how Muslims around the globe view the United States. In an NPR interview just before his departure for the Middle East, addressing the demand to freeze the settlements, Mr. Obama stated that “the United States has to follow through on what it says.” If he truly means that, then a dramatic change in American policy is coming.

Hopefully President Obama will deliver, because he is playing with fire. He is creating great expectations and, without action to satisfy these expectations, will produce great disillusionment in the Muslim world. That would be another blow to U.S. credibility and a gift to terrorists and extremists. A new beginning with the Muslim world will require President Obama not only to talk the talk, but to walk the walk.

One major hurdle for Mr. Obama is that many in Congress, like Florida Representative Robert Wexler, portray a settlement freeze as an Israeli concession that “. . . we cannot ask one party to unilaterally perform if the other parties are not fully willing.” This is a peculiar and dangerous logic. It is peculiar because it implies that Israel should be compensated for freezing the settlements, which were against international law in the first place. This is not to mention that they were contrary to the stated American policy of the past several decades, as well as morally wrong because of their impact on innocent Palestinians. Comments like those of Rep. Wexler are dangerous because they create the false impression that being more even handed would serve America well only if it leads to an agreement, rather than simply for the sake of doing the right thing and getting credit for it.

A peace agreement, should one be achieved, would very much be in the U.S. interest and would be a personal triumph for President Obama. However, while the United States may be indispensable in getting an agreement, it cannot force one; peace will require cooperation and, indeed, sacrifice by both sides, something we know from experience can only come through their willing participation. What is no less important, and what the United States can entirely control, is its own policy in the region. Moreover, it is not the lack of a peace agreement per se, but rather a widespread perception that the United States enables Israeli policies and actions that fuels hostility toward the United States among Muslims.

There are many longstanding conflicts in the world that the United States would prefer to settle but is not blamed for failing to solve. The India-Pakistan dispute over Kashmir is a perfect example. With this in mind, anything the United States can do to demonstrate to the world’s Muslims that it is not blindly in Israel’s corner would greatly help the American image. Israel is a democracy and an ally of the United States, but America knows how to distance itself from actions considered to be against U.S. interests and principles, even actions by its closest allies. President Dwight Eisenhower sided with Egypt in 1956 against Britain, France and Israel during the Suez Crisis, when Britain was America’s closest ally.

In the past there was a reason for the United States to make clear that it would always support Israel, no matter what. Faced with Soviet support for key Arab states, America could not afford the perception that allies of another superpower could defeat its closest friend in the region. Also, since Israel’s military superiority over its neighbors was not as overwhelming as it is today, there was a legitimate concern that by distancing itself from Israel, America could encourage an Arab attack. These factors are no longer present and, as a result, America can afford to treat Israel like any other friendly state, supporting Israel when it is in U.S. interests to do so and letting Israel accept responsibility for its actions and their consequences when Israeli conduct does not correspond with U.S. interests.

This is exactly how Israel treats the United States. Just the other day in Moscow, Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman publicly described Israel’s friendly gestures toward Russia, which included refusing to recognize the independence of Kosovo and ceasing to sell weapons to Georgia beyond servicing those provided in the past. Mr. Lieberman also accused President Obama and Secretary of State Clinton of using double standards in the Middle East, meaning applying double standards against the Jewish state. When the Israeli foreign minister is prepared to talk like that in Moscow, Washington has every reason to move from the cold war-era blanket endorsements of Israel to the more selective support typical among sovereign states. So if Israel chooses to continue with its settlement expansion, the United States can and should make sure that the cost of settlements is deducted from any aid it provides to Israel—and that America abstains if the UN Security Council wants to censure Israel on the issue.

A more even-handed U.S. position on the Arab-Israeli dispute is justified on its own merits, but if Mr. Obama will put his money—or rather the denial of it—where his mouth is, chances are that the Netanyahu government would retreat on the settlements. While the United States has been unable to bring about comprehensive peace so far, the Israelis have always complied when America shows it means business on specific issues. In 1956, Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion reversed his refusal to withdraw Israeli forces from the Sinai Peninsula within hours after President Eisenhower informed him that “it would be a matter of the greatest regret to all my countrymen if Israeli policy on a matter of such grave concern to the world should in any way impair the friendly cooperation between our two countries.” In October 1973, the Israelis stopped their assault on the encircled Egyptian Third Army after Henry Kissinger emphatically told Israeli Ambassador Simcha Dinitz that its destruction “is an option that does not exist.” And in 1982, President Ronald Reagan forced Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin to abandon an attack on Beirut by threatening sanctions.

Mr. Obama has already discovered before seriously trying that applying meaningful pressure on Israel will create a powerful backlash from Israel’s most ardent supporters in the United States. But the president is at the peak of his popularity and the very beginning of his term; as long as he stands tall, while making clear as he did in Cairo that the United States’ basic bond with Israel “is unbreakable,” he can weather the storm. And Mr. Netanyahu knows from his previous term as prime minister of Israel that being on the wrong end of U.S. animosity is not a prescription for political longevity in Israel. Even with his fragile coalition, he may be able to find a way to accommodate the United States on the settlements. It would not bring instant Arab-Israeli peace or, for that matter, restore American credibility in the Muslim world, but it would surely be a good start.

Dimitri K. Simes is the publisher of The National Interest.

Former Soviet leader and KGB Chairman Yuri Andropov would be proud of Liz Cheney’s charge that President Obama’s initial willingness to release pictures of U.S. military prisoner abuses amounted to “siding with terrorists.” After all, Andropov and his prosecutors always argued that Soviet dissidents who exposed human rights violations were guilty of treason. But Ms. Cheney goes even further than Andropov and his associates, who at least pretended that the dissidents were distorting the facts. Liz Cheney makes no such claim, nor any allegation that the pictures were fabricated. Yet despite this she asserts that exposing actual wrongdoing is sufficient to accuse someone of not simply providing comfort to America’s enemies or aiding their propaganda efforts but siding with the mass murderers.  Of course, Ms. Cheney’s father, former Vice President Richard Cheney, sets a clear example for his daughter in the Department of Offensive Nonsense. His idea that because Colin Powell endorsed Barack Obama for President and often took positions at variance with the conservative base should be reason to exclude him from the Republican Party defies common sense, especially in what appears to be a rapidly shrinking GOP.

Let me be clear: I voted for Senator John McCain, and the more President Obama’s leadership unfolds, the more comfortable I am with the choice that I made. Moreover, I am glad that Mr. Obama ultimately decided to follow the strong advice of Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and military commanders in resisting, in court, the pictures’ release. While there is a clear public interest in fully exposing the alleged abuses under normal circumstances, these are not normal circumstances. We are at war with Al Qaeda, the Taliban and, more broadly, radical Islam. The job in Iraq, and particularly Afghanistan, is far from finished, and there is sufficient evidence that earlier-released pictures, including those from Abu Ghraib, were used to incite violence against the United States to warrant being most careful about releasing new pictures.  This is especially true since the information already available to the public makes the necessary big point.

But Richard and Liz Cheney’s offensive and nonsensical statements damage the Republican Party by reminding the American people of the narrow-minded viciousness that was far too often associated with the George W. Bush Administration. A smart course for the Republicans is to run away from this legacy rather than advertising it on every television talk show as something that may represent not only Republican leaders’ troubling past, but also their future.

