TIME: Almanac 1993/TIME Almanac 1993.iso/time/120991/1209000.000

Text File | 1992-08-28 | 10.2 KB | 203 lines

                                                                                WORLD, Page 34

SOVIET UNION

Final Dissolution


Ukraine's independence and Bush's decision to recognize it may
touch off the ultimate splintering -- but into how many new
fragments?

By GEORGE J. CHURCH -- Reported by James Carney/Kiev, Sinting
Lai/New York and J.F.O. McAllister/Washington


    Top-heavy with significance, the referendum was almost
devoid of suspense -- so much so that President Bush provided
the main surprise by acknowledging its expected outcome in
advance. As Ukrainians trooped to the voting booths on Sunday,
polls predicted that anywhere from 65% to 85% would choose to
make Ukraine an independent nation -- and Bush leaked word that
the U.S. would recognize it as such.

    The import of the vote went beyond the imminent creation
of the fifth most populous country in Europe -- 52 million
people, slightly fewer than in France. More broadly, the ballot
seems likely to trigger the final dissolution of the Soviet
Union. The possibilities for a replacement run from a new
Russian empire absorbing the 10 other, non-Ukrainian republics
to a score or more of squabbling sovereignties, if a Ukrainian
breakaway inspires secessionist movements not just by but within
the remaining republics. Various recombinations, like a
federation of the five Central Asian republics, could also
emerge.

    One outcome, though, seems impossible: the resurrection as
a true central authority of the Kremlin government, headed by
Mikhail Gorbachev, that still calls itself the Soviet Union.
Even now it is only a shell that some diplomats assert fails the
test for diplomatic recognition -- it does not control the
territory it claims. Last week the central bank ran out of
cash; starting this week the Gorbachev government may be unable
to pay its employees, including the more than 3 million members
of the military. If that does not finish off the flimsy
creature, Ukrainian independence may. "Russia can do without
Ukraine, Ukraine can do without Russia," says a State Department
official. "But the Soviet Union can't do without Ukraine. It's
over!"

    Which brings the U.S. and other Western governments up
against a task they had hoped to avoid: how to deal with a
plethora of former Soviet states instead of just one. Washington
and other capitals have so far focused on encouraging the
republics to preserve, or reconstitute, some kind of central
government. Now they must think about a policy toward Kiev --
and other emerging centers of authority -- on such matters as
distribution of aid, repayment of the U.S.S.R.'s foreign debt
and control of nuclear weapons. The START treaty calls for
destruction of some of the nuclear arms on Ukrainian soil, which
can no longer simply be ordered by the Kremlin, and Ukrainian
officials have demanded a say-so. At the same time, the West
must strive to encourage a peaceful and democratic transition
to whatever replaces the old union, lest the dissolution of the
U.S.S.R. be accomplished in part by civil wars. "Imagine
Yugoslavia with nuclear weapons" is the new catch phrase.

    It is a task the West has only begun -- and haltingly so.
As recently as Aug. 1, when he was in Kiev, Bush warned
Ukrainians against "suicidal nationalism." Then last week the
White House leaked word that the President was prepared to grant
"expeditious" recognition of Ukraine as a separate nation.
Meaning when? "Longer than two weeks, shorter than six months,"
said one official. Best guess: one or two months, depending on
how convincingly the Ukrainians pledge to respect human rights;
to carry out a share of treaty obligations incurred by the old
Soviet Union, including the destruction of nukes; and to fulfill
other conditions laid down by Washington to achieve what the
State Department calls "earned recognition" of independence.

    Nonetheless, the reports brought an expression of pain
from Gorbachev, who complained -- perhaps rightly so -- that
the shift in U.S. policy was premature. It certainly came at a
particularly awkward moment for the Soviet President, who had
already been rebuffed last week on his latest efforts to shore
up the union. British officials charged that Washington had made
public a significant change without any attempt to coordinate
policy with friends and allies. But Bush's lieutenants were more
concerned that some of those allies, notably Germany and Canada,
might hurry to recognize Ukraine and make Bush seem to be
following the pack rather than exercising leadership.

    However clumsily the U.S. move was handled, Western
recognition of Ukraine seems inevitable; at this point, probably
only war could keep the republic in any kind of union. The
chances of preserving a union-wide central government dwindle
almost daily. Last week leaders of seven of the remaining
republics were to initial a treaty setting up a new political
association, the "Union of Sovereign States," so loose that it
would have no constitution. Nonetheless, Gorbachev had to
confess that at the last minute the republics' leaders balked,
at least until their parliaments ratified the treaty -- which
could take months, years, or forever. Meanwhile, the
institutions still maintained by the central government are
falling apart.

