АГЕНТ ГОСДЕПА О ЗНАЧЕНИИ САММИТА В ВИЛЬНЮСЕ english via https://facebook/luba.bilash =================================== = Граждане за ликвидацию ОПГ ПРУ #STOPpartyofregions facebook/STOPpartyofregions #ЕС #Евроинтеграция #саммит #Госдеп Speech by Bruce Jackson former US Intelligence Officer: “What’s at Stake at the Vilnius Summit?” A Discussion of Europe’s Eastern Partnership European Parliament, Brussels October 2, 2013 We have been meeting in early autumn for four or five years now, and each year the Eastern question seems to be more complex, more intractable, and the motives of the major players more opaque. This year, the European Union approaches a decision point at the Vilnius Summit. I think that we can all agree that whatever happens at the end of November will be defining in relations between the EU and Europe’s East. The Summit could be decisive, but it is not clear about what. And it will probably be historic (either positively in the sense of Rome or Thessaloniki or negatively in the sense of Versailles or Munich.) All agree the decisions at Vilnius will be highly consequential. But we do not really know what we want the decisions to be. And we probably have profound disagreements even in this room about what we expect to achieve with these decisions, either at the Vilnius Summit or in the future of the Eastern Partnership. Ironically, the Vilnius Summit is the first occasion the EU has ever had to make any decision on the Eastern Partnership itself since its founding on May 7, 2009 in Prague. Over the past four years experts have focused on facets of the problem (values vs. interests, Orange or Blue, Russia or Europe) and neglected the context for the Eastern Question as a whole. I want to step back and look at how the EU and Eastern Partners have arrived at this crossroads in Vilnius and how the key questions have been framed. The Archaeology: The Eastern Partnership was not, as most people suppose, an altruistic response to the weakness of the smaller, post-Soviet states. It was Western Europe’s response to the deficiencies of its institutions and its loss of influence in the East. On April 4, 2008, NATO’s MAP had collapsed at the Bucharest Summit with the rejection of Georgia and Ukraine and in a bitter dispute between the US and Germany. In response to the institutional vacuum which then spread throughout Eastern Europe and the Caucasus, Radek Sikorski and Carl Bildt pitched the Eastern Partnership to the European Union less than sixty days after the disaster in Bucharest. By the time the Eastern Partnership was finally adopted in Prague on May 7, 2009, the financial markets of the West had also collapsed and the West had remained on the side lines of the Russian-Georgian war the previous October. The EU created the Eastern Partnership because it did not have anything else with which to manage its relationships with adjacent post-Soviet states and the South Caucasus. This is an important point. Ukraine and Georgia did not apply for closer relations with the EU. The EU proposed engagement to the Eastern partners, not the other way around. (The EU may be the first suitor in history to propose engagement and then spend the next four years excoriating the morals of their chosen fiancé.) The proposal of the Eastern Partnership was motivated by a sense that Europe lacked the instruments to influence the Eastern countries and, lacking the tools of foreign policy, Europe risked political and economic disorder and even war on its Eastern borders. As the author of the Eastern Partnership, Europe therefore bears responsibility for the sincerity and content of its own policy. In fact, content became the first crisis of the Eastern Partnership. At first, the policy was just as vacuous as the institutional deficit which it was designed to fill. What is really on offer in Partnership? As in all marriages, most fights are about money, and the Eastern Partnership was no exception. Supporters of the Mediterranean Union and members interested in the Balkans and Black Sea immediately went after funding for the Eastern Partnership, leaving it under-resourced at birth. It seemed to many at the time that the Eastern Partnership was too much for most of Western Europe and too little for all of Eastern Europe. This critical view has evolved over time as the Association process has taken on symbolic weight, as the DCFTA has acquired real content, and as visa-liberalization has become a credible goal for citizens in Partner countries. Today, we might say that the Eastern Partnership is not much but it is more than nothing. It is worth spending a minute on how the EP finally gained a grudging acceptance among half of the Eastern partners. · False expectations. In the beginning, Georgia saw every Western institution including EP as a way to gain US security guarantees. Likewise, Moldova saw every institutional affiliation as offering the perspective of EU membership. Azerbaijan saw the EP as WTO by another name and who can say what Lukashenko thought. Gradually, these illusions were laid to rest. · Many countries, particularly Ukraine, saw the Eastern Partnership as a one-way street which required years of strenuous reforms for