Creating Civil Wars is Russian Foreign Policy

Featured in Stars and Stripes on March 24, 2016. To access the original article, click here.

Russia is increasing its presence in Syria, while its efforts to find a diplomatic solution to the impasse grind to a halt. T-90 main battle tanks with explosive armor, only previously deployed in Chechnya and Ukraine, have been spotted outside of Aleppo. Reuters reports seven T-90s are at the Russian airfield in Latakia. Russia took over the main international airport in Damascus last year, and began airlifting tons of supplies, soldiers and armaments into the country, according to Business Insider. President Vladimir Putin confirmed in December that Russia is providing support to the Free Syrian Army.

“We support it from the air, as well as the Syrian army, we assist them with weapons, ammunition and provide material support,” he said.

This is part of a long pattern of Russian expansion of its military reach since the fall of the Soviet Union.

In March 1992, elements of the Russian 14th Army sided with separatists to oppose the central government of Moldova’s efforts to exert sovereignty on the ethnically Russian enclave of Transnistria. Russian officers trained the Transnistrian defense forces, and transferred weaponry to them. The separatist regime engaged in ethnic cleansing, leading to 25,000 Moldovans becoming internally displaced persons (IDPs). Russia then engineered a cease-fire patrolled by predominantly Russian peacekeepers, and the 14th Army remains on Transnistrian soil.

From 1991 to 1993, when Azerbaijan faced a war of occupation by neighboring Armenia, Russia put its entire weight behind pro-Russian Armenia against pro-Western Azerbaijan. This support allowed Armenia to occupy the Nagorno-Karabakh region as well as seven surrounding regions of Azerbaijan. During the war, in February 1992, Russia’s 366th Motorized Rifle Regiment surrounded the Azerbaijani town of Khojaly, while Armenians massacred the residents. Moscow said the Russians who had been involved in this action were “volunteers.”

By 1993, the Russian 7th Army was already protecting Armenia’s borders. Russia then arranged to be a co-chair of the OSCE Minsk Group, which has mediated Armenian-Azerbaijani peace talks for decades without any results. Azerbaijan houses approximately 600,000-1,000,000 IDPs expelled from its occupied regions. For Russia, however, the continuing unrest provides an excuse for maintaining 3,000 troops at the 102nd Military Base, north of Yerevan, Armenia.

Russian forces supported Abkhazian separatists in their fight with the Georgian government in 1992. Human Rights Watch reported, “The conflict in Abkhazia was heightened by the involvement of Russia, mostly on the Abkhaz side, especially during the war’s initial stages. … Russian arms found their way into Abkhaz hands, Russian planes bombed civilian targets in Georgian-controlled territory, Russian military vessels, manned by supporters of the Abkhaz side, were made available to shell Georgian-held Sukhumi, and at least a handful of Russian-trained and Russian-paid fighters defended Abkhaz territory in Tkvarcheli.”

Human Rights Watch later interviewed a group of six armed Russians in Abkhazia who admitted they had been brought to the conflict area on Russian helicopters, were all former KGB and Spetznaz forces, had been fighting Georgian troops, had previously been fighting in Transnistria, and had begun in Moscow as a group of 30 “experienced, disciplined, Russian professionals.” They then denied being members of Russian government forces, but said they were “independent, patriotic forces.” (It was one of the earliest examples of the “little green men” made famous in the 2014 Russian seizure of Crimea.) The result: a cease-fire patrolled by Russian peacekeepers.

This led to devastating results in 2008, when the Russian army intervened in Abkhazia and Ossetia to “restore the peace.” Georgia cares for approximately 300,000 IDPs. Russia is one of three parties involved in the Geneva peace talks. Today, Russian troops remain in these separatist areas, on soil recognized by the international community as Georgian, without the permission of the Georgian government. Russia also recognizes these areas as independent states.

