Secret documents smuggled out of Moscow proving a conspiracy between Thatcher and Gorbachev to stop German unification? Christmas has come three months early for Cold War junkies.

A cache of files copied by Pavel Stroilov, a young researcher at the Gorbachev foundation mere months before they were re-classified, have rocked England with revelations that despite her reputation as a hard line cold warrior and public support for German unity, Thatcher had actually reached out to the Soviet leader to prevent it.

In strict secrecy (recorded only by an unscrupulous Russian note-taker), she told Gorbachev:

“The reunification of Germany is not in the interests of Britain and Western Europe. It might look different from public pronouncements, in official communiqué at Nato meetings, but it is not worth paying ones attention to it.

We do not want a united Germany. This would have led to a change to post-war borders and we can not allow that because such development would undermine the stability of the whole international situation and could endanger our security.

In the same way, a destabilisation of Eastern Europe and breakdown of the Warsaw Pact are also not in our interests.

I can say that the President of the United States is of the same position”.

Today, the thought that Germany might cause another war in Europe is laughably quaint. Yet this was precisely the fear animating Thatcher, only 20 years ago which now seem like two centuries.

She even says: “All Europe is watching this not without a degree of fear, remembering very well who started the two world wars.”

Gorby himself worried about “the likelihood of new Bismarcks or Hitlers [appearing from the woodwork]”.

So what do these new documents tell us, apart from reinforcing the suspicions of being kept in the dark by our leaders?

For one thing, many of the fears expressed in the papers about German unification have come true.

Thatcher foresaw Germany quickly eclipsing Britain’s economy and destabilising Europe through its recognition of Croatia, which precipitated the Yugoslav war and led to all sorts of traumatic re-drawing of borders.

And Gorbachev’s prescient warning that “we won’t be able to explain it to our people if we lose the GDR” was proved right when he was taken out by an attempted hardline coup in 1991 from which neither he nor the USSR would recover.

In all this Byzantine mess, Gorbachev is the only statesman that comes out looking good and keeping his word.

At a time when Thatcher, Mitterand, Reagan and Bush were saying one thing publicly but scheming the exact opposite, he stood out (to the alarm of the others) by sticking true to his radical doctrine of non-intervention and de-militarisation.

As he told Bush in Malta: “The main principle which we have adopted and which we follow as part of our new thinking is the right of each country to choose, including the right to reconsider and change its original course. This is a very painful process, however this is a fundamental right.”

Though the USA did not keep its promises about Nato’s eastward expansion, Gorbachev kept his and removed all Soviet troops from German territory.

Gorbachev’s unyielding commitment to this rule sent shivers down the spine of France, whose foreign minister Jaques Attali told Gorbachev:

“A firm position of non-interference in internal matters of brother nations shown by the USSR during the events in the GDR have puzzled the French leadership. On the one hand, the French sincerely and with pleasure welcomed that fact that the ‘Brezhnev doctrine’ has become a thing of the past. However, on the other hand, the French leadership raised a question whether this meant that the USSR has made peace with the prospect of a united Germany and will not take any steps to prevent it? This has caused a fear approaching panic. France by no means wants German re-unification”.

Indeed, faced with the looming possibility of the Wall’s collapse, Gorbachev’s foreign minister, far from getting ready to defend it at all costs, says: “We’d better take down the Wall ourselves’.

Gorbachev’s assessment that “Mr Kohl is hurrying, fussing, acting irresponsibly, not approaching things seriously”, and that “the theme of re-unification [is being] exploited for electioneering” was vindicated by the chancellor’s humiliating defeat in the 1993 local elections, at the hands of the ‘newly liberated’ former East Germans.

A newspaper at the time wrote:

“Mr Kohl’s promise then that the east would soon be a ‘blooming landscape’ returned to haunt him yesterday as the voters of Brandenburg, which in some parts has unemployment of more than 30 per cent, delivered their verdict. In addition to feeling deceived by the 1990 promises of swift prosperity for all, anti- CDU feeling was fuelled by the revelation last month that CDU leaders from west Germany who had come to run the government in the eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt had been improperly over-paying themselves”.

