Old allies die unnamed

The Ministry of Defence is quick to give us personal details of the British soldiers who die on its behalf in Afghanistan (207 to date), writes Christopher Booker. It is more reluctant to explain why many of them are being killed in a nasty little insurgency war which, too often, they haven't been given the proper equipment to fight.

Last Sunday, however, the MoD remained silent about the deaths of two young Estonian soldiers, Eerik Salmus and Raivis Kang, although they were clearing a road of explosives alongside British troops as part of a unit integrated into British command, performing tasks which otherwise would be putting our own men at risk.

Britain is still honoured in Estonia for the crucial part the Royal Navy played in 1918 in helping that gallant little country to win its independence from the Bolsheviks. Several dozen British sailors lie in a Tallinn cemetery where their graves are still lovingly tended. The MoD should give our Estonian allies similar respect.

COMMENT THREAD

The EU acts (not!)

In yesterday’s Wall Street Journal Europe Mart Laar, the former Prime Minister of Estonia and a devoted free-marketeer, had an article entitled “Imperially Deluded”[subscription only]. In it he analyzes President Putin’s more or less imperial ambitions, his desire to reunite what was the Soviet Union or, at least, the Russian Empire and his turn away from the attempts made under Yeltsin to understand twentieth century history. All of this is very worrying for Europe and the world and, as Mr Laar rightly points out, for the Russian people. It is also fraught with problems for President Putin and his successor, whoever he may be.

The article also corrects the various accounts of Estonia’s liberation that are and have, for the last sixty odd years, been put about by the Russian authorities. (Incidentally, one does wonder yet again about those youngsters and their supposed rage. They look to me to be in their late teens and early twenties. Yet they are screaming about their grandfathers being called gangsters. Given how early people marry and bear children in Russia, I’d say they are talking about great-grandfathers at least, possibly great-great-grandfathers.)

This is what Mr Laar says:

All this agitation comes over a monument that not only was not destroyed but that most Estonians view as symbol of over four decades of Soviet occupation. On September 22, 1944, the Red Army “liberated” Tallinn not from German forces, who were nearly gone, but from a legitimate Estonian government. The Estonian flag, not the German swastika, was taken down from government buildings that day.

The swastika had been removed by Estonian soldiers, some of whom died in the fighting. The Soviets arrested the Estonian government, shot some of its members and sent others to the gulag. So the Estonians shared the fate of the leaders of the 1944 Warsaw Uprising, who were also hunted down and killed by the NKVD after putting up a valiant fight against the Nazis.

These are the facts that official Russian ignores, and most ordinary Russians are not even aware of. Members of Estonia’s 1944 government haven’t even been rehabilitated in post-Soviet Russia, whose Supreme Court still considers them “enemies of the state”, as the USSR branded them.

Official Soviet behaviour was similar in other liberated countries with a great deal of effort going into ensuring that local resistance to the Nazis was side-lined and exiled at best, murdered, judicially or otherwise, at worst. On the other hand one cannot blame the soldiers and officers involved. They were undoubtedly told that these were all fascists, Nazis and the enemy in general. What did they know? What do the journalists who have been foaming at the mouth in the last couple of days know?

Some Soviet soldiers realized what was going on and brought stories home. Quite a few of them found themselves transported to the gulag as well. A very large proportion of the victorious Red Army celebrated a number of Victory Day anniversaries behind barbed wire in Siberia.

So much for the history that is still unresolved and is causing so much anguish. What of the present and the future? It is true that until you know and understand the past you cannot move forward to the future. This seems to apply to Russia, a potentially great country but, apparently, doomed to go round and round in historical circles.

This time round, however, there is a new kid on the block – the European Union, who has insisted that the only relationship it could have with the former Communist countries is for them to become members. Estonia is, thus, a member state as is Latvia, which was being bullied, though not so spectacularly, last year.

Russia, as the Estonian government has pointed out, is interfering in Estonian affairs, inciting riots in the country, attacking Estonian diplomats in Moscow. Should the EU not make a stand?

We have already documented the mewling response the European Union has produced. It has sent a delegation to Moscow. Nor has it exactly been active in lifting the blockade on the Estonian embassy that has finally gone, according to Kommersant.

