Russia as a great power: Status inconsistency and the two Chechen wars

Communist and Post-Communist Studies xxx (2014) 1e9

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Russia as a great power: Status inconsistency and the two Chechen wars Hanna Smith Aleksanteri Institute, University of Helsinki, Finland

a r t i c l e i n f o

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The article examines Russia as a great power from the point of view of status inconsistency theory. Applications of the theory to Russia have focused on the status accorded to Russia in diplomatic representation and membership of key international organizations, which suggests that Russia is a ‘status overachiever’ in that it has an international status that is greater than its actual capabilities would warrant. However, this article focuses on Russian perceptions of the country's status internationally, especially as reflected in the actual experience of membership in international organizations (OSCE, Council of Europe) and relations with the EU in the context of the two Chechen wars. The article demonstrates that, at least according to Russian assessments, Russia is accorded lower status in these organizations than the great power status which most Russians believe should be theirs. While concluding that status inconsistency is a useful tool for explaining Russian foreign policy behavior, the article notes that differing assessments of what Russia's level of status recognition is pose challenges for status inconsistency theory. © 2014 The Regents of the University of California. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Chechen wars Great power Recognition Russia Status inconsistency

1. Introduction Russia's status as a great power in world politics arguably has not been stable (Haukkala, 2008; Neumann, 2008a,b). Different wars and domestic political situations have changed Russia's status as a recognized great power by others in the outside world. But independent of the actual views of others, as Thomas Ambrosio has put it, ‘Russia seeks to be respected as a great power because of deep seated beliefs about its own identity and its place in the world’ (Ambrosio, 2005a, p. viii). It will be argued that such greatpowerness (velikoderzhavnost) plays an important part in Russian foreign policy. At different historical times it has had different effects, sometimes pulling Russia closer to Europe and the Western world and sometimes pushing Russia away from them. Greatpowerness has also had effects on Russian domestic political decision-making. In this article the effect of greatpowerness on Russian relations with the Western world will be examined through the two Chechen wars and in the framework of status inconsistency theory. The fall of the Soviet Union is an unprecedented case of the loss of status ranking. Huge Empires have come and gone in the past, but in other cases the decline of Empires has been a long, drawn out process. While internal divisions and loss of authority by the ruler have played a part in the end of the Mongol, Roman, and Ottoman empires, their eventual demise was also brought about by military defeats, leaving little or no vestige of the former imperial power behind. In modern times, perhaps only the disintegration of the great overseas Empires of Spain and Great Britain can be compared with the end of the Soviet Union in that gradual internal decline was accompanied by rebellion in the peripheries of Empire. In the case of Britain, a state which still had some claims to great power status was left after the end of Empire, but even this differed from the case of Russia in that the Empire was not lost all at once, the heartland was left intact and thriving, and the formal http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.postcomstud.2014.09.005 0967-067X/© 2014 The Regents of the University of California. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Please cite this article in press as: Smith, H., Russia as a great power: Status inconsistency and the two Chechen wars, Communist and Post-Communist Studies (2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.postcomstud.2014.09.005

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hegemony of the imperial power over its former colonies was recognized in the role of the monarch and the Commonwealth. By the time its empire was dismantled, Great Britain was one of the major powers in a multipolar world, whereas the Soviet Union stood as the sole rival to US global hegemony in the bipolar Cold War world. The sudden loss of this status by one superpower, while the other increased its status, was a humiliating experience for Russia. Russian foreign policy has been studied from many angles, and the factor of humiliation connected to the fall of the Soviet Union has been referred to many times and cited in much research. However, the effect of the loss of status which led to the feeling of humiliation has been less studied. This article will start by looking at how status and status inconsistency has been dealt with in academic literature. It will then proceed to look at how, after the fall of the Soviet Union, the Russian Federation clearly regarded Russia as the rightful heir to the USSR. The Chechen wars are then looked at in the light of this situation. The wars in Chechnya in part represented an attempt by Russia to achieve status consistency. The two Chechen wars each, however, had different outcomes in terms of status, and not always the ones that were intended. The starting point of this argument is that the fall of the Soviet Union resulted in the loss of Russian status from the point of view of the West, but in the eyes of Russia in the longue duree of Russian history, Russian status has remained consistent. The actions taken in regard to Chechnya are viewed as a case of maintaining status consistency by proving through actions the ability of Russia to act as a great power. Status is one important part of being a great power. Status is the factor that is acquired through recognition by others. Various scholars have attempted to provide objective definitions of a ‘Great Power’, but even if a country meets these objective criteria and feels itself to be a great power, this is no guarantee that this status is recognized by other countries or that the country enjoys great power status in world politics. Vogly, Corbetta, Grant and Baird have suggested that status attribution matters in three different ways: a country that is a great power is expected to be visible and important in major issues and conflicts in international politics; a great power is more involved in international politics than others; and claims to great power status are valued