Sadly, Gorbachev was also proven right in his warning that, in the event of unification, the GDR “will be bought up whole… And when they reach world prices, living standards will fall immediately”.

Twenty years after the fall of the wall, “unemployment in the former East Germany remains double what it is in the west, and in some regions the number of women between the ages of 20 and 30 has dropped by more than 30 percent”.

Is there anything we have lost in this painful transition from a world of Berlin Walls and potential mutual nuclear annihilation, which now seems an entirely different planet from the one we currently inhabit?

If anything, it may have been the very ideal that allowed this transition to occur peacefully: Gorbachev’s principle that every country must be allowed to choose its own way.

Speaking frankly with George HW Bush at Malta, Gorbachev warned:

“It looks as though if in the past we were accused in ‘exporting the revolution’, today it is about the export of American values. The USA are committed to a particular social and economic system chosen by the American people. Let people of other countries also decide which god they want to pray to. The result will not be a copy of Swedish, British or Soviet model. No. They are looking for their own version which will provide them with better life”.

In their rush towards integration into ‘the West’, the newly independent states of Eastern Europe had forfeited this agency, emulating an economic and political system created by other people instead of plotting their own course according to their own unique idea of the good life.

The sudden end of East Germany has shown that no system is inevitable or immutable. Indeed, in the wake of the economic crisis, citizens of America and Western Europe must also ask whether the economic and political system they have inherited is one they would have chosen themselves; whether it really meets their needs for a better life.

Perhaps it’s time for a Perestroika of their own.

Why would a shrewd Russian oligarch want to buy two notoriously loss making English newspapers? According to billionaire Alexander Lebedev, it was his fond memories of scouring the London dailies for information as a young Soviet spy, as well as being a “good way to waste money”. But really he just wanted to hang out with JK Rowling.

Now that he has already purchased the centre-right Evening Standard, the ‘oligarch with a social conscience’ is set any day now to close the deal on the Independent, a centre left-liberal broadsheet much closer to his champagne-socialist tastes: Lebedev blogs under the name Capitalist-Idealist.

But who is he and what does this all mean?

Unlike other oligarchs, he is not close to the Kremlin (while never doing anything Khodorkovskian to inspire their full rage). He has run on a reformist platform in the controversial Sochi elections only to have his candidacy thrown out by the authories.

Despite his KGB ties Levedev’s unabashed anglophilia has made him more welcome in London than the other oligarchs who have been playing real-life Monopoly in the English capital.

That was a very superficial analysis, and I will now do more homework on this guy.

But I leave you with this pricelessly disconcerting series of photos published in today’s Guardian featuring Lebedev and his bearded, seemingly taxidermic son surrealistically hobnobbing with JK Rowling, Gorbachev, Sophie Dahl and the Prime Minister’s wife.

A gloriously nostalgic little photo collection in today's Guardian looks back on David Bowie's 1973 visit to the USSR.

“We drank cheap riesling wine and beer (peeva) with a bunch of soldiers we met the night before. They were friendly and inquisitive as to what life was like in the west, when we asked them what they did in the army they said they were in the construction unit”.

But it wasn't all fun and games for Mr Bowie.

Life in the USSR blew the sequins off our Western-decadent hero, who was quickly reduced to a wimpering pile of bourgeois slobber, according to another account of his journey:

“I just want bloody well to go home and watch the telly,” he confessed to his wife, Angie, on their way home to Beckenham, England. “After what I’ve seen of this world, I’ve never been so damned scared in my life.”

Final Score:

Communist Siberia 1 : 0 British Glam Rock

Yet another casualty of the credit crisis: prices for Western European politicians have plummeted.

What is the world coming to when a nouveau riche Russian aluminium baron can be suspected of buying an old-schooler-than-thou UK shadow chancellor, member of Oxford's elite Bullingdon club and heir to the third Osborne Baronetcy, all for a bargain $80000?

Naturally, Gideon George Oliver Osborne denies any impropriety occured on Oleg Deripaska's yacht off the coast of Corfu, and that the whole incident was but an innocent mistake precipitated by the poor judgement of his old Oxford and Bullingdon pal Nat Roschild.