It seems that members of Molodaya Gvardiya and Nashi, both pro-Kremlin organizations, controlled and supported by the Kremlin, have lifted their siege, much to the local militia’s relief. One can imagine that the militiamen were itching to deal with that lot the way they usually deal with demonstrators but were restrained by the knowledge that this spontaneous action was entirely favoured by the authorities.

It seems that the Estonian ambassador’s scheduled holiday was used as an excuse to call back the hooligans, who departed, enormously pleased with themselves and shouting nasty and stupid abuse at Estonia, the Estonian ambassador and the Estonian people in general. At some point, Putin will have to deal with these youthful cadres, who may well get out of hand. That will not be pretty.

Meanwhile, some businesses have decided to boycott Estonian economically.

Although the Russian authorities did not proclaim any economic sanctions against Estonia, regional businessmen and some companies took it upon themselves. Thus, Severstaltrans holding suspended the construction of a car-assembling factory in Estonia, which was to assemble up to 120,000 off-road cars annually (the investments into this project reach about $80 million). Akron chemical holding decided to suspend the funding of investment projects in Estonia. Bashkiria’s chain Universal-Trading stopped selling Estonian goods in its stores. Owner of Kalev confectionary Oliver Kruuda said on Thursday that “the Russian market is closed for Kalev”. According to Estonia's Aripaev, Kalev’s sales in Russia made up €260,000 monthly.

It seems unlikely that these businesses merely decided to cut off their noses to spite their faces. One is justified in suspecting a certain amount of government pressure behind the scenes.

On the whole, Russia prefers to deal with individual member states, knowing full well that some of the older ones like France and Germany will probably find ways of accommodating it. Unfortunately, this crisis has been too big and too public. The EU had to step in as has NATO, possibly, once again seeing that the EU will do precious little.

The EU is now threatening to withdraw its support, bought by Russia reluctantly signing up to Kyoto, for that country’s membership of the WTO unless it stops trading sanctions on Estonia, resumes the supply of oil and stops hassling her diplomats. As the United States was never that keen on Russia joining, it seems quite likely that this will be put on the back burner again.

Meanwhile the Finnish President, Tarya Halonen, has expressed what must be the thought in many an EU politician’s head: above all we must have joint line, no matter what that might be. The crisis with Estonia will not affect the EU-Russia Summit that is due on May 18 and only Germany, the President, can deal with the matter. The Estonians must be a little surprised by the Finns running scared but this may not be the general opinion in that country. Politicians, as we know, do not always express the general opinion in their country.

Both the EU and NATO have, apparently, offered support and solidarity to Estonia though their main concern is to defuse the tension with Chancellor Merkel particularly active in trying to ensure that the coming Summit is not derailed. So far, no member state has asked for a postponement but if the situation is not resolved this may well happen.

In any case, what can be achieved at the Summit? It is quite clear that Russia is determined to show her supposed stature as a great power by bullying anyone who appears to be a possible victim. Once these victims stand up to the bully, there is a retrenchment.

The EU has boasted mightily of its soft power and ability to influence other countries through it, unlike the nasty Yanks who always use force. Actually, even the second half of that is not true. Well, here is Russia, on the EU’s doorstep, that could do with a bit of influencing and soft power. All the EU seems to be doing is limp-wristed flapping and running up Angela Merkel’s phone bill and all because that famed common foreign policy has no real aim or purpose. All it ever wants to achieve is peace and quiet and everybody getting along. If that means giving in to bullying, well, so be it.

COMMENT THREAD

This goes on and on

It really did look like the story of the Bronze Soldier would die. May 1 was quiet in Tallinn, though the, no doubt, spontaneous pickets in Moscow outside the Estonian embassy continued. There was also a demonstration outside a press centre where the Estonian ambassador was due to hold a press conference, though she was, for a while prevented from leaving the embassy compound.

At one point, while the militia was looking elsewhere, about 25 of the picketers quite spontaneously broke into the building and smashed up a good deal of the furniture.

