Putin and Litvinenko

[PeeWee]

Now that traces of polonium-210 have been found aboard three BA London Moscow flight it appears that the trail is indeed leading to Moscow. Does any one know, since Alexander Litvinenko had accsed Putin of ordering his murder, if Putin could be charged with the murder. Or does he have diplomatic immunity?

Peewee

[DKMM]

Hmm dunno about that one.

I just picked up that book, Putin's Russia.  It was written by that journalist that got whacked (by Putin?).  Put the book on your Xmas list its pretty insightful and will give you guys conversation material.

[Rvrwind]

I don't see the big deal here.
The guy was revealing state secrets to forgien intelligence, he got wacked by the FSB. Play with the big boys & you pay the price. Russia didn't do anything more or less than what MI6 or the Mossad or CIA would have done. They wacked a snitch. It happens all the time in the world of espionage.
My only thought on it is 'Why Bother'?
Ain't no secrets in this world anymore anyway. And Russia certainly doesn't have anything over the rest of the world that is worth keeping secret in my opinion. Seems like a waste of good plutonium to me.
With spy satilites floating around in space there ain't much that is hidden anymore & technilogically speaking, Russia is far behind most of the civilized world in that regard, so why get so uptight? They just fired three high ranking officers for revealing to the media that their fancy, big talking new missile system is a bust. He!! the US new that before anybody because they saw it via satillite.
Its mostly propiganda, plain & simple. That communist attitude is still alive & well in the Kremlin! Still keeping the truth from their own people is the main goal.
Here's a copy of the pesses veiw -

<tit>DEFENSE MINISTRY WAVES BULAVA
<stl>Excessively frank officers are expelled from the Defense Ministry
<aut>Olga Bozhyeva
<src>Moskovsky Komsomolets, November 27, 2006, p. 5
<sum>Last week, three officers of the central staff of the Defense Ministry and the Navy were fired from military service.</sum>
<cov>THREE OFFICERS OF THE CENTRAL STAFF OF THE DEFENSE MINISTRY AND NAVY SACKED FOR DISCLOSURE OF INFORMATION ABOUT UNSUCCESSFUL LAUNCH OF BULAVA MISSILE TO JOURNALISTS

Last week, three officers of the central staff of the Defense Ministry and the Navy were fired from military service. They were accused of disclosure of a terrible military secret. They allegedly dared to inform journalists about the unsuccessful launch of our new strategic missile Bulava.
Sources in the Defense Ministry reported that at the latest army consultations Defense Minister Ivanov told generals that recently the ministry found and fired three "moles" who were revealing important military information to journalists.
The following officers were announced the "moles": Colonel Nikolai Baranov, deputy director of the press service of the Defense Minister, Captain First Rank Valery Burmistrov, officer of the press service of the Navy (so far he is in hospital and is not fired formally yet), as well as Lieutenant Colonel Kuznetsov, operational officer on duty in the staff of a missile space defense army (Space Forces).
These officers were reportedly offered to write resignation reports "according to their own wish" in 15 minutes. In case of refusal they were promised such conditions of service that they would be sorry for their decision to remain. There was no long investigation to find if they were guilty or were not guilty. Lieutenant Colonel Kuznetsov suffered only because he was son of the correspondent of ITAR-TASS news agency that published the first report about the launch of Bulava. But why were the "spies" sacked "according to their own wish" without instituting criminal proceedings about disclosure of state secrets?
Because they did not disclose any secret.
Under the Russian-American START-1 treaty Russia should inform the US about all launches of intercontinental ballistic missiles including test ones beforehand. For which secret did the "moles" suffer?
There is an impression that now the Russian Defense Ministry is afraid not of foreign intelligence services but rather of its own citizens who can learn the real state of affairs in armament of our army. This may cast a shadow on the Defense Minister being one of the leaders of the presidential race. So, it seemed that the failed launch of Bulava hit on the prestige of the Defense Minister seriously. This happened due to the following circumstance.
October 25, the day of the missile launch, strangely coincided with the day when Vladimir Putin talked to citizens of Russia on television and said that he was "satisfied with activities of the Defense Ministry and General Staff in strengthening the country’s defense capability." Of course, it would be impressive to support this statement with a television image of Bulava flight, which would definitely add points to Sergei Ivanov as a successor. However, the missile fell into the sea at the 200th second of flight. This happened not for the first time. The most important thing was the model of this missile.
This was the missile about which Defense Minister Ivanov spoke first and the President spoke about it in November 2004, after Ivanov’s report saying, "Not a single other country has such weapon systems."
There is no Bulava and, as specialists say, it will not be for two or three years yet. The missile also fell when the President spoke about the might of our weapons for the whole country. This was pure information subversion, according to the Defense Ministry. Naturally, Sergei Ivanov demanded investigation and taking necessary measures.
Ivanov’s aides immediately rushed to seek for scapegoats. As usual, these were journalists and the three fired "moles." This way or the other, well-informed people say that this time the innocent people have been punished as usual.
Today all Russian military officials can communicate with journalists only with personal permit of the Defense Minister. This verbal order is observed stringently because nobody wants to be a "mole." Even Duma deputies complain that they do not know for sure for purchase of which armament the budget money is allocated. The Defense Ministry manages this money independently.
Probably that is why armament is the main secret of the Defense Ministry, although it does not apply to the really newest weapons that Russia supplies to China, India and that it does not have in its own army. Only the airplanes, tanks and air defense systems that are getting rusty and decay in the troops are secret. About them we should now know. It is up to the Defense Ministry to decide what we should know. For example, we would be told about Bulava for sure but for its untimely fall.
It is rumored that there will be another launch of Bulava soon. This time it will be definitely exclusively successful because the "moles" have already been driven away and all the rest have been scared duly.