Despite all the pious if eloquent incantations by Edward Lucas (and a little ironic coming from a writer for the supposedly cold-headedly & rational Economist), it must be heartening for Russian oligarchs to know that money still talks, or is at least capable of making the second most senior opposition politician in the UK so hurry to meet his appointment with Deripaska as to very un-Britishly trample over a beach full of swimmers with his motor boat.

(courtesy Martin Rowson)
And for those inclined to dismiss these sorts of plutocrat romances as traditionally Conservative indiscretions, consider the case of Peter Mandelson.

Indeed, our poor Deripaska has been caught in an improbable menage a trois with both Labour and the Conservatives: a moving case of love (of money) superceding ideology.

It must be said that, for all his superiour breeding, Osborne did the roguish thing and tried to publicly wash his hands of the affair, while Mandelson remained admirably tight lipped, no doubt to preserve Deripaska's maiden honour.

Nothing to do with preserving the quickly evaporating semblance of legitimacy surrounding Mandelson's recent decision, as EU trade commissioner, to slash aluminium tariffs by half from 6% to 3%, after a party aboard Deripaska's luxury yacht.

So legendary has Russian generosity to Western politicians become that even the Americans wanted in on the deal, with none other than John McCain asking the Russians for a donation, albeit apparently by mistake.

Dig a little deeper, however, and it turns out that McCain's campaign strategist Rick Davis has had close dealings with, you guessed it, Mr Deripaska.
For all the sleazy visuals of MPs begging at the table of a foreign businessman, it's impossible not to see the huge firestorm that has erupted in English politics over their politicians’ sordid dealings with Russian business interests as rather quaint.

The Deripaska affair has been Britain's ‘Jeremiah Wright moment‘: after a decade of Western captains of industry wining and dining Russian politicians into sweetheart deals and reforms that benefited Western investors,  the chickens have come home to roost.

 

Whatever one thinks of his foppish red socks or penchant for Prime Ministerial underwear,  famous Iraq whistleblower Sir Christopher Meyer is a sound chap when it comes to foreign policy.

So when the UK's former ambassador to the US writes that “a return to 1815 is the way forward for Europe: the Congress of Vienna divided the continent into spheres of influence[and] similar rules are needed for the 21st century”, we should listen.

His provocative essay, published in the Times, argues that globalisation and the end of the cold war have actually strengthened nationalism around the world:

It is useless to say that nationalism and ethnic tribalism have no place in the international relations of the 21st century. If anything the spread of Western-style democracy has amplified their appeal and resonance.

He issues a stinging rebuke to the now fashionable conception of the national interest, and spheres of interest, as anachronistic. Speaking of Russia and Iran, Meyer states:

You don't have to like or approve of these regimes. But not to understand their histories is not to understand the mainspring of their external policies - in Russia's case its determination to rebuild its greatness, dismantled, as millions of Russians see it, by Mikhail Gorbachev and his Georgian Foreign Minister, Eduard Shevardnadze, aided and abetted by the West.

I would bet a sackful of roubles that Russian foreign policy would not be one jot different if it were a fully functioning democracy of the kind that we appear keen to spread around the globe.

This last passage is so important because it pierces the misguided notion of ideological primacy in international relations so peddled by the Bush and Blair administrations. Whether a regime is democratic or not ultimately bears little relation to its definition of geopolitical self-interest.

Sir Chris calls on “Russia and the West…to draw up rules of the road for the 21st century” similar ot the Congress of Vienna in 1815.

Something similar is needed today, based again on spheres of influence. Nato must renounce the provocative folly of being open to Georgian or, worse, Ukrainian membership. This strikes at the heart of the Russian national interest and offers no enhanced security to either Tbilisi or Kiev. As for Russia, it must be made unambiguously clear where any revanchist lunge westwards would provoke a military response by Nato.

Couldn't have said it better myself.

 

In a refreshing turn of events, Vladimir Putin has reportedly saved the lives of several journalists during a trip to a Siberian conservation area for the endangered Amur tiger (in accordance with the Lomonosov-Lavoisier Law of Conservation of Media, an opposition website owner in secessionist Ingushetia was ordered killed shortly afterwards).