domestically to the extent that such claims can become critical to holding office (Volgy et al., 2011, p.10). Volgy et al. (2011, pp.10e12) have also made a difference between status-consistent and status-inconsistent powers. They then divide the status inconsistent powers into two: underachievers and overachievers. Their definition (op. cit. p.11) of status-consistent powers views the great powers as having additional capacity to engage in a wide variety of pursuits ranging from cooperative to coercive ones. The status-consistent power may undertake costly measures with the expectation that they will be successful and run a lower risk of failure externally and negative consequences domestically. The statusinconsistent power's approach to international politics is different from the approach of a status-consistent power. This is an important distinction and plays a role when examining Russia's status in world politics. The status-inconsistent underachievers are great powers that have capabilities and desire to act as major powers, but still do not have full recognition by others. The underachievers are likely to seek a more visible role for themselves in world politics but run a risk that their efforts are undermined by lack of legitimacy and respect. The overachievers are states that do enjoy great power recognition but lack the critical material means associated with major powers. The expectation is that the approach of overachievers is more constructive in international affairs. They are afraid of losing the status they have and therefore act more on the basis of smaller but safer gains than taking high-risk action (Volgy et al., 2011; pp. 11e12). In examining Russia, this article introduces a new category e a country that believes itself to be a great power, but does not have all of the capabilities of a great power according to certain definitions, and which only enjoys limited recognition as a great power internationally. Small and victorious wars have always been a way of maintaining or establishing a certain status. Count Plehve's famous remark that Russia needed a ‘short, victorious war’ in 1904 is the best known case of status motives playing a major role in triggering warfare, but such motives are not unique to Russia. Bismarck's short and victorious war with Denmark over Schleswig and Holstein in 1864 was important in establishing Prussia as a major power in European affairs, while Napoleon III's involvement in the Crimean War in 1853e1855 has been explained by his being ‘eager for a military victory to solidify support for his regime’ (Merriman, 2004, p. 753). Likewise, Argentina invaded the Falkland Islands in May 1982 ‘seeking to reverse a decline in its popularity at home’, but with the perverse outcome that a British victory ‘encouraged a burst of patriotism, boosting the Prime Minister's [Margaret Thatcher] standing at home’ (Merriman, 2004, p. 1295). In the case of the Falkland Islands one can also argue that if Argentina had been victorious, that would have boosted its international status too. With its victory Great Britain revived its flagging international great power status. In these examples, it was the domestic popularity of the government that gained the greatest boost from successful wars. But France, Great Britain, and especially Prussia were also able to act with more confidence and influence in international affairs, at least for a while after these wars. In the case of Chechnya, however, the effect of this strategy was not the recognition of Russia as an undisputed great power by the Western world, but in fact almost the opposite. In domestic discourse, however, the first Chechen war reinforced feelings of Russian greatpowerness, the self-perception that Russia was, is, and will be a great power. Even if the Russian military was not that successful in the warfare, Russia's failings combined with Western criticism reinforced the domestic arguments about the need to show others that Russia was a great power. This was also given as a reason for the second war in its early stages. Through the reinforced feeling of greatpowerness, Russia started to play a more assertive role in world politics. It was important that one way or another Russia as a great power would be part of and play a role in different international crises. Russia tried to execute this in the Kosovo case but failed (see Regina Heller in this Special Issue). The second and more successful case, clearly indicating a reversal of the trend of trying to secure alignment with the US, first and foremost was the war in Iraq, as Ambrosio has shown (Ambrosio, 2005b, p.1202). Please cite this article in press as: Smith, H., Russia as a great power: Status inconsistency and the two Chechen wars, Communist and Post-Communist Studies (2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.postcomstud.2014.09.005

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2. Status inconsistency? The early 1990s was a watershed between the old and the new order in world politics. The effect that the fall of the Soviet Union and the rejection of communism had on international relations can be compared to the situations which followed major wars, especially when the focus is on the great powers. These effects have been widely examined and then reexamined. However an argument can be made that most of such studies were carried out with focus on the international system in general, not on a specific country. There is also a large body of literature on Russian foreign policy directions from the early 1990s but not from the point of view of lost status/status inconsistency. Most of the Russian foreign policy literature concentrates on analyzing Russia from the point of view of change and continuity (Donaldson and Nogee, 2005; Lo, 2002; Trenin, 2007). Change is linked by such authors mostly to changes in leadership, but there are also other external factors that can impact on new foreign policy directions. Some writers have argued that wars have a tremendous impact and that rethinking on the part of the Russian leadership has resulted. Sometimes foreign policy formation has been influenced by outside factors and domestic challenges simultaneously. Russian great power identity is one of the factors that has been identified in nearly all the literature on Russian foreign policy as a major feature. But exactly the way of how great power identity effects Russian foreign policy's formation and priorities is little studied. For Russia there was no inconsistency in claiming the Soviet Union's mantle of a great power (if not a superpower), since great power status can be maintained even in the face of some internal weaknesses given the size of the country, its nuclear weapons