In 2014, Russian forces stationed at the Russian naval station in Crimea surged out of their base in uniforms without insignia, to forcibly evict Ukrainian forces from their own territory. Russian “volunteers” have fought on the side of separatists in eastern Ukraine, and these separatists are armed with Russian tanks, anti-aircraft missiles and personnel carriers. Crater analysis shows that mortar rounds and missiles fired in support of the separatists have their origins inside Russia itself.

Russia has now annexed Crimea, and called for diplomacy to solve the crisis it created in eastern Ukraine. It is a cosponsor of the Minsk talks. Today, Russian troops are stationed in Crimea, and Putin has threatened to introduce Russian troops overtly into eastern Ukraine to “protect” the citizenry.

The pattern is clear: Russian military support for a side in a civil war contributes to unrest, and then Russian diplomatic efforts keep the conflict simmering. The continuing problems justify maintaining a Russian troop presence.

In all these instances, Russian military interventions and/or peace efforts have led to a continued expansion of Russian power and influence. America and its allies in Syria need to learn from history, and not just repeat it.

James J. Coyle, director of Chapman University’s Center for Global Education, is former director of Middle East studies at the U.S. Army War College.

Russia's Lame Legal Arguments

Russia's lame legal arguments

falseCoyle, James J

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.Orange County Register [Santa Ana, Calif] 25 Apr 2014.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has put forward justifications for his annexation of the Crimea and continued meddling in Eastern Ukraine.

The broadest of his claims is that Russia has the right to intervene anywhere, anytime, if ethnic Russians are endangered. If accepted by the world community, this modern day Brezhnev doctrine (the Soviet Union has the right to intervene in communist countries to protect them from the threat of capitalism) would give the Russian leader the right to intervene in the internal affairs of any country of the former Soviet empire.
Putin has also put forward a number of legal arguments, the first of which is that the government in Kiev is an illegal formation. Russian leaders have pointed out that the Ukrainian constitution allows for the removal of a president only by death, illness, physical or mental incapacity, or impeachment. When the Ukrainian parliament removed President Viktor Yanukovych from his position after he fled the country, the parliament did so by a majority vote - failing to observe the constitutional niceties.
Consequently, Yanukovych remains president of Ukraine. This has a number of implications. Since the current government in Kiev was created outside of constitutional provisions, it is illegal and Russia has no one with whom to dialogue about events.
Putin has asserted that Crimea has always been a part of Russia and that Premier Nikita Khrushchev's transfer of Crimea to Ukraine was "in clear violation of the constitutional norms that were in place even then." When the Soviet Union collapsed, the Russian people realized they were not simply robbed, but plundered.
Russia also uses the principle of self-determination to justify annexation of Crimea, citing a referendum held in March in which 83 percent of Crimean inhabitants participated. The vote was held under the guns of armed supporters of Moscow. Integration into Russia received 96 percent approval.
Russia has gleefully called on the example of the West, including the United States, that approved the independence of Kosovo from Serbia. If Kosovo can do it, Putin asked, why can't Crimea?
The Russian position is wrong. While it is true the Ukrainian constitution did not include removal of a president by majority vote, the constitution also did not envision its president fleeing the country after looting the treasury. Further, there is no provision within the constitution authorizing parts of the country to declare independence or to unite with neighboring powers.
Putin declared the fall of the Soviet Union the greatest tragedy of the 20th century. It is therefore odd to hear him challenge the 1954 decision of that country's premier. The leader of the Soviet Union had the power to send its citizens to the Gulag, authorize mass deportations of the Tatars and so on, but Putin does not believe he had the power to transfer Crimea.
No one accepts the legitimacy of the 2014 referendum that took place while Crimea was under armed occupation. A more accurate view on the right to self-determination is the 1991 referendum in which 54 percent of Crimeans voted to separate from Moscow.
Kosovo separated from Serbia after war and ethnic cleansing. Kosovo did not seek to join another country. In Crimea, there was no war, no ethnic cleansing and no desire for independence. International law recognizes the right of a government to have the monopoly on the use of force within a country: Kiev's efforts to regain control in the east is its sovereign right.
Moscow's meddling in Ukraine is cynical, power politics and not justified by international law.
 

