Friday, September 13, 2013

Don’t React Emotionally to President Putin


 

 

 
Vincent J. Curtis


12 September 2013

 

Russian President Vladimir V. Putin released an Op-Ed piece published in the New York Times on September 11, 2013, that has created an uproar.  At the end of the piece, President Putin seemed to call into question American exceptionalism.  This mistaken interpretation of what he said has raised the hackles of some supposedly serious experts in foreign policy such as Senator John McCain (R-AZ) and Senator Robert Menendez (D-NJ), who is the Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.  The punditocracy are in a similar state of emotional distress.

 

It would be wrong of serious foreign policy analysts to react emotionally to what Putin said and seemed to say.  They should instead be looking for insights provided by this most serious practitioner of the diplomatic arts.

 

Let us take at face value the claim that Putin actually called into question American exceptionalism.  This would be no different than what President Obama said himself!

 

On April 4, 2009, in Strasbourg, France, in response to a question put to him by Mr. Ed Luce of the Financial Times, President Obama said,

 

            “I believe in American exceptionalism, just as I suspect that the Brits believe in British exceptionalism and the Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism….”

 

If Putin called into question American exceptionalism he would have said nothing more than what President Obama apparently believes: that there is nothing exceptional about American exceptionalism.  At worst, this interpretation of what Putin said amounts to a dig at President Obama, whom Putin has completely out-maneuvered on the matter of Syria and chemical weapons.

 

However, this is not what he said.  What Putin actually did was to call into question the wisdom of relying upon the premise of exceptionalism as a basis for making foreign policy decisions.  That is food for thought, not a basis for an emotional reaction.

 

The argument by which Putin justifies his advice is a non sequitor, however.  After talking about countries large and small, rich and poor, democratic and non-democratic, he says,

 

            “We are all different, but when we ask for the Lord’s blessing, we must not forget that God created us equal.”

 

The statement is a non sequitor because in the eyes of God, each individual human being is equal, while previously Putin was referred to countries and in this line he refers to individuals.

 

Putin is undoubtedly aware that the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution are full of the concept of the equality of individuals before and under the law, and that this principle of equality was justified because of the belief that we are all equal before God.

 

This may be what Putin thinks is a clever dig before a world-wide audience at the contradictions of American political philosophy: that all men are created equal and yet America is the greatest country in the world.

 

The reason why his statement is a non sequitor is the difference between millions of individuals on the one hand, and a society and a country on the other.  This difference explains why the society and country made up of these three hundred million individuals who collectively comprise the greatest country in the world, while those three hundred million who live in some province in China do not.  Thus the seeming contradiction between the equality of the individual and the inequality of country and society is resolved.

 

What serious observers ought to take from this argument that President Putin makes are that he is a close observer of America, and of the political power of Christian beliefs and consequently of the Russian Orthodox Church in Russia.  Putin, in his public remarks, has often hinted that he is a Christian believer.  As a former KGB agent, Putin may not be a believer, but it apparently is important to him that he seem to be.  Dealing with Putin then on his home turf, it would be important to frame public positions on the principles of Christian belief.

 

The rest of Putin’s Op-Ed also provides food for serious thought.  In the first place, it reads as being sensible, reasonable, and sincere.  It may stick in the craw of people to think that a reasonable sounding argument from President Putin would be sincere, but the important take away is that a lot of people around the world who are not emotionally invested in America will think it sounds reasonable and sensible.  If America wants to rally the world behind a policy in Syria contrary to Russian wishes, President Obama is going to have to be a lot better in putting his case.  So far, on Syria, he has looked like a slow-footed puncher, while Putin looks like Mohammed Ali in his prime.

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