little gain at the end (or none at all if the goal posts were moved.) Most if not all of the near-term deliverables come from the Partners and many of the rewards, such as DCFTA, involve losses to the Partners in the initial years. · However, the travel and trade provisions of the Association Agreement gradually became more prominent and these pocket-book issues had a positive impact on voters concerned with jobs and oligarchs concerned with trade with the EU. At the same time, post-Soviet political leaders began to understand the interconnectedness of Western institutions. An association and even a limited trade deal with the EU helps with the IMF (a little) which helps with FDI, which helps with credit rating, trade balance, political stability etc. At the moment, AA and DCFTA are nothing remotely like the economic and labor mobility benefits that were offered to the Visegrad and Vilnius states a generation ago or the Marshall Plan aid to Western Europe after WWII. There is no comparison. One might say “Never has so little been offered so reluctantly to so many poor people by so many much richer people.” But the Eastern Partnership was never proposed as a destination but as a mechanism which would allow for closer relationships to develop. In this sense (and in this limited sense only) the Eastern Partnership is just barely enough to pass as an institution. The devolution of the Eastern Partnership: But even as the Eastern Partnership began to take on content, its partners were heading for the exits. Belarus had no interest and no possibilities from the start. For Lukashenko, reform is synonymous with “regime change,” and for once he was right. It is far safer for Belarus to hide in the Customs Union from Western institutions than to suffer the intrusive affections of the EU. More recently, Armenia dropped out of the Association process ostensibly in favour of membership in the Customs Union. In truth, the Armenians calculated correctly that Russian military and commercial powers are a far more persuasive deterrent to Azeri and Turkish irredentist desires than the mild scolding of faraway Europe. For those countries who are still pre-occupied with the harsh requirements of hard security a “partnership” does not offer anything. (Misha Saakashvili for most of his Presidency felt much the same way.) Azerbaijan sits at the more luxurious end of the “opt-out” spectrum. With enough petro-dollars, the comparative advantages of a little more trade with Europe pale in comparison with the threat which political reform would pose to the longevity of the Aliyev clan. So without much fuss and solely by natural causes, the class of Partner countries declined by 50% in roughly four years and now is comprised of only Ukraine, Moldova and arguably Georgia. If the Eastern Partnership were a corporation, a decline in market share of 50% would be a very negative indicator indeed. In political organizations, however, such a radical change in constituency produces different kinds of effects. · There are no longer enough smaller states in the EP to balance the vast size and weight of Ukraine. For the last couple of years, the debate on the Eastern partnership has become exclusively a discussion of Ukraine. Like the only student in school, the spoiled child gets too much attention and becomes ungovernable. · Moldova and Georgia, on the other hand, soon discovered that with very little effort they can come along for the ride. Whatever they do, their failures will not compare with the faults of the Ukraine, and whatever good they do will be too small to impress. Basically both countries are countries whose leadership is only partially on-board with European values (Georgia far behind Moldova), but they will be brought along at Vilnius to soften opposition to Ukraine. In the brutal language of politics, at Vilnius the EU may “Put lipstick on the pig.” Moldova and Georgia are the lipstick; Ukraine is the pig. Said more politely, it is unwise to try to build institutions with extremely small classes of membership because fairness, standards and equality are very hard to maintain as the number of applicants declines to one. The problem of Ukraine: Reform and Red Lines: This brings us to the problems which the dominant role of Ukraine has brought to the Eastern Partnership. At the most basic level, since Ukraine does not have to compete with other candidates for a place in the Association program, it begins to negotiate with the European Union on what it presumes are equal terms. Obviously, for Ukraine to believe that Association can be achieved by negotiation as opposed to by qualification is a very bad thing for those in Europe who expect to see as much reform from Kyiv as humanly possible. For the purposes of our discussion today, we can say that the dynamic of reform in Ukraine is not organized to Europe’s satisfaction nor does it generate the progress Europe would like to see. Secondly, it has been widely known for years that the large post-Communist states (such as Romania and Bulgaria) take far longer on internal reforms (notably judiciary and Governmental corruption) than small states like the Baltics or Slovenia. Poland is the great