When a tiger escaped from a trap and ran in the direction of the press pack, Putin is said to have shot it with a tranquiliser gun. Then, in a clear signal to Nato and Georgia, the Prime Minister stripped down to his camouflage underwear and proceeded to tear out and eat its still beating heart.

Well, not exactly; but he might as well have done, judging by the British headlines:

“Putin shoots a tiger as Europe grapples with Russian aggression” screams the Guardian, and then asks: “Was it an openly hostile signal of power play to the west? Or just another incarnation of Putin's oft-demonstrated masculinity?”

“Vladimir Putin 'shoots’ tiger, dismisses EU leaders”, declares the Times, adding that “the Russian Prime Minister , shown in new macho-style pictures apparently tranquilising a tiger , said that any attempts at severing relations would be hampered by the self-interest of European nations”.

In fact, histrionics aside, this has been a big week for Russian diplomacy: President Medvedev spelt out the 5 principles of his new foreign policy vision. The following is the BBC's Paul Reynolds's fine summary; his article is also worth reading for its good commentary.

1. International law

“Russia recognises the primacy of the basic principles of international law, which define relations between civilised nations. It is in the framework of these principles, of this concept of international law, that we will develop our relations with other states.”

2. Multi-polar world

“The world should be multi-polar. Unipolarity is unacceptable, domination is impermissible. We cannot accept a world order in which all decisions are taken by one country, even such a serious and authoritative country as the United States of America. This kind of world is unstable and fraught with conflict.”

3. No isolation

“Russia does not want confrontation with any country; Russia has no intention of isolating itself. We will develop, as far as possible, friendly relations both with Europe and with the United State of America, as well as with other countries of the world.”

4. Protect citizens

“Our unquestionable priority is to protect the life and dignity of our citizens, wherever they are. We will also proceed from this in pursuing our foreign policy. We will also protect the interest of our business community abroad. And it should be clear to everyone that if someone makes aggressive forays, he will get a response.”

5. Spheres of influence

“Russia, just like other countries in the world, has regions where it has its privileged interests. In these regions, there are countries with which we have traditionally had friendly cordial relations, historically special relations. We will work very attentively in these regions and develop these friendly relations with these states, with our close neighbours.”

Asked if these “priority regions” were those that bordered on Russia he replied: “Certainly the regions bordering [on Russia], but not only them.”

And he stated: “As regards the future, it depends not just on us. It also depends on our friends, our partners in the international community. They have a choice.”

Of course, these postulates are nothing new. The principles of Multipolarity and the idea of Russia's Monroe Doctrine in the so-called Near Abroad (the former Soviet republics) were first advanced about a decade ago by Yevgueny Primakov. At the time, around the allied bombing of Yugoslavia, Russia made a lot of bluster regarding Nato encroachment, but couldn't deliver.  The difference is that now Russia appears for the first time able to put its tanks where its mouth is.

Russia's recognition of Ossetia and Abkhazia baffled me. On this blog, I have frequently tried to show alternative, Russian perspectives on matters that seem otherwise to be common sense, above debate, to Western audiences. But I just cannot see any benefits this move will bring. On the contrary, by uniting the traditionally friendly OSCE, pragmatic EU and hostile NATO in opposition, it threatens to increase Russia's international isolation, and heighten the very encirclement that Putin had so anxiously tried to roll back with his Caucasian gambit.

In an interview with Russia Today, Medvedev raised the stakes further still:

“We are not afraid of anything, including the possibility of a new cold war. But of course, we don't desire it”.

Not one other country has recognised the breakaway republics.

Indeed, while “it would be an exaggeration to say that Russia finds itself in international isolation, writes the Russian political scientist Fyodor Lukyanov, “Russia has clearly found itself in a vacuum. No one has supported Moscow's actions, although for various reasons”.