Worse, this silly nastiness is a diversion from the Republicans’ desperate need to offer a new alternative vision to play a role as a meaningful and constructive opposition party. That vision does not have to be a wishy-washy version of George H. W. Bush’s kinder and gentler America to be appealing. Here, many conservative pundits are correct: When Republicans get wobbly, they are likely to lose. To give Barack Obama credit where credit is due, he has so far acted as a bold and transformational president.  However, his plans are so ambitious with such profound consequences for America today and future generations, that the loyal opposition has a right and, indeed, a responsibility to challenge his goals head-on. You can call his objectives socialist–obviously in the Western European sense of social democracy rather than anything similar to Soviet Communism, or you can call it progressive or radical liberal, but they are clearly designed to increase the power of the federal government vastly, to redistribute income , to support  unions against businesses and even state governments, to relax already inadequate immigration enforcement policies, and to appoint judges who would not simply uphold the law but also demonstrate their “empathy,” as if one man’s empathy is not another man’s bias.

President Obama is frequently praised for his analytical and pragmatic approach and, in foreign policy, as a newcomer to the field without too many strong original convictions, the President has indeed so far acted, or to be more precise, spoken, as a realist putting a new focus on diplomacy and emphasizing results over rhetoric. With real hard choices still to be made, from Afghanistan/Pakistan to dealing with a resurgent Russia to coping with the rise of China, Mr. Obama should be congratulated for a good beginning. But on domestic issues, notwithstanding the President’s thoughtful style, he remains true to his origins as a community organizer, a leftist member of the Illinois State Senate and, more recently, the most liberal member of the U.S. Senate. Mr. Obama is using the economic crisis as a cover for introducing a wide variety of new initiatives that have little to do with the need to stimulate the economy, and that reflect the wish-list of liberal Democrats for reshaping America.

Polls have shown that Americans like Mr. Obama himself considerably more than his policies, before he has even had a chance to deliver on some of his far-reaching schemes like imposing new devastating taxes on the upper middle class. More to the point, the gap between the president’s personal popularity and approval of his policies exists well before any real political debate has begun, notwithstanding the phony debate that the Cheneys are trying to start. Polls make clear that voters are concerned with budget deficits, nervous about more taxes, and despise illegal immigration. But the Republicans have so far failed to articulate the severe impact that President Obama’s promiscuous spending is going to have on America’s ability to put its budget under control, to protect Social Security, and to avoid inflation, which might trigger a flight from the dollar by foreign holders of U.S. Treasury debt, starting with the Chinese.

On taxes, Mr. Obama has positioned himself squarely as an enemy of the upper middle class. It is not only what he wants to do by increasing marginal tax rates and reducing exemptions, but how he justifies it: by arguing that tax increases would affect only a small minority, less than 5% of Americans. In the President’s liberal political correctness, it is apparently self-evident that discrimination on the basis of success is perfectly legitimate. But for many if not most Americans, such discrimination is no less offensive than discrimination on the basis of race or sex.  Moreover, from a practical perspective,  it is clear from numerous budget studies that an assault on the upper middle class alone will not suffice to support Obama’s mountain of spending. That would require increasing corporate taxes, with the costs predictably being passed on to consumers.  Some Democrats on Capitol Hill, with encouragement from members of the Obama Administration, are also calling for new taxes on employer-provided health insurance benefits. This kind of healthcare reform, providing free coverage to the uninsured at the expense of millions of hardworking Americans, reflects a mindset most voters are likely to reject. And like former Vice President Cheney, President Obama has shown no hesitation in demonizing those with whom he disagrees, by bullying businesses to cooperate with his administration, as he did with hedge funds that were trying to protect their rights in the Chrysler bankruptcy.  And even as he did so, Mr. Obama secured preferential treatment for unions despite the demonstrable fact that it was the auto industry unions, rather than the hedge funds, that greatly contributed to the demise of the U.S. auto industry.

On illegal immigration, the Obama Administration has further reduced what were already fairly lax federal government enforcement efforts, yet Republicans have done virtually nothing to expose the Obama Administration’s reluctance to make any genuine effort to deal with the creeping invasion of illegal aliens who overwhelm the U.S. welfare system, crowd motor vehicle administration offices and hospital emergency rooms, and routinely get away with using fraudulent documents for which legal residents would be held criminally liable. Overall, as George Will observed, “the political allocation of wealth and opportunity is not merely susceptible to corruption, it is corruption.”

It became fashionable after the Democratic Party’s success in the last two elections to talk about the Republican Party being marginalized and doomed to failure. But the last two elections were very much influenced by the Bush Administration’s failed policies—and not only in Iraq, but also in expanding budget deficits and weakening civil liberties at home. And in terms of tax relief, contrary to the conventional wisdom, the Bush Administration did very little for the upper middle class, whose gains through marginal tax reductions were more than compensated for by millions and millions of not-so-wealthy taxpayers being subjected to the Alternative Minimum Tax, originally intended for the truly wealthy.

What the Republican Party really needs is to move away quickly and decisively from the Bush/Cheney thoroughly unconservative legacy of big government and foreign policy over-reach, and to focus on a forward-looking agenda for America that would reflect what is really crucial for the nation and, fortunately, what polls indicate that voters care about most. It may be true that only 23% of adults identify themselves today as Republicans—however, it is also true that the greatest voting bloc is not the Democrats but, at 36%, the independents.  Their alienation from President Obama’s progressive transformational zeal could easily reverse the Democrat Party’s fortunes dramatically, as happened in 1966 and 1994, just two years after earlier major Republican defeats in presidential elections.

Watch TNI Publisher Dimitri K. Simes debate John Ikenberry and Daniel Deudney at the New America Foundation. The three discussed the future of liberal democracy and autocracy. Click here to see the video.

Factories in southern Europe cut their production and ordinary cities began to lose their heat. After the cutoff of Russian gas supplies through Ukraine, German Chancellor Angela Merkel is quite right to state “searching for the causes is not the first priority. The first priority is for gas to reach Bulgaria, Serbia and Bosnia again.” But she is also right to observe that once the immediate crisis is over, hopefully via the deployment of European Union monitors at Ukrainian transit stations, it will be essential to think seriously about “consequences for European policy.”

Unfortunately, so far there has been little analysis about the underlying causes of the Russian/Ukrainian gas-price dispute, which clearly goes beyond commerce alone. All parties—including not only Russia and Ukraine, but also the EU and the United States—share blame for a situation that has deteriorated into an international emergency.

The divided and dysfunctional government in Kiev acted in a truly delusional fashion, assuming that it could pursue a hostile policy toward Russia (or at a minimum a policy they knew Russia considered hostile), and still expect to get Russian gas at a heavily subsidized rate. During the first gas conflict with Ukraine in 2006, the Kremlin made abundantly clear that it was not prepared to accept any such arrangement. Yet President Viktor Yushchenko, despite some hesitation on the part of Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, not only insisted on bringing Ukraine into NATO as soon as possible, but sided fully with Georgia during its August war with Russia. Moreover, as a commission of the Ukrainian parliament, the Rada, has established, Yushchenko repeatedly authorized secret Ukrainian military assistance to the Georgian army. The Russian government claims that most Russian combat aircraft destroyed in the conflict were hit by Ukrainian-made anti-aircraft missiles, crewed by Ukrainian advisers. The Ukrainian government is entitled to determine its own foreign policy, but would be reckless to assume that Russia would provide multibillion dollar subsidies to an adversary.

