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Vyacheslav Nikonov,
D. Sc.(Hist.), Chairman of the Committee on Education of the State Duma, Chairman of the "Russky Mir" Foundation, member of the Supreme Council of the "United Russia" Party FOREIGN POLICY AND VALUE ORIENTATIONS
A country's foreign policy and value orientations are not only part and parcel of international relations, but also of its domestic policy. It is true of our country's policy, too. There is an evident confrontation between the two value pictures of the world. The world looks differently from a side glance, from the point of view of The New York Times or French TV, or from Russian perception.
People are being persuaded that the western world had made a correct civilizational choice, whereas Russia had made a wrong choice and fell out from the Catholic mainstream, which moved forward, having become one of the greatest cultural phenomena. Russia had fallen under the domination of the Mongolians, while Europe had been going forward to the peaks of world science. Free cities emerged, Renaissance, Reformation and religious freedom flourished in Europe at the time when Russia remained a country of serfdom, backwardness, and religious persecution. The West was bringing civilization, while Russia was enslaving Eurasian peoples. Europe gave the world national states and democracy as the main value of the modern world, whereas
Russia was unable to offer any value orientations. Europe and the West put forward the concept of human rights, but Russia and the Soviet Union offered a totalitarian political model. Today the West upholds the rights of minorities, both national and sexual, while Russia, on the contrary, enslaves them. Indeed, the West offers a comprehensive picture of values, and it largely coincides with that seen by any of our liberal-minded people. However, this picture is not true.
Some people think that the civilizational choice is made at the present time. For instance Petro Poroshenko speaks of the civilizational choice for Ukraine. In actual fact, this civilizational choice had been made a long time ago by our ancestors. For Russia it had been the choice of Orthodox Christianity taken from Byzantium, whereas the West had been Catholic, taken from Roman Catholicism, and crowned all European kings.
At the time, when the choice was made between Byzantium and Rome, it looked like the modern choice between, say, Paris and Bantustan. At that time Constantinople was the greatest capital of the world and Byzantium - the greatest empire which was looked upon as the center of the universe. There were quite enough foundations for this view. It was only China that could have been viewed as the rival of Byzantium in cultural level. At the time the population o Rome did not exceed twenty thousand, the power of the Pope was not spread beyond the boundaries of the Vatican. Europe was a rural civilization, in contrast to Byzantine civilization. It did not know Roman architecture, which came later from Byzantium. After it came Gothic architecture. At the time Byzantium was at the height of human civilization in the development level of architecture and science, which had imbibed the fruits of Oriental science and wisdom, and the achievements of the Hellenistic world and western scholars.
There were no libraries in the West at the time. It was only in the 13 th century that Europe began to learn sciences through translations of works from Greek, Arabic and Persian. The West learnt of works by Aristotle and Plato through the East. Light was coming from the East, as the said at the time, and it Byzantium was the East from Europe.
Russia had been lucky for it had taken Orthodox Christianity and culture at the peak of their development. We were one of the few nations in the world which could receive the Word of God in the native language thanks to the noble efforts of St. Cyril and Methodius who created the Slavic written language, having transformed the Greek language and added eight letters mode to its alphabet. Thanks to the new written language we had learnt scholarly treasures of the time, received the Holy Writ, legends, liturgy, and architecture. Kiev was trying to imitate Constantinople, and not without success. The culture of Kievan Rus was more profound than culture of West Europe of the epoch. All those who have studied Russian chronicles admit that they contained more information than West European ones and had been written by better educated people.
By the 11th century, Rus was almost entirely literate, especially in towns, due to the efforts of the church, which was shown by birchbark manuscripts and graffiti on the walls of our ancient cathedrals.
When Anna Yaroslavna, daughter of Yaroslav the Wise, had become the Queen of France, having married Henri I, it turned out that she was the most educated person at the royal court, including the king himself, for she knew and could write Latin and several other languages. The Gospels, which she had brought, was used by all Kings of France giving an oath.
The Mongolian invasion was a terrible trial for Russia. Scholars believe that only one percent, even less, of the cultural heritage of Kievan Rus had come down to us. We know of the "Lay of the Host of
Igor." There had been hundreds, perhaps thousands, of such works, but they have not come down to us, having been burnt or otherwise destroyed in wars. That was a terrible invasion, urban culture was largely destroyed, and Russian became a country of rural culture.
It was a time of serious trials and tribulations for our country. The Mongolian Empire was the biggest empire in human history, much bigger than the Roman or the British Empire at the peak of its flourishing.
