Putin: Are his agents at work creating chaos in Warsaw to smooth
the
path toward Kiev?
Has Putin Orchestrated Poland's Eavesdropping Scandal? (Newsweek
Polska, Poland)
"There is no doubt that at a critical juncture in history,
when the future of the region is being decided, the internal chaos and
paralysis of Polish foreign policy is extremely beneficial to Russia. ... For
Russia, what does it mean that every day, the Polish state is sinking deeper
into chaos and paralysis? What are the interests of the Kremlin in having the
Polish government, Parliament, secret services, and diplomacy, unable to
mobilize themselves and their foreign partners in aiding Ukraine, and instead,
attacking one another? What can Putin gain by knowing that for at least six
months, Polish politicians will be kept off the field in Ukraine, instead being
ensconced in a domestic political brawl? The answers are obvious."
Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski. Not long ago regarded as a rising star, tapes have emerged that record Sikorski and some of his fellow ministers making disparaging remarks about the United States, for instance, that the 'Polish-American alliance is worthless, even harmful, as it gives Poland a false sense of security. It's bullshit.'
There
is, of course, no evidence so far that the boys from Lubyanka
organized the recording studio in Warsaw. And yet, as former CIA director Allen Dulles used to say,
"the case is too random to have happened by chance."
[Editor's Note: This column refers to recordings of private conversations among leading Polish politicians published by the news magazine Wprost. Polish ministers are heard chatting over dinner. Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski is quoted as saying, among other things, "Complete bullshit. We'll get in conflict with the Germans, Russians and we'll think that everything is super because we gave the Americans a blow job. ... Losers. Complete losers." The recordings now threaten to bring down the Polish government].
Russia
has a huge and effective special service with massive resources. It also has a
long and successful tradition of influencing the governments of neighboring
countries. Beginning with Peter I [Peter the Great -
1672-1725], the Russian authorities have often paralyzed, both overtly and
covertly, the functioning of the Polish state, in some cases leading to its
demise. Although it may sound cynical, since the beginning of the
world, this has been common practice for international politics, used by
everyone with the technical means and political will. The saddest
part of the entire situation is that today, just as it was during the First Republic
[1569-1795], neighboring powers need only hand Poles hatchets and skillfully
goad them in order to watch calmly as they kill one another while simultaneously
sinking their own state for the umpteenth time.
There
is no doubt that at a critical juncture in history, when the future of the
region is being decided, the internal chaos and paralysis of Polish foreign
policy is extremely beneficial to Russia. Today, Russia's game is about
limiting her geopolitical influence: will the border be on the San River, or on the Don, i.e. on the
western Ukrainian border, or the eastern? In a positive scenario for the
Kremlin, the high-stakes bidding taking place for the last six months would
lead to a breaking of the "geopolitical dam," and bring Ukraine into
Russia's sphere of influence. That would mean Ukraine’s separation from Europe
and a restoration of the Soviet Union under the Eurasian Union banner. This is
Putin’s idée
fixe which he would regard as his crowning political achievement. In a
negative scenario for the Kremlin, which is forcefully proposed by Warsaw,
Ukraine will ally itself with the European Union and begin, if not a march
toward membership (which could take more than a decade), then at least to its
final escape from Russia.
The
stakes for Moscow are therefore so high that losing this geopolitical game
would mean not only a political defeat, but probably a farewell to power for
the current Kremlin team and its patron. Russians can endure the utmost misery,
but only if their leaders give them the sense that they are, if not
"masters of the world," at least masters of a good portion of it. It
was Poland and her stubborn endeavor to bring Ukraine to the good side of
European power that was the main obstacle to the realization of Putin’s
historical mission of "reuniting Russian lands." Tusk, Sikorski, and all of Poland's ambassadors (who send notes
on Ukraine to the governments they are accredited to nearly every day so as not
to allow the issue of supportingKiev to
be put on the back burner), on one hand, incited the Maidan
demonstrators to stand firm, and on the other, exhorted the West in Washington
and Brussels to support the revolution. Seeing the role Poland has played, it
is hard to imagine that the Russian president would not summon his specialist
saboteurs and command them in no uncertain terms to "fix" the Polish
problem. Taking into account the softness and indecisiveness of the United
States and major European countries, taking Warsaw out of the Ukrainian game
may be a critical turning point for him.