Yet this was exactly how Yushchenko positioned Ukraine vis-à-vis Russia. With European countries paying in excess of $400 per thousand cubic meters of Russian gas, why on earth would Mr. Yushchenko think that Russia would accept his offer of $201? In the context of the Russian/Ukrainian relationship, Russia reportedly offered $250—if anything, it sounds generous. Yushchenko’s gamble was to count on the leverage Ukraine holds by serving as a transit route for 80 percent of Russian gas to Europe as well as anticipated support of the EU and the United States. He also thought that this time, unlike in 2006, Ukraine had enough gas in storage to prevent a dramatic Russian gas cutoff. Yushenko should have known from his previous experience with Vladimir Putin and Russia’s handling of Western-supported Georgia in August that a gamble like that was unlikely to work—especially when, because of the global financial crisis and subsequent drastic loss of energy revenues, Moscow genuinely needed to get as much cash from Ukraine as possible.

Russia, for its part, had no clear game plan. Moscow had every reason to anticipate that once Russia’s supplies to Ukraine stopped, Kiev would start siphoning gas designated for Europe. Yet until the last moment, the Russian government provided unrealistic assurances to European customers that they would not be affected by the dispute. Moscow failed to realize or accept the self-evident principle that a reliable supplier simply cannot take the position that it is not responsible for its product actually reaching consumers.

At the same time, Russia’s diplomacy was for weeks essentially outsourced to Gazprom, which argued that once its gas crossed the Ukrainian border, the company has no further responsibility. And despite relatively good relations with French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Russia’s top leaders did not reach out to these heads of state early on to explain their position and to ask for help in preventing the conflict from reaching the boiling point. As Ukraine had the right to develop a sovereign foreign policy, Russia had the right to insist on a fair price for its gas—but should not have done so with a cavalier disregard of EU interests. After all, being seen as a reliable supplier and a responsible great power is first and foremost in Moscow’s own interest.

The EU also cannot escape its share of responsibility. European leaders saw the escalating Russian/Ukrainian dispute but preferred to stay on the sidelines under the futile pretense that it was a purely commercial disagreement. More fundamentally, the Bush administration and some Europeans, particularly in the so-called New Europe, encouraged Kiev’s belligerence vis-à-vis Moscow for years without thinking of the consequences. This blind support of Russia’s neighbors against Russia contributed to Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili’s disastrous decision to use force in South Ossetia, and it similarly contributed to President Yushchenko’s miscalculation in the gas dispute with Moscow.

Fortunately, because the Ukrainians need gas, the Russians need to sell it and both states need to maintain a degree of credibility in Europe, chances are that Russian gas supplies across Ukraine to Europe will resume soon. But no arrangement will be sustainable for weeks, let alone months, unless Kiev and Moscow reach their own agreement on gas prices. It is accordingly in the EU’s fundamental interest to facilitate such an agreement and—without apportioning blame—to make clear to both parties how much their relationship with the EU may suffer if they do not resolve the problem promptly and reliably. Second, there can be no better argument for the need to diversify Europe’s energy supplies by bringing more North African gas to Europe, building more pipelines from Central Asia bypassing Russia, as well as creating a more unified EU gas market and putting a new emphasis on nuclear power. In the same vein, Ukrainian conduct lends additional credibility to Moscow’s argument that it needs new pipelines bypassing its post-Soviet neighbors, like North Stream and South Stream, to deliver gas reliably to the rest of Europe.

Last but not least, the Russian/Ukrainian dispute should make the incoming Obama administration and the European Union reassess the policy of aggressively co-opting Ukraine into Euro-Atlantic structures in a way that triggers fears of a new containment in Moscow. The West needs a secure, stable and sovereign Ukraine, but it does not need to turn Ukraine into a perpetual battleground with Russia, to create a new dividing line in Europe or facilitate conflicts that become major distractions from other international priorities—including the need to work constructively with Moscow on nonproliferation, counterterrorism and—yes—energy security.

Beneath the façade of normalcy, social and political tensions are brewing in Russia. During a visit to Moscow last week, I was struck that prestigious restaurants were as full as ever, elite boutiques had what looked like a normal share of shoppers and the business-class lounge at Sheremetyevo Airport was crowded with fashionably-dressed Russians leaving for their holiday vacations overseas. In contrast to New York, no major Russian financial institution has gone down so far, and the Russian government has issued regular assurances that it has sufficient reserves in various state-controlled funds to deliver on all of its social commitments to the people. The Russian State Duma, the popularly elected lower chamber of the parliament, is fully controlled by pro-government parties and continues to give President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin an unqualified vote of confidence.

Still, traveling by car through the Russian capital’s nightmarish traffic quickly reveals signs of trouble. The vast majority of the numerous construction sites appear frozen, with cranes standing idly and no crews in sight; pages of Russian papers are filled with obligatory bankruptcy announcements; and at the Alexander House, one of Moscow’s most prominent business addresses, there is no normal line in the cafeteria. Many employees of energy and consulting firms in the building have been put on unpaid leaves of undefined lengths. Nonprofits have been hit particularly hard. Few have any meaningful endowments, and with sponsors disappearing, many public policy and charitable organizations have had to cut their staff and programs dramatically.

With oil prices falling below fifty dollars, the figure on which the Russian budget is based, it is clear that 2009 will not be a rosy time for the Putin-Medvedev leadership. The regime Mr. Putin has built, while authoritarian by Western standards, has enjoyed genuine popular support because the combination of high energy prices and prudent fiscal policy has assured remarkable growth in living standards. During Putin’s years in power, per capita income more than doubled. And while political liberties were severely curtailed, personal freedoms have remained largely intact. People could freely select their place of employment, move from one private company to another, travel abroad with very few, if any, restrictions, experiment with artistic shapes and forms without much official interference and even criticize the government without fear of consequences—not just in the privacy of their homes, but on the internet and to a lesser extent, in printed media.

This implicit social contract, where society allowed the leaders to rule without much public control and the leaders delivered to the public a regular dose of improvement in their everyday lives, is seriously threatened by the economic downturn. The Duma has been discussing a bill which would broaden the definition of treason in a way that would criminalize some contact with Western nongovernmental organizations or even the media. When almost four years ago, in January 2005, thousands of retired people in Russia angrily protested the controversial reform of Soviet-era social benefits they relied upon, the government treated the demonstrations with kid gloves, quickly reversing course and using the state treasury to accommodate protestors’ demands. With dwindling hard-currency reserves, however, the Russian leadership has less room to maneuver. On Sunday, when hundreds of people demonstrated in Vladivostok in the Far East against increased tariffs on foreign cars, special police units responded with overwhelming force. Canceling the fees, which were recently announced by Vladimir Putin, would deliver a blow to the severely troubled Russian automobile industry. And with growing public discontent, the government clearly is afraid that even peaceful and relatively insignificant protests could easily get out of hand.