[Bruno]

And Russia certainly doesn't have anything over the rest of the world that is worth keeping secret in my opinion.

What about Russian women, the best Russian secret 

[ConnerVT]

Careful there, Rvr.  The FSB will be lookin' for YOU next!   

 

[groovlstk]

From what I've read this guy was an attention hound. He made some outrageous claims about the FSB being involved in bombing some apartments that were ultimately blamed on Chechyans.

After 9/11, he publicly stated that the FSB worked with al qaeda to plan the attacks, and after that any rational person put him on ignore.

Berezovsky is and will continue to be a thorn in Putin's side, but Litvinenko was little more than a gadfly. 

It's funny though, I see guys like Berezovsky tagged as "billionaire businessman" in the Western press when anyone who does a little digging can see he's a thief with an unquenchable appetite and a monster.

[PeeWee]

Source: Stratfor Intelligence Service 11/28

Russia's Interest in Litvinenko
By George Friedman

The recent death of a former Russian intelligence agent, Alexander Litvinenko, apparently after being poisoned with polonium-210, raises three interesting questions. First: Was he poisoned by the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB), the successor to the KGB? Second: If so, what were they trying to achieve? Third: Why were they using polonium-210, instead of other poisons the KGB used in the past? In short, the question is, what in the world is going on?

Litvinenko would seem to have cut a traditional figure in Russian and Soviet history, at least on the surface. The first part of his life was spent as a functionary of the state. Then, for reasons that are not altogether clear, he became an exile and a strident critic of the state he had served. He published two books that made explosive allegations about the FSB and President Vladimir Putin, and he recently had been investigating the shooting death of a Russian journalist, Anna Politkovskaya, who also was a critic of the Putin government. Clearly, he was intent on stirring up trouble for Moscow.

Russian and Soviet tradition on this is clear: Turncoats like Litvinenko must be dealt with, for two reasons. First, they represent an ongoing embarrassment to the state. And second, if they are permitted to continue with their criticisms, they will encourage other dissidents -- making it appear that, having once worked for the FSB, you can settle safely in a city like London and hurl thunderbolts at the motherland with impunity. The state must demonstrate that this will not be permitted -- that turncoats will be dealt with no matter what the circumstances.

The death of Litvinenko, then, certainly makes sense from a political perspective. But it is the perspective of the old Soviet Union -- not of the new Russia that many believed was being born, slowly and painfully, with economic opening some 15 years ago. This does not mean, however, that the killing would not serve a purpose for the Russian administration, in the current geopolitical context.

For years, we have been forecasting and following the transformation of Russia under Vladimir Putin. Putin became president of Russia to reverse the catastrophe of the Yeltsin years. Under communism, Russia led an empire that was relatively poor but enormously powerful in the international system. After the fall of communism, Russia lost its empire, stopped being enormously powerful, and became even poorer than before. Though Westerners celebrated the fall of communism and the Soviet Union, these turned out to be, for most Russians, a catastrophe with few mitigating tradeoffs.

Obviously, the new Russia was of enormous benefit to a small class of entrepreneurs, led by what became known as the oligarchs. These men appeared to be the cutting edge of capitalism in Russia. They were nothing of the sort. They were simply people who knew how to game the chaos of the fall of communism, figuring out how to reverse Soviet expropriation with private expropriation. The ability to turn state property into their own property represented free enterprise only to the most superficial or cynical viewers.

The West was filled with both in the 1990s. Many academics and journalists saw the process going on in Russia as the painful birth of a new liberal democracy. Western financial interests saw it as a tremendous opportunity to tap into the enormous value of a collapsing empire. The critical thing is that the creation of value, the justification of capitalism, was not what was going on. Rather, the expropriation of existing value was the name of the game. Bankers loved it, analysts misunderstood it and the Russians were crushed by it.

