Soviet Crackdown Watch (Part 6): It Begins…Repression With a ‘Human Face’?

(Washington, D.C.): After
weeks of documenting evidence that the
central authorities were preparing a
crackdown in the Soviet Union, the Center
for Security Policy today notes with
profound regret that the crackdown
has now begun. Henceforth,
the Center will be monitoring the
dimensions and character of Soviet
repression against the genuinely
pro-democratic forces inside the USSR.

Evidence of the crackdown now underway
includes the following:

• On 7 January 1991, Defense
  Minister Yazov ordered tens of
  thousands of Soviet paratroopers
  into Lithuania, Latvia, and
  Estonia to “round up draft
  dodgers.” The Lithuanian
  Borders Defense Department
  reported two columns of tanks had
  crossed into Lithuania. The order
  to enforce conscription was also
  delivered to Georgia, the
  Ukraine, Albania, and Moldavia.
• Colonel General Fyodor Kuzmin,
  Commander of the Baltic Military
  District, informed the three
  Baltic presidents by phone of the
  order and warned that the
  round-up would begin on 13
  January. In fact, Soviet
  troops have already begun
  apprehending persons according to
  a Radio Riga report on 10
  January.

• Lithuanian President Landsbergis
  called the action “a huge
  provocation” in a New
  York Times interview on 7
  January.

• On 7 January, Polish officials
  prevented a Soviet military train
  carrying 200 troops, 9 tanks and
  other military equipment bound
  for the Ukraine from exiting
  Polish territory.
• On 8 January, the first U.S.
  official reaction was registered
  in a statement issued at the
  White House and the State
  Department. It indicated that the
  United States was “especially
  concerned” over
  actions by the Gorbachev regime
  which were characterized as
  “provocative and
  counterproductive.” The
  White House press secretary urged
  the Kremlin “to cease
  attempts at intimidation and turn
  back to negotiations” in
  dealing with the republics. In
  Moscow, U.S. Ambassador Matlock
  contacted Foreign Minister Eduard
  Shevardnadze about the reports
  and in Washington, Deputy
  Secretary of State Larry
  Eagleberger summoned Soviet
  Ambassador Bessmertnykh.
• On the same day, however,
  the Administration announced an
  allocation of $900 million of the
  $1 billion in agricultural credit
  guarantees extended to Moscow
  center on 12 December 1990. In
  addition, $300 million in U.S.
  Export-Import Bank insurance and
  credit guarantees are expected to
  be drawn down by American
  companies over the next few
  weeks.
• As such agricultural credit
  subsidies begin to flow to the
  Soviet Union, it is noteworthy
  that reports reaching the Center
  for Security Policy indicate that
  Moscow has threatened
  republics that U.S. grain would
  be withheld from areas not
  cooperating with the Kremlin.

• On 9 January, TASS denounced
  Marlin Fitzwater’s statements as
  “a manifestation of
  old-style thinking, which members
  of the world community have
  already begun moving away
  from.”
• When asked on 9 January whether
  any further communications or
  warnings had been issued to the
  Soviet Union, White House
  spokesman Marlin Fitzwater
  replied, “We don’t
  have anything to add at this
  point. We continue to monitor the
  situation.”

• In an interview on 9 January with
  the Christian Science Monitor,
  Foreign Minister Eduard
  Shevardnadze said that he did not
  consider the deployments in the
  Baltic states as evidence of the
  dictatorship he was warning of in
  his resignation speech.
  “I can’t say this is the
  display of some kind of
  dictatorship. This is a simple
  desire to introduce order,
  because it’s impossible to live
  under conditions of chaos and
  anarchy. It’s chaos and anarchy
  that can lead to
  dictatorship.”
• Such a statement casts
  substantial doubt on hopeful
  Western predictions that
  Shevardnadze might emerge in the
  future as a champion of the
  reformist republics. Moreover, coming
  as it does against the backdrop
  of reports that he may remain in
  the Gorbachev cabinet, this
  astonishing pronouncement raises
  anew fears that Shevardnadze
  might revert to form and serve as
  an instrument of the repressive
  central authorities.

