Ukraine Local Elections - People Give Government a Free Pass For Now

Local elections carried out on Sunday in Ukraine were described as a test of Poroshenko’s government.  In the event, the electorate has given the government a free pass for now.

Turnout was low (seeming to average around 40%), there were no major disruptions (though balloting in Mariupol was canceled and will have to be done later), and parties of the extreme right or left did not sweep into power.  The worst that can be said is that a seeming reversion in the east to parities supported by parochial, oligarchic interests is not a good sign for civil society.

Despite widespread public distrust of government and dissatisfaction with the economy, the electorate, by not showing up and by not voting for extremists is giving the government the option to reform before getting punished in subsequent elections.

Local electoral contests financed by oligarchic interests and/or restructured political machines, and involving fraud and overt electoral manipulation--such as between Borys Filatov, backed by oligarchic Ihor Kolomoisky, and Oleksandr Vilkul, the Russia leaning descendent of the Yanukovych era Party of the Regions backed by Oligarchic Rinat Akhmetov--do not instill confidence in the integrity of the electoral process or the legitimacy of government.

For Ukraine to move forward, whoever wins needs the credibility of a reasonably fair election process that reflects the wider interests of civil society.  Neither Filatov nor Vilkul have that.

To endure, and for the sake of a strong civil society, the Poroshenko government has to make progress on three reform fronts,

• ·      The corruption agenda, especially judicial reform where the principles of sound corporate and public governance are established and defended,
• ·      The economic agenda, especially the need to separate politics and business based in law, supportive economic policies and transperancy.
• ·      The political agenda, where reform is essential to build a credible civil society.  Indeed, the incumbents need it most if government is to gain credibility and legitimacy.

Poroshenko needs to deliver a cleaner election process next time around through an uninterrupted reform process.

An excellent break down of Sunday’s election results and implications by freelance journalist Oliver Carroll can be found at http://www.politico.eu/article/petro-poroshenko-hobbles-on-ukraine-local-election-vote-rigging/

Gazing at Stars Backwards - Russia in Syria

Russia’s show of force in Syria is intended to assert Russian power and impress geopolitical stargazers.  But look through the telescope from the other end.

Only 10^th largest among world economies, Russia’s economy is about 15% smaller than Italy’s and roughly half that of Germany’s economy (the Euro area economy is 7 times larger than Russia’s) (http://data.worldbank.org/data-catalog/GDP-ranking-table).  Russia's economy is also shrinking.

In such circumstances, imagine Italy dominating the military and political process in Syria, or imagine Italy’s Prime Minister, Matteo Renzi—who is critical of EU sanctions on Russia--threatening, if only in economic terms, to unilaterally re-impose Italy’s authority over its traditional sphere of influence in Europe.

Is Russia's seeming success due to an authentic projection of power or are we looking through the wrong end of the telescope?

MH17 - The Rule of Chance

The biggest crisis in Putin's early career was the sinking of the Submarine Kursk.  The Kursk malfunctioned or there was human error.  Soviet leaders first refused international assistance and lied about the circumstances of the catastrophe.  They pressed their luck managing the event and with the truth.  Putin was not involved in the sequence of events in the sinking, but it happened on his watch and it contributed to the collapse in the Russian people's confidence in public institutions.

The destruction of MH17 is on Putin.  The downing of MH17 tore away the mask of Russian deniability of involvement in Ukraine and resulted in nearly 300 innocent deaths, not to mention the deaths of thousands of innocent Ukrainians lost in the civil conflict.  Although the Dutch report released today does not assign blame, the facts and circumstances make clear that the chain of accountability for the catastrophe lies with Russia and with Putin personally.  Meanwhile, Russia continues to issue fabricated evidence to "prove" MH17 was shot down by anyone else but Russia.  By launching a war in eastern Ukraine, Putin invited unexpected, catastrophic events, as will always happen when leaders are reckless and overreach and lie.  Putin has had an extraordinary run of good luck.  But it was chance.  With each additional role of the dice, Putin presses his luck. It could be Syria, or a moment in the next sequence of events, but the risk of catastrophe is all but certain.

The Constant Gardener: Putin on Method

They didn’t teach vision they taught method at the KGB.  After all, the KGB was an instrument of power not the power itself.  That changed, of course, when one of their own, Vladimir Putin, became prime minister of Russia.

You have to admire the KGB.  They did their work well.  Putin doesn’t waste time worrying about the big picture.  If anything Russia’s decline is accelerating—the economy is sliding, its international standing is in tatters, and civil society is dead.  But, if Putin knows anything, it is method.  The slow, patient cultivation of incremental advantage.

The secret of method is simple.  In short, if you are prepared to think about something for 15 minutes more than the other guy, you’ve probably got the edge because you will be better prepared to anticipate that guy’s next move and figure out how you will respond in turn.  And, you are always in the position to take the initiative.

In The Art of Strategy, Avinash Dixit and Barry Nalebuff summarize it this way,

“The general principle for sequential move games is that each player should figure out the other players’ future responses and use them in calculating his own best current move.  This idea is so important that it is worth codifying into a basic rule of strategic behavior.”

Nothing went the way Putin wanted in Ukraine.  He’d rather have kept Yanukovych.   The invasion of eastern Ukraine didn’t turn out so hot.  Using it to prevent Ukraine getting closer to Europe hasn’t paid off so far--they’re closer than ever.  And Crimea has turned out to be an albatross around the neck of the Russian economy.  But Putin is still in the game because one thing he knows how to do is keep his adversaries off balance.  Method.

So, with Putin it works like this.