The Empire of Genghiz Khan and his descendants included China, Siberia, Central Asia, considerable part of India, the Middle East, Russia and Ukraine. This empire was ruled from China. Byzantium had only one rival in the development level of civilization at the time - China. We were part of the empire ruled from China, and the Russian Prince Alexander Nevsky had gone there, just as many others of our princes, who had to travel almost to the very Pacific coast.
The Russian part of the Golden Horde was ruled in Chinese style, which was more advanced than West European managerial practices of the time. Head tax, population census, and coachman service existed in these parts of the Golden Horde. In other words, society was organized in a way enabling the state to receive taxes regularly. Apart from that, a system existed which provided supplies of forage and built bridges and roads. All this had existed in China for many centuries. In other words, our territory was managed not by Mongolian rules, but by Chinese, Uighur, Samarkand technologies. Highly-developed managerial practices in Russia as part of the Genghiz-Khan Empire lent it advanced imperial experience. So that when the great empire began to disintegrate, its western part did not fall into a vacuum, and ultimately became the biggest power on our planet.
The choice of values at the time was very important. The West offered its assistance to Russia in the struggle against the Mongolian
invader, but Russia did not accept it due to a great difference of values. In the Cenghiz-Khan Empire human soul and beliefs were not violated. Orthodox Christianity was not banned. It became widespread especially after one of our metropolitans had cured the blind wife of a Mongolian khan. The West offered Catholicism and the change of the very foundations of faith. Mongolians could take away life, whereas the West wanted to take away the soul. This was why the Russian warriors led by Prince Alexander Nevsky put up bitter resistance to the Crusaders on Lake Peipus and the Neva River. The watershed in the history of our country was liberation from the Mongolian-Tatar yoke. It almost completely coincided with the discovery of American by Christopher Columbus.
True, this was not a simple coincidence. At the moment western civilization and Europe began to expand actively in all directions: America,, Africa, Asia. Suddenly, on the boundary of the West and East a small territory was found, which was called Russia and was smaller than Poland or Lithuania. It had just freed itself from foreign domination, and was ravaged and poor. Besides, it was situated in the farthest northeastern corner of Eurasia.
But that state was destined to become a great power. How and
why?
At the time Russia was regarded as something like Africa, which had to be rapidly developed and colonized. However, it had a state structure, which worked and was quite active toward many East European countries. Many embassies were opened - from Vatican to the Sacred Roman Empire of the German nation, the strongest European state at the time. Some of these sates offered Ivan III, then Vasily III, his son, the crown from the hands of the Pope, along with Catholicism.
It was actively trying to penetrate into Russia. The marriage of Sophia Palaeologue and Ivan III was in actual fact a Pope's intrigue. Sophia Palaeologue was the niece of the last emperor of Byzantium which fell to the Ottoman Turks betrayed by the West. Now the West hoped to persuade Vasily III to accept Catholicism through his wife whose family entered into a union with Catholics in order to save themselves.
Vasily was thinking about that and even sent a special mission to Rome. But it could not find the Pope at the time because had had been overthrown by a feudal lord and fled. The mission returned to Moscow and told Vasily that the game was not worth the candle. Russia came to the conclusion that it needed the autocracy.
The idea did not mean absolute power, but it meant that Russia will not be ruled by the Mongolians or by Rome. And the son of Vasiliy III Ivan the Terrible became the autocratic monarch (czar) of Russia. But Russia's refusal from western protection and patronage did not go without a trace. The modern image of Russia, which we have been trying to change in the West, originated at that time.
Thus, the development of Russia as a new Africa began. Piligrims and travelers of various types arrived, and some of them gave their views like "Beautiful and wonderful country whose people are God-fearing, respected their power and have high moral standards."
But negotiations with the West failed. The last embassy of the Sacred Roman Empire headed by Ziegmund Herbertstein left Moscow. Works began to be written in Poland and Germany proving that the Russian people were savage and backward, their fear of God was heresy, and respect for power - slavish psychology. It was at that time that the negative image of our country emerged. In 1528 Ziegmund Herbertstein wrote his "Notes about Moscovy," which were published thirty time in the West in the16th century alone.
This image prompted westerners to say "No, we are not like this, not so savage, not so terrible."
Western cities were self-governed, were populated by free people, craftsmen and artisans of various types united on the shopsteward principle. Why then were Russian cities different, not like that? The reason was geographical and it proved quite weighty. A western king had a serious enemy in the person of another western king or duke. Whereas we, Russians, had a different serious enemy, namely, nomadic tribes living in the steppe around our cities. The most cruel thing which could have happened to a western king or duke would have been a tribute to be paid in case of military defeat. In Russia the payment for military defeat was much more terrible: either painful death or slavery.