Now Russia seems to be doing what it does best: bullying. Of course, it might be a coincidence but all of a sudden, the state owned railway company has decided to carry out maintenance on railways leading to Estonia, thus preventing the export of both oil and coal. Well, actually, the coal has been halted because there are not enough wagons, it seems, in the whole of Russia and the Estonians could not find substitute ones immediately.

The sudden cessation of oil exports is likely to have a knock-on effect as much of the produce is then re-exported to northern Europe.

This is sadly reminiscent of Russia’s reaction to what they view as recalcitrant behaviour in other former Soviet republics or, in the case of Poland, just colonies.

The European Union and the holder of the presidency have found themselves drawn into the fray as Estonia is insisting that the EU should make a stand. Russia is, as they say, interfering with the internal affairs of one of the member states.

Chancellor Merkel has expressed her concern and the European Commission will send a delegation to Moscow to discuss the matter. “The dispute,” Reuters says in what must count as a serious understatement, “is likely to cast a cloud over an EU-Russia summit to be held in Russia on May 18.”

The question one cannot help asking is what is Russia hoping to achieve. There has been a good deal of bleating in the western media about this being a newly strengthened, confident Russia displaying its prowess. Confident? A country that pretends to a threat from another one that is about one thousandth its size? A country that can offer nothing to anyone except economic and political bullying or the odd bit of strafing from the air, as in the case of Georgia?

A truly strong, secure and confident Russia would, in my opinion, be a good thing. I have always maintained that the most frightening development could be a continuation of Russian instability and feeling of insecurity. Frightened – whether for good reason or not – Russia becomes a completely unpredictable force. President Putin is working hard to prove to the Russians that there are enemies inside and outside the country who need to be browbeaten (or just beaten up). One wonders where this is all leading. A change in the constitution, perhaps?

COMMENT THREAD

Last word?

Could the story of the Bronze soldier and his peregrinations together with the Russian deliberate over-reaction be coming to an end? One can but hope, though, if past history is anything to go by, President Putin or his ministers will find some other excuse to try to stir up trouble in the former Soviet republics.

Both the BBC Russian Service and RIA News have reported that the statue would be open to visitors today in its new place. The latter is ahead of the Beeb with a photograph (it looks real) of the Bronze Soldier in the new position though the wall has not been reconstructed behind him. The official opening will be on May 8, VE Day or the eve of Victory Day, depending on where you are.

Meanwhile, the accusations have started flying back and forth. The Estonian Foreign Ministry has accused the Russian government of deliberately fomenting the protests in Tallinn and Narva and has protested against the continuing picketing of the Estonian embassy in Moscow, in the process preventing the Estonian ambassador from leaving the building.

The same news item on the BBC website tells us that the coffins of 12 Soviet soldiers have been found near to where the memorial had stood until this Friday.

Meanwhile the Russian parliamentary delegation has arrived in Tallinn. According to the Estonians discussions will centre around the scores of Russian citizens who were arrested during the riots and the one Russian citizen who has died of knife wounds.

The delegation seems to have a different view:

The Russians will call on Estonian Prime Minister Andrus Ansip to resign, delegation chief Nikolai Kovalyov told the Baltic News Service before leaving Moscow.

They also want the statue of the Bronze soldier at the centre of the row to be returned to the central Tallinn site from where it was removed last week, he added.

Since neither of these things are likely to happen, they might as well discuss what to do about the various Russians from Russia.

The EU has finally noticed that something is going on around its eastern border. Chancellor Merkel has spoken to President Putin about the Estonian problem among other matters and Ilkka Kanerva, the Finnish Foreign Minister has called for the maintenance of a joint line on the subject. Of course, that begs the question of what that joint line might be and, it would appear, that the attitude of the new intake, especially the Baltic States and Finland could be somewhat different from that of other member states. But that’s just attitude.

When it comes to the joint line, it seems to consist of a general agreement that this is a bilateral problem (aren’t they all?) and the EU need not interfere. So much for a common foreign policy though the German Foreign Minister is desperately warning about a renewed Cold War. Given what has been going on in the last few weeks and months, the words horses, bolting and stable doors spring to mind.