First, think several steps ahead.  Putin is widely reported to have had plans to retake Crimea for years and to have decided to seize it as early as December 2013, well before Yanukovych fell from power.  To do that he had to weaken the Ukrainian government so that it could not respond and position in advance the resources necessary to take Crimea, all of which was in place well before the Maidan demonstrations.

Second, take the initiative, act first.  If there is one word that continually comes up in the press to define the West’s response to Putin’s aggression it is “wrong-footed.”  Throughout the crisis, Putin has taken the initiative and surprised his opponents.  The shift to Syria and bombing the moderate opposition in Syria rather than ISIL is just the latest example.

Third, while your opponent is digesting your last move, execute your next one.  Also, a recurring experience.  While the West hummed with indignation over Russia’s seizing Crimea, Putin’s agents undermined eastern Ukraine.  While Ukraine focused on retaking eastern Ukraine, Putin invaded south toward Mariupol.  While the West digested the sudden calm in eastern Ukraine, Putin seized the initiative in Syria.

Fourth, eschew conventional wisdom.  Putin does not let “sensible” behavior define his actions.  He focuses rather on the gaps or vacuums left by others.  The fall of Yanukovych opened the door to seizing Crimea, a high-risk initiative but one that the Ukrainian government—and the West—was unprepared to counter.  Conventional wisdom would say that ramping up military support for Assad, whose back is to the wall and will never regain legitimacy, is a bad, high-risk idea.  It might still be.  But Putin saw opportunity in the vacuum that the West and Arab World left when they failed to come up with a game plan to halt either Assad or ISIL and to end the Syrian conflict.

Fifth, give your opponent no time to react.  Putin moves in rapid succession.  Putin decided to seize Crimea at an all night meeting in the Kremlin on February 22, 2014.  On February 23 pro-Russian demonstrations began in Sevastopol, and on February 27 Russian troops seized the first Crimean government buildings.  All in a week’s work.   Putin needed parliamentary approval for military action in Syria.  Within 48 hours he had it, and Russian planes undertook their first air strike on Homs.

Sixth--need it be said--exploit you opponent’s weaknesses.  Early in the Ukrainian crisis, the US and leading countries in Western Europe, announced they would not use force to counter Russian aggression.  That left the door open for Putin to risk limited military action to achieve his goals.  The West has also been clear that it would not invoke sanctions sufficient to collapse the Russian economy, such as locking Russia out of SWIFT or blocking short-term Western finance, thus allowing Putin to believe that he just might ride out the economic consequences of his aggression.  In a sense, Putin is more interested in what the West will not do than he is in what it will do, because that is where opportunity lies.

If there is a core to Putin’s method, it is this; the path to success is in many, small steps.  He needs to keep moving forward but without invoking a massive response, just a small, continuing erosion of his opponent’s credibility.  Again, Dixit and Nalebuff,

“…you can try to destroy the credibility of an opponent’s threat by going against his wishes in small steps.  Each step should be so small in relation to the threatened costly action that it is not in the interests of the other to invoke it.” 

None of Putin’s actions have resulted in the overwhelming response from the world community that would halt his aggression, but the drum beat of his actions is eroding confidence in the principles and stability of the global system.  The West has followed a policy of incremental responses designed to dissuade Putin but not to compel him to stop.   The game is one of endurance, and Putin believes that the West’s credibility will erode before he has to face the consequences of his misspent efforts. 

So, now the “Normandy Four” (Ukraine, Germany France and Russia) met in Paris on Friday and Minsk II seems to be back on track.  There will be elections in eastern Ukraine under Ukrainian law.  They’ll just be a few months later.  Game over at last?

As the meeting in Paris took place, the OSCE monitoring group discovered for the first time in separatist-held territory advanced “thermobaric” missile systems.  At the same time, of the four parties to Friday’s Minsk II discussions, the only one who has not had anything to say about the outcome is Putin.

Go ahead, take 15 minutes to ask yourself, what next?

A Majestic Idea Hangs In The Balance. It Is The Idea Of What Peace Means to Europe.

On Friday, the so-called Normandy Group (Germany, France, Russia and Ukraine) meets to discuss implementation of the Minsk II agreement to end hostilities in eastern Ukraine.

A majestic idea hangs in the balance.  It is the idea of what peace means to Europe.

Russia has already taken Crimea, the territory of a sovereign Ukraine, and it is continuing its invasion of eastern Ukraine.  It pursues the subversion of other countries, including the leading European countries through support for extremist political parties on the right and left, and support for civil conflicts elsewhere, as in Syria, that drain Europe’s attention and energy.

Putin believes he is at war.  This gives him the advantage over his European contemporaries, because he believes he is fighting for something.  To Putin this is World War 2.1.  He is wrong, of course.  Russia is not at risk from European aggression.  Russia’s problem is that it is corroding from within.  It needs political, social and economic reform.

The Europeans however lack the conviction that they must fight to preserve the values that define their way of life, even though these are under direct attack.

In Friday’s discussion, Europe should avoid the temptation to acquiesce to what Russia has already done to Ukraine or to compromise further.  Russia is weak not strong.  Russia cannot sustain its aggression in Ukraine and in Syria unless Europe facilitates it by failing to confront Putin.  Relative calm in Ukraine is not a glimmer of hope but a negotiating ploy by Putin to deflect Europe’s focus by instilling the false hope that there is an easy way out of the Ukrainian crisis.  Calm in Ukraine is the carrot to the Syria stick, but Ukraine and Syria are the two faces of Putin’s aggression.  Europe marching backwards won’t halt Putin’s advance.

So, now is your moment.  Either in blindness give back to Russia what it took as the Soviet Union and then lost, or, defend the peace that was won on the basis of equity and dignity among nations and respect for open and free civil societies.  Now is your moment.