In his illuminating and clear-headed essay for Radio Liberty, Lukyanov goes on to state that:

“Russia has demonstrated that it is able and willing to use force outside its borders in order to defend its national interests. This leaves neighboring countries faced with the question of how to ensure their own security…And Russia has to answer an equally important question: What are the criteria for determining those genuinely essential national interests in the name of which it is justified to use military force?

Very important questions, which should have been answered BEFORE any shots were fired. Yet perhaps Lukyanov's most important observation is that Russia and the US appear to have “incompatible strategic horizons”.

Russia is a global power with regional ambitions. That is, it is ready to exchange its opportunities in distant regions like Latin America, Africa, the Middle East, and the Far East in exchange for its interests in the regions that border it — Europe and Eurasia. That is, Moscow has a clear hierarchy of its priorities.

The United States is a superpower with global ambitions. A global leader does not have secondary interests. It isn't possible to sacrifice anything or make trades because if something starts to totter in one place, it could trigger a domino effect. Therefore, everyone else must be pushed back as much as possible. As a result, no constructive dialogue is possible.

Whether or not one endorses the rather bleak conclusion, it is undeniable that a new relationship must be negotiated between Russia and the US-led West.

All my friends have been asking me: why does Russia just not seem to care what other countries think of it? Surely there could have been more conciliatory, diplomatic things that Medvedev could have said etc? The truth is, I’m not sure how useful that would have been. George HW Bush famously said that the USA does not apologise to anyone. It is very doubtful that ‘politeness’ achieves anything in relations with other countries, whose ties are based on shared interests, not good vibrations. But it could cost you domestically. Just think of how Obama's foreign trip was interpreted by the right wing press as ‘pandering to France’ and ‘apologising for America’. Leaders have every incentive to sound tough, and the tougher, the better. Does anyone really believe that if Medvedev had been more balanced and understanding that Bush and NATO would have changed their Caucasus policy in his favour?

In fact, that is precisely what Gorbachev did in the late 1980s, and the near-universal perception in Russia is that the West royally took advantage of that to beat Russia while it was down. Gorbachev made a very big deal of sharing Western values, of transcending the old politics of division, of believing in universal human rights and individual free choice. And the West loved him back. But did all that Gorbymania stop America and West Germany from wresting concession after concession from the spluttering USSR? Nothing personal, just business!

So now it's no more Mr Nice Guy, goes the thinking, because Russia's learnt the hard way exactly where they finish.

The latest edition of Private Eye, the finest satirical/investigative journal in the English language, is all about Russia & Georgia, with an Olympic flavour:

Let's have a look, shall we?

And the party-political angle:

Forget Barack Obama: Medvedev is already the world's first metrosexual leader.

Joel Stein recently wrote of the effeminate US Democratic presidential candidate in the LA Times:

“He's well-dressed. He eats arugula (rocket) — which he buys at Whole Foods… He is, as we mentioned, quite thin. He may only be half-black, but he's three-quarters gay”.

What a girl! Being thin, eating organic leaves and wearing an off the rack Burberry suit was the best Obama could do?

Once again, as with women's tennis, robber barons, computer hacking, conspicuous consumption, espionage and racism, it falls to Russia to step in and show America how it's done.

While it may have stalled a little regarding such incidentals as elections, a free press, tolerance for minorities and business transparency, Russia has made democratic history where it counts: by electing a president who appears to be more a puppet of GQ magazine than of Vladimir Putin.

Take this EASY QUIZ to see if YOU are a METROSEXUAL PRESIDENT!

1. When hosting an international summit, you give visiting heads of state gifts of:

a) Oligarch livers.
b) Silver scale models of the next generation T-90 tank
c) Signed albums of your own amateur photography, which include pictures of ‘Italian cherubs, a rowing boat bobbing on a dappled turquoise lake, ducks, and several landscapes’.

2. What is your favourite Crayola colour?

a) Bruised-Chechen Blue
b) Rib-eye Red
c) Deep purple

3. To relax, you:

a) go shirtless fishing
b) practice judo on little children
c) meditate

4. As a kid, you wanted to be:

a) a spy
b) leader of all the Russias
c) a lawyer

5. Outside of the office, you prefer to dress in:

a) a nuclear submarine commander's uniform
b) just a strategically placed gun
c) turtleneck paired with a leather jacket

(ANSWERS: 5 Cs or more: Congratulations! You’re a Metrosexual President!