For
Russia, what does it mean that every day, the Polish state is sinking deeper
into chaos and paralysis? What are the interests of the Kremlin in having the
Polish government, Parliament, secret services, and diplomacy, unable to
mobilize themselves and their foreign partners in aiding Ukraine, and instead,
attacking one another? What can Putin gain by knowing that for at least six
months, Polish politicians will be kept off the field in Ukraine, instead being
ensconced in a domestic political brawl? The answers are obvious, but putting
the facts in order would be worthwhile.
First,
in the short term, neutralizing Poland will allow Putin to play the Ukraine
situation to his liking: destabilize the country to the degree that will either
force the present government into far-reaching concessions, or even a change of
Kiev’s team, introducing people who better understand the "historical
need" to be submissive toward Russia.
Second,
the collapse of the Polish government in its present form will give Russia hope
that in the medium term, the Polish political class will sink into reciprocal
accusations and completely lose interest in foreign policy, as well as any
capacity to influence the surrounding reality. If we add to this the
possibility of the seizure of power by a Euro-skeptic coalition government with
a Smolensk
catastrophe-related mentality of conspiracy theorists, we may expect a
lasting marginalization of Poland not only in the region, but in wider European
politics.
[Editor's
Note: On April 11, 2010, the Smolensk air crash took the lives of 97 of
Poland's leading politicians, soldiers and intellectuals, including the president.
The country has yet to recover. Ironically, the Polish passengers on their way
to Smolensk, Russia; were, along with Russian leaders, about to take part in a
memorial intended to heal the pain of the Katyn
massacre, the mass execution of Polish nationals perpetrated by the Soviet
secret police in April-May 1940. Many Poles believe there is some kind of cover
up - or even that it was a conspiracy hatched by the former opposition party, who
now govern the country.]
Third,
in strategic terms, for Russia just as for the West, the Polish government's
fall will be yet more evidence of who has the biggest stick in the region and
is most prepared to use it against current and future adversaries. If today,
Russia manages to neutralize Poland - a main obstacle on its road to restoring
its empire - in the future, every politician in the region will think twice
before deciding to inconvenience the Kremlin by word or deed. If now, by
causing (or discretely stimulating) an internal crisis, and Poland is
successfully cut off from aiding Ukraine, there will be few obstacles remaining
on the road to restoring a Russian sphere of influence in the Eastern
Europe.
Posted By
Worldmeets.US
If
we proceed on the optimistic assumption that Interior
Minister Sienkiewicz is wrong, and that the Polish state still exists, it
surely confronts its greatest crisis in at least a quarter century. [In one of the leaked recordings, Sienkiewicz tells the governor of Poland's central bank that 'the Polish state exists only in theory, in practice it doesn’t exist.'] The problem
is the way Poland has entered the game over international policy issues which
are absolutely fundamental to her existence and national security. The most
important people in the government and the institutions they control are now
excluded from that game and the historical events raging around us. At a moment
when the fate of economic, political, and let’s not shy away from the phrase,
the civilized order on our part of the continent are at stake, the railroad
switches of history are being operated not by Poles, but by Vladimir Putin.
At
a time when our centuries-old ambitions and the dreams held close by
generations have become a reality [genuine Polish independence], it looks as
though, from the point of view of international politics, we are returning to
the era so beautifully described by that illustrious ancestor of our hapless
Interior minister [Henryk Sienkiewicz], who in the 19th century, wrote a
series of wildly popular novels about 17th century Poland]. Let it not turn out
that when this Polish hell cools, and when the dust of partisan bickering, ego
trips, and unleashed private interests settle down, we wake up in a world in
which a French ambassador [Horace Sébastiani, 1771-1851] once again comments on the Russian pacification of Poland by
uttering the words "order reigns in Warsaw."
And even if
it turns out later that it was not Putin and colleagues from his former place
of employment who organized the "tapes scandal," one would have to
admit that, from their point of view, it couldn’t have been done better.