exception. Ukraine is by far the largest and most post-Soviet of all the states with which the EU has interacted since 1989. As a consequence, Ukraine forces proponents and supporters of the EP to conceptualize an association process which produces adequate reforms and shared European values twenty or even fifty years from now. Does anyone want to tell European voters that they are taking on twice the problems of Romania for three times as long as Europe has worked with Romania? Or four and a half Bulgarias for five times longer than Bulgaria has been a member of the EU? All for an associative relationship and a bite-sized free trade agreement? The Eastern Partnership cannot be too successful because this would threaten the EU with imminent membership decisions, nor can the Partnership move too slowly which would risk losing the EU’s interest and attention. The Politics of Yanukovych and Timoshenko: The problem of institutions, such as Association, which lack the more rigid rules of EU membership, is that they tend to stretch to fit the applicant distorting their standards and the intentions of their founders. I suspect that the West came up with the “red line” on Tymoshenko’s release from prison as a desperate measure to prevent our political values from being “stretched” by the political weight and extended timelines of Ukraine. Much like Obama’s red line in Syria, our red line on Yulia has not achieved the immediate result we hoped for nor has it contributed to de-politicizing the political transition of Ukraine. No doubt, the Yanukovych-Timoshenko relationship is the single largest factor which endangers the Vilnius Summit. Let me try to sum up where the battle stands at the moment. Roughly speaking, the Cox-Kwasniewski plan calls for President Yanukovych to permit Yulia Timoshenko to travel to Germany for medical treatment. By employing “humanitarian grounds,” President Yanukovych sidesteps the question of a pardon, which may be unconstitutional at this juncture anyway, and remains silent on the question of additional charges. So far, so good. But Yulia’s departure for Germany for medical care is really only a pretence. Obviously, it is a pretence for the EU and for Victor Yanukovych, but, as it turns out, it is very much a fairytale for Yulia Timoshenko as well who does not plan to be ill for very long once in Germany, if at all. She intends to begin campaigning immediately, tour the capitals of Europe and North America, and start large-scale fundraising. In short, Yulia sees her departure to Germany as the beginning of her return to political power with which she will produce revolutionary change in Ukraine – which may or may not be a good thing depending on one’s perspective. Suffice to say, Yulia’s objectives are political. As President Yanukovych considers the proposal of Cox and Kwasniewski, he needs to worry about the Russians and increasingly about the economy, but he cannot help but worry about the Presidential Elections in 2015. Yanukovych defeated Timoshenko in the elections of 2010, and she was barred from politics by her conviction in 2011 and she potentially faces more serious charges. The President quite reasonably could be concerned that a well-rested and well-funded revolutionary will bound from her hospital bed and return to Kyiv, with all the effects of the return of the Ayatollah Khomeini to Tehran in 1979. Whatever one thinks of the legitimacy of the President’s fears, his concerns are political. And herein lies the rub. Europeans believe that the red line the EU imposed on politically-influenced prosecutions is both a humanitarian goal and a legitimate test of shared political values. Unfortunately, neither Yanukovych nor Timoshenko believes it has anything to do with values. For Ukrainians, the release of Yulia Tymoshenko is a political decision on who will take political control of Ukraine in 2015 or even earlier if things get rough. This analysis tells us two things. One, it explains why it has been so hard to find a resolution of the Yulia Tymoshenko case. And, two, it explains why the Europeans have to avoid forcing an outcome which overturns a democratic decision of voters in 2010 and prejudges their decision in 2015. For all the claims for the benefits of the EP, it is not an alternative to Ukrainian law, Ukrainian elections or Ukrainian politics. The EU has gotten itself into a position where it wants to promote reform without picking political favorites which is tricky in Ukraine. The Russian Factor: Notwithstanding the paralyzing effect of the political struggle between Timoshenko and Yanukovych on Ukrainian reforms and EU decisions, the situation dramatically changed in the course of the summer with the entry of Russia into the fray. Russia began its campaign with a mid-summer trade war with Ukraine, followed by an embargo of Moldovan wine, threats to Georgia, delays at Lithuanian border crossings and finally in explicit threats by Presidential Advisor Sergei Glazyev at the Yalta Conference against any former Soviet nation considering signing an Association Agreement. Frankly, Russian antagonism has done more to reinvigorate the Eastern Partnership and boost the prospects of Ukraine, Georgia