and the country's history with a long tradition of belonging to European and global great power politics. A country needs to have something to offer to be recognized in international politics. To become a major power, a Great power, a country needs to have resources for it, both military and economic, and it needs to have co-optive and coercive powers, attractiveness and recognition by others (Levy, 1981; Neumann, 2008a; Nye, 1990). However in the case of Russia, one can ask if self-perception is also an important part of the picture. In relation to the theoretical literature on status inconsistency, Maria Raquel Freire has identified the USSR and Russia as status-inconsistent underachievers and overachievers respectively in the international system, marking their evolution and influencing the course of their foreign policies (Freire, 2011, p. 57). From her analysis Freire draws the conclusion that today's Russian Federation is an overachiever, enjoying a Great power status without having the capabilities of a Great power (ibid., p. 74). Status-inconsistency led the USSR, initially, to overextend itself militarily, including engagement in such failed ventures as the Korean War, and later to engage in costly demonstrations of technological superiority in order to affirm its status. Under Putin and Medvedev, the Russian Federation's position as a status overachiever led to a concentration on establishing her role as the hegemonic leader of the group of post-Soviet states (Freire, 2011; pp.58e74). Freire's argument is interesting and convincingly argued. The assessment that Russia was an underachiever up until 1981 and has been an overachiever since is, however, highly dependent on measurable variables such as GDP and diplomatic contacts. Thus it runs in the face of the more widely accepted picture that the Soviet Union's status as one of the two world superpowers during the Cold War was based on both recognition and capabilities, and therefore the status of the USSR was consistent from 1945 to 1991. The view that from the beginning of the 1990s Russia's capabilities were at all times low but that the international community continued to treat Russia for a while as a major power is problematic. In the Western approach to treating Russia as a major great power, there are many mixed signals and inconsistencies. A different, but less measurable, way of looking at status is to consider how a country (whether the general population, political elites, media and others) thinks that others perceive it, in comparison to national self-perception. International developments since the fall of the Soviet Union show that Russian self-perception has always been one of Russia belonging to the great powers, but Russians at least feel that it has not been recognized as such by the West. At the beginning of the 1990s Russia took it for granted that others would treat Russia as a great power but gradually started to feel, even as its capabilities increased, that this was not the case. This is a central argument of this article, and rests on the fact that Russia measures the ways it is viewed by others according to experience, rather than the formal role given to Russia in international organizations such as the UN. Thus the self-perception of status is in contradiction to how Russia believes it has been perceived by others. Russia sees itself as a great power but because it feels it is not treated as such by the West, it sees itself as an underachiever, in contradiction to Freire's view of Western perceptions. By focusing on formal markers such as a place on the UN Security Council and membership of the G8, Freire argues that Russia is viewed as a great power internationally, thus making it an overachiever. By contrast the Russian focus is more on particular instances where Russia is not accorded the same status as other powers in global decision making, or where its interests appear to be ignored. Thus the Russian impression is that Russia is not consistently treated as a great power by other great powers and by international organizations. When the selfperception of a state is in discord with how the state is perceived by others, the potential for conflict grows. This is one of the major factors that link status with conflict. The concept of status-inconsistency has its origin in sociology. The status-inconsistency argument sees that countries may diverge on a number of status dimensions which are considered salient for decision makers. ‘For example, a country may rank relatively high on economic and/or military capabilities (i.e., achieved status) but may be accorded little prestige (i.e., ascribed status) by the international community. Under such conditions of rank disequilibrium, it is plausible that a nation's decision makers would evidence a strong desire to change the status quo, and failing to do so, to engage in conflict and violence’ (Volgy and Mayhall, 1995, p. 68). In the late 1960s and in the 1970s there emerged a body of international relations literature devoted to the relationship between conflict and status inconsistency. Maurice East (1972), Manus Midlarsky (1969), Harald von Riekhoff (1973), and Please cite this article in press as: Smith, H., Russia as a great power: Status inconsistency and the two Chechen wars, Communist and Post-Communist Studies (2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.postcomstud.2014.09.005

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Michael Wallace (1973) found in their studies a link between status inconsistency and violent conflict (war). James L. Ray (1974) came to the conclusion that the link is not clear. Some later research on the topic came to a mixed conclusion. Depending on different time periods there was a link between status inconsistency and violent conflict (Gochman, 1980; Volgy and Mayhall, 1995). As Jonathan Renshon has noted, research relating to status inconsistency and conflict suffered from a lack of theoretical foundations. The research was often linked to sociology and/or psychology. Furthermore the limited size of the data did not help to sufficiently test the hypothesis convincingly (Renshon, 2013. pp. 4e5). By using network-based measures of international status, Renshon came to the conclusion that status deficits are significantly associated with an increased probability of war initiation, that state actors are more sensitive to regional status concerns than competitions within an undifferentiated global hierarchy and that conflict initiation does in fact provide status benefits. Renshon's case study is German foreign policy during the period of Weltpolitik 1898e1912. Similarly to Russian foreign policy, the German foreign policy had been described as ‘prestige