The result of this flight from history is pla n to see: just as 1917 caught the West unawares, so the Russian Idea's Year 2000 s beyond the scope of any Western strategies (or game plans', as it is becoming fashionable to call them) related to the superpower rivalry at the end of this century. The Russian New Right has been preparing for this historical calamity — clearly and loudly — for the past two decades (just as the Bolsheviks prepared for 1917.) Yet the West still doesn't heed the signals, any more than it did at the turn of the century.
A Replay of the Past
Let us consider tsarist Russia at the fateful moment when she ,ust seemed to be overcoming a 'regime' crisis, and Stolypin was desperately trying to hold her back from the brink of the abyss. What.
would the best strategy for the West have been then? To deliberately push tsarism over the edge? To involve it in global geopolitical games which it hadn't the strength to survive? To let things contmue in the direction they were headed > Or to support Stolypin, tsarist apparatchik that he was, in his attempt to save Petersburg Russia from a fatal 'systemic' crisis, whose outcome, as we now know, was the emergence in the world of a Communist Russia?
At first glance, this last alternative seems as unthmkable as would be a suggestion by someone today to support Gorbachev's reforms. True, Stolypin's Russia wasn't perceived then as a direct threat to the West the way Gorbachev's Russia is now. Still, it was the monstrous tsarist empire. The most abhorrent human lights violations were habitual there, including savage Jewish pogroms Its political system was antiquated and oppressive, its military posture threatening. No one doubted at the time that Petersburg Russia was a medieval state, the Sick Man of Europe. Besides, who was this Stolypin if nnt a tsarist satrap through and through ? The former governor of Saratov province and then minister of internal affairs — hardly an nspir ng record. If one listened to Russian radicals of the ime. Stolypin would emerge as a more sinister figure yet: the butcher of the revolution, the ;nst;gator of the court martials, the violator of the constitution
This was an accurate picture What it lacked was the context — a correlation with the alternatives These were either a fascist dictatorship under someone like Purishkevich or a Communist one under someone like Lenin. Cruel as he was, Stolypin did abolish the medieval institution of the peasant commune ana thus opened the gates for the development of the middle class. He also agreed to collaborate ivitb a constitutional body, albeit a truncated one, and so gave the middle class a means of
This was the situation in the empire at the time Stolypin was trying to pull it from the brink of the abyss, very much as Gorbachev is trying to do today. Thus, the ultimate criterion for the evaluation of any Western 'game plan is, m my view, whether the Bolsheviks in Stolypin's time (or, the Russian New Right in Gorbachev's.) would perceive this plan to be in their interests, that is, conducive to Russia's transformation into a Communist, or fascist, state.
The Game Plans
The first, and perhaps most popular, of these was introduced into Amer ca's Soviet debate in 1984 by Richard Pipes's Survival is Not Enough. It is a most elaborate plan to accelerate Russia's decline, to push her over the brink: to deliver her to the Bolsheviks (in Stolypin's time) or the Russian New Right (in Gorbachev's). For Lenin, it would be one more manifestation of the imperialist nature of the West; for Shimanov, a confirmation that the West is indeed part of a worldwide k.ke-Freemason' conspiracy against Russia. For the Jews it would most probably mean a new holocaust. Even so, there can be little doubt that R ;hard Pipes's plan for a crusade against the 'evil empire' would be held in h'.ghest esteem by both the Bolsheviks at the dawn of the century and the Russian New Right at its twilight. It is intended to ensure that reform fails and thereby to accelerate Russia's slide toward the abyss.
Another strategy for dealing with a Russia in the throes of a 'regime' cris. was mtroduced into the debate in 1986 by Zbigniew Brzezinski in li i; book Game Plan. Unlike F pes, Brzez isk was not writing a tract or the ev 's of the Russian emp.re compared to the merits of Western democracy. His book is intended as a practical guide for action a a nuclear geopo tical contest. What he is concerned with is Russia's global design to d ;place the United States as the world's principal power and primary stal lizmg influence. This must not be allowed to happen. America must prevail. It can do this by achieving military preponderance, by building a two-tier stratcg.: defence (Star Wars) and by weakening the adversary n any way it can. For example, the rel . on of 55 m llion Muslims, the national sm of 50 n llion Ukrain ans and 10 million Baits, not to mention 40 m dion Poles, are all potential targets for US expl< tation of political unrest within the Russian empire. None of tf s, however, takes into account what happens to Russia as a result of a mil tary contest projected into infii ty.
The Bolsheviks would have liked such a game plan. For the Russian New Right it is a godsend. It actually looks as if Brzezinski has incorporated in his game plan the granc asc Young Guardist vision of the inevitability of an ultimate confrontation between Russia and the devil. It would confirm that Russ a's conflict with the West is irreconcilable. It would strengthen the hand of the military- idusti a) complex, the most reliable ally of the New R ght within the Soviet establishment. Finally, by trying to exploit the unrest of national minorities it would trigger the isolation of the empire from the word The onlv wa> Russia would be able to resist such press-re would be che traditional one — to transform hersdf m:o a ortress Thus a new garrison-state in Russia would be ensured whether Communist as after Stolvpin) or fascist (as after Gorbachev'
Within American sovietology, there are also more moderate game plans. According to one of these introducec ж l-So by Seweryn Bialer in The Soviet Paradox Russia's reforms: eadership Is in a Catch 22 situation- an irreconcilable contradiction ben veer, on tr.e one hand, the urgent need for radical reform г: home arc on the other, the fear of losing Russian dominance within the errpire and in the superpower contest. Unlike Pipes and Brzezinski. however. Bialer understands that a policy of relentless confrontation may backfire It would ralh the Soviet people arourd the reg.ne g.vlng it the legitimacy it has been unable to win through its pertorrrar.ee But exactly which Soviet regime is Bialer talking about? We heard the Young Guardist Chalmaev and the dissident Sta. r.rst Antonov passionately condemning the flabbv and rotten Brezhnev- regime c: stagnation. Instead, they dreamed of a reg-meoi dctatersh p capab e of combating the 'Americanization of the spirit exterminating the 'civilized savages" and declaring war on the wtsrld-vUee F reerr.ssor — Kike' conspiracv To them Khrushche- s reform reg.me that tad actively fought for a permanent accommodation w.t - the West seemed even worse than Brezhnev s torpor Thus to the preachers of the Russian Idea, it makes all the difference in the wor.d which of these regimes the Russian people would rally behind if the confrontation with the West were projected intc infinity as Pipes s and Brzezinsk: s game plans suggest They would love such a game pian- a permanent confrontation would exclude a repetition of Khrushchev's reformist regime and make a new garrison-state ben: on granc expansion anc the Orthodoxization of the wcrid almost me\:tsbe for E;;ss.a.