On paper, the Russian government’s response to the crisis was prompt and decisive. Huge funds are being allocated to support the banking system and basic industries. A special cabinet commission was created to deal with the crisis, presided by First Deputy Prime Minister Igor Shuvalov, an able and authoritative official with strong ties to both Putin and Medvedev. Yet sources in the Russian government complain that without a clearly defined division of labor, having two leaders at the same time who make key decisions largely through private, confidential contact makes orderly decision making difficult. Often, a lot depends on who was able to speak to one of the leaders last. Meanwhile, while there is no sign of rivalry between Putin and Medvedev, their subordinates are increasingly eager to promote their bosses on the assumption that sooner or later, the demands of dealing with the economic crisis will make the dichotomy of power hard to sustain, and one person will ultimately remain in charge.

Remarkably, there is little expectation that crisis will lead to liberal reforms. In Russia, hard times normally produce hard lines, and while Medvedev has a number of advisers with liberal reputations on key policy issues, whether of conviction or convenience, he sounds very much like Putin, projecting an image of toughness and determination. As far as Russian foreign policy is concerned, the economic downturn has largely put an end to the triumphalist mood after the August victory against Georgia. And there is a growing understanding that, like it or not, a conflict—or even the perception of a conflict – with the United States would be detrimental to investors’ confidence in Russia, leading to an outflow of capital and the decline of the ruble.

But economic difficulties, in addition to generating protectionist measures like the additional tariffs on foreign cars, mean that the Russian government has less room for flexibility in offering special consideration to energy customers failing to pay their gas bills, such as Ukraine. And there is increased temptation to provide Russian weapons to whomever is in a position to pay cash, Iran included. Moscow still denies Tehran’s claims that it has supplied Iran with long-range S-300 missiles, but clearly, whether the denials are genuine or not, the temptation to sell to whomever or whatever is only going to grow as the Russian economy continues to go downhill and government resources dwindle further and further.

Chances are still good that Russian reserves will prove sufficient to muddle through 2009, that the Russian political system has enough stability to withstand the test of economic downturn, and that a new beginning with the United States offered by the Obama administration coupled with a new sense of vulnerability, will be sufficient to discourage Moscow from taking risks in their relationship with the United States and, more broadly, the West. Still, Russia is in uncharted waters, where few things are taken for granted, and in this time of uncertainty, it is particularly important for the incoming Obama administration to proceed with care, being mindful of unintended consequences of American actions that could tip the balance in Russia against U.S. interests.

There have been more embarrassing selections for the Nobel Peace Prize than this year’s choice, former–Finnish President Martti Ahtisaari, but not more illogical ones. Whatever one may say about North Vietnamese communist leader Lê Dúc Tho or PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat, they received the Nobel Peace Prize for real accomplishments, or at least accomplishments that looked real at the time: the Paris Peace Accords Tho negotiated with Henry Kissinger in 1973 and the Oslo Accords that Arafat negotiated with Yitzhak Rabin in 1993. Neither of these agreements lasted long and blood and treachery soon followed both. But at the time the prize was awarded, there was at a minimum an appearance of a major diplomatic achievement.

Not so in the case of Mr. Ahtisaari, who, while officially being celebrated for a long career mediating global conflicts, is best and most recently known for his disastrous role in arranging Kosovo’s independence. It was this independence, declared in clear violation of international law and despite the strong objections of democratic UN member state Serbia, which was effectively divided, that contributed to the recent conflict between Russia and Georgia over Abkhazia and South Ossetia. Those two separatist enclaves won Russia’s recognition as independent states and are now probably lost to Georgia for a long time, if not forever. This outcome was easy to predict, and indeed was predicted by many both inside and outside the Bush administration, myself included. Moscow was quite explicit in saying that the unilateral independence of Kosovo without Serbian and UN Security Council consent would inevitably create a precedent for Abkhazia and South Ossetia, and Georgia was equally explicit in making clear that it would not tolerate the two territories moving further and further from its control.

Mr. Ahtisaari cannot escape the blame for the conflict in the Caucasus in August. He was appointed in 2005 by then-UN Secretary General Kofi Annan to lead Kosovo’s “final status” negotiations, but never made the slightest pretense of being an impartial mediator. From the beginning, he made clear to the Serbians and Kosovar Albanians alike that the only conceivable outcome of the talks was independence for Kosovo. That left little incentive for the parties, particularly for the Kosovars, to compromise, and effectively precluded any negotiated solution. Ahtisaari did not seriously attempt to explore a possible partition of Kosovo, an extension of the timetable for achieving independence, or anything that would have given the democratically-elected government in Belgrade a way to defend an agreement to its deeply skeptical body politic.

The results of Ahtisaari’s work are well-known. First, Kosovo unilaterally declared its independence in violation of UN Resolution 1244 which had ended the war between NATO and Yugoslavia (and which Ahtisaari himself helped to negotiate at the time). Then, war broke out between Russia and Georgia, leading to the inevitable defeat of the government of Mikheil Saakashvili, the United States’s closest ally in the post-Soviet space. And the fighting pushed the United States and Russia toward a new confrontation at a moment when Washington needs Russian cooperation in a number of vital areas, including Iran and Afghanistan.

The Bush administration openly embraced Ahtisaari as an advocate for the U.S. position during the process he led—and Serbians and Russians alike saw him as such. Russian officials claim that on several occasions when they tried to encourage Ahtisaari to offer more to Belgrade, he suggested that they raise their proposals with Washington first.

During the cold war, “Finlandization” referred to the willingness of Finland and other small countries on the Soviet Union’s periphery to take foreign-policy guidance from their Big Brother to the east, while protecting their domestic independence. Reverse Finlandization emerged quickly after the collapse of the USSR, when Martti Ahtisaari, elected Finnish president in 1994, became a poster boy for former-Soviet client states lining up to swear fealty to the United States. His dismissive attitude to Russian concerns is supported by today’s Finnish public opinion, which is the most anti-Russian in Europe (with 62 percent of Finns polled by Gallup in November 2008 having a “very negative” or “fairly negative” view of Russia) after—guess?—Kosovo (73 percent fairly or very negative). Remarkably, Finns have an even more negative view of Moscow than Poles and Lithuanians, who have much more legitimate grievances vis-à-vis Moscow. Apparently, voluntarily choosing to cooperate with the USSR makes one more hostile to its successors than being forced into submission and waging courageous resistance.

There was a concert in Oslo today paying tribute to Mr. Ahtisaari. I assume they did not play a Russian military march—but that’s what Georgians had to hear because of Mr. Ahtisaari’s failed mediation over Kosovo. And a lesson for American foreign policy: America needs thoughtful friends, not sycophants who often create more problems than they solve.

Rarely has there been a more offensive, counterproductive, and—frankly—undemocratic and un-American idea in public politics as the suggestion by Michigan Republican Party Chairman Saul Anuzis to exclude Representative Ron Paul from the Republican presidential debates because of remarks he made during the South Carolina debate about the reasons behind the September 11 terrorist attacks.

My foreign policy philosophy is different from Mr. Paul’s. I enthusiastically supported the first Gulf War and, with reservations, supported the invasion of Iraq in 2003 as well. In the latter case, we were led to believe that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, and I argued for a quick intervention to depose Saddam, eliminate his WMD programs and get out. In my view, we should have immediately turned over reconstruction and nation-building to the United Nations, the Organization of the Islamic Conference or almost anyone else. I wrote a piece in support of the invasion ("Give War a Chance", ITNI) and would make the same recommendation again on the basis of what I knew at the time.

