Russia's National Security Strategy

The Russian National Security Strategy until 2020, approved by President Dmitry Medvedev on May 12, has been portrayed as innovative while clarifying the nature of the strategic environment facing the country. Much attention was devoted to the potential risk of future energy wars, in regions including the Arctic, where Russia will defend its access to hydrocarbon resources. Nevertheless, despite continued credence being given to the concept of a "resurgent Russia," the new strategy appeared more conciliatory than widely expected (Interfax, May 12).
The Secretary of the Security Council Nikolay Patrushev explained in an interview with Izvestiya that the National Security Strategy replaces the National Security Concept drawn up in 1997 and modified in 2000, reflecting changes within the international security environment. In June 2008 Medvedev ordered the Security Council to develop the new strategy. Although it is remarkably similar to the former security concept, there are differences. Its main difference lies in placing security as a goal that can be realised by attaining national priorities. Another subtle shift is its vagueness over the circumstances in which Moscow would consider using nuclear weapons. The strategy defines the goals, threats, tasks the measures to realize them in the short-term (2012), medium-term (2015) and long-term (2020). It links the principle of security through stable development, emphasizing the standard of living of its citizens and the nurturing of the economy. It is innovative: including new sections on "science," "culture," "public health," and even the "rational use of nature."

One clear vestigial element of the "resurgent Russia" theme was advocated by Patrushev, saying that the strategy stresses Moscow's aim to establish an "equal and fully-fledged strategic partnership with the United States based on coinciding interests" (Izvestia, May 12). He believes this will be achieved by focussing on strategic arms reduction, strengthening confidence building measures and enhancing counter-terrorist cooperation. "Our country will make all the necessary efforts at the lowest-cost level to maintain parity with the U.S. in strategic offensive arms in conditions when the global missile defence system is deployed, and the concept of global strike with the use of strategic carriers in nuclear and non-nuclear versions is implemented," he explained (Izvestia, May 12).

Patrushev believes that the departure from "bloc confrontation" and fostering multivector diplomacy," are key to boosting Russia's position in the world. He attacked the present Euro-Atlantic security architecture, which he argued is weighted in favor of NATO and the OSCE, and praised Medvedev's suggestion to develop a new European security treaty.
Despite its idealism in advancing such views of Russia's place in the world, including the aim of being one of the "top five" countries within the global economy, Patrushev admitted that foreign policy will become "rational and pragmatic," ruling out any "high-cost confrontation" or a new arms race. Yet the strategy does include aspects that clearly contradict this aspiration, since it crystallizes an anti-Western agenda. For instance, Moscow's long-standing opposition to any future eastward expansion of NATO and the Alliance increasingly adopting a global role forms part of the new strategy (www.scrf.gov.ru, May 12).

One indication of uncertainty at high levels over the new strategy came in late March, when its signing was delayed, after Medvedev ordered its further refinement. According to Patrushev no substantive revisions were implemented, instead only clarifying certain phrases. The concept and methodology were examined and approved during a conference which included the 104 members of the presidium of the scientific council under the Security Council. Approximately 60 percent of the council's members are drawn from mainly state academic institutions tasked with examining national security. The council included 20 members of the state academies of sciences. On May 14 Vyacheslav Senchagov, a member of the scientific council, alleged that specific economic benchmarks in areas such as poverty and food costs were removed from the draft strategy -as a result financial crisis. "The figures were removed to reduce the liability of the government for their performance," he said (Izvestiya, May 12; Kommersant, May 14).
The text was finally agreed by the Security Council on April 24. A large portion of the text is devoted to economic issues, highlighting the importance of energy security which will apparently be achieved by 2015 -without specifying how this will be realized. The global financial crisis has clearly had a major influence in the formulation of the document, which places the crisis and any future recurrence on a par with "the large-scale use of military force" (www.scrf.gov.ru, May 12). Underlying the hostility toward NATO expansion and claims to attain strategic parity with the U.S. the strategy places energy security center-stage:

"...the preservation of the raw materials export model of national economic development, the declining competitiveness and high dependence of the economy's most important spheres on the foreign economic situation, loss of control over national resources, the worsening state of the raw materials base of industry and power generation, the regions' uneven development and progressive labor shortage, the poor stability and unprotected nature of the national financial system, and the preservation of conditions for corruption and the criminalization of financial-economic relations" (www.scrf.gov.ru, May 12).