In the West it was possible to defend oneself from an aggressive or greedy neighbor by the thick walls of one's castle. Whereas it was well-nigh impossible to defend themselves from nomads, except from building military fortresses according to all fortification rules. Thus, hundreds and thousands of Russian city dwellers became the defenders of their native cities arms in hand.
There could be no self-government in these conditions at all, because another social organization and another social model were necessary.
That was the only possible model for survival. And the only alternative - death or slavery. Slave-trade thrived at the time, especially in the Crimea. Genoese and Venetian merchants were quite active buying and selling Russians prisoners brought by nomads from the northern Black Sea shore. Understandably, no free Russian town could exist in such conditions.
Europe lived through the Renaissance became free from church dogmas, it remembered and revived the art of Ancient Rome and Ancient Greece, although there was a wide historical and civilizational
gap between them and medieval Europe. Architecture developed, and great masters emerged and worked fruitfully, but there were none in Russia, because the Byzantine tradition of Godliness had always been considered higher than welfare. Then Renaissance brought capitalist relations along with it; it became possible largely because a market economy came into being.
Russia could not accept naked human body because Orthodox Christianity was against it. Incidentally, the Renaissance existed in the West for comparatively short time. Even Michelangelo lived up to the moment when the authorities banned him to depict nude figures as a result of the Reformation. The Embassy of Vasily III to Italy were aware of mores and morals in Italy and Russians residents did not like life at the Pope's and Medici's courts, whose people weltered in vice.
True, the Renaissance did not bypass us. The Moscow Kremlin was built by Italian Renaissance architects. As to the European Reformation, religious freedom did take place, Protestantism emerged, which opposed to Catholic luxury. But it was also accompanied with religious wars, which lasted for decades. These prolonged bloody wars cost colossal victims. Religious persecutions were rampant. Just one Massacre of St. Bartholomew took away more human lives than the entire reign of terror of Ivan the Terrible. This cruel Russian czar was a virtual Agnus Dei as compared with the British Tudors, for example.
The West brought civilization primarily in the form of extermination of many peoples. The Incas and Azteks had been no inferior to the Spaniards, but their civilizations had been destroyed by the conquistadores thirsty for gold and precious stones. Colonialism gripped the entire planet, it was only Japan, Ethiopia and Russia that remained outside the colonial empires.
Colonialism also meant slave-trade, because to develop the American continent it was necessary to procure more and more
workforce. We do not know the exact figures of people captured in Africa and then brought and sold in America and other parts of the world, but according to record-books by British, Dutch, Portuguese, Spanish, and then American companies, which were engaged in slave-trade, ten million men, women and children were transported from the African continent. Slave-trade continued in the United States right up to the Civil war in the 1860s.
While developing in Eurasia Russia did not destroy a single civilization, not a single nation, and it was not engaged in slave-trade. True, serfdom did exist in our country, just as in Western Europe, but it concerned only the Russian people. And it was not spread to new territories which the Russian state annexed and developed. People there had to pay tribute. This was why national oppression of Russians themselves was greater than that of the so-called colonial peoples. Besides, the Russian elite had always been multinational. Moreover, Russian names were in minority. There had never been suppression of titular nations, either in pre-Soviet of post-Soviet time.
Democracy is a great gain of the West, which had originated from the Greek roots. Indeed, democracy did exist in Greece. But of 2,000 Ancient Greek polices it was Athens for a century and a half. Its fruits were used by adult men who comprised the aboriginal population of the city. The overwhelming part of the population consisting of women and slaves could not even dream of democracy. Contemporary people such as Aristotle, Plato and Socrates were very skeptical toward it. For many long centuries after that democracy did not reveal itself in any way until John Locke and Thomas Hobbes began to write about it in the modern world. The great political reform of Britain in 1826 consisted of increasing the number of the country's electorate from 2.5 percent to 4.5 percent of the entire adult male population.
American democracy began with the U.S. Constitution. It concerned adult men having a definite property qualification. There were about 50,000 men who had the right to vote in the United States after the adoption of the U.S. Constitution. Women in 1929, the Afro-Americans received civil rights in the 1960. As to the Indian, who at the time comprised a majority of th population of the North American continent when the Constitution was being adopted, they had never gained civil rights. Of about six million Indians at the time. only one million were left. They were deliberately annihilated. They were
consciously destroyed for cleansing the continent.