Still, I admire Representative Paul’s courage and consistency and cannot understand why his comments should make him a pariah in the Republican Party. Mr. Anuzis and his ilk had better watch themselves—if they succeed in removing Mr. Paul from the debate, they would send a powerful signal not only to Democrats, but also to independents and quite a few Republicans that the Republican Party is not a big tent, that there is no place in the party for those who are skeptical of foreign interventions, and that on the most important campaign issue—Iraq—the Republican Party has lost touch with reality on the ground in both Iraq and America. Mr. Anuzis may succeed in excluding Rep. Paul from the debate, but he would likely also contribute to excluding the Republicans from the White House.

What is it that Mr. Paul said? Now, his language was not quite precise, and I wish he had stressed that he was talking about what motivated suicide bombers and their masters, not legitimizing it. But for the record, these are his words:

Non-intervention was a major contributing factor. Have you ever read the reasons they attacked us? They attack us because we’ve been over there; we’ve been bombing Iraq for 10 years. We’ve been in the Middle East—I think Reagan was right. We don’t understand the irrationality of Middle Eastern politics. So right now we’re building an embassy in Iraq that’s bigger than the Vatican. We’re building 14 permanent bases. What would we say here if China was doing this in our country or in the Gulf of Mexico? We would be objecting. We need to look at what we do from the perspective of what would happen if somebody else did it to us…I’m suggesting that we listen to the people who attacked us and the reason they did it, and they are delighted that we’re over there because Osama bin Laden has said, ‘I am glad you’re over on our sand because we can target you so much easier.’ They have already now since that time killed 3,400 of our men, and I don’t think it was necessary.

Whether one agrees with it or not, there was nothing repugnant in his statement. Actually, it was quite refreshing to hear a candidate, even someone who is considered a long-shot, trying to analyze what motivated the attackers.

My problem with the debate was not with Ron Paul, but with Mayor Rudy Giuliani. Of course, with the way Mr. Paul phrased his argument, he made himself vulnerable to a strong rebuttal. But I wish that Mr. Giuliani had offered an alternative explanation of why we were hit rather than self-righteous indignation. No one familiar with Al-Qaeda, its actions and statements, and the interrogations of suspected terrorists in Guantanamo and elsewhere, could say that the American way of life or even our status as the sole superpower was the exclusive reason for the 9/11 attacks. On the contrary, specific U.S. conduct in a number of areas, particularly the Middle East, has motivated and continues to motivate the terrorists. Acknowledging this does not necessarily mean that U.S. conduct was wrong and or that we should change our foreign policy behavior. But when American security and lives are at stake, we should be intellectually honest in evaluating what animates our enemies, even if we find their grievances without foundation. Understanding the other side is a basic requirement in any war, though it seems to be news to some leading politicians in both parties.

Mr. Giuliani was magnificent as the mayor of New York during the aftermath of the attack on the city. He was also a strong prosecutor. But does he have the character and intellectual depth to lead the United States in these troubled times? His moralistic sound bite at Ron Paul’s expense is not a substitute for the serious thinking that the American people are entitled to hear from presidential candidates. To be fair to Mayor Giuliani, the debates so far have been a travesty of the democratic process, which should allow voters to make informed choices. As Newt Gingrich commented, "We have shrunk our political process to this pathetic dance in which people spend an entire year raising money in order to offer non-answers, so they can memorize what their consultant and focus groups said would work. . . . This idea of demeaning the presidency by reducing it to being a game show contest . . . is wrong for America."

Forcing presidential candidates to be game show contestants does demean them—and all of us too. Worse, it is a fundamental danger to the United States. The sad fact is that the most articulate contestant, even if he or she is also the best fundraiser, is not necessarily the best person to lead the nation. Most dangerous of all if the possibility that the winner will not even be able to do so.

To the casual observer, Paul Wolfowitz’s continuing refusal to step down as President of the World Bank is puzzling. Without taking sides in his dispute with members of the World Bank Board regarding alleged violations of ethical rules in arranging a promotion and raise for his girlfriend, Shaha Riza, it is quite clear that Mr. Wolfowitz has lost his ability to be an effective leader of that institution. A significant majority of the Board wants him to step down. The World Bank Staff Association wants him out. Many governments, particularly in Europe, that are major contributors to the World Bank and add credibility to its efforts to implement often controversial anti-corruption programs demand his departure. So, even assuming (which seems unlikely) that strong White House support and vigorous counterattacks from his neoconservative friends allow him to keep his job, what could he accomplish—for himself, for the world’s poor, and for the United States, whose prestige is clearly on the line?

In recent weeks there have been spectacular resignations at two major corporations. Lord John Browne left BP just months before his scheduled retirement and may lose up to $30 million in compensation from his retirement package in the process. His transgression—lying to a court about the circumstances in which he met a man with whom he admitted to having a long-term affair—could be more serious than Mr. Wolfowitz’s improprieties. Still, if he put up a fight, Browne could perhaps have negotiated an agreement to stay for the remaining part of his term and keep some or all of the money.

Chris Albrecht, the Chairman of HBO, stepped down after allegedly committing battery against his girlfriend in a Las Vegas hotel parking lot. He did not put up much of a fight when told by his Time Warner superiors that this was his time to go. (Note that Jeffrey Bewkes, President and Chief Operating Officer of Time Warner, is a member of The Nixon Center’s Board.)

In contrast to Mr. Wolfowitz, who has had few accomplishments at the World Bank, partly due to his short term in office (since 2005) and partly because of his inability to build effective relationships with his career subordinates, Mr. Albrecht and Lord Browne were at the helm of their companies for many years and are widely believed to have delivered impressive results.

So why is Mr. Wolfowitz putting up such a desperate defense, going so far as to launch a vitriolic attack against the very institution he supposedly wants to lead? Mr. Wolfowitz is not accused of any criminal offense. Neither does he face the prospect of civil charges that would require him to pay many millions in fines and legal expenses. As a matter of fact, if he had not hired Washington’s star lawyer/hatchet man, Robert Bennett, Wolfowitz in all likelihood would not have needed to spend much money or time to arrange an honorable exit from the World Bank. He could have denied any wrongdoing, but said that in the name of both American interests and the interests of the institution, he had decided it was the time to move on. And move on he would—with his celebrity status and cohorts of neo-conservative admirers, Wolfowitz was virtually guaranteed a plush fellowship in a prestigious think tank, multiple well-compensated positions on corporate boards, lucrative speaking engagements, and a six—if not seven—figure book deal.

How then to explain the aggressive counter-offensive? First, despite almost saying "sorry", he seems firmly convinced not only of his innocence, but of his inherent virtue. He appears not to have engaged in any introspective reflection about his bad judgment (at a minimum) in arranging an almost 50 percent raise for his girlfriend that resulted in her being paid $10,000 more than the Secretary of State while being detailed to the State Department. Yet, as Mr. Wolfowitz made clear at the time of his appointment, he knew that he was not universally popular at the Bank, that his conduct could easily be put under a microscope, and that he had to be as pure Caesar’s wife to avoid even the perception of impropriety.

Second, Mr. Wolfowitz sounds like he believes he is a victim of a vast conspiracy uniting liberals, Europeans, and World Bank bureaucrats that is exploiting a very minor incident. But here he misses the point. While many were unhappy about his appointment at the Bank, nothing happened until the Riza compensation scandal. And while some facts are in dispute, it is hard to imagine any unbiased observer who would not accept that Mr. Wolfowitz helped to bring all this trouble upon himself.