    Ethnic tensions have sparked secessionist movements inside
as well as between republics. Says Michael Mandelbaum, director
of East-West studies at the Council on Foreign Relations: "If
you did a map showing all these conflicts, it would have to be
5 yds. long." In the southern part of the Russian Federation
alone, Chechens, Bashkirs, Tatars and Cossacks have been making
noises about more autonomy, if not full independence. There are
secessionist movements in Yakutia in the Far East, in South
Ossetia in the Georgian republic and among ethnic Russians in
the Moldavian republic -- and elsewhere.

    Some secessionists are prompted by economic desperation as
much as ethnic resentment and possibly could reverse course if
a recovery got under way. One hopeful sign is that inside the
Russian Federation, President Boris Yeltsin has at last decreed
the kind of reforms that nearly all specialists have identified
as essential: freedom for prices to find their own level, and a
rapid conversion of most agricultural and industrial property
from state to private ownership.

    Unfortunately, there is also the strong possibility of a
vicious circle in which republics and even smaller units would
try misguidedly to wall off their economies from the general
chaos. Such actions would intensify shortages and inflation, and
those troubles in turn would give another boost to secession.
Though 10 republics, including Ukraine, have initialed a treaty
of economic cooperation, it is far from certain that they will
agree on the detailed arrangements needed to put it into effect.
Some Ukrainian politicians have assailed the accord on the
ground that any kind of coordination with Russia would involve
submitting to Russian domination. The resulting split-ups may
not stay peaceful either. Georgia and Azerbaijan have issued
decrees "nationalizing" all military property on their soil. In
response, the Soviet Interior and Defense ministries have
pledged that the army will shoot if necessary to repel attempts
to seize military property.

    What can or should the West do to smooth the transition?
It does not have a great deal of leverage. Still, U.S. experts
think even simple preaching does some good; they have been
surprised by how much importance the republics' leaders attach
to American opinion. "We have a kind of moral authority," says
a State Department official, "and we need to use that."

    One obvious necessity is to expand contacts with the
republics instead of continuing to talk mostly with the Kremlin.
A start has been made: the seven major industrial powers last
month agreed to a suspension of repayments of principal on
Moscow's foreign debt for the next year and negotiated the
accord with the republics rather than with Gorbachev's vanishing
center. The U.S. embassy in Moscow has started a "circuit rider"
program, sending junior diplomats to the republics to contact
local leaders, listen to their problems and explain U.S. policy.

    Economic aid will have to be expanded, in the hope of
helping the republics weather what threatens to be a winter of
food and fuel shortages. Bush is moving in that direction; last
month he announced an additional $1.5 billion in food aid,
bringing the total pledged since January to $4 billion. That is
still minor compared with the efforts of some European
countries; Germany alone puts its total aid to the U.S.S.R. at
$40 billion. Congress nonetheless grumbles about feeding
Russians while Americans go hungry during the recession, and
there is a real possibility that the aid might be wasted or
stolen.

    Private relief efforts, which are burgeoning rapidly, may
point to one way around that trouble. The Russian Winter
Campaign, a project coordinated in the West by the nonprofit
International Foreign Policy Association, plans to airlift 300
tons of medical supplies into Moscow on Dec. 16 and similar
quantities in each of the next five months. "We're not giving
any goods over to any Soviet relief agency," says I.F.P.A.
president Jim Garrison. Americans pick out the hospitals to be
helped and physically deliver the supplies.

    In general, critics of Bush and, to a lesser extent, other
Western leaders fault them less for their specific acts than for
a general timidity and lack of imagination in appreciating that
the old policy of propping up Gorbachev and the central
government will no longer work, as well as in devising a new one
to replace it. That cannot be delayed; chaos is not the only
possible calamitous result of the Soviet turmoil. There is a
frightening possibility that hunger and cold could bring to
power a fascist government in Russia that would seek to reunite
the old union by force, under the pretext of protecting Russian
minorities in Ukraine and neighboring republics. The world is
well rid of the Soviet Union's old communist totalitarianism,
but that could all too easily be replaced by a new
authoritarianism -- or chaos -- almost as threatening.