hungry diplomacy’ (Renshon, 2013, p. 30). Academic literature on Russian foreign policy clearly illustrates that Russia's quest for being a Great Power has figured strongly in international relations as well as being an important part of the domestic agenda. Margot Light has argued that ‘Russia was clearly not a superpower; indeed, it was questionable whether it was a great power. Yet to ordinary people, as well as to politicians, it was unthinkable that Russia could be anything less than this. The insistence that Russia should be regarded as a great power became an important theme in foreign policy statements and discussions and it remains an important driver of foreign policy’ (Light, 2010, p. 229). However in the Russian case the picture is not so much one of a quest to become a great power, as it is about trying to reconfirm to others what is a central belief in Russian identity. As Russians see the situation, it is not that there is inconsistency or a deficit in Russia's status, which is formally recognized in international organizations and in diplomatic representation, but a certain insecurity resulting from the practices of other powers and institutions in their relations with Russia. 3. The first Chechen war In the early 1990s it seemed that Russian foreign policy was properly focused on integration with the West. Expectations were high. One key element for a ‘new’ rift between Russia and the West was a question of ‘who won the Cold War?’ The Russian view is well put by Konstantin Kosachev, a chairman of the Duma Committee on International Affairs and a respected diplomat: ‘Judging objectively, however, it was the Russians who really won the Cold War e they not only freed themselves from totalitarianism, but they also delivered other peoples from it. For a period of time, we considered this subject closed, regarding any discussions as to who was the winner as absolutely unimportant. We attached primary importance to our “bright common future”’ (Kosachev, 2007). This view is in line with the Russian view of itself as a great power even at a time of weakness and supports the fact that the West saw Russia's status as in decline. The Soviet Union had been the second superpower in the world. No other country apart from the United States could claim that status and still cannot. Russia had been one of the European great powers before the October 1917 revolution. The tradition of belonging to the group of influential countries in international politics is a long one in Russia. Foreign minister Kozyrev has often pointed out that in spite of Russian weaknesses Russia is a world power: ‘ … Russia, even if it is going through a period of difficult transition, remains as a world power, not only because it has nuclear weapons and a complete military capability, but because it even has the latest technology, not to mention its natural resources and geostrategic location’ (Kozyrev, 1994, p. 186). The first serious challenge to the Russian Federation's status in world politics came from within. The tiny republic of Chechnya in the Russian North Caucasus took literally president Yeltsin's encouragement in 1991 to the Russian regions to ‘take as much sovereignty as you can swallow’. However they had missed the significance of the word ‘can’. Yeltsin later explained that the word ‘can’ should have shown that there was a limit, and if you cross the limit there will be consequences (Colton, 2008, p. 289). It should be noted that the Chechen regime headed by Dzhokar Dudayev did not initially ask for independence from Russia, but for a favorable deal between Chechnya and the center. Dudayev's challenge to Russian status as a great power came on two fronts e first, it attempted to put the weakened center into a negotiating situation, and second, with the demand for independence it questioned the sovereignty of the state, the Russian Federation that had been born from the ashes of the Soviet Union. In international diplomatic terms, the first decision to use force in Chechnya was itself very peculiar, given that at that time Russia was building bridges, especially towards Europe, through international institutions, and the invasion risked to jeopardize the progress already made. The year 1994 looked very positive in terms of foreign policy opportunities for Russia. In March the IMF approved a loan worth US$ 1.5 billion to Russia and so indicated the West's keen interest in trying to keep Russia on course to a market economy. Russia became a member of NATO's Partnership for Peace Programme in 1994. In the summer of 1994 Russia had signed a Partnership and Cooperation Agreement with the EU in Corfu, when Yeltsin himself stated ‘Our country has made a strategic choice in favor of integration into the world community and, in the first instance, with the European Union’ (Yeltsin, 1994, p. 1). In July the same year Andrei Kozyrev attended the G7 meeting in Naples and there were hopes in the Russian camp of the G7 becoming the G8. Russia was also in negotiations over membership of the Council of Europe. The current towards Russian Western integration was strong. Russia also signed two OSCE documents which committed her to giving advance notice of troop movements and to take measures to minimize civilian casualties: the Vienna document on Confidence and Security Building Measures (CSBM) and the OSCE Code of Conduct on Politico-Military Aspects of Security. These documents were signed at the Budapest summit on 5 and 6 December 1994 just some days before the first military offensive against Chechnya. The launch of the Chechen war violated both these agreements, and the nature of the whole case broke general OSCE norms and rules (Pursiainen, 1999; pp. 135e136). Please cite this article in press as: Smith, H., Russia as a great power: Status inconsistency and the two Chechen wars, Communist and Post-Communist Studies (2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.postcomstud.2014.09.005