Last but definitely not least, Mr. Wolfowitz seems to share a neo-conservative world-view that requires a constant sense of a history-shaping mission, of saving mankind from another Holocaust by dividing the world into good and evil, and protecting friends regardless of their conduct. Since he knows he is good, his opponents must be evil. He may even believe that like in a B-movie, he is so good that he is bound to win in the end, once everyone around him finally sees the light. This kind of mindset helped to bring the United States into Iraq and it explains, in my view to a large degree, the vitriolic counterattacks by Wolfowitz and his blind supporters.

The only silver lining is that the stakes at the World Bank are much less than those in Iraq. The Bank is—and was for a long time before Wolfowitz’s arrival—a deeply troubled institution; a collection of social workers pretending to be bankers that has too many people with too great a sense of entitlement and too much compensation for too little in the way of good works. Once the Wolfowitz saga is over, this bigger problem must be addressed. If those insisting on Mr. Wolfowitz’s departure in the name of the Bank’s credibility would stop at arranging his resignation, their hypocrisy would be exposed. And Mr. Wolfowitz would receive at least partial vindication from history.

The NATO and European Union spat with Russia over Estonia demonstrates the great dangers in the current dynamics of the East-West relationship.

Let me start with the obvious. Russia’s response to the Estonian decision to move a monument to an unnamed Russian soldier and the remnants of Russian servicemen buried under him to a military cemetery was unacceptable. First, as a sovereign country, Estonia is entitled to decide which monuments to keep and where. Second, it is perfectly understandable why a country that was occupied in 1940 by the Soviet Union as a result of a deal between Hitler and Stalin in 1939 and then victimized by purges and suppression of local culture after the Nazi defeat would not view Soviet troops as liberators. It is equally understandable that many in such a country would not necessarily want to see a monument to Soviet soldiers in the center of its capital. Finally, attacks on the Estonian Embassy in Moscow by Kremlin-supported youth groups raise troubling questions about possible incitement by the Russian government of Russian militants in Estonia. Russian efforts to use Russian minorities in the former USSR to undermine their governments could destabilize the whole post-Soviet space and would further complicate relations between Russia and the West. Accordingly, it is perfectly appropriate for the United States, NATO and the European Union to communicate to Russian President Vladimir Putin their strong concern over Russian actions.

But Western governments went beyond expressing concern. They opted to side with Estonia, failing to see the other side of the coin in the Estonian-Russian dispute and sending the wrong message to Moscow (and Tallinn) in the process. What Moscow’s critics have failed to acknowledge in this instance is that the conflict over a monument was a manifestation of a larger issue—the treatment of the Russian minority in Estonia since the country became independent in 1991.

Mind you, it was not the United States, Ronald Reagan or George H. W. Bush who provided the greatest help to the Estonian people in re-establishing their state. The greatest help came from Moscow, from Mikhail Gorbachev, who allowed people in the Baltics and elsewhere to hold free elections that produced pro-independence governments which demanded splitting from the Soviet Union altogether. And it was Russian leader Boris Yeltsin who issued an order prohibiting Russian citizens serving in the Soviet armed forces from obeying orders requiring violence against people in the Baltic nations. Yet, the Estonian response to this Russian assistance was to disenfranchise one-third of its population, mostly ethnic Russians and other Slavs, including those who had been born in Estonia but whose parents and grandparents had not lived in independent Estonia before it was occupied by Stalin in 1940.

It is that marginalization of the Russian minority that is at the root of ethnic tension in Estonia. This marginalization actually encourages Estonian politicians like Prime Minister Andrus Ansip to use the issue of moving the monument to exploit nationalist sentiments in Estonia for electoral advantage without fear of reprisals from disaffected voters—because those most troubled by the decision don’t have the right to vote. Knowing that a considerable minority of those who live in Estonia would view this action as a further attempt to de-legitimize them, leaders in Tallinn intentionally proceeded with an action highly provocative both internally and vis-à-vis Russia for domestic political gain.

Also, the way the Estonian police responded to the demonstrators in Tallinn—some, but not all, of whom were violent—would certainly be called excessive force if it happened in Moscow or even in Los Angeles. But somehow, neither Western governments nor the Western media were prepared to criticize beating up ethnic Russians in Tallinn. Serious people, like those at The Economist, may acknowledge that the Estonian government "has blundered" and its "tactics were gravely mistaken." But they still seem to think, as The Economist does, that the West had to support Estonia because it is "a commendably keen member of the European Union, and a loyal member of NATO." Little imagination is required to understand how statements like that are read in Moscow, which has been told for years that bringing its former satellites into Euro-Atlantic economic and security institutions is not a danger to Russia. Unqualified support of Estonia clearly sends a message to Russia—and not just to the Putin government, but to the public at large—that these assurances are false, that the process of NATO expansion is directed against Russia, and that Russia should view a possible NATO membership for Ukraine and Georgia as a serious threat to its vital interests.

Is this really the lesson we want Moscow to learn? And are we sure that we will like the consequences? As The Economist writes, "The importance of this goes far beyond Estonia. If the Kremlin concludes that former Soviet satellites are not real members of Western clubs, but will be dumped by their allies once they blunder, the consequences for Europe’s peace and stability will be lethal." Fair enough. But do we conversely want Russian neighbors to conclude that they are entitled to provoke Moscow needlessly, hiding behind NATO’s security umbrella or possible EU sanctions? Are we certain that other leaders in the region will not overestimate their leverage in dealing with Moscow—like Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili in his efforts to re-establish control over the de facto independent enclaves of Abkhazia and South Ossetia? Will Moscow eventually call the West’s bluff and respond militarily there or somewhere else? If it does, will the United States go to war with Russia—or will it abandon a target of Russian military action the same way as it abandoned Hungary in 1956?

These are not questions any American President would like to answer. But blind and uncritical support for Russia’s neighbors in virtually every dispute with Moscow makes them increasingly important—and our own failure to think about these issues now makes it more and more likely that if we have no answers, someone else will.

President George W. Bush was absolutely right to veto the Iraq funding bill. As he observed, "This is a prescription for chaos and confusion and we must not impose it on our troops." I also agree with the president’s statement that "our troops are worthy of this funding and we have a responsibility to get it to them without further delay."

The other side of the coin, however, is whether Mr. Bush is worthy of the nation’s confidence as a leader who can conduct the war in a responsible and effective manner. Public opinion polls provide a clear answer that a significant majority of Americans does not trust the president to bring the war to a successful conclusion. And that is not because the public is brainwashed by the left-wing media or is suffering, four years after the "Mission Accomplished" speech, from war fatigue.

The Bush Administration brought the United States into Iraq under false pretenses and it is disingenuous for the president and his advisors to proclaim that they, along with everybody else, were victims of faulty intelligence. First, different people drew different conclusions from the intelligence available at the time. With the notable exception of Tony Blair, not a single foreign government had the same sense of urgency to invade Iraq as the Bush Administration. Both Mohamed El Baradei’s International Atomic Energy Agency and UN inspectors in Iraq warned that there was, at a minimum, considerable uncertainty about whether Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction, and particularly whether he was close to obtaining nuclear weapons. It was the Bush Administration’s choice to dismiss those warnings contemptuously.

