Soviet Union: Boris Looks Westward

By George J. Church.

He did not say "Read my lips." In fact, his wording was rather pedestrian. But the substance of Boris Yeltsin's campaign promise was quite as bold, and may be every bit as difficult to fulfill, as George Bush's 1988 vow not to raise taxes. Under his "program of immediate economic stabilization" for the Russian Federation, said Yeltsin, "there will be the beginning of an improvement in living standards toward the end of 1992." In other words, he would not just stop but reverse the calamitous economic plunge that is the legacy of more than 70 years of communist mismanagement. And he would do it in only a year and a half. And while the main levers of economic power -- to the extent that there are any left in the chaotic production-and-distribution system -- are not in his hands but in those of Mikhail Gorbachev.

The impetuous optimism, however, was quintessential Yeltsin, and it has helped make him the first popularly elected head of government in Russia's 1,000-year history. The eventual outcome of last week's presidential election was never in doubt, but there was some question whether Yeltsin would win the 50%-plus majority -- against five other candidates -- necessary to avoid a runoff. Those doubts dissolved almost as soon as voters began entering polling places stretching across the Russian republic's eleven time zones. Though the official count of more than 70 million mostly paper ballots will not be announced until late this week, informal tallies indicated he had won in a landslide with about 60% of the vote.

So now Yeltsin will have to produce results rather than just carp about the Kremlin. The future of nascent democracy not only in Russia but in many of the other 14 Soviet republics may ride on his success. His demonstrated popularity may boost his chances of negotiating with the Kremlin and the other republics a new union treaty that would give his government greater autonomy. That in turn might increase Yeltsin's ability to actually create the private-property, free-market economy he envisions, and to strip away most of the authority still exercised by Communist Party bureaucrats. Even then, however, Yeltsin will have to stop relying entirely on his personal popularity and begin building a genuine political movement and an efficient bureaucracy of his own.

But before even beginning to tackle those problems, Yeltsin prepared for a visit to the U.S. that underscored his growing clout. He was initially invited by congressional leaders, but once the election returns were in, President Bush lost no time asking Yeltsin to drop by the White House also as long as he was in town. They plan to chat in the Oval Office this Thursday. Simultaneously, some Administration officials began hinting that Bush's twice- postponed summit with Gorbachev may be held off until fall, though others continued to say late July. The hang-up is lack of progress on a nuclear arms- reduction treaty that Bush has identified as a precondition for the summit.

Coincidental or not, the timing symbolized a foreign policy conundrum. Eager to prop up Gorbachev, the Bush Administration previously had pretty much ignored Yeltsin. Now, the U.S. and other Western powers can no longer put off cultivating contacts with him and other rising leaders of a rapidly decentralizing Soviet Union. Yet they must try to do so without alienating Gorbachev, who still determines Soviet foreign policy. The question of how far to go is already causing some dissent in the West. British diplomats last week were privately but sharply critical of the White House invitation to Yeltsin; one called it a "needless slap in the face to Gorbachev."

The dilemma is likely to worsen, because while it is Gorbachev who is pleading for tens or even hundreds of billions of dollars in economic aid from the West, it is Yeltsin who is pushing the sweeping reforms that in Western eyes are needed to make any such aid effective. That divergence will be pointed up at the conclusion of the summit conference of the G-7 (the Group of Seven major industrial and financial powers) in London on July 15-17. The group last week formally invited Gorbachev to meet with them immediately afterward. He will then make his pitch for massive aid, and the seven undoubtedly will press him for assurances of fundamental change. They probably will get unsatisfactory answers -- except in the unlikely event that they can persuade him to adopt Yeltsin's program.

Yeltsin has promised to resurrect private farming on a grand scale, making land available to every peasant who wants to till his own fields rather than toil for a collective or state farm. Russia already has a private-property law on the books, though Gorbachev gags at endorsing one for the whole Soviet Union. Yeltsin promises to strengthen it and to bring about the "rebirth of entrepreneurship," promoting the formation and expansion of privately owned companies in "any business." Further, he proposes departizatsiya, or departification, meaning that the ubiquitous Communist Party committees should have nothing to do with running factories, the army, the KGB or any other Russian institution.

This program is so frightening to communist hard-liners as to spur speculation -- some of it inside Yeltsin's entourage -- that they might attempt a military coup to prevent anything like it from being carried out, in Russia or the other republics. Actually, though, the greater danger might be that Yeltsin will simply be unable to deliver, and his failure will sour a disillusioned populace not only on him but on democracy itself. Yeltsin takes office considerably overpromised. For example, he has pledged a hefty increase in pensions without offering any idea of how he proposes to raise the money. He runs pretty much a one-man show: he has made little attempt to organize his legions of admirers into a political party, and his staff of advisers and idea people, though excellent, is stretched very thin. Ironically, in fact, Yeltsin can carry out his program only with the cooperation of at least part of the very Communist Party bureaucracy and central Soviet administration he assails so vigorously.