The oddest reaction came from Javier Solana, though this seems to have been reported only by RIA:

The EU's leading foreign policy and security official said Saturday he was concerned by the use of force against protesters following the removal of a WWII statue in Tallinn Friday.

In a telephone conversation with Estonian President Toomas Hendrik, EU High Representative for the Common Foreign and Security Policy Javier Solana urged Estonia to avoid violence and defuse tensions, Solana's press secretary said.

Apparently, Solana confirmed that he did not think this was an EU issue but a bilateral one between Estonia and Russia (just as he thought Poland’s problems with Russia were no concern of his). The question is why Solana? If the story is true he was commenting on something that is not part of his portfolio. He deals with the EU’s foreign policy while the behaviour of the Estonian police is internal EU policy.

Is Solana making noises because this is, after all, a matter for the Common Foreign Policy Supremo, there being the problem of Russia interfering with the internal matters of an EU member state? If so, why not say so? Or, perhaps, he did but RIA did not report it. Then again, no-one else seems to have reported him either.

COMMENT THREAD

Burying the dead

On my last visit to Moscow some years ago I went with a friend to a church and the nearby graveyard. It was explained to me that the graveyard was now minute because of the huge construction efforts throughout the Soviet period but before that it had been a large military cemetery where many of the Russian and allied soldiers and officers were buried during the First World War.

In the post-Soviet years attempts had been made to put up monuments to various Russian officers of that period. It was an interesting experiment since the fate of the various men had been different. Some had joined the Red Army and some the White; some went abroad and died there or, possibly, were handed over for belated settling accounts at the end of the Second World War; some disappeared in Stalin’s purges in the thirties and some actually survived to die in bed to be buried with honour.

This applied to a few senior officers only. For the most part no trace was left of the several hundred Russian and allied soldiers who had been buried in that military cemetery during World War I.

This does bear some relevance to the present problems that surround the question of the Bronze Soldier and the Soviet soldiers buried in the nearby graves (though there is some talk of there being older burials there) and this rather peculiar picture supposedly of the desecrated memorial, though it is obviously photoshopped.

Graveyards and cemeteries do not remain untouched for ever. Anyone who has ever worked on an archaeological dig would know that the dead had been dug up and unceremoniously reburied or simply dumped in the past. One may argue about the rightness of it but not about the facts.

The problem is not so much Estonia as Russia. As I have pointed out before, there was never any suggestion that the Bronze Soldier should be destroyed or that the exhumed soldiers should not receive proper re-burial. It would have been perfectly possible for the Russian government to insist on full military honours for them. Instead, this seemed like a good opportunity to stir up hatred against the West and particularly against the countries that have definitely got away, the Baltic ones.

A longer piece on what has been going on in Russia and Estonia can be found here.

COMMENT THREAD

Update on the Bronze Soldier

According to the BBC Russian Service website (usually more reliable than the rest of the BBC) there were 44 demosntrators injured and 13 police officers, most the wounds being caused by flying glass. One man is dead, a victim of a knife fight between two gangs of demonstrators, according to the Estonian authorities. 273 people have been arrested.

At an extraordinary meeting the government decided that the Bronze Soldier needs to be removed immediately as in "police custody". Presumably the excavations will carry on when the situation calms down.

It is not quite clear whether this is what the Russian authorities wanted. At the moment there is a great deal of huffing and puffing, with the Foreign Ministry thundering on about "sacrilege" and "inhumanity" and the Speaker of the Federation Council, Sergei Mironov, accusing the Estonian authorities of mocking the dead and those who had liberated them from fascism.

On all sides there are suggestions that the President should break off diplomatic relations with Estonia. The Russian newspaper Nezavisimaya Gazeta (Independent Newspaper and it is, kind of, though not as much as it used to be) says that there will be a meeting outside the Estonian embassy in Moscow. No doubt one of those old-fashioned "spontaneous" meetings.

Actually, there is no pretence even that this is spontaneous. It is being organized by the Moscow City Council and the participants will be activists from the "Young Guard" movement (presumably called after the well-known and somewhat turgid novel by the Soviet hack, Konstantin Fadeyev, about a group of youngsters who organized a resistance movement to the German invaders in Krasnodar) and from "One Russia" party.

