Hacking emails, dope-fuelled medals, M16 warnings … has Putin’s Russia defied all the rules and gone rogue?
A rogue state with a vast nuclear arsenal is not a happy thought
LAST week was as bad as it gets for Russia’s reputation.
US intelligence agencies said they had “high confidence” Russia had hacked and leaked Democratic Party emails to help Donald Trump win the US presidential election.
An official report charged the Russian government with helping around a thousand Russian athletes over the years to avoid drug tests and win dope-fuelled Olympic medals, including at the London Games in 2012.
Head of MI6 Alex Younger warned of the “fundamental threat to our sovereignty” of Russian cyber-attacks.
No wonder people are asking whether Vladimir Putin’s Russia has gone rogue, flouting all the rules of international relations.
A rogue state with a vast nuclear arsenal is not a happy thought.
But what has really set the diplomats’ alarm bells ringing is what appears to be a love-in between President-elect Trump and President Putin.
Each has expressed admiration for the other. Both want to make their countries great again. Both think of themselves as strong leaders.
Trump immediately rubbished the CIA’s report of Russian interference in the presidential election.
He has already cast doubt on Nato, the cornerstone of Britain’s security. Nato binds together North America and 26 European countries in collective defence.
Its key principle is that if one member is attacked, all the others come to its aid.
This is especially important today when Putin is aggressively manoeuvring along the Russian frontier with the Baltic states.
Even before last week’s revelations, relations between Russia and the West were fraught.
After Putin’s seizure of the Crimea and incursion into Eastern Ukraine in 2014, the US and Europe retaliated with sanctions.
These have damaged an already poorly performing economy. It now looks likely that sanctions will be renewed for a further six months.
Meanwhile, Russia’s bombing campaign against rebels trying to unseat Syrian President Assad has provoked worldwide revulsion, as it indiscriminately slaughters civilians and destroys hospitals.
This is worse than a return to the Cold War with Russia’s predecessor, the Soviet Union.
At least then there were rules to prevent accidental nuclear war and to keep tensions under control.
Today these restraints barely exist. The danger of hot war is far greater.
Some of this is down to Putin’s macho personality. Biographies describe a tough childhood when his response was always to hit back when attacked.
But it goes deeper. Back in 1991, 25 years ago this month when the Soviet Union collapsed and the West triumphed over Russian communism, we were fools to think that there would not be a price to pay in later years.
Russia, a great and proud power, had been humiliated. It is the life mission of Putin and his closest advisers to restore his country’s greatness.
Trump’s lack of experience in foreign affairs is a major concern. It will add unpredictability to American diplomacy.
He has already provoked a crisis in relations with China, by breaking with decades of US foreign policy and taking a call from the president of Taiwan, a country which the US does not recognise and to which China lays claim.
Related stories
Yet, might Trump’s willingness to do the unexpected be turned to advantage?
Is he on to something in wishing to reverse the downward spiral in relations with Russia?
What if we in Britain take the opportunity of the Trump presidency to re-examine the basics of our own relations with Russia?
It would have to be done with very great prudence. One of its purposes would be to contain Russian espionage and subversion in the UK.
It would require an approach agreed between Theresa May, Donald Trump and other allies.
First there would have to be a renewed commitment by Trump to Nato and the obligation to come to the aid of any member under attack.
This would send a necessary signal to Putin that any incursion by Russian forces into a Nato state would be met by the full force of the US-led alliance.
At the same time, after the disdainful Obama, we should show Putin and the Russians some respect.
This matters a lot to them. It is self-defeating to treat them as pariahs.
Second, we should drop sanctions. They won’t change Russian behaviour.
They hit, as ever, ordinary folk hardest and they give Putin an alibi for bad government.
Third, we need to reach an understanding on Syria.
It is fatuous our fighting IS and Assad, who are fighting each other. IS is by far the greater enemy to Britain’s interests.
It will stick in the craw of many, but the fastest way to stop civilian suffering is for Assad, helped by the Russians, to win the civil war.
What is urgently now needed are new international rules of the road. History teaches much.
After the defeat of the Emperor Napoleon in 1815, a great congress took place in Vienna which redrew the map of Europe.
It was based on the ideas of balance of power and spheres of influence. It did a good job of keeping the peace until World War One.
If Trump’s America, Putin’s Russia, May’s UK and the rest of Europe are to live in harmony, they need to conjure up the ghosts of Vienna to help them in this endeavour.