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The decision for the full-scale military operation was however already made on 29 November, thus before the Budapest summit. Just as he was speaking in Budapest, Yeltsin was aware of what would follow. Since both of the commitments undertaken in the Budapest summit were violated by Russia in its military operation, two alternative conclusions relating to Yeltsin's appearance in Budapest can be drawn; that he did not see any connection between Chechnya and the Budapest summit, or that he saw Russia's internal affairs as not to be included in these commitments. The first reason suggests inexperience in international multilateral commitments and their meaning; the other–Russian arrogance in international cooperation. Great powers have different rules than others. Launching the war in Chechnya in late 1994 was one of the first significant signs that the Russian power elite at that time was prepared to defend its Great power identity. Two and a half years after the fall of the Soviet Union, Yeltsin had declared in August 1994 that the danger of Russia falling apart had passed (Colton, 2008, p.287). This made it also possible to take a risk in Chechnya since other similar situations were not in sight. Interestingly the decision to go to war in Chechnya in 1994 appeared to go against the 1993 Russian constitution, which recognized that obligations under international law must be followed e pacta sunt servanda (article 15.4). As the result of a Duma initiative during 1995 a court case in Russia raised the question of whether the Chechen war was unconstitutional but President Boris Yeltsin was cleared. The question of why Boris Yeltsin chose to launch an invasion of Chechnya when he did has been widely discussed, without any consensus emerging. Matthew Evangelista's list of reasons runs as follows: the historical and structural legacy of the Soviet system; strategic arguments; domino theory and spill-over effect; leadership politics; personalities and elite battles (Evangelista, 2002). Other authors mention the social structure and love of freedom of the Chechens; Dudaev's or Yeltsin's personality; and oil and oil transit. Treisman goes through these explanations and argues that most of the explanations relating to the first Chechen war are relevant but not enough to cause a war. He adds that Chechnya was seen as an easy way to boost Yeltsin's declining popularity. Furthermore it seemed rather clear that some of the Kremlin hardliners favored military action to strengthen the image of the Russian state and the role of the military in Russia. Treisman comes to the conclusion that one of the main reasons was the security situation in the region. Too many mistakes had been made on both sides, by Dudayev losing control in Chechnya and so raising a pure security threat and by Yeltsin letting himself be drawn into the conflict and by letting Chechnya cross the line of attempts at sovereignty (Treisman, 2011; pp. 284e296). In Treisman's account there is an interesting detail. According to Treisman, Yeltsin had not decided whether or not to use military force in Chechnya before Dudayev paraded a captured tank crew before the press, threatening to execute them (ibid., p. 294). This public humiliation of Russian military personnel was in the end too much and even if the army was not ready, the decision was taken. Thereby to the list of explanations of why the first Chechen war happened can be added Russian honor and the status that comes with it, not only at home but also abroad. The idea that one of the reasons for the launch of the first Chechen war was notions of status is supported by accounts of some of the discussions that took place in the build-up to war. Yury Kalmykov, Minister of Justice until he resigned over the decision to use force in Chechnya, later recalled the key meeting of the Security Council on November 29, 1994. Parallels were drawn with the American lightning invasion of Haiti a couple of months before. Sergei Stepashin, head of Federal Counterintelligence, stated that a number of more realistic options for solving the Chechen crisis were available. The chain of events suggests a sudden momentum behind a decision which was dedicated to the use of force per se rather than based on any analysis of outcomes (Gall and de Waal, 1998; pp. 160e163). There is also an argument that it was the Russian armed forces that had a direct interest in starting a war to boost its prestige (Seely, 2001, p. 206). While there is enough secrecy surrounding the decision to invade to make its causes unclear, there would seem to be a number of factors at work. But the traditionalist ‘realist’ explanations have been found wanting, and the theory that the war had something to do with prestige, either at home or internationally, both fits the course of events and the little eyewitness evidence that is available. However it is questionable whether the war in the first instance did actually help to restore honor and status. Vladimir Lukin, Chairman of the State Duma's Committee on International Affairs, claimed in 1995 that Russian foreign policy was at its lowest levels since 1982. He saw the Chechen crisis as resulting in a total loss of fear and/or respect of Russia in the eyes of the world (Portansky, 1995, p. 20). Interestingly Lukin sees that fear and respect are both important in international relations. Even if a great power is not respected but is feared, it does then have an important position and a say in world affairs. Surveys of public opinion in Russia in the first Chechen war showed quite clearly that in the public view the military activities lowered the respect of Russia in world politics. After two years of the war, 51% of respondents thought so, while only 11% believed that the war would gain some respect for Russia. In the same poll 74% of respondents saw the war as a tragedy for the whole of Russia. Furthermore 63% were against the war in Chechnya, while only 23% were supportive (FOM, 1995). One of the biggest fears was that Russia would lose out badly economically, since its image had suffered in the eyes of the West. The interesting contradiction in public opinion is that during 1993e2000, despite the humiliating failures of the Russian military and the worry about what the war in Chechnya had done to Russia's image in the world, the army was the public institution that enjoyed more trust than any other public institutions in Russia (Sperling, 2001). It was not just the Russian public which considered that Russia had lost respect internationally. Reactions in the West echoed those in Russia. The invasion and especially the way force was used, were seen as a tragedy for the whole of Russia and also badly damaged Russia's image in the West. The positive foreign policy atmosphere of 1994 quickly turned sour. The Russian application to the Council of Europe was held up for a second time because of the Chechen war. The first pause had happened due to the storming of the Russian White House in October of 1993. With the European Union similar problems started to occur. The ratification of the Partnership and Cooperation Agreement, signed in Corfu in June 1994, was temporarily suspended by the EU in early 1995. According to Jackie Gower: ‘The action Please cite this article in press as: Smith, H., Russia as a great power: Status inconsistency and the two Chechen wars, Communist and Post-Communist Studies (2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.postcomstud.2014.09.005