Second, the U.S. intelligence data that persuaded so many on the Hill from both parties was produced with White House guidance and sometimes outright pressure. This is not to say that analysts were instructed to fabricate facts. However, with CIA Director George Tenet fighting to keep his job, the CIA in general under attack from Donald Rumsfeld’s and Paul Wolfowtiz’s highly ideological and aggressive intelligence turf raids, and Vice President Dick Cheney’s not-so-subtle encouragement to find evidence of Saddam’s misdeeds, it is simply incredible for the administration to pretend that Bush and his associates were innocent bystanders or even victims of erroneous information they did so much to orchestrate. Finally, the President, Donald Rumsfeld and particularly Paul Wolfowitz also disregarded the advice of the professional military to use a much larger force for the initial stage of occupation and even punished those like General Eric K. Shinseki who performed their soldiers’ duty by speaking the truth to power.

Too much has happened, too many lives have been lost, too many hundreds of billions have been wasted and too much damage has been done to America’s credibility—and Mr. Bush’s personal credibility—for the President to continue to have a carte blanche from Congress and the American people. Yet the President remains commander-in-chief and the Congress has the power of the purse. If both continue playing the blame game, making unrealistic proposals and presenting exaggerated claims of each other’s culpability at the expense of American troops, American honor, and American interests, it would be a sad comment on the ability of our democratic process to do what is necessary to protect the nation. The Democrats need to abandon the notion of withdrawal deadlines that makes defeat a self-fulfilling prophecy. If that is the path they want to take, it would be much more honest to cut the funding right away, except what is necessary for the removal of U.S. forces from Iraq. Assuming that they are not prepared to make this choice for reasons of politics and national security, they should look for a solution that would at least allow the United States to try to reach some minimally acceptable outcome in Iraq.

The Republicans, on the other hand, should not insist on toothless and rather symbolic benchmarks for the Iraqi government that would allow the president to continue the war effort without any meaningful accountability. What is desperately needed is a formula that would allow continued funding, but with clear and binding guidelines that the president must observe in order to be allowed to lead the war effort. There is some truth in the Republicans’ argument that we cannot have 535 generals running the war from Capitol Hill—but at a certain point, even that unpleasant prospect should be weighted against the potential dangers of the president’s incompetent leadership. The American people and the American troops deserve for politicians in Washington—from both parties and all branches of government—to get off their white horses, suspend their demagoguery (to end it all together would be too much to ask) and to do the nation’s work at a moment of crisis.

President Vladimir Putin declared April 25 the National Day of Mourning for the first Russian president, Boris Yeltsin, who died today in Moscow. In his announcement, Putin was most positive on Yeltsin, praising him as a man who gave birth to "a new democratic Russia" and particularly praising the late president for his "massive support" from the people. If public opinion polls before Yeltsin’s death are any guidance, this is one instance where most Russians profoundly disagree with Putin, his great popularity notwithstanding. Yeltsin is widely viewed as a failed leader who pursued policies rejected by the vast majority of Russian citizens—and he pursued them by undemocratic means, including using a tank attack against the duly elected Parliament. He is also remembered as somebody who helped create the class of oligarchs—fantastically rich tycoons who emerged from nowhere primarily through the redistribution of state property, including energy resources, to the benefit of the well-connected few. And all at a time when wages and pensions were rarely paid on time and the living standards of most Russians were dramatically decreasing.

I met Yeltsin late in the 1980s when he was still an aspiring politician and was impressed with his steel will, magnetism and a willingness—in contrast to Mikhail Gorbachev—to make tough decisions and to do whatever it took to accomplish his objectives. These were the qualifications of a perfect revolutionary. But Yeltsin was no democrat. If anything, he was less devoted to democratic values than Gorbachev. My impression was that he had no real political philosophy whatsoever, just a great sense of entitlement to take over Russia. He would use this power as a building block to create a new multinational entity on the Soviet territory where most of the republics, after rejecting Soviet rule, somehow were expected to endorse Russia’s and, of course, Yeltsin’s personal predominance. That clearly was an illusion.

As with Russian czars, Yeltsin had little respect for people, including his closest associates, as long as their station in life was below his. He enjoyed dealing with Presidents George H. W. Bush and Bill Clinton, thinking that he was their equal, even as they—Clinton especially—were taking advantage of his ignorance, vanity and alcohol abuse to get concessions from Moscow.

It was Yeltsin who began relying on the post-KGB security services as a major instrument of running the country long before Putin came to power. Yeltsin’s respect for democratic procedure can be well-illustrated by his conversation with Richard Nixon back in April 1993 when, after meeting with Yeltsin’s opponents, Speaker of the Supreme Soviet Ruslan Khasbulatov and then–Vice President Alexander Rutskoy, Nixon shared with the Russian president that these people were professing a willingness to support pro-market reforms, as long as they would be given more voice in formulating them and there would be greater emphasis on social protection of the weak. "You really mean, Mr. President, that I should listen to these midgets?" Yeltsin asked. Earlier in 1992, Yeltsin reacted in disbelief when I told him in Nixon’s presence that there was a good possibility of Bill Clinton prevailing over George H. W. Bush for the presidency. "But I thought that Bush was popular with the U.S. ruling class. Do you really mean to say that in America it is the common rabble who determines the next president of the United States?"

Anecdotes, of course, are always selective and history will remember Yeltsin defiantly standing on the tank, heroically leading the opposition to a reactionary coup d’état in 1991. If only he had ended his career then after bringing a triumph to the anti-Communist revolution.

President George W. Bush’s “full support” of Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez and World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz has implications far beyond the future of the two besieged officials. Gonzalez’s explanations yesterday before the Senate Judiciary Committee regarding the circumstances of the firing of U.S. attorneys were clearly unpersuasive, even to a number of Republican senators. The Senate cannot remove the attorney general—only the president can—but the Senate, by expressing no confidence in Gonzalez, is certainly in a position to make it much more difficult for him to be effective in the performance of his duties, which are essential to the nation, particularly during the war against Islamist terrorists and the controversy over the immigration crisis. Similarly, even if Mr. Wolfowitz survives as president of the World Bank, will he be able to be a formidable leader? Would his anti-corruption preaching be taken literally? Would he be credible with donor nations, especially in Europe, in getting additional funding for the Bank?

Clearly, at a minimum both Mr. Gonzalez and Mr. Wolfowitz are guilty of very flawed judgment. The attorney general lost the trust of the U.S. Congress and the president of the World Bank that of the majority of his staff and much of his board. Mr. Bush of course is still entitled to have confidence in them, but not if he wants the rest of us to have confidence in his own ability to be a wise and effective Chief Executive. I for one am most reluctant to see the Congress trying to micromanage U.S. military activity in Iraq. I agree with Mr. Bush that 535 senators and representatives should not act as a collective commander-in-chief and that establishing public deadlines for U.S. withdrawal would encourage America’s enemies and severely undermine the morale of America’s allies, as it happened more than thirty years ago in Vietnam. And, I further agree with the president and Senator John McCain (R-AZ) that the price of defeat in Iraq in terms of American security and prestige may be huge.