Crimea following Russian Playbook

James J. Coyle: Crimea following Russian playbook

 

By JAMES J. COYLE / Contributing Writer

Published: March 6, 2014 Updated: 3:19 p.m.

Moscow has a long history of using military force to maintain its control over areas it considers part of its empire. East Berlin, Hungary and Czechoslovakia are examples from Cold War history. Other examples are less well known in the West, but are still significant.
On Dec. 27, 1979, Soviet forces dressed in Afghan army uniforms took over the major government and military installations in Kabul, Afghanistan. Russia recognized Babrak Karmal as the rightful leader of Afghanistan and then heeded his request for intervention (broadcast from his location inside the Soviet Union) to justify the invasion. The Soviets announced their military action was to protect the socialist revolution in Afghanistan.
A decade later, as the Soviet Union collapsed, a section of Moldova separated from that country and unilaterally declared its independence. This separatist region, the Trans-Dniester, was supported by Moscow in a brief war in 1992. Russian troops then moved into the area as peacekeepers. Russia now chairs fruitless peace talks between the two sides. Russia also used its position in Transdniester as justification to cancel its involvement with the Conventional Forces in Europe arms limitation treaty.
In the same period, areas within Georgia broke away from that country. These separatist regions, Abkhazia and South Ossetia, declared their independence. Russia again moved troops into the area as peacekeepers and co-chaired peace talks that have gone nowhere. In 2008, when Georgia tried to restore its sovereignty over these separatist areas, Moscow fought a war with that country, supposedly to protect Russian citizens living in the breakaway republics. Russia has since recognized the two areas as sovereign nations and kept their forces on the Georgian border.
In 1991-94 Armenia invaded around one-fifth of Azerbaijan's territory, including the Nagorno-Karabakh region. During the war, Armenia was heavily supported by the Russian military. Today, the largest Russian military base outside of Russian territory is located in Armenia.
The United Nations Security Council passed four resolutions acknowledging that Nagorno Karabakh and the surrounding occupied territories are part of Azerbaijan, and demanding immediate withdrawal of all Armenian troops from the occupied territories. But the resolutions remain unfulfilled by Russian-backed Armenia. Given Russia’s veto power on the Security Council, it is not surprising that the Council does nothing to push for the implementation of its own resolutions. As in Moldova and Georgia, Russia is a cosponsor of peace talks that have not solved the conflict.
Now it is Ukraine’s turn. Russian military units dressed in uniforms without insignia (but driving Russian-licensed military vehicles) occupied or surrounded major governmental and military installations in Crimea. Russia has recognized Sergei Aksyonov as the leader of Crimea, despite his party having the support of 3 percent of the people. Russia is defending its moves in the area as an effort to protect Russian citizens in Crimea. As NATO forces mass on the Polish border and the United States calls for a cease-fire, Russian President Vladimir Putin has ended military maneuvers on the Russian-Ukrainian border. He said he has not ruled out direct military intervention in the east of the country, if necessary to protect Russian citizens.
If history is a guide, neither Europe nor the United States will militarily defend Ukraine’s independence. Any United Nations resolution will call for respecting the territorial integrity of Ukraine, but will not contain enforcement provisions or a condemnation of Russian moves.
A cease-fire will be established, with Russian troops acting as peacekeepers. Russia will co-chair peace talks that will enshrine their continued involvement. Russia, controlling Ukraine’s northern borders and the Crimea, will have a stranglehold on that nation’s independence. American prestige in Eastern Europe and the Caucasus will slip another notch.
American politicians are calling for steps to roll back Russian gains in Crimea. For their calls to be heeded, they should first call for the removal of Russian troops in the conflicts in Moldova, Georgia and Azerbaijan.
James J. Coyle, Ph.D., is the director of Global Education at Chapman University and is chair of the Eurasian committee of the Pacific Council on International Policy.