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by the European Parliament in suspending the ratification of the PCA for several months in 1995, owing to its concern about the violation of human rights in Chechnya, demonstrated that political conditionality is no empty threat’ (Gower, 2000, p. 74). The aim of the so-called Interim Agreement between Russia and the EU was to precede the PCA and ease and accelerate the implementation of the PCA's trade and commercial portions. The agreement was very important for Russia but also for the EU trade partners. It covered trade regulations, as well as a number of aspects of customs, standardization, competition and protection of the rights to intellectual property. From the Russian side the agreement was seen as an agreement to remove numerous discriminatory restrictive measures. Furthermore, the EU was not able officially to label Russia a ‘transitioneconomy,’ a term which was viewed in Russia as a political tool in EU trade relations. Aleksei Portansky in Finansovye izvestia wrote: ‘The entry into force of the interim agreement between the Russian Federation and the EU is also of considerable psychological and political significance for Moscow, since it relieves the unpleasant feeling of isolation that has intensified in connection with the war in Chechnya’ (Portansky, 1995, p. 12). But the Interim Agreement that should have entered into force in March 1995 was postponed due to the conflict in Chechnya. In March 1995 representatives of the EU troika (France, Germany, and Spain) traveled to Moscow and laid down four conditions for implementing the Interim Agreement: a ceasefire, progress in the political settlement of the crisis, free access for humanitarian aid, and the establishment of a permanent OSCE mission in Chechnya (Pursiainen, 1999, p. 150). As already mentioned, since OSCE commitments were violated by the launch of the war, the OSCE had formal reasons to become involved. All the reactions from the Western European side and from the United States pointed out that Yeltsin had agreed in Budapest to commit Russia to the principles that in case a use of force cannot be avoided ‘the armed forces will take due care to avoid injury to civilians or their property’ (Hollis, 1995; pp. 807e808). Naturally this cast a shadow over all agreements between Russians and any Western partners. Could Russia be trusted? The Russian response came already in January 1995. In Rossiiskiye vesti an article from the Russian Foreign ministry called the international reactions to the Chechen war hasty and declared Russia's readiness to constructively cooperate with international human rights and humanitarian organizations. Furthermore it accused the West of being unfair: ‘… to our regret, such rhetoric [Western reactions] evokes memories of the recent and very sad past in our relations with the West. In a number of instances we are observing a syndrome in which chronic reflexes are being triggered and long standing stereotypical ways of reacting to events associated with Russia are returning’ (Rossiiskie vesti, 1995). The first Chechen war showed some internal insecurities and the inability of the Russian leadership to deal with the difficult situation in the North Caucasus through the traditional responses available to a great power when faced with a colonial uprising.1 The military failings caused growing unpopularity with the leadership, but did not shake the conviction that Russia was a great power. The experience also revealed that the West was not convinced about Russia's transformation after the fall of the Soviet Union. This led to a significant learning period for Russia: Russia had entered into a relationship with a number of international organizations and had not expected the Chechen war, regarded as an internal matter, to become an obstacle to those relationships. The feeling prevailed that these organizations would not treat other, recognized, great powers in the way Russia was being treated, hence reinforcing the feeling that Russia was not recognized by others as a great power. 4. The second Chechen war The first Chechen war ended with the Khasaviurt ceasefire agreement at the end of August 1996. At the beginning of that year some changes were also made in the Russian foreign ministry. Yevgeny Primakov was appointed foreign minister of Russia. This change was seen as a defeat of the so called Westernizers, the group that argued strongly for Russia benefiting from integration and cooperation with the West. Foreign minister Kozyrev was portrayed as belonging to the group of the Westernizers. Upon becoming foreign minister in 1996, Yevgeny Primakov declared his motto to be ‘Russia was and remains a great power. Her foreign policy should correspond to that status’. From 1996 to 1999 the Russian policy was mainly characterized as passive. The Khasaviurt agreement included talks between Russia and Chechnya about the status of Chechnya in the future. But the matter was never seriously discussed in the talks that were held (Jonson, 2000, p. 2). Violence increased in the region and the central government chose not to support Chechen president Aslan Maskhadov, elected in 1997. In retrospect it is easy to see that Russia was never seriously ready to consider the status of Chechnya to be anything else than a part of Russia. The planning of the second Chechen war began well before August 1999, even if the shot that started it was fired from the side of the Chechen rebels lead by Shamil Basayev by making a foray into Dagestan. In March 1999 the kidnapping of an interior ministry official made the Minister of the Interior Sergei Stepashin call for a new mission in Chechnya. Plans regarding Chechnya had already begun in early 1999 (Evangelista, 2002, p. 73). It was also clear that the military had its own agenda relating to Chechnya: ‘Chief of the General Staff Anatoly Kvashnin gathered a group of combat generals (Konstantin Pulikovsky, Gennady Troshev, Viktor Kazantsev, Vladimir Shamanov) driven hard by the desire to take revenge for the humiliating defeat in 1996’ (Baev, 2004). In Daniel Treisman's view the incidents that began the second war had been planned for months on both sides (Treisman, 2011, p. 298). The view that planning for the second Chechen war was under way already in early 1999 is also supported by the then Prime Minister Putin's claim made during his first meeting with President Clinton in the summer of 1999 that al-Qaeda had 1 Cerwyn Moore has suggested that the Chechen wars and Russian policy in Caucasus could be best viewed through post-colonialism’s lenses in ‘Russia's post-colonial war(s)’, EuropeeAsia Studies, 2008, Vol. 60, Issue 5, pp. 851e861.