MORE

Kommersant quotes the Estonian newspaper Postimees, which said that "activists from Russia's Nashi movement have moved into the Meriton Grand Hotel Tallinn (69 euros a night) a few hundred meters from the monument". One wonders (though not too hard) who paid for this indulgence. It would appear that there is considerably less support for the "Night Watch", the self-appointed defenders of the Bronze Soldier, among the Estonian Russians.

COMMENT THREAD

The saga of the Bronze Soldier goes on

Not so long ago we wrote about the plan to move the Bronze Soldier in Tallinn, the memorial to the Soviet Liberators (or, as all these memorials are popularly known, to the Unknown Rapist). The plan seems to be to excavate the nearby grave of 14 Soviet soldiers (we do not know for certain that they are actually Russian) and to move them together with the memorial to a military cemetery.

This has upset the local Russian population and the big neighbour to the East, where Sergei Lavrov, the Foreign Minister and Mikhail Kamynin, the Foreign Ministry’s spokesman warned Estonia, no later than today that the dismantling of the monument, excavating of the graves and moving the whole lot will cause serious problems between that country and Russia. Russian newspapers have been writing continuously about the outrageous attitude of the Estonian authorities who are denigrating the great achievements and sacrifices of the Soviet army in the Second World War.

Even the Chief Rabbi of Russia has been roped in:

We know that extremist forces are raising their heads in some European countries, nursing plans to rehabilitate the Nazi ideology. We know that totalitarian regimes, among them the Ahmadinejad regime in Iran, have made the negation of Nazi crimes a central tenet of their propaganda.

One wonders how much of this Rabbi Berel Lazar believes. After all, it is his own government that has been particularly friendly and helpful towards the Ahmadinejad regime.

The problem of the Bronze Soldier illuminates the difficulty of assessing twentieth century history and, in particular, the events of the Second World War in the eastern half of Europe. The truth is that the two halves of the Continent had different experiences throughout the century.

To the Russians (and, let’s face it, some Balts and East Europeans) the various monuments to the Soviet soldier symbolizes the great sacrifices and achievements of the Great Patriotic War and the glory of the liberation the Red Army brought to various European countries. The truth is that the sacrifices were enormous and the achievement was astonishing. It is the liberation that has become problematic.

To many East Europeans and the Balts in particular the monuments are symbols of near-fifty years of oppression afterwards as well as the horrors of that liberation. The Baltic States were invaded by the Red Army in 1940, followed by the NKVD, then by the German Army, followed by the Gestapo, then again by the Red Army followed by the NKVD. All in all, it has been estimated that a third of the three countries’ population disappeared into Soviet prisons, camps and exile.

At the same time one cannot help feeling that some agreement could have been reached on the fate of the Estonian Bronze Soldier, if Putin and Lavrov did not see this as a wonderful opportunity to wind up Russian nationalism in Estonia and to play on that feeling of victimhood that is never far from the surface of Russian thinking. The Estonian authorities have emphasized over and over again that they do not intend to destroy the Soldier, merely move him.

Yesterday, the monument was covered with a huge tent, the square cordoned off and the border with Russia temporarily closed to prevent possible trouble. Work was due to start. Instead the police had to deal with about 1,000 demonstrators who screamed “fascists” at the Estonian police and refused to move, despite accounts in the Russian press of their determination to keep the demonstration peaceful.

The police used tear gas, water canons and stun grenades, eventually having to break the windows of cars in which the demonstrators locked themselves in. It is, as yet, not clear why it was necessary to use all this weaponry against 1,000 people.

Some of the crowd broke away and (accidentally, according to Izvestiya) broke the windows of the National Library, taking their revenge to other windows, shops and cars. Eventually, they were rounded up. One of the buildings targeted was the headquarters of the Reform Party.

There were several arrests and a number of people, including police officers, were hurt. Here is a video of some of the goings on, the general impression being of hooligan behaviour (as the Russians would put it). Interestingly enough those involved seem to be too young to care very much about what happened at the end of World War II.

COMMENT THREAD

I know this is a far-off country but still ....