3 As or 3 Bs: Congratulations! You’re the new Prime Minister!)

A cursory analysis of Medvedev's dress confirms the suspicions: Roped shoulders a la Tom Ford? Check. Waisted double vented shorter-than-average jacket? Check.

High lapels? Metrolicious!

Cheeky school-tie knot paired with uber-spread collar? Like, straight out of Gossip Girl!!!

And don't neglect those nails!

Many commentators have attempted to paint Medvedev as little more than an extension of his predecessor. Yet nothing could be further from the truth. In a radical departure, the new leader quickly jettisoned Putin's boxy Brionis and his predictable, precision tied half-windsors.

But what does that tell us about his future foreign policy?

More than you might think!

Vladimir Putin's preference for Brioni and Hugo Boss suits correlated perfectly with his close political ties to Berlusconi's Italy and Schroeder's Germany (Schoeder, too, apparently chose Brioni). Conversely, Putin was as circumspect of British tailoring as of its Berezovsky-shelterin’ Prime Minister.

Unlike his mentor, Medvedev is clearly a Saville Row man. Though we do not know exactly which tailor he uses, the subtly waisted cut and characteristic navy colour (preferred by the likes of Daniel Craig and Prince Charles) of several of his suits, together with his penchant for old-boy style asymmetrical tie-knots, points strongly to a W1S postcode.

Therefore, could the era of hostility and suspicion between Russia and the UK be drawing to a close?

It is too early to tell, but all those sceptical of sartorial power in international diplomacy should note the wonders Medvedev's style has already done for Russia's relationship with France.

The recent spat with America and Britain over Zimbabwe and Russia's continued intransigence over the US AMB shield in the Czech republic have dashed the hopes of many in the West that Medvedev would make a qualitative departure from Putin.

The Guardian's Luke Harding put it just so:

Medvedev's hardline comments in one of his first major speeches on foreign policy since his inauguration in May are likely to disappoint western observers. They had hoped that his presidency might usher in a more conciliatory era in relations with the west.

However, whether one defines Russia's position on these issues as anti-Western grandstanding or pragmatic self-interest, one thing is clear: the Russian press has been covering many sides of the story.

In the immediate wake of the Zimbabwe brouhaha, much of the reaction in the Russian mainstream news was refreshingly critical of the government's policies.

For example, Vremya Novostei, a liberal but pro-government paper, contextualised the veto with a recap of recent moves by Russia to protect Burma and Sudan against Western reprisals. Then, it quoted Sergei Oznobischev, head of the Institute of Strategic Studies as saying that appeasing pariah states is a sure recipe for conflict with the West, and that the key to Russian great power status lies not in Burma, Zimbabwe or even China, but in partnership with Europe and the US.

Naturally, the government has not loosened its grip on the media, and that fact alone makes the appearance of such articles all the more interesting.

In a recent interview, former White House rebel Vladimir Ryzhkov drew a tentative parallel between Medvedev and Gorbachev. Gorbachev started out as a liberal, not a democrat. He wanted to democratise institutions in order to promote his vision of liberal humanism, not to have a free for all. Similarly, he started off with very cautious economic reforms, that began with a tinkering around the edges and concentrated on efficiency and market accounting mechanisms.

Medvedev has certainly started to tinker. Earlier this month, he announced that Gazprom, Putin's Koh-i-Noor, would have to start sharing its pipelines with other companies. This was a pretty important announcement, as one of the things that made Gazprom such a threat to Europe was its ownership of both gas and pipelines: EU monopoly regulations forbade such things for its own companies, who ended up outflanked. Today came the news that Gazprom would lay off 500 executives, or 10% of the staff, at its head office.

It is too early to say whether Medvedev has any plans for a full fledged Perestroika. As the closure of the Exile has revealed, he's not one for free for alls. Yet the critical press line and gentle economic restructuring may point to a liberal impulse that, like with Gorbachev, not only may come to fruition with time, but also be eventually overtaken by events.