I think that it ironic that in the past it was those on the far left in this country who were most often accused of being sympathizers of the Russian dominated Soviet Union, the principle enemy of the United States for much of the 20th Century. Now it is American conservatives whose political views most resemble those of Putin and his Russian inner circle.
Ever since the McCarthy era, the most degrading term conservatives reserved for liberals was to call them “communists”. However, any resemblance between American liberals and the leaders of the Russian Communist Party who ran the multi-country Russian empire they called the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (the USSR) was superficial at best. The communists of the USSR on the surface pretended to ascribe to the teachings of Lenin and Trotsky who certainly preached far left political doctrines. They believed that power must be transferred to the “proletariat” (working class people) and the state must “wither away”. However, Russian communism was actually founded on the views of Joseph Stalin. He believed that the state must first become all powerful before it could dissolve in order to safeguard the communist revolution, distribute the property of wealthy landowners, and purge the country of nonbelievers.
However, Stalin never intended for the state to wither away, at least not in his lifetime. Instead he set up a dictatorship of the Russian Communist Party which was subservient to him, its chairman. Perhaps more than any dictator before him, he ruthlessly eliminated his real and imagined enemies in purges designed he said to keep the State “pure”. He then proceeded to gather all political power to himself. After Stalin’s death Russia’s government evolved into a dictatorship of the Russian Communist Party. Except at a superficial level, their policies and actions resembled that of a right wing dictatorship more than anything else.
When the Soviet Union imploded, all pretense of Russia having a leftist government dissolved with it. Vladimir Putin sensed that the Russian people, who had been dominated by Czars and the communist party for centuries, were not ready for democracy. He moved aggressively to fill the vacuum left by the fall of the Soviet Union. While still pretending that Russia is a democracy, he established what is essentially a right wing dictatorship. It’s not surprising he views American conservatives, and Donald Trump in particular, as his natural allies.
Note, Putin didn’t direct the GRU (Russia’s military intelligence organization) to hack computer systems of the Republican party and infiltrate American social media to help Hillary Clinton to get elected President of the United States. It wasn’t the Democratic presidential campaign that his agents did their best to infiltrate. Putin obviously wanted the Republican candidate to win.
Now a good argument can be made that was Donald Trump that Putin favored, not the conservative Republican party. Many believe that the Russians had “kompromat” (compromising material) on Trump and consequently Putin would have undue influence over the occupant of the White House. Others would say that installing a very unconventional politician like Trump into the White House best served the Russian objective inserting chaos into the American political system. (If that was Putin’s intention, he succeeded beyond his wildest dreams.) However, none of this explains the separate Russian attempts to cultivate the leaders of Republican Party and conservative organizations such as the National Rifle Association.
In her recent change of plea proceedings where she admitted to being an agent of a foreign power, Maria Butina acknowledged that with the backing of Alexander Torshin, a Russian banker with close ties to Putin and who is now a subject to US sanctions, it was her mission to establish unofficial lines of communications between Moscow and influential leaders of NRA, conservative groups and the Republican Party. She likewise admitted that it was also her mission to sell those prominent Americans conservatives on the idea that Russia as their friend, not their foe. It is important to keep in mind that Butina began her “friendship project” in the US long before anyone believed that Trump would become the Republican nominee, so her efforts were originally entirely separate from those designed to assist Trump.
Butina set up a gun rights organization in a country in Russia, a country that tightly restricts gun ownership. (Ask yourself why Putin’s cronies didn’t go after her early on.) After she gained entry to the United States as a graduate student, she used her reputation as a gun advocate and a romantic relationship with longtime Republican operative Paul Erickson to establish contacts with key NRA members.
She would go on to join the N.R.A., attend at least three of its conventions and get to know NRA board members and three former presidents. Using those contacts she went on to establish friendly relations with several Republican Party officials and politicians as well as the leaders of Christian conservative groups. She even tried to establish a back channel between the Trump campaign and Russian leaders and also attempted to set up as a meeting between Trump and Putin during the campaign. (Those efforts apparently were not successful.)
Her high level hobnobbing evidently paid off in as she was able to meet many influential Republican and conservative leaders with whom she pushed her Russia-US friendship project. She met and has been photographed with such notables as Donald Trump Jr., Bobby Jindal, Scott Walker, Rick Santorum, James W. Porter II – then president of the N.R.A. and Wayne Lapierre – the group’s CEO and executive vice president.
Why would a close associate of Putin try to use Butina to infiltrate the NRA, other conservative groups, and the Republican Party? Please note that at the time the Russians were doing nothing to cozy up Democrats and other progressives. Despite the fact that in the past conservative Republicans were the sworn enemies of the USSR, the game in Moscow has changed dramatically. Putin needs US sanctions on Russia removed and needs the US to turn a blind eye as he attempts to reassemble the lost Russian empire. He evidently sees the Republicans and American conservative groups in general as potential future allies.
In part that is because based on recent history. Putin sees several prominent Democrats as enemies. Hillary Clinton and Putin were often at odds when she was Secretary of State and Putin will never forgive her for stirring up protests in Russia by accusing his party of stuffing ballot boxes and manipulating voter lists during his presidential election. Despite an early attempt to reset diplomatic relations with Russia, President Obama ultimately lead efforts by the US, the European Union, and numerous other countries to impose an escalating series crippling sanctions on Russia following Putin’s military invasion of eastern Ukraine and his annexation of the Crimean Peninsula. Obama then imposed still more sanctions on Russia in retaliation to its interference on the 2016 presidential election.
In addition, I’m sure that Putin doesn’t believe that Democrats will ever be friendly with a government that lacks independent judiciary, manipulates elections to stay in power, arrests and kills leaders of opposition parties, takes numerous steps to fully control Russian media, arrests journalists and occasionally kills them, engages in pervasive and hyperpatriotic propaganda, discriminates against and sometimes persecutes its LGBT community, restricts freedoms of assembly and association, and kills those who are deemed to be enemies of his regime both in Russia and in other countries.
That leaves Putin with only the Republicans and conservative supporters as potential American allies. He also knows that conservatives by nature are more comfortable with the authoritarian types of government. Several well respected psychological studies have indicated this to be the case. If you require additional proof of that statement, you need take a good look at the would be dictator that the Republicans nominated to be President of the United States.
Will Republican leaders fall into Putin’s web? If we were talking about establishment Republicans, I would think that the answer would be a definite “No”. Their long held animosity towards the Soviet Union has been transferred undiminished to Putin’s government. However, they are no longer own the soul of the Republican Party. Even if Trump is ultimately removed from the presidency, or loses his bid for a second term, the right wing populism which Trump used to seize power will continue to dominate the political views of everyday conservative voters for some time to come. Trump’s “American first” message speaks to isolationism, the degradation of our relationship with traditional allies and relationships, and the withdrawal of our country from its leadership role on the world stage. What could be more perfect for Putin’s ambitions?
Cajun 12/16/17