Texas University professor Alan Cooperman is a well-known foreign affairs specialist. He has worked as a consultant to many American congressmen and published a number of analytical materials that have appeared in the New York Times, Washington Post, and Foreign Affairs. This expert’s views on US influence on other countries, the exporting of revolution, and the role of the EU and Russia in international relations are especially interesting. In his interview with The Day, Prof. Cooperman gives his assessment of the events connected with the appointment of Victor Yanukovych as prime minister and the signing of the Declaration on National Unity. The American scholar also says that the US has changed its attitude toward the Ukrainian president.
Do you think the role of the European Union is increasing in comparison with the importance of the US?
“To determine whether this is so, one should examine economic and military aspects. Europe is developing economically faster than the US, and this is caused not by the success of individual countries but by the fact that there are a lot of new EU members. The GDP and other similar indices are growing faster in the US than in the European countries, but because of the large number of “newcomers,” total European economic power indices are higher. And the population of the European Union is large.
“Therefore, if you consider only the economic aspect, the EU appears to be more powerful than the United States. If you consider military might, American military power is expanding much more rapidly. But the countries that are entering the EU cannot say the same. Moreover, Europe spends money on military affairs very ineffectively. If there’s enough money to pay soldiers, then they lack it for new technology and communications development.
“Now we should define what is more important: the military or economic power component. What is power? It is the ability to make others do things they would never do without compulsion. What made Libya curtail its nuclear program? Europe’s economic potential? No. It was the military force of the US. Why is Iran so persistent in its decision to enrich uranium? This is not a reaction to the EU’s economic policy but to US military power.
“On the other hand, the power of the EU’s economy lies in the fact that more and more new members want to join United Europe in order to become a free market territory. But consider another thing: the main EU players are not absolute partners in the sense of external strategies, and this is a problem. To sum up, I would say that the approach whereby Europe becomes more influential and the US, less, is too simplified.
How can Russia’s efforts to restore the bipolar world order of the Cold War era influence the balance of power?
President Vladimir Putin understands that it would be absurd to strive for the restoration of the Soviet Union. Russia wants to establish a different order from the one that existed during the Cold War. It wants to establish its own spheres of influence in a large part of the former Soviet Union’s territory, thereby remaining an economic and military partner of the ex-Soviet republics. It also strives to influence their domestic affairs, to block their pro-NATO aspirations. The Kremlin reckons NATO to be a threat to Russia’s sovereignty, freedom, and influence. Domestic affairs are another aspect. Russia has a different political system from NATO member countries; it may be characterized as something between an authoritarian state and a democratic one.
Why is this so? Putin has clearly understood that capitalism, which emerged in Russia in the 1990s, was profitable only for certain people in the country, i.e., it was the wrong path to take. That’s why today an “iron hand” is applied to domestic policies to control the economy. An interesting thing is that the Kremlin considers that the political model recently invented by Russia may become useful for Ukraine, Belarus, Transdnistria, Tadzhikistan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, and China as well.
China, as well as many other countries, is in favor of a multipolar world, opposing it to the world order where you have the US on one side, and other countries (supposedly of a lower sort) - on the other. By the way, the Shanghai Co-operation Organization was initiated as an institution whose aim is to establish cooperation among various states against terrorists. It is not the Warsaw Pact, but its members are deliberately refusing to let the US into their ranks and are striving to oppose their self-sufficiency to it by every means. However, Russia and China are not uniting to oppose the US, so we don’t have any bipolarity.
Can a revolution be exported?
Russia openly supported Viktor Yanukovych in his struggle against Viktor Yushchenko. During the presidential elections in your country Moscow emphasized every time that eastern Ukraine has close relations with Russia. I agree with this, but I don’t think Putin should have been the one to claim this! However, another thing is more important now: it looked as though Russia had lost, but Yanukovych came into power again soon after that.
As for US influence, the Americans are conducting an open policy of advancing democracy into some authoritarian states, supporting those political parties that want a regime change. Is this the advancement of revolution or evolution idea? No, it is the desire to change a regime. Not just the US, but international organizations as well, supports such changes, and they are absolutely open about this — the days of the CIA are over.
What about results? Similar aspirations were successful in Serbia, Georgia, Ukraine, and Kyrgyzstan. However, many reasons were behind the correction (or 180- degree turn) of the state direction in these countries (except for Georgia), but it happened after the regime change, so that is a different question. The main thing for us is that Washington is open about advancing democracy through various foundations that are established inside states.
You mean the US gave money to different non-governmental organizations in Ukraine who were advancing the idea of revolution (successfully, as it turns out!)?
We do not call the events that happened in your country a revolution — that is your term. It seems too broad to us. We use the term “regime change” instead. The US gives money to those forces that advance the idea of regime change, first to different foundations, and they in turn provide financial assistance to certain parties and NGOs.
What is Viktor Yushchenko’s reputation in the US? Has it changed in the last 1.5 years?
The Ukrainian president used to have the reputation of a liberal, uncorrupted politician and a progressive democrat. In contrast, his opponent in the elections in 2006, Viktor Yanukovych, was considered loyal to Russia, with the reputation of a corrupt communist. In time, people who study Ukraine’s problems began claiming that Yanukovych is not so dirty and that the abyss between them is not so large. When the results of the parliamentary elections appeared, the Americans shrugged their shoulders: how could the democratic Ukrainian voters support “a corrupt communist” instead of the brilliant pro-Western democrat Yushchenko?
What is your assessment of the events connected with the nomination of Victor Yanukovych as prime minister of Ukraine and the essence of the Declaration?
It looks as though the Ukrainian president was doing his best not to accept Yanukovych’s nomination. But finally Yushchenko had to consider the huge support for Yanukovych among voters and also the fact that Yulia Tymoshenko had refused to work with the president. Ukrainian policy experts think that she is an opportunist and puts career advancement in first place. It is obvious to me personally that she is the one who is responsible for all these processes, but the American mass media do not pay much attention to her. Instead, they have concentrated on the fact that Yushchenko practically squeezed out Yanukovych’s promise to support a pro- Western policy. If you generalize the whole picture, what you notice is the anxious tone of journalists’ materials that seem to be saying: doesn’t all this mean a 180-degree turn in Ukraine’s state direction in comparison with the slogans of the Orange Revolution?
The author expresses her gratitude to Viadrina European University in Frankfurt (Oder) and Olena Syrinska of the Centre of Near Eastern Studies (Kyiv) for their assistance in organizing and preparing this interview.