and Moldova than any other factor in the last four years. Why Moscow has done the EU and its neighbours such a great favour is a puzzle. The argument that Ukraine will re-export EU goods into the Customs Union is specious. The fear that a DCFTA between EU and Ukraine will displace Russia-Ukrainian trade is misplaced. The most recent argument that Ukraine could default on its foreign debt is closer to the mark, but joining the Customs Union and thereby losing the EU and IMF makes default more not less likely. There are three points which can be made about the Russian factor: · For Russia, Ukraine is a symbolic good, and Russia’s disruptive behaviour is part of a symbolic war. The objective of symbolic war is not the capture of Ukraine, but the enhancement of Russia’s self-image as the powerful successor of the Soviet Union. In pursuit of this self-image, the EU is a rival or at least an obstacle for Russia. · The competition for Ukraine is limited to very specific Russian businesses which stand to benefit financially from the isolation of Ukraine from European markets. It is not clear whether these businesses are associated with President Putin or Prime Minister Medvedev or scattered throughout the Russian economy. But the dispatch of a minor figure such as Sergei Glazyev to deliver Russia’s ultimatum is to suggest an ambiguity about Russia’s real objectives. · That said, the continuous and progressive deterioration of trade relations in the post-Soviet world and with the European Union is a harbinger of an approaching trade war. Ukraine may be one of the battlefields, but Ukraine’s decision about EU association is not the cause. The Disposition of the European Powers at the moment: Broadly speaking, there are more people in Western Europe who are angry with Russia than there are who are excited about the reforms and political credentials of Ukraine, Georgia and Moldova. Were Cox and Kwasniewski to succeed in obtaining the release of Timoshenko to German medical care, it is widely thought that support for advancing all three candidates at Vilnius would be unanimous. There is slightly increasing support for signing with Ukraine without Yulia’s release in Central Europe and the Baltics but not enough to carry the decision. · Britain is being difficult because it never saw an EU program it liked. · The Dutch have reservations because other countries, particularly Ukraine, are not as perfectible as the Dutch would like them to be. Neither were the Serbs. · Spain and others in the South still don’t like these Northern projects and worry they will lose money somehow. · And, the Germans have strong views but we won’t know what they are until Chancellor Merkel builds a coalition Government. In short, Europe is split on the Eastern Partnership for reasons having very little to do with the Eastern Partners. Nevertheless, Europe is relatively united in its annoyance with Russia. But we cannot know how this will play out until sometime between October 15 (Cox and Kwasniewski report to the European Parliament) and October 27 (EU Foreign Ministers’ meeting) or later if the German coalition talks extend. What is at stake in Vilnius? If the EU makes an affirmative decision to begin Association with Ukraine, Moldova, and Georgia, very little will change. The Eastern Partnership will begin a decade of tedious work in which it will have to prove to its new Partners and the European Union that there are real benefits to association, DCFTA and visa liberalization, and that these programs accelerate the process of reform and really do inculcate desirable political values. It will be slow, grinding work. Russia will be equally unhappy (plus or minus.) The Ukrainian economy will remain at the precipice. Even if Yulia reaches a German hospital she will be just as far removed from politics as she was in a Ukrainian cell. And doubts about whether Europe is serious about the post-Soviet semi-democracies will persist the day after Vilnius. But Europe will have slightly improved the possibility of a brighter future for 45 million Ukrainians, 4.5 million Georgians, and 3.5 million Moldovans, but only slightly. Still improving the lives of 53 million people on the border of Europe (or slightly less than the population of Poland, the Czech Republic and Hungary combined) is nothing to sneeze at. The stakes are easier to see and far starker in the event of a rejection or postponement of Association. Then Europe will have constructed an institution of association whose only purpose is to deny association to those few countries who would accept it. There are great risks to this kind of silliness in international politics. · Ukrainian default: The rejection of Ukraine at Vilnius will quickly be followed by a devastating financial crisis in Ukraine. Ukraine’s sovereign debt was recently downgraded to the level of Cuba’s and Pakistan’s. Its one-year paper recently traded at almost 16% and its 10-year paper yields 10.5%. There is only $21.69b left in reserves – enough for 2 ½ months of imports. Ukraine must pay $10.8b in foreign debt by the end of 2013. In short on the current course and trajectory, Ukraine will be bankrupt by February 2014 without a large