It was this kind of chaos into which Putin stepped when he became president, and which he has slowly, inexorably, been bringing to heel for several years. This is the context in which Litvinenko's death -- which, admittedly, raises many questions -- must be understood.

The Andropov Doctrine

Let's go back to Yuri Andropov, who was the legendary head of the KGB in the 1970s and early 1980s, and the man who first realized that the Soviet Union was in massive trouble. Of all the institutions in the world, the KGB alone had the clearest idea of the condition of the Soviet Union. Andropov realized in the early 1980s that the Soviet economy was failing and that, with economic failure, it would collapse. Andropov knew that the exploitation of Western innovation had always been vital to the Soviet economy. The KGB had been tasked with economic and technical espionage in the West. Rather than developing their own technology, in many instances, the Soviets innovated by stealing Western technology via the KGB, essentially using the KGB as an research and development system. Andropov understood just how badly the Soviet Union needed this innovation and how inefficient the Soviet kleptocracy was.

Andropov engineered a new concept. If the Soviet Union was to survive, it had to forge a new relationship with the West. The regime needed not only Western technology, but also Western-style management systems and, above all, Western capital. Andropov realized that so long as the Soviet Union was perceived as a geopolitical threat to the West and, particularly, to the United States, this transfer was not going to take place. Therefore, the Soviet Union had to shift its global strategy and stop threatening Western geopolitical interests.

The Andropov doctrine argued that the Soviet Union could not survive if it did not end, or at least mitigate, the Cold War. Furthermore, if it was to entice Western investment and utilize that investment efficiently, it needed to do two things. First, there had to be a restructuring of the Soviet economy (perestroika). Second, the Soviet system had to be opened to accept innovation (glasnost). Andropov's dream for the Soviet Union never really took hold during his lifetime, as he died several months after becoming the Soviet leader. He was replaced by a nonentity, Konstantin Chernenko, who also died after a short time in office. And then there was Mikhail Gorbachev, who came to embody the KGB's strategy.

Gorbachev was clearly perceived by the West as a reformer, which he certainly was. But less clear to the West were his motives for reform. He was in favor of glasnost and perestroika, but not because he rejected the Soviet system. Rather, Gorbachev embraced these because, like the KGB, he was desperately trying to save the system. Gorbachev pursued the core vision of Yuri Andropov -- and by the time he took over, he was the last hope for that vision. His task was to end the Cold War and trade geopolitical concessions for economic relations with the West.

It was a well-thought-out policy, but it was ultimately a desperate one -- and it failed. In conceding Central Europe, allowing it to break away without Soviet resistance, Gorbachev lost control of the entire empire, and it collapsed. At that point, the economic restructuring went out of control, and openness became the cover for chaos -- with the rising oligarchs and others looting the state for personal gain. But one thing remained: The KGB, both as an institution and as a group of individuals, continued to operate.

Saving the System: A Motive for Murder?

As a young KGB operative, Vladimir Putin was a follower of Andropov. Like Andropov, Putin was committed to the restructuring of the Soviet Union in order to save it. He was a foot soldier in that process.

Putin and his FSB faction realized in the late 1990s that, however lucrative the economic opening process might have been for some, the net effect on Russia was catastrophic. Unlike the oligarchs, many of whom were indifferent to the fate of Russia, Putin understood that the path they were on would only lead to another revolution -- one even more catastrophic than the first. Outside of Moscow and St. Petersburg, there was hunger and desperation. The conditions for disaster were all there.

Putin also realized that Russia had not reaped the sought-after payoff with its loss of prestige and power in the world. Russia had traded geopolitics but had not gotten sufficient benefits in return. This was driven home during the Kosovo crisis, when the United States treated fundamental Russian interests in the Balkans with indifference and contempt. It was clear to Putin by then that Boris Yeltsin had to go. And go he did, with Putin taking over.

Putin is a creation of Andropov. In his bones, he believes in the need for a close economic relationship with the West. But his motives are not those of the oligarchs, and certainly not those of the West. His goal, like that of the KGB, is the preservation and reconstruction of the Russian state. For Putin, perestroika and glasnost were tactical necessities that caused a strategic disaster. He came into office with the intention of reversing that disaster. He continued to believe in the need for openness and restructuring, but only as a means toward the end of Russian power, not as an end in itself.