Those examining the document for signs or indications of Moscow's future intentions may be overestimating its significance. The concentration on economic issues, lack of clarity on issues such as the role of nuclear weapons in national security, conceal the widespread uncertainty currently gripping the political and security elite as a result of the global financial crisis. In other words, this could be the worst possible timing to introduce a new strategy, while with the political consequences of the financial crisis are entirely unclear.
The confidence which denoted Russian foreign policy, and its more rhetorical stance against the West no longer seems to fit with economic reality - in March official statistics showed the Russian economy had contracted by 9.5 percent year-on-year. In the context of that economic downturn, the myth of achieving strategic partnership with the U.S. "based on coinciding interests," may sound good, but it is uncertain where this message is received, let alone believed.
--Roger McDermott

http://www.jamestown.org

The World Needs an Energy Framework
By Josef Braml
A new global energy framework is long overdue. The Obama administration could well be interested in teaming up with the European Union to create one. In addition to enhancing security, it would also spur economic growth and curb global warming.
For the present, Europe's goal of creating a unified and dependable European Union domestic market for electricity and gas remains wishful thinking. One of the most striking -- and backward -- aspects of the European energy market is its lack of market integration, especially in electricity. In order to ensure that member states open their energy markets, we not only need unified standards of implementation but a European regulatory agency with sanctioning mechanisms that can counter unfair competition.