• On 10 January, President
  Gorbachev declared that the
  situation in Lithuania had
  reached “a dead end”
  and threatened to impose direct
  presidential rule from the
  Kremlin. He accused Lithuanian
  leaders of “gross
  violations” of the Soviet
  constitution and of attempting
  “to restore a bourgeois
  regime…under slogans of
  democracy.”
• On 10 January, the Estonian
  Popular Front called on citizens
  to “make ready for
  siege-like conditions.”
• After weeks of postponing the
  broadcast of a Shevardnadze
  interview — conducted
  immediately following and
  focusing on his resignation — by
  the popular TV program, Vzglyad,
  the Deputy Chairman of the USSR
  State Committee for Radio and
  Television has banned
  this popular television program
  (estimated to have an audience of
  up to 100 million Soviets) from
  the airwaves entirely and
  indefinitely.
• Today, Soviet troops occupied
  several official buildings,
  including the National Defense
  Department and the National Press
  Building in Vilnius. Military
  units sprayed the Press Building
  with machine gun fire, reportedly
  seriously wounding a number of
  people inside. When
  surrounded by civilians, Soviet
  tanks fired deafening blank
  rounds to intimidate the crowds.
  According to the Deputy Chairman
  of the Lithuanian Supreme
  Council, at least one foreign
  correspondent filming Soviet
  tanks on Putnios Street was
  beaten up.
• In its report on the Baltics,
  London’s Financial Times
  concluded today that, “The
  question now is just how
  and when the Soviet
  leader will attempt to enforce
  his authority — and the military
  conscription — with the open use
  of force.” (Emphasis added.)
• In a striking indication
  of Gorbachev’s confidence that he
  can defuse any possible U.S.
  sanctions in response to his
  crackdown by highlighting the
  USSR’s “cooperative”
  role in the Persian Gulf crisis,
  the Soviet leader called
  President Bush to talk about next
  steps towards Iraq.
• Reporting to the press on this
  phone conversation, President
  Bush went out of his way to
  praise Gorbachev yet again for
  his stand on the Gulf. Subsequent
  to a discussion of the Gulf
  crisis — and clearly as a
  subordinate issue — Bush raised
  the Baltic issue with Gorbachev.
  He told reporters:

“The United States feels that the
use of force, particularly in the Baltics
would be counterproductive. There was
some discussion of the internal affairs
in the Soviet Union when I talked to Mr.
Gorbachev. He knows of my position that
we view the Baltics differently….They
have a very different standing than other
republics….I am very hopeful that they
can find a way to resolve these extraordinarily
complex problems without
resorting to force.”

• Interestingly, Soviet Foreign
  Ministry spokesman Vitaly Churkin
  chose a similar formulation in
  commenting on the domestic Soviet
  situation today. He said:
  “Without observance of law
  and without discipline, I don’t
  see how it might be possible to
  continue with the immensely
  complex and difficult
  reform program and program of
  perestroika in our country.”
• Interfax, the only
  non-state-controlled news service
  in the Soviet Union was
  jettisoned from its offices in
  Moscow today.
• Importantly, the timing
  of Gorbachev’s crackdown in the
  Baltics — coming at the moment
  when all eyes are focused on the
  Persian Gulf and the United
  States hopes for a benign Soviet
  attitude — is eerily reminiscent
  of the Soviet 1956 invasion of
  Hungary at the height of the Suez
  crisis.

The Bush Administration was
legitimately criticized for sending mixed
signals — if not a green light
— to Saddam Hussein prior to his
invasion of Kuwait. It seems now to be in
danger of encouraging Mikhail Gorbachev
to further repression by its minimalist
and largely perfunctory reaction to his
crackdown to date. The Center for
Security Policy believes that President
Bush’s willingness to extend $1.3 billion
in U.S. taxpayer credit guarantees to
Gorbachev and the ruling Communist Party
speaks far louder than the mild rebukes
and “serious concern” expressed
by the White House.

The Center called on the
Administration and the Congress to: halt
immediately the disbursement of any
Commodity Credit Corporation grain loan
guarantees; freeze U.S. Eximbank
insurance coverage and credit guarantees;
shelve all U.S. technical assistance to
the strategic Soviet energy sector; and
suspend any forward movement on Soviet
associate membership status in the
International Monetary Fund and the World
Bank. It goes without saying that
new concessions under active
consideration — notably the removal of
Soviet borrowing restrictions at the
European Bank for Reconstruction and
Development and technology transfer
liberalizations — be suspended
indefinitely.

Such firm U.S. actions — not mere
words — will be required if the
escalating spiral of violence and
repression by Moscow central authorities
against innocent civilians is to be
reversed. To do otherwise will only lead
down the same road of dismal policy
miscalculation and ensuing fiascoes
evident in China and Iraq.