Following the Russian revolution of 1917 and subsequent civil war that established the USSR much of the west was reluctant to extend diplomatic recognition to the new political entity. However, most European nations began to come to terms with reality on the ground by the mid 1920s. The US was the major holdout. Republican administrations refused recognition and it had to wait until FDR took office in 1933. Up until WW II the USSR had limited trading relationships with the west. When Hitler invaded the USSR the US began to pour in money and equipment under the lend lease program.
The developments that led to what became known as the cold war took place over the period of 1945-1948. The Berlin blockade was the unequivocal break. However, Stalin was actively working on plans to establish a buffer zone for the USSR during the war. He was clearly determined to install a post war regime in Poland that he could control. With the eventual establishment of what Churchill colorfully termed the iron curtain, he had a cordon sanitaire that stretched from the Baltic to the Adriatic. The nations that became members of the Warsaw Pact were pulled under the economic umbrella of the USSR. Not only did they have Communist governments installed but their trade and economic ties were all directed toward the east. When the US offered economic aid to all European nations under the Marshall Plan it was turned down by the USSR and its satellites.
From the late 1940s to 1990 this bloc of nations functioned as a mostly self contained economic system with only limited trade with the US and western Europe. The globe was divided in influence between the west as first world, the Communist bloc as second world and the rest as third world where the first and second competed with each other. With the collapse of the USSR there was an effort to incorporate the second world into the first. Most of the non-Russian members of the Warsaw Pact moved toward eventual membership in NATO and the EU. The present crisis in Ukraine is a part of that process. Russia has made significant movement in establishing greater economic ties with the west finally becoming a member of the WTO in 2012.
Suddenly it seems almost as though the world has jumped back 25 years in time. The west and Russia are locked in a struggle over the future of Ukraine that is strongly reminiscent of the cold war era. While there doesn't seem to be a high probability of direct military conflict between Russia and NATO forces, the US and the EU are considering the imposition of economic sanctions against Russia in an effort to restrain the actions of the Putin government. So far the official attitude of the Russian government in response to such threats has been one of defiance. This raises the very important question of just where does Russia see its economic future.
Foes of America in Russia Crave Rupture in Ties
But it became clear last week, as the United States threatened to cut off Russian corporations from the Western financial system, that influential members of the president’s inner circle view isolation from the West as a good thing for Russia, the strain of thought advanced by Mr. Prokhanov and his fellow travelers. Some in Mr. Putin’s camp see the confrontation as an opportunity to make the diplomatic turn toward China that they have long advocated, said Sergei A. Karaganov, a dean of the faculty of international relations at the Higher School of Economics in Moscow.
When he took power in Russia, Mr. Putin seemed intent on balancing the voices of strong-state nationalists and promarket liberals, among them the tycoons entrusted with Russia’s corporate empires. That balance flew out the window in 2012, and with the Crimean crisis the space for liberal dissent has been melting away, a process that accelerated Thursday when the Russian authorities blocked websites used by prominent opposition figures.
When I came across this article I checked in with pico, who IMO is the best source of information on Daily Kos about Russian and Eastern European affairs. I asked him if he felt that there was enough validity to the picture that was being presented to warrant a serious discussion of it. With the reservations and caveats that one would expect from any self respecting academic, he said that he thought there was. I am hopeful, they he may be able to drop by for the discussion.
It does seem plausible that there is something of a sea change under way in Russia since Putin returned to the office of president. There have been crack downs of domestic political dissent and he has used cultural issues like gay rights to throw bones to conservative opinion. The issue at this point is just how far is he willing to go in reversing the trends of the past two decades and is the Russian public prepared to follow him.
One very critical facet is Russia's relationship with China. While Russia was floundering in its immediate post Soviet malaise, China was surging ahead toward global economic power. Energy resources are a key link between the two countries. Russia has a substantial surplus for export and China has become a major importer. The perennial turbulence in the Middle East makes their sources of supply uncertain. China abstained in the vote in the UNSC which Russia vetoed and seems to be keeping its options open.
Russia and China are participants along with Brazil, India and South Africa in what is known as the BRICS alliance. This is a fledgling effort to develop a center of economic and political power to balance the alliance of the US and the EU. All of this background makes Putin's recent actions seem less of an impulsive outburst and more a part of long range plans. Within Russia there is definitely a tug of war between economic liberalism and the kind of economic and political confrontation that at least in part looks back to the past.