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A global energy policy could improve security of the energy supply, give fresh impulses to economic growth and curb the greenhouse effect.
The EU should also develop a unified policy in its external relations. Europe has neither a clear idea how the changes of government in Moscow and Washington can be exploited, nor does it have a plan for how to deal with states that pursue regional power through energy policies, including nuclear power ambitions. Europe's dependence on crude oil exporting nations makes it equally clear that it must continue to develop multilateral structures to deal with these market failures and market powers.
Energizing Transatlantic Relations
In terms of energy and climate issues, neither the United States nor the European Union have gone beyond declamatory and non-binding goals. Barack Obama's election as US president and the realignment of established interest groups in the American energy policy debate presents a fine opportunity to cooperate in a political area that is of central importance to the future of energy-dependent economies.
During his campaign, Obama explained that an immense economic potential resides in alternative energy. Accordingly, the annual global demand for sources of energy with minimal fossil components will reach $500 billion by the year 2050. In view of the acute economic crisis, President Obama asked the US Congress to get the ball rolling on an $800 billion economic stimulus package. Investment in modernizing the energy infrastructure is not only intended to create jobs in the short term, but has the long-term objective of reducing America's oil dependency and carbon footprint. First and foremost, the United States is concerned with developing alternative fuels and efficient technologies for the transport sector. Here is where German and European policy can have an impact: a transatlantic energy and environmental partnership could promote research and investment in new technologies as well as free trade in alternative fuels. It would be in their mutual interest, moreover, to counteract the Russian tendency to make traditional energy relations bilateral.
Cooperation with Russia
Europe still has no blueprint for its future strategic relationship with Russia. A new partnership and cooperation treaty is necessary, particularly as Russia sees the European Energy Charter (EEC) as a relic of the early 1990s when Russia was weak and still had to play by the West's rules. The EEC served more to protect Western interests vis-à-vis Russia's energy supply rather than mutually benefiting both sides. Under the terms of the charter (which were never fully ratified by Russia), Russia's energy supplies became open to free trade, and foreign investments in Russia's energy infrastructure were protected. By means of exclusive bilateral agreements with European companies, Moscow can use its newly won status as an energy superpower to intensify the competition among European states and companies for Russian energy sources and play them off against one another. Pipeline plans are also guided by the Kremlin's geopolitical considerations. The Blue Stream Project undermines European diversification efforts (the Nabucco Pipeline) as it would allow Russia to route energy supplies to Turkey via a trans-Black Sea pipeline.
Nevertheless, the financial crisis and recent developments in the energy markets have created possibilities for cooperation. Due to sinking energy prices, Russia's self-confidence has been reduced to a level allowing for negotiations between equal partners. According to some observers, crude oil prices of less than $60 a barrel endanger the financing of necessary economic reforms in Russia and possibly -- if the petroleum dollars fail to materialize before long -- threatening its political stability. The financial crisis has only heightened Russia's interest in foreign investments and its willingness to cooperate.
Nuclear Nonproliferation Regime
Cooperation with Russia is also critical to the nuclear nonproliferation system being able to adapt to changed technical and economic circumstances. As civilian use of nuclear energy for the generation of electricity increases, so too has the need for enrichment and reprocessing facilities as well as the demand for natural uranium reactors. These reactors all have one thing in common: they employ materials that can be used to make nuclear weapons. North Korea and Iran illustrate the international nuclear order's vulnerable areas. What is required is a group of states that are ready and able to defend the nuclear nonproliferation system against such challenges as the North Korean and Iranian nuclear programs.
Even without the nuclear option, Iran poses a massive potential threat. Iranian troops stationed not far from the Strait of Hormuz, a strategically critical position, could halt the daily delivery of 17 million barrels of oil, which according to American security experts equals 40 percent of the world's oil trade. Were the "Iranian oil weapon" to be deployed, a marked rise in oil prices would take place, causing lasting damage to Western and Asian economies.
OPEC's Strategic Market Power
In addition, the growing power of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) threatens the energy security and economic strength of oil-dependent nations. OPEC's potential power becomes clear in considering the fact that those 10 countries with the largest proven oil reserves -- with the exception of Canada and Russia-are all OPEC members. OPEC controls over 70 percent of all known oil reserves. Though OPEC's share of world production remains constant at 40 percent, in the long term the cartel's power is increasing in the same proportion as resources of non-OPEC countries are dwindling. To ward off the strategic market power of OPEC, innovative governments could raise anti-cyclical taxes on fossil fuels that are coupled with the market price for oil. Investments would then be protected from potentially sudden price collapses -- that may be engineered by OPEC -- and tax revenues could be utilized for the research and development of renewable energy.
When the Market Fails
The usefulness of energy prices for governance should be purposefully exploited. When energy prices, particularly in the industrial countries, are systematically raised, then one can more reliably plan adaptive measures with regard to energy supply and demand. Unaccompanied by political flanking measures, markets are as unable to meet the challenges posed by OPEC, climate change, and sketchy research efforts as they are to solve the distribution problems associated with high oil prices. Energy security, environmental protection, and human rights are all public commodities that should not be left to imperfect (energy) markets distorted by the suppliers. Market imperfections such as oligopolistic structures and the neglect of negative external effects (carbon dioxide pollution, nuclear waste, proliferation) or positive ones (research and development) not only justify but in fact cry out for state intervention.
An example of market failure through "negative externality" is the impact on the global climate of the burning of coal, gas, and oil. But for users of oil and other fossil fuels, the market price for such fuels is hardly an indicator of the social costs arising from their polluting emissions. Politicians can take countermeasures against these external costs by integrating them in the price mechanism. This can be achieved through climate policy instruments such as an emissions tax or emissions allowance trading. If EU states wish not to forfeit the credibility gained through their pioneering role in promoting a global and internationally binding post-Kyoto Treaty -- and the associated market chances for energy-saving technologies and renewable energies -- then they should not deviate from their climate objectives despite the current economic crisis.
The market also disregards the positive external effects of research and development. Technological innovations benefit many oil importers; they cannot be prevented from using a certain innovation -- as would be the case with private commodities. The trailblazing innovator himself would thus have to bear the high costs, but with little hope of profit and small incentive to invest in research. Without political control -- for example through patent protection or subsidies -- too little research and innovation takes place. To remedy market shortcomings one must increasingly promote the research and development of energy-efficient techniques and renewable energy. There are incentives for multilateral action particularly in terms of alternative fuels and in the development of marketable technologies. A further reason to create such structures for collective research efforts is the problem of "free-riding," or the worldwide application or "copy-cating" of pioneering research achievements by third parties. With multilateral financing, an international group of scientists and economic experts could develop new technologies and market strategies.
Reform of Multilateral Organizations
In order to meet the new challenges, a whole array of multilateral organizations and transnational structures must adjust to the new conditions; but affected, first and foremost, are the International Energy Agency (IEA) and the World Trade Organization (WTO). In particular, the IEA's system for securing the fuel supply must undergo further development. The IEA's establishment as an autonomous unit of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) in the mid-1970s was a tacit recognition that securing the oil supply should not be entrusted solely to the oil companies and that long-term energy policy measures were necessary -- measures that transcended the national framework. This OECD club must now be expanded. All of the important oil-producing and transit and consuming nations should be integrated at both the regional and global level, and within new structural frameworks if necessary. Above all, medium- and long-term cooperation with countries such as China and India is indispensable. All of the great Asian economic powers have hitherto tended to pursue a neo-mercantilist or nationalistic approach to securing energy imports and their routes of transport, which makes the development of cooperative and market-oriented approaches difficult.
In trade policy, negotiations between energy-rich candidates for accession and energy-importing members could lead to long-term development of the WTO's rules and regulations. In particular, rules must be developed that would harmonize the interests of oil and gas exporters with those of producers of renewable energy. The growing global trade in biofuels has created numerous issues for international trade policy that go far beyond the present core competence of the WTO. They concern climate protection, the securing of fuel supplies, and world hunger.
Mr. Energy's Multitasking
To guarantee energy security in the widest sense of the term --that is, to bring the partly complementary and partly conflicting goals of energy security, economic efficiency, environmental compatibility, and human rights into greater accord with one another -- the first requirement, at the individual state level, is to establish a non-partisan interagency apparatus. In Germany, this would take the form of a kind of federal security council. The next step, at the European level, would be to set up an "energy coordinator." This would be necessary if only to have a contact partner for other nations that, like the United States, will have established similarly comprehensive structures.
A global energy policy could improve security of the energy supply, give fresh impulses to economic growth, and curb the greenhouse effect. Such a sweeping political plan could reduce or obviate human suffering by readjusting the balance of power in the energy markets and forestall further wars over resources. Germany, as a nation dependent on energy imports, should play a leading role.
Josef Braml is the editor in chief of DGAP's "Jahrbuch Internationale Politik". The current volume is a comprehensive analysis of energy-related issues by leading experts.
URL:
http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/0,1518,621997,00.html