* * *
For the first time in the history of mankind, elections, based on universal direct suffrage by secret ballot, took place in Russia in the Constituent Assembly in 1917. The elections brought success to two cult radical left parties, so one can not say that it was a good experience. In the first place there was a party of terrorists - the Social Revolutionaries, on the second - the Bolsheviks. It was difficult to expect something different in the conditions of the country. However, no one ever in the world held such elections before.
As for Europe, democracy appeared and disappeared there. For example, elections were held only in six European countries before World War II. That Europe gave us the phenomenon of fascism, not Africa, Asia or Russia. It is a purely European "value", which has its roots in nationalism. But nationalism is a European "value" that was born, by the German Romantics: Goethe, Heine, Schlegel, by the way. They believed that it was necessary to refer to national roots, came up with the idea of nationalism, the nation-state. And then Nazism sprouted through the idea, becoming the most terrible threat to all humanity.
We can not say that fascism was limited to the territory of Germany and Italy. Was not any European country opposed fascism strongly? And were there any other state, except keeping neutrality? Did some European countries oppose, when Hitler pushed them into an alliance with Germany attack the Soviet Union? He brought all Europe to our land. At that time Europe shared his values. Unfortunately, we are now faced with the residual effects of the fact, that fascism was a very organic in Europe, more organic than democracy.
When did democracy and human rights appear? After the Second World War. No one said before, that Western civilization was determined by democracy, and Soviet civilization was determined by totalitarianism.
Similar theories and concepts emerged after the victory over fascism.
Actually the concept of human rights has been written into the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, created in the anti-Soviet purposes specially. It has been argued that Western values meant democracy and freedom of speech first of all. In fact, there was nothing of this in Europe then, no such values. But they were depicted as the achievements of Western civilization, opposing Soviet Asiatic hordes.
A whole system of intelligent exposure has been created, first in Europe, then on a global scale. Central Intelligence Agency in cooperation with the British MI6 was behind this operation. Today, researchers have access to all archive documents that clarify the essence of the operation. There was not an influential intellectual in Europe by the end of the 1940s, that would not work for the CIA or MI6 anyway. No one! They were neither influential intellectuals, nor they were regarded as dangerous communist elements. The system of total control of the information space was built, and it has been improved all the time.
Is it possible to convince any Western journalist today that he writes about Russia wrong? It is not possible, because the journalist has been through all steps of a special selection. And if he takes this position, he will write what he is told. This system is worked out: people fall into it from childhood, they are invited to various conferences and events, are selected and prepared from college.
We all admire the works of Orwell, but we know now that Orwell wrote all his works for MI6. It was and still is a very good system, from their point of view. Therefore, it is about promoting their own national interests when they talk about promoting democracy. The main interest of the United States is a global hegemony. As a system of political, economic, military impact and a system of environmental impact are created to accomplish it with the assistance of the media and the vast network of non-profit organizations. 15 thousand of non-profit organizations are engaged in foreign policy in the United States, and each of them manages organizations in other countries - Poland, Germany, France, Japan, Turkey, actively implementing practical tasks. This system helps to overthrow regimes in countries, "displeasing" to the United States.
Only about 400 Russian non-profit organizations were financed in the amount of about 4 billion rubles officially two years ago, when the law on foreign agents was adopted. They were much more informal - quite a different order of numbers. Western structures associated with the State Department and the CIA mainly provided funding. Today there are more than 4 thousand similar organizations, and their financing is at least 70 billion rubles officially, but there is much more in cash through the embassies. Victoria Nuland stated that $ 5 billion spent on the "democratization" of Ukraine, although this figure is underestimated too.
It is not necessary to discuss the rights of minorities too active as a value gap is very large in this area. The rights of minorities are protected better in our country than in the United States. There is more democracy in Russia in many ways: a much wider ideological and political spectrum, more political parties participating in the political process.
Now let's see how we and they can get on the ballot. Municipal filter in Russia in comparison with the procedure of participation in elections in the US is just child's play. 14 parties may participate in the Duma elections in Russia now. There are two parties in the United States, and the difference between them is not greater than between the "United" and "Fair Russia".
As for such indicator as the accumulated wealth, then the accumulation of wealth is not the same as the income of a family. The accumulated wealth of a white family is 20 times more than a black family.
Inmates in prisons are 80% black.
Now, let's speak about the rights of sexual minorities. Homosexuality is a criminal offense in six states in the United States. As for Russia, there is a ban on promoting homosexuality in kindergarten and school. It is seen as a huge encroachment on the rights of citizens.