For Putin, the only solution to Russian chaos was the reassertion of Russian value. The state was the center of Russian society, and the intelligence apparatus was the center of the Russian state. Thus, Putin embarked on a new, slowly implemented policy. First, bring the oligarchs under control; don't necessarily destroy them, but compel them to work in parallel with the state. Second, increase Moscow's control over the outlying regions. Third, recreate a Russian sphere of influence in the former Soviet Union. Fourth, use the intelligence services internally to achieve these ends and externally to reassert Russian global authority.

None of these goals could be accomplished if a former intelligence officer could betray the organs of the state and sit in London hurling insults at Putin, the FSB and Russia. For a KGB man trained by Andropov, this would show how far Russia had fallen. Something would have to be done about it. Litvinenko's death, seen from this standpoint, was a necessary and inevitable step if Putin's new strategy to save the Russian state is to have meaning.

Anomaly

That, at least, is the logic. It makes sense that Litvinenko would have been killed by the FSB. But there is an oddity: The KGB/FSB have tended to use poison mostly in cases where they wanted someone dead, but wanted to leave it unclear how he died and who killed him. Poison traditionally has been used when someone wants to leave a corpse in a way that would not incur an autopsy or, if a normal autopsy is conducted, the real cause of death would not be discovered (as the poisons used would rapidly degrade or leave the body). When the KGB/FSB wanted someone dead, and wanted the world to know why he had been killed -- or by whom -- they would use two bullets to the brain. A professional hit leaves no ambiguity.

The use of polonium-210 in this case, then, is very odd. First, it took a long time to kill Litvinenko -- giving him plenty of time to give interviews to the press and level charges against the Kremlin. Second, there was no way to rationalize his death as a heart attack or brain aneurysm. Radiation poisoning doesn't look like anything but what it is. Third, polonium-210 is not widely available. It is not something you pick up at your local pharmacy. The average homicidal maniac would not be able to get hold of it or use it.

So, we have a poisoning that was unmistakably deliberate. Litvinenko was killed slowly, leaving him plenty of time to confirm that he thought Putin did it. And the poison would be very difficult to obtain by anyone other than a state agency. Whether it was delivered from Russia -- something the Russians have denied -- or stolen and deployed in the United Kingdom, this is not something to be tried at home, kids. So, there was a killing, designed to look like what it was -- a sophisticated hit.

This certainly raises questions among conspiracy theorists and others. The linkage back to the Russian state appears so direct that some might argue it points to other actors or factions out to stir up trouble for Putin, rather than to Putin himself. Others might say that Litvinenko was killed slowly, yet with an obvious poisoning signature, so that he in effect could help broadcast the Kremlin's message -- and cause other dissidents to think seriously about their actions.

We know only what everyone else knows about this case, and we are working deductively. For all we know, Litvinenko had a very angry former girlfriend who worked in a nuclear lab. But while that's possible, one cannot dismiss the fact that his death -- in so public a manner -- fits in directly with the logic of today's Russia and the interests of Vladimir Putin and his group. It is not that we know or necessarily believe Putin personally ordered a killing, but we do know that, in the vast apparatus of the FSB, giving such an order would not have been contrary to the current inclinations of the leadership.

And whatever the public's impression of the case might be, the KGB/FSB has not suddenly returned to the scene. In fact, it never left. Putin has been getting the system back under control for years. The free-for-all over economic matters has ended, and Putin has been restructuring the Russian economy for several years to increase state control, without totally reversing openness. This process, however, requires the existence of a highly disciplined FSB -- and that is not compatible with someone like a Litvinenko publicly criticizing the Kremlin from London. Litvinenko's death would certainly make that point very clear.

[Rvrwind]

Careful there, Rvr.  The FSB will be lookin' for YOU next!

LOL - Not to worry Fred, I'm just small potatoes!!!
But it has become very obvious to me over the last couple of years here as to what the current leaders are up to. I know the average Russian doesn't see it but then they have never had total freedom as we have had, so we notice these things & which way they are headed.
Its all about control & he who controls the most is the eventual winner.
There's a lot of sh!t coming down the shut & there are gonna be some real dustups in the very near future. I expect the Caucuses won't keep the lid on much longer & if they go Russia will be involved. Nato & the US are helping Georgia, bad move. It would be best for all involved if they stay out of this one. Its post Soviet space, let the Russians deal with it. If the West steps in it won't be another Iraq & the body count will be way higher!!!

[BillyB]

LOL - Not to worry Fred, I'm just small potatoes!!!
But it has become very obvious to me over the last couple of years here as to what the current leaders are up to.

But you know too much to cause harm to Russia's image and to be living Richard. The good news is that you probably won't be assasinated by Polonium-210 since they don't want anymore attention with that stuff but the FSB could get you with Uranium-238 or WD-40.

[Rvrwind]

WD-40!!!! OMG, not that please!!! The thought makes me cringe in fear!!!! ROTFLMAO