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troops in Chechnya and that they were planning operations against Russia (Council of Foreign Relations (2004)). Furthermore, the fight against terrorism was also raised in the CIS summit in Minsk in June 1999. By bringing the Chechen issue linked with the threat of international terrorism to the international tables, Russia was also making the international community aware that something was going on in the Russian North Caucasus again. The timing of the second Chechen war made far more sense than the first one, given the international climate. The arguments deployed by Russia were parallel to those of NATO and the United States on Kosovo. The bombings of Kosovo and Serbia in the summer of 1999 marked a significant change in attitudes in the international arena. The Russian military used the bombing as an argument for their own actions: ‘If NATO can shell civilian objects in a sovereign country for the sake of political aims we can do the same in our own country’ (Pain, 2000, p. 22). It seems that while the main reasons for launching the war were internal to the Russian Federation, the precise timing was provided by NATO. This rhetorical framework, of two great powers doing what they see as best for world order, suited the Russian home audience. The Kosovo case earlier in 1999 showed that Russia could not stop the USA in international matters. Some in Russia saw the Serbian defeat to be also a Russian defeat (Yuryev, 2003). This was a blow to Russian national self-esteem and perhaps one of the reasons for Yeltsin's grip on power diminishing. The Kosovo bombings also became a watershed in Russia-West relations. But for the Russian armed forces the year 1999 was labeled the ‘golden year of the Russian military’. With their fierce statements about Kosovo they had already gained some influence, the military doctrine was going to be rewritten and more funds were made available for it. In late October 1999, Defense Minister Igor Sergeev said that troops would never leave Chechnya (Busza, 1999). The military officers were fostering a myth that if the civilian leaders had not intervened during the first war, there would have been a totally different outcome (Kramer, 1999). It seemed that the public and political establishment, as well as economic elite, was behind the strengthening of the Russian military. After all, a strong military is the main symbol of a great power. Anatoly Chubais, widely known for being pro-Western, commented on the Chechen intervention: ‘I really do believe that the issue being decided in Chechnya today is not the Chechen problem but something incomparably more important than that e in Chechnya, the Russian army is being reborn … . Now, for the first time in all these years, the army is regaining its proper status. And this fact, in my view, should be welcomed by democrats and nondemocrats alike e by all segments of the political spectrum.’ (Kommersant, 1999). Chubais' statement reflects well the specific and important feature of the second Chechen war. Russian society was united for the first time since the fall of the Soviet Union in its views relating to Chechnya. The initial international reactions to the second Chechen war were strong, perhaps in some ways stronger than during the first war, but it could be argued that they were more symbolic then anything else, even if the list of ‘threats’ was this time longer and more carefully thought through. Interestingly all criticisms also included confirmation of Russia's territorial integrity and her right to fight against terrorism. In his speech of November 1999, the EU's external relations commissioner Christopher Patten made it clear that the three main bodies of the EU - the Council, the Parliament and the Commission - had reached a consensus on condemning all kinds of acts of terrorism (this clearly referred to Chechnya as well), while at the same time condemning the use of strong military force, and the fact that political solutions were being disregarded as well as the human consequences of military action. He did, however, stress the fact that Europe should not make the same mistake they had made in 1917, by isolating Russia from European affairs (Patten, 1999). Patten addressed directly to Russians the point that they should understand that the situation in Chechnya was putting a strain on Russia-EU relations, that it would have an impact on the acceptance of Russia by the international community and on Russia's credibility as a political and economic partner (ibid.). After initially voicing strong criticism, by the second half of 2000 the international community, even before the events of 9/ 11 that changed the situation even further, started to tone down its statements. This shift was not linked to any noticeable improvement in the situation in Chechnya (although according to the Russians the war had officially finished). Rather, by 2001 it started to be clear that tough language seemed to have little effect on Russia and that the West was not ready to jeopardize the relationship they had already established by threatening concrete measures. This appeared to be the stand not only of the EU but of other international organizations, on the basis that it is more dangerous to isolate Russia than it is to let it have its way, and it seems that Russians have understood that this is how it stands e Russia could push the limits of international tolerance to a very high degree. The situation was different than with the first Chechen war mainly for two reasons. Firstly, there was not the same level of internal opposition to the war that could be supported from outside. National unity had given a boost to Russian selfconfidence and Russian great power identity had found its place in Russian domestic discourse. This had its effect on Russian international relations. Secondly, the second Chechen war was portrayed as a war on terrorism. Hence it was more difficult for outside criticisms to be formulated. The actual situation was not fully clear for the outside world and the benefit of doubt was given to the Russian argument. As Strobe Talbott, the foreign policy advisor to the US president, has summarized the US position. The West had neither the desire nor the means to engage diplomatically in the Chechen conflict, much less intervene militarily … . They [Chechens] had indisputably e and it seemed, deliberately e brought down the wrath of Russian armed forces on their people. That meant there was little we could do but cite Russia's obligations under various international covenants to protect civilian life and call on Moscow to let representatives of the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe into Chechnya to help deal with the refugee crisis and monitor the behavior of the Russian troops (Talbott, 2002, p. 357). Please cite this article in press as: Smith, H., Russia as a great power: Status inconsistency and the two Chechen wars, Communist and Post-Communist Studies (2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.postcomstud.2014.09.005