But the price of not allowing the president to act as the bona fide commander-in-chief in Iraq has to be measured against his miserable record of misjudgment, misrepresentation and mismanagement of the war. If the president believes that the troop surge in Iraq is the right tactic, how can he maintain confidence in Mr. Wolfowitz, who was one of the architects of the totally different and disastrous strategy in Iraq? Had the president thought when he appointed Mr. Wolfowitz to run the World Bank that his failures at the Department of Defense were not apparent, he surely should know better by now. And as Mr. Wolfowitz demonstrates serious misjudgment again, why wouldn’t the president delicately encourage him to move on to the whole variety of high-profile and profitable pursuits that should be available to him in the private sector?

With 61 percent of Americans—according to a recent CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll—favoring immediate withdrawal or withdrawal by March 2008, and with only 30 percent being prepared to keep troops in Iraq without a timetable, the president should be well-aware that the clock is ticking. There is an invisible line in the sand beyond which Congress, and as a matter of fact the American people, will not be prepared to allow him a free hand, no matter what. Under somewhat similar circumstances near the end of his term, President Ronald Reagan cleared house, brought in new, wise and reputable people and moved on, restoring his popularity in the process and helping elect his vice president, George H.W. Bush, as the next president of the United States. But while he likes to wear the Reagan mantle, George W. Bush is no Reagan. His sharply reduced credibility notwithstanding, his stubborn refusal to acknowledge the facts and a propensity to sound like an elected monarch may define his presidency as a terrible cost to the nation.

The heavy-handed response by Russian authorities to last weekend’s demonstrations in Moscow and St. Petersburg is just another illustration of a tightening-up of the Russian political space. A Jeffersonian democracy Putin’s Russia is not. Just the other day the leader of the newly-created Just Russia opposition—yet pro-Putin—party, Speaker of the Council of the Federation Sergei Mironov, suggested extending Putin’s term and reminded us all that according to a recent public opinion poll, 69 percent of Russians are in favor of keeping the president in power, even if it would require changes to the constitution. Putin so far has firmly rejected this possibility, but informed sources in the Kremlin suggest that discussion of how to keep Putin as a dominant figure is growing, whether it would require amending the constitution to permit him to stay president or finding some other arrangement that would allow him to stay in charge.

It is perfectly appropriate, and indeed necessary, not to whitewash Russian domestic practices, as President George W. Bush once did. What is not appropriate, however, is to accuse Putin and his government of all kinds of terrible deeds—often providing highly misleading information in the process—just because he is supposed to be undemocratic. And that is clearly what happened with coverage of last weekend’s protests in much of the mainstream media in the United States. The Wall Street Journal editorial page—which believes that Vice President Dick Cheney is a wise statesman, John Bolton an effective diplomat and Paul Wolfowitz a model anti-corruption reformer—has predictably adopted the cause of their regular contributor, former chess champion Garry Kasparov, who was one of the leaders of the opposition marches. Mr. Kasparov was a great chess player. He is also a man of courage and determination. But anyone familiar with his career in politics, and as a matter of fact, in chess long before it, would know that he has a strong propensity for theatrics and artificial confrontation. Quoting Mr. Kasparov as a dispassionate commentator on his own struggle, as The Wall Street Journal editorial page did, is unpersuasive.

But, being persuasive is in the eyes of the beholder, and editorial pages by definition are entitled to their opinions. Not so the news pages. In the case of The Washington Post, news stories regarding the April 14 and 15 events in Moscow and St. Petersburg were written as if they were coordinated with the notoriously anti-Putin attitude of The Washington Post editorial page. In their April 18 article, " Kremlin Says Riot Police Overreacted ", by Peter Finn, both the text and the photographs present a highly misleading picture. The photographs show Garry Kasparov appealing to the menacing-looking police officers. It also shows the police in anti-riot gear overwhelming a long-haired, bespectacled young man. And talking about the organizers of the marches, Mr. Finn refers to Garry Kasparov and former–Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov—and nobody else. He does not mention at all that another organizer—and a key ally of Mr. Kasparov and Mr. Kasyanov—was Eduard Limonov, leader of the nationalist and militantly anti-American outlawed National Bolshevik Party. As the photographs accompanying this article show—and these pictures come from grani.ru , an online anti-government publication to which Mr. Limonov is a columnist—a significant, and the most assertive, part of the demonstrators marched under the Nazi-style banners of the National Bolshevik Party, where the hammer and sickle replace the swastika. And some of the demonstrators did not just march, according to the opposition paper Novaya Gazeta, where Anna Politkovskaya used to work before she was murdered last fall. In a number of instances they also attacked the police, who were trying to block their path when they took an unauthorized route.

When the Russian government was deciding how to respond to last weekend’s marches, they had to take into account what had happened at the March 3 demonstrations of the same coalition in St. Petersburg, where Mr. Limonov’s militants overran police lines and roughed up some of the officers. In Mr. Limonov’s own words on that occasion, "the activists of the National Bolshevik Party have fully justified our hopes. They really were on March 3 the avant-garde’s strike battalion, a hot shell, in all confrontations the first and most militant." Limonov added that in addition to their own flags in St. Petersburg, they were marching under the black, gold and white banners of the Russian empire, which Mr. Limonov’s party wants to recreate. He talked about the spirit of "revolution" and put Moscow authorities on notice that they better not interfere with the April 14 march if they wanted to avoid the same assault to which police were subjected in St. Petersburg on March 3. Mr. Kasyanov and Mr. Kasparov apparently came to the conclusion that almost nobody is bad enough not to be an acceptable ally against the Putin government. Traditional liberals with strong democratic credentials such as Yabloko and the Union of the Right Wing Forces (SPS) refused to cooperate with Mr. Limonov.

That still would not justify a crackdown against peaceful demonstrators and would justify even less the tendency of the Moscow city authorities to tightly control where the opposition can meet and march, often, as I have witnessed myself in the past, with transparently false excuses such as closing the street for repairs for several hours just to make an opposition march impossible. Police violence there certainly was, but to put things in perspective, Mr. Kasparov was detained and released several hours later with a fine of $40. Mr. Limonov was also detained for a number of hours, but has not been fined so far. Both he and Mr. Kasparov were summoned to appear before post-KGB Federal Security Service officials. Former Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov was protected against the police by his own security detail. One assumes that if detaining him would be a priority, it could somehow be arranged.

Why the police overreacted this time, as President Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov has acknowledged, to the relatively small demonstrations of a few thousand people at most is anybody’s guess. Perhaps it can be explained partly by a concern of how far Mr. Limonov and his militants would be prepared to go if allowed the freedom to move around Moscow. Perhaps there was a sentiment typical in Russian security agencies that not doing enough is more dangerous vis-à-vis one’s superiors than doing too much. Perhaps some in the Russian government were provoked by exiled oligarch Boris Berezovsky’s statements on the eve of the march that he was providing funds for a revolution, which was supposed to start precisely with marches like those that Mr. Kasparov, Mr. Kasyanov and Mr. Limonov were organizing in Moscow. And quite possibly some in the Russian government saw the protests as a welcome opportunity to show that might is always right in Russia and any resistance, particularly violent resistance, is hopeless and will be crushed at the outset.

This is not a pretty picture just as the violent clashes between police and protesters in Genoa over the G-8 and in Washington at the World Bank and IMF were not pretty by most accounts. Some overreaction clearly took place, but I still wonder whether a demonstration in Berlin with neo-Nazi symbols appealing to recreate the Third Reich would generate the same kind of an outcry as in the case of Moscow and St. Petersburg. Actually, there is no need to wonder; we all know the answer.