The result of this weekend's Estonian election is of no real interest with the new government probably consisting of the incumbent coalition. In fact, AP's reports all seem to be full of padding, though whether informing the world endlessly that

the country grapples with some of the EU's worst health statistics, including high rates of alcoholism, HIV infections and traffic-related deaths

without any proof makes Estonians particularly happy is open to question.

A more interesting aspect of the AP report is their phraseology:

Estonia's two major coalition parties were poised to stay in power Sunday after grabbing about half of the votes in the country's first parliamentary election since joining the European Union, according to partial official results.

Grabbing? Is there any evidence of fraud or use of force? And if there is no evidence, on what basis does AP describe the results as votes being grabbed?

COMMENT THREAD

Trouble on the eastern border

Two items of news from Estonia, apart from its unexpectedly high position in the European crime charts: Andrus Ansip, the Prime Minister has finally decided not to bother to negotiate a border treaty with Russia and the Russians are accusing the Estonians of nurturing neo-Nazism because the parliament has voted to remove the bronze statue of the Soviet soldier from the centre of Tallinn to a cemetery outside the city.

Those border treaties between the former Soviet Baltic republics and Russia have been somewhat problematic since the Balts would like some kind of an acknowledgement of the fact that they had existed as independent states between 1918 and 1939, were then invaded by the Soviet Union twice with a Nazi invasion sandwiched between the two.

The Soviet invasions, at least one of which is called liberation, have been responsible for the destruction through death and deportation of roughly a third of the population of the tiny Baltic States. When the Russian population of those countries complains about being discriminated against one must not forget that most of them moved there or were moved there to take up the jobs and homes of those who had gone east.

Convinced that they were there to rule for ever the Russians did not bother to learn the languages of the republics they lived in. The break-up of the Soviet Union did cause a great deal of displacement and bewilderment but of them all, the Russians in the Baltic States deserve less sympathy than many others.

What went wrong with the agreement between Russia and Estonia?

The two countries signed border agreements on May 18, 2005, and the Estonian parliament ratified the documents on June 20, but with additional demands linked to the 1920 peace treaty between Soviet Russia and Estonia.

On September 6, Russia notified Estonia that it was revoking its signature from the treaties because the 1920 document was no longer valid.

Moscow said the new provisions in the ratification law could be seen as legally entitling Estonia to make some territorial claims on Russia.

Moscow proposed including a provision "that all the previously signed agreements and treaties in bilateral history outlining the border are invalid" in mid-2006, but Estonia replied that it had no intention of resuming negotiations.

So that seems to be that, though as Mr Ansip points out, it is perfectly possible to live next to a country and have cross-border co-operation without any formal agreements. Most likely President Putin agrees with that and will go on doing so until it becomes convenient for him to blame the Balts for something or other.

That brings us to the bronze soldier. After the second invasion … sorry, liberation … of the Baltic States, there were referendums in all of them and by an overwhelming majority they all voted to become part of the Soviet Union. Presumably, even the people who went off into the forests to fight a ten-year long civil war, also voted to join.

To celebrate the liberation of these countries and all East European ones, large monuments were erected to the Soviet soldier, popularly known in most of those places as the monument to the unknown rapist.

The Estonians would like to remove their bronze soldier to a cemetery outside Tallinn and President Putin, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Sergei Mironov, speaker of the upper house of the Russian parliament, one and all see this as a development of neo-Nazi ideology in Estonia.

Estonian arguments that Nazi insignia has been legally banned in the country cut no ice. Just to acknowledge that the Soviet invasion of 1944 was not the liberation longed for by the local population shows that the country is becoming neo-Nazi.

The EU has an interesting problem on its hands. Presumably, if the German proposal for making the denial of racist and xenophobic genocide illegal will go through, nobody will be allowed to say that the Nazis had murdered Jews and Slavs in the Baltic States. But, given the scale of Soviet activity, it, too could be called genocide. Was it on racist and xenophobic grounds? Did they simply feel the need to destroy large parts of the Baltic middle classes, intelligentsia and peasantry? Or did they really hate the Estonians? Some lucky lawyer is going to have to decide these matters.

COMMENT THREAD