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5. Conclusion: the price of status The fall of the Soviet Union was clearly a blow to Russian status in world politics. However, it also seemed that from the Russian point of view, the status that had fallen down was that of the Soviet Union not of Russia. In the Western world's eyes Russia's status had changed, in the Russian view it had not. Russian great power identity, greatpowerness,2 had therefore to be proved to the outside world. This can be observed in Russian foreign policy behavior, and could be predicted by the status inconsistency theory. ‘Many aspects of a nation's interactions with others appear to be affected by its rank position, hence if a nation lacks a clear, unequivocal ranking, these interactions may become less predictable, increasing misperceptions and tension’ (Wallace, 1971, p. 32). The academic literature on status inconsistency, much of it predating the Soviet collapse, draws attention to changes in both the actual ability of a state to project great power status, and possible gaps between that ability and the perception of status. From the Russian perspective, Russia since 1991 can be viewed as a status underachiever in that it has not consistently been recognized as a great power internationally, while at the same time greatpowerness has been assumed, for historic and geopolitical reasons, as given for the population and political elites of Russia. This gap between greatpowerness as a part of self-identity and the actual status of a state in international politics has not been so well studied in specific cases. Russia clearly fits this picture. This article has shown that this status inconsistency is not just an academic category, but has been understood by Russia's political leadership and has informed important aspects of domestic and foreign policy. One of the probable reasons for launching the first and second Chechen wars was to close this gap and impress on the international community that the Russian Federation had indeed inherited the great power mantle of the Soviet Union. In the case of the first Chechen war, this attempt had perverse consequences for Russia. In the first place, opinion polls showed that in the eyes of the Russian population, the war had actually diminished Russia's status. But this was due to the unforeseen military failures of the Russian armed forces in Grozny and the Caucasus mountains. In the second place, Russia's conduct of the war initially decreased its standing in the eyes of the international community e because it appeared to violate international agreements that Russia had only recently signed up to, and because the war was carried out with disregard to human rights and the welfare of the civilian population. On this last count, Russia's pursuit of great power status did not take account of the norms and values which feature in several academic definitions of what constitutes a great power, and which were important in the eyes of European and other Western actors. This crucial feature of the RussiaeEurope relationship in particular involves fuller investigation of the European notions of great power status, which is beyond the scope of this article. The case of the second Chechen war was different. While still displaying a deficit with regard to human rights, Russian politicians succeeded to some extent in circumventing such criticisms by adopting the discourse of the War on Terror, a discourse which gained even greater resonance after the events of 9/11 2001. Crucially, Russian society was much more united behind the war than in the earlier case, and it was not marked by the same level of military failures. For these reasons, international organizations were far less critical and it could be said that Russia went some way towards achieving the status recognition that it had sought when launching the first Chechen war. The international context had changed, not just with the War on Terror, but also with the NATO action in Kosovo, and at the same time it seems that Russia had learnt from earlier mistakes. While Russia has achieved increased status, it still suffers from Western norms of democracy and human rights which the West, by and large, sees Russia as falling short on. Whether the adoption of agreed norms should be considered as a part of actual capacity or a part of status is an interesting question for status inconsistency theory. At least, there are different views of Russia's status. This mismatch is one of the reasons why, far from building on the international consensus that appeared to be emerging in the early 2000s, Russia has been found diametrically opposed to predominant positions in the US and Europe on a range of issues from Iraq to Syria, to Ukraine. Status inconsistency remains, then, an important analytical tool for understanding Russian foreign and domestic policy behavior as well as a concept which, in different forms, is understood and addressed by Russian political elites. This article has, however, exposed some deficiencies in the theory of status inconsistency. The theory rests on measuring two factors e the actual capability that a country has, and the status it has internationally. Once these are established, it is then a straightforward judgment as to whether or not they match up with each other. Perhaps the most obvious problem, which is not discussed here, is the assumption that there is an objective means of observing whether a country has the actual capabilities to act as a great, medium, small, or whatever power. Uncertainty over this measurement means that the question of whether Russia, after increasing its status in the course of the second Chechen war, was moving in the direction of status consistency or status-inconsistency as an overachiever remains a debatable one. A more intriguing difficulty arises over measuring status. Status is about perceptions, but there are also perceptions of perceptions. It may be that Western politicians and academics alike consider that, because of its position in the UN Security Council and the G-8, and the large numbers of diplomatic representations in Moscow, Russia is recognized as one of the leading powers in the world. But this article has 2 I have defined greatpowerness as a state's self-image as one of the dominant powers in the world which can have a variety of impacts on that state's behavior. Such behavior can be observed across a wide range of activities and includes measures not only to confirm great power status to the citizens of the state itself, but also to obtain and continually reaffirm the recognition of that status by the international community, and especially by other great powers (Smith, 2014, p.45).

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