Thus, the western system of values - is a huge propaganda filter, and Russia opposes its own cultural matrix, more viable. If it seems less democratic to someone, it is explained by the peculiarities of life in our country, which had to fight longer because of its geopolitical environment.
There are two countries in the world that have 500 years of sovereign existence. One of them is Russia, the second - the United Kingdom. But you know our neighbors. As to England, it is the only
Scotland and fish. It's clear that it is easier to exist in the environment in a certain relaxation there. We could never relaxed, unfortunately,. Periods of peace were the exception rather than the rule.
The periods of peaceful existence and development were the exception rather than the rule. Russia (together with its partners in the BRICS) opposes its system of value orientation to the Western system. BRICS is becoming the global community of values. This is 44 percent of humanity, 5 states. There are one and a half times more people in India alone than in all the Western countries combined. If you add China, Brazil, Russia and South Africa, you get a totally different picture of the world, and it is not completely western.
Each of these countries is the center of a single civilization, and has its own view of the world, their understanding of values in contemporary international relations. This is not the promotion of democracy and it is not humanitarian interventions, followed by military action, the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people, or even more than a million, as in Iraq, where democracy promotion has happened. It is not chaos, as in Libya, not ISIS as in Syria and Iraq, not ravaged Afghanistan. It is quite another. It is a system of values, where the primacy of international law is in the first place, the central role belongs to the United Nations and its Security Council in the resolution of international conflicts.
The US just gone mad due to the Crimea, because it was the first time we interpreted what international law is. Until that moment, The US considered themselves only having the right to interpret international law.
This is the value of sovereignty - the ability to make their own decisions inside and outside the state, and not by external clues. Sovereignty is the ability to build a policy on democratic principles in accordance with the interests of the people, not as foreign nonprofit
organizations dictate. This is democracy eliminates the pressure on political process on the part of the forces, representing the interests of others, and not the Russian people. And when we restrict the activities of non-commercial organizations, we do not limit democracy. We protect opportunities for the realization of the normal democratic process in accordance with the will of the majority of citizens. These non-profit organizations represent the interests of the American people and the Central Intelligence Agency, which is behind most of these non-profit organizations.
We stand for the values of non-interference in the internal affairs of other countries, for the opportunity to build a policy in accordance with their national interests, national traditions, to build as we see the world and our ancestors saw it, in accordance with national culture, our - Orthodox, Chinese - Confucian, India - Hindu, as well as Brazilian or South African. South Africa's foreign policy concept is called diplomacy ubuntu, that is translated into Russian as collegiality, affiliation of the individual to society, unlike the West, professing the aggressive individualism.
When someone objects to a Briton, he raises his voice. He does not listen to your arguments, he simply raises his voice and starts yelling. That's what it is - policy of the West. They do not take the other side, they do not accept anyone as the people outside the AngloSaxon world, who should be considered equal to them. No, they just need to raise voice, to impose sanctions, to arrange the pressure, to bring the military bases to borders.
What is there to say? There is an opinion: mine and wrong. That is how the whole number of values of American and British policy is based, unfortunately. They believe that their values are universal for the whole world, and take offense if someone thinks otherwise, moreover, begins to object them.
The value of freedom and democracy. We speak of freedom, but not in the Western sense - compliance with certain rules of law, freedom, as justice as the real truth, that Russia, along with China and other BRICS countries brings to the world. Why are they so afraid of channel Russia Today? The only one channel and thousands of other channels and newspapers are against it. They begin blocking: "Oh, what a nightmare, Russian propaganda!" But this channel only carries the truth, that they fear the most.
But, as we know, what is power? Power is in the truth. So, the enemy will be defeated, and victory will be ours!
«Strategiya Rossii» Moscow, 2015, N 8, August, pp. 3-14.
A. Vavilov,
Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary of the second class, D. Sc. (Hist.), Ph.D. (Econ.) Professor, leading researcher, Center for Partnership of Civilizations, IMI MGIMO University THE RISE OF THE "ISLAMIC STATE": CAUSES AND CONSEQUENCES
The phenomenon of "Islamic State" is the result of a whole complex of factors of global, regional and country dimensions. The rising imbalance of world development in the globalization process, deepening the differences between "city" and "countryside", where the majority of Muslim countries live, can be referred to the global cause of its occurrence. The increasing gap in living standards between the "golden billion" and the rest mankind is becoming more obvious and frustrating for the general strata of the Muslim population because of the easy access to the global information as a result of the revolution in communications technology. Protest moods are growing on this basis,
