Military Doctrine Consolidates Xenophobia of the Russian Elites

Jamestown Foundation ^ | 2/10/2010 | Pavel Felgenhauer

[ErnstStavroBlofeld]

The constitution of the new democratic Russia adopted in 1993 contains a special clause that the nation must have a public military doctrine to mark the end of the time of communist tyranny. A provisional military doctrine was adopted in 1993 and in this document Russia rejected the use of military force to solve international disputes, a notion that is today scorned by the pro-Kremlin press (Izvestiya, February 8).

In 2000, the then President Vladimir Putin signed Russia’s first permanent military doctrine, but in fact the text was prepared during the rule of his predecessor Boris Yeltsin. The 2000 military doctrine was an ambiguous document, created during a time of transition from a shaky democracy to an authoritarian dictatorship. Moscow had already openly clashed with the West over the eastward expansion of NATO and the bombing of Yugoslavia in 1999. The 2000 doctrine singled out as a serious external threat “the expansion of alliances that threaten Russia and its allies,” but it avoided mentioning NATO directly. The military doctrine President Dmitry Medvedev signed into law last week identifies NATO expansion as the prime external threat together with the deployment of foreign soldiers and naval forces close to the territory of Russia and its allies (www.kremlin.ru, February 5).

The Secretary of the Security Council, Nikolai Patrushev, who was in charge of preparing the doctrine, told a press conference in Moscow, “It is a consensus opinion of all who worked on the military doctrine that NATO threatens us and seriously.” Patrushev demanded that NATO must stop “pulling” Ukraine and Georgia into its ranks and “arming Georgia” (RIA Novosti, February 10).

[ErnstStavroBlofeld]

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