infusion of cash from the IMF. Now, if Ukraine has been rejected by Europe in late November for inadequate reforms, what are the chances that the IMF will release $3-4b to Ukraine in January on the basis of successful reforms? Zero. Like it or not, the Eastern Partnership and the IMF are linked. · Russian relations – trade war. Like it or not, there is a trade war coming with Russia, the Customs Union, Gazprom or some combination of the many protectionisms and populisms that now dominate the East. In the event of a failed Summit, there will no longer be an institutional barrier to economic disorder. Other states will run to the false protection of the Customs Union, as Armenia has already done. The better response at a successful Vilnius would be to propose immediate negotiations between Russia and the European Union on an enhanced trade relationship between Russia and/or the Customs Union and the EU. Ideally, this proposal would be part of the Summit communique and would reinforce the point that DCFTA with Ukraine does not come at the expense of trade with Russia. Failing to address Russia’s understandable economic insecurity will contribute to longer-term trade dislocations throughout the East. · European credibility: Americans have recently gained considerable experience in the loss of political credibility and the decline of the legitimate use of American power internationally. This experience was quite unpleasant. The EU faces much the same test of its soft power at Vilnius as the United States faced of its hard power in Syria. It would be highly adverse if the EU – the greatest assemblage of soft power in world history – lost the first “war of soft powers” – in its own Neighborhood – on a playing field of its own choosing. And TO RUSSIA ?– a nation untouched by persuasion or any other influence which might be considered “soft.” What will be left of the EU then after even the most modest of foreign policy initiatives fails completely? Not to mention the cries of “Victory” from the Kremlin and the dancing in the streets of Moscow at the humiliation of both the United States and the European Union in a three month period with no real effort whatsoever. There is no doubt that the failure of the Partnership at Vilnius will damage the foreign policy of the EU to some significant degree. · Institutional Framework of the West: At the most general level, the Euro-Atlantic system on which the United States and EU depend relies on responsibilities and institutions shared across the Atlantic. Just as it would be a grave concern to Europe if the United States failed to support NATO, it will be a grave concern to the United States if the EU cannot provide institutions and relationships which reform, engage, stabilize and direct their Eastern partners. By definition, civilizations are judged by their ability to export norms, institutions, political cultures, and, dare I say it, democratic values. If we cannot – even in as trivial a decision as Vilnius – we need to start thinking seriously about pulling back. Conclusion: I have tried to describe how a very modest Partnership program – born from the sense in Poland and Sweden that the West was losing in the East – became in just four years one of the most difficult and consequential decisions facing Europe. I am struck by how a program of the bureaucracy of the dull-as-dishwater European Commission has become imbued with the high drama of a great Russian novel: a hostile Kremlin, impoverished peoples on the steppes, tragically flawed politicians, tragically flawed imprisoned blond politicians, hundreds of billions about to be lost, and countries about to disappear from the map of Europe. But what makes for a good movie in Hollywood makes for very difficult politics in Vilnius. I think that it is clear that a positive decision at Vilnius to advance Ukraine, Georgia and Moldova is the better outcome for Europe and the West. A retreat would likely be far more dangerous for the EU, its institutions and especially the vulnerable Eastern partners. Doubtless, it would also be far more expensive. We should all pray that Cox and Kwasniewski can find some mechanism, which will certainly be imperfect and likely a bit whorish, which conveys Ms. Timoshenko at least as far as German medical care. Only because this would make the right decision at Vilnius far easier for the Presidents and Prime Ministers who have to make the call. If not, it will come down to Angela Merkel and the new German Government neither of whom will be pleased to be confronted (during their first week on the job) with the Hobson’s choice of abandoning Yulia to jail or throwing all of Ukraine to the Russian wolves. This is after all a Chancellor who has made avoiding tough decisions into a form of political art. It is impossible to predict what the leaders will decide at the Summit. The day after Vilnius we will wake up either to find that the EU has embarked on a long and tedious repair and reform job in the East or we will find ourselves in the midst of a disorderly retreat from our abandoned partners, hotly pursued by financial crisis and trade war. These are the stakes at Vilnius.
Posted on: Thu, 24 Oct 2013 13:07:51 +0000