[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 11 (Thursday, January 19, 1995)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1241-S1242]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         ADDITIONAL STATEMENTS

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            CHECHNYA AND THE FUTURE OF RUSSIAN CIVIL SOCIETY

 Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, I am sure that, like me, my 
colleagues in this Chamber have been appalled by the pictures coming 
out of Chechnya. There is a grim familiarity to the events taking place 
there. Massive military force sent by Moscow to take on lightly armed, 
or unarmed, civilians: this is something we saw in Hungary in 1956, in 
Czechoslovakia in 1968, in Afghanistan in 1979. We hoped we wouldn't 
see it again.
  With Chechnya, though, we are also seeing something new, and very 
significant. With the exception of the ultranationalists on the one 
hand, and the diehard pro-Yeltsin camp on the other, Russian public 
opinion has risen up in outspoken opposition to a war they feel is not 
worth the cost. Not worth the cost in lives; not worth the cost in 
money; not worth the cost to Russia's name in the world community.
  Freedom of speech is one of the foundations of a democratic system, 
and there's no guarantees that that freedom, or that democracy itself, 
have taken permanent root in Russia. But the reaction of the Russian 
public to the war in Chechnya is a heartening indication that the first 
shoots of a civil society are beginning to appear in Russia.
  In a recent column William Safire makes this point very well, 
contrasting the tumultuous energy of Russia's political environment 
with the deceptive stability of one-party rule in China. I ask that Mr. 
Safire's column ``Yeltsin's Tiananmen,'' be printed in the Record in 
full.
The column follows:
[[Page S1242]]
                          Yeltsin's Tiananmen

       Washington.--Which great power is more unstable today--
     China or Russia?
       The quick answer, of course, is Russia. The elected leader, 
     Boris Yeltsin, is besieged in Moscow after his bloody siege 
     of Grozny, capital of the Connecticut-sized breakaway 
     republic of Chechnya.
       Russian television showed vivid pictures of the bombing of 
     that city even as it showed Yeltsin saying it wasn't so; then 
     the cameras showed Yeltsin upbraiding his Defense Minister 
     for making him look like a liar.
       As Helmut Kohl telephoned to tell him that world opinion 
     frowns on the savage method his Russia Federation is using to 
     preserve its borders, Bill Clinton wrote a ``Dear Boris'' 
     letter reaffirming support of Federation unity but stressing 
     how ``distressed'' he is at civilian deaths and suggesting 
     mediation by an organization of 53 nations.
       What's Yeltsin to do? The Chechens are dead serious about 
     secession. If Russia lets Chechnya go, other Causasian 
     dominoes will fall and Moscow will be denied the Caspian oil 
     it needs to rule a hundred nationalities across 11 time 
     zones.
       He tried negotiation, which was met by a declaration of 
     independence; he tried an internal coup, which flopped; now 
     he's trying force, which is bringing world obloquy on his 
     head because the Chechens are fiercely fighting for their 
     homeland and the Russian Army has no heart for a lengthy 
     guerrilla battle, especially after its loss in Afghanistan.
       All that--added to Yeltsin's personal punchiness and 
     isolation--is why Russia appears unstable. We tend to equate 
     the future of democracy with the future of Yeltsin, who is on 
     his last leg.
       But consider the political miracle taking place in Moscow 
     today. An unpopular and unjust war is being denounced in the 
     Parliament, with reformer Grigory Yavlinsky, openly calling 
     for Yeltsin's resignation. The military is publicly divided 
     between conscience-stricken warriors and hard-line 
     incompetents. Free speech is spilling out all over.
       The newspapers, after centuries of czarist and Communist 
     docility, are crusading: a picture of Defense Minister Pavel 
     Grachev is captioned ``the most talentless commander in 
     Russia.'' And the television crews are bringing home the 
     horror of the war just as American cameramen did in Vietnam, 
     with similar impact on Russian public opinion.
       This is wonderful. The world should be proud of the Russian 
     people, who should be prouder of themselves for exercising 
     their new-found freedom to debate a great issue.
       Contrast that democratic turmoil to the facade of 
     ``stability'' in China. With the death of Deng Xiaoping 
     imminent, the leadership is cracking down on dissidents.
       By jailing its leading independent thinkers, the regime in 
     Bejing reveals its inherent weakness. The new imprisonment of 
     the courageous Wei Jingsheng, China's Sakharov, was the tip-
     off that the leadership fears a popular uprising, this time 
     led by angry workers rather than idealistic students. As Deng 
     sinks, the number of panicky arrests rises.
       This demonstrates again that succession in a Communist 
     state is a ruthless wrestle for power within an impenetrable 
     clique. It mocks the assurances of China's Western apologists 
     that a market economy leads to political freedom.
       In a litchi nutshell, here's the play:
       Yang Shangkun, an old army leader whose powerful family was 
     neutralized by Deng, is close to Adm. Liu Huaqing, the 
     nation's top military leader. They may challenge Deng's 
     proteges, party boss Jiang Zemin and Prime Minister Li Peng, 
     by backing economic chief, Zhu Rongji, or promoting a next-
     generation politician, Hu Jintao, or by backing Qiao Shi, the 
     former national security adviser and now chairman of the 
     rubber-stamp People's Congress, hereinafter known as 
     ``China's Newt Gingrich.''
       What do 1.2 billion Chinese have to say about all this? 
     Zilch. (Analysts in Bejing, aware of the exclusive accuracy 
     of my prediction of Mao's successor in the 70's, will have to 
     puzzle out ``zilch.'') And therein lies real instability.
       A monolithic, totalitarian state, repressing the spirit of 
     freedom, only seems secure; we have seen how it can suddenly 
     collapse. A noisy, unruly democratic state, drawing on the 
     legitimacy of free elections, is more secure--no matter how 
     shaky the leadership. That's why Russia is in better 
     political shape than China.

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