Though on paper Yeltsin now has considerably more legal powers than he did as chairman of the Russian parliament, it is an open question whether he will be able to deploy them. He is heavily dependent on the negotiations between Gorbachev's central government and nine of the 15 Soviet republics for a new treaty replacing the one that formed the Soviet Union in 1922. In those talks, says Georgi Shakhnazarov, an adviser to Gorbachev, "we are encountering the same problems the Americans faced 200 years ago" -- and occasionally seeking guidance from the same sources. At one point, addressing representatives of the republics, Gorbachev read excerpts from an Alexander Hamilton essay in The Federalist Papers to back up his advocacy of a federal tax system under which the central government would collect at least some revenues directly. He was trying to steer them away from proposals, primarily from Yeltsin, for a plan in which the republics collect all the money and pass on a portion to the Kremlin.

The negotiations are making enough progress to give Yeltsin and some others hope for a completed draft by next month. But that will not solve all problems even if it happens. For example, the current draft calls for dual administration of defense plants, with organization, planning and design bureaus under central control and factory management within each republic's jurisdiction. That seems less a clear division of authority than a formula for chaotic conflict.

Six of the 15 republics have refused even to participate in the negotiations for a new union treaty, and are shaping programs that look toward total independence. In the rebellious Baltics, Estonia is offering, in effect, to buy its freedom for $1 billion in hard currency delivered to Moscow. Latvia plans to introduce its own currency, the lat, in the next 12 to 18 months, and has already lined up a Dutch company to print the banknotes. Lithuania has adopted a budget totally separate from the union budget. It proposes to keep all taxes and revenues collected on its territory and use the funds to administer agencies -- the Interior Ministry, the public prosecutor's office -- formerly financed by and run from Moscow.

In the south, Armenia has scheduled a referendum on independence for Sept. 21, the first step in the five-year process decreed by Moscow for formal secession. Meanwhile, though torn by violent ethnic clashes, Armenia is actually carrying out one of the reforms proposed by Yeltsin. The republic has sold 65% of its agricultural land to private farmers. Georgia and Moldavia have been too preoccupied by their own ethnic conflicts to do much in the way of economic reform, but they have made it clear that they also want out of the Union -- and in a lot less than five years.

The Baltics, in addition, are making a strong pitch for more foreign investment, and they may soon be joined by most or all of the nine republics that want autonomy rather than independence. Article VII of the draft union treaty authorizes the republics to "establish direct diplomatic, consular, trade and other ties with foreign governments." Shakhnazarov insists this does not mean they can set up their own embassies and conduct their own foreign policy. But, he says, republics can and probably will station representatives at various Soviet embassies to deal directly with foreign governments about the republics' special interests. Those interests are heavily economic; the republics can be expected to strike their own trade and investment deals with foreign countries and, in particular, to angle for a chunk of whatever grants, loans or credits the Western powers decide to make available to the U.S.S.R.

That would please some Sovietologists who have been arguing for years that the West should stop dealing exclusively with Gorbachev and the center, which they view as declining forces, and cultivate contacts with Yeltsin and other republic leaders. Some American experts argue in addition that aid funneled to the republics would do more to promote economic reform and democracy than would assistance through Moscow's bureaucracy. One idea: set up an international superagency to hold all money the Western governments put up for Soviet economic aid; then have the central government, republics, cities and enterprises bid for the funds; a multinational board of experts would weigh their claims.

"It's a mistake to go through the central government, which has only a 14% acceptance rating in its own country," says James Billington, Librarian of Congress and a scholar of Soviet affairs. "That tends to reinforce precisely the old, essentially declining but still strong ((Communist)) Party system." Alexander Motyl, a Columbia University Sovietologist, concurs: "There is too much going on in the Soviet Union to have a Soviet policy that is essentially a Gorbachev policy. It misses the variety, the contradictions and the complexity of the situation."

Such talk sounds foolish to many diplomats. British experts insist that the West must continue to deal primarily with Gorbachev because he still holds the power in foreign affairs: Washington can hardly negotiate a reduction in nuclear missiles or Soviet support for the war against Iraq with Yeltsin. Western officials whose prime interest is stability are afraid that bypassing | Gorbachev, especially to deal with the six breakaway republics, might encourage a splitting up of the Soviet Union or even civil war, with unpredictable consequences. Deputy Secretary of State Lawrence Eagleburger goes so far as to talk about a "situation akin to 1914," when the breakdown of the Austro-Hungarian Empire into savagely feuding fiefdoms helped trigger World War I.

What is needed is to strike a balance between dealing more with Yeltsin and other republic leaders on economic affairs while continuing to negotiate with Gorbachev on foreign policy. That is a tricky job, and there is no assurance the West will get it right, but Yeltsin has simply put on too much political weight to be ignored. In March he could not get Secretary of State James Baker, who was visiting Moscow, to come to his office for a private meeting; Baker did not want to give Gorbachev's rival special treatment. Now the doors of the White House are about to swing open for Yeltsin. Next year who knows how much power he will exercise and what reception he might deserve? But it would be unwise to bet against the man's potential -- and a horseshoe-pitching session between Boris and George at Camp David.

With reporting by David Aikman and John Kohan/Moscow and Christopher Ogden/Washington