First I would like to thank you for both the existence of the European Council on Foreign Relations, which I hope will become a successful and powerful think-tank for the European Foreign Policy, and for this Russia and wider Europe forum.

I thank you also for the quality of the description that you did of the political situation in Russia, I would like only to bring here some other perspectives from a European democrat having already spent 11 years in Russia.

Will Medvedev be a democrat?

I share everything that you write in this part and thank you for this concise and useful overview, however I do not share the spirit or the reproach that I feel behind your words reading this part of your document. You criticize and reproach the lack of any democratic reality and definitely this is a very sad and frustrating when you look at it with the eyes of a European Democrat. And indeed I have to say that it was very much depressing to drive in the Moscow streets before the Duma vote. You had the impression to drive in the Soviet Union where all the advertisements in the street celebrated the unique political party. I also very much remember the relief that at this time gave me a little sentence pronounced by Mr Medvedev,  he said that Russia deserves to have many parties and that 3-4 parties are not enough to represent Russian public opinion. At this time it was not yet clear that he will be the unique heir and I thank him for these few words which remembered me another small but important sentence he pronounced few years ago, saying the democracy does not need any further adjective, sovereign or any other.

I am thoroughly convinced that democracy will not come in Russia thanks to any foreign evangelization. There will never be any imported democracy in Russia. Let?s remember that one of the biggest weakness of the Weimar Republik was to have been set up by enemies? A very simple thing that I learned in Russia is that in order to get a democracy you need first to have ? democrats. You can regret it, cry internally, but unfortunately it does not help a lot if there are anybody to stand for the democracy within Russia. It remembers me also my reaction to a very good Russian friend, a sincere democrat, who told me one day that EU missed an important moment for the Russian democracy when it accepted the Yukos affair. I was a bit blunt with him, I told him, no Andrey, you should have reacted yourselves, Russian people should have reacted, some did in fact, courageously in the street. But Yukos does not belong to the attribution of the EU. The EU has no say on pure internal Russian affair.

Did you ever see this quite unknown film from Nikita Mikhailkov, whose English title might be Anna from 6 to 18 (Анна. От 6 до 18), this is a very interesting film where this great Russian film maker filmed his daughter once a year, which let us go through the fall of the Soviet Union. Twice he speaks about democracy, the two times he illustrates his word by a male strip-show, this is the way a great Russian film maker sees democracy.

Let?s remember Goethe and Baudelaire, is free who conquers its freedom, is equal to another who proves its. A bit tough, unfortunately very true, and very useful to remember.

I do not say that I am satisfied with the current situation, not at all, I am just say that the road to democracy can only be a Russian way, from an entire people, with its elites, artists, writers and mass. I noticed that you are also a specialist of Ukraine. You are totally right, the Orange Revolution (and its ?technology?) very much frightened the Russian power, on the other side the Russian people were puzzled: my goodness why our Ukrainian brothers so much care about politics whereas we Russian are so passive? Some noticed that the current Russian territory was almost fully occupied by the Mongols where Ukraine was not. It might be one of the explanations?

Consequently I am unfortunately very much skeptical about any democratic evangelization or about any hard critic built only on good democratic consciousness. However since I have to confess that unfortunately I remain a very na?ve and a very convinced European democrat, I continue to believe in the power of exemplarity. Therefore I very much appreciated your description of Gleb Pavlovsky ?technology? and his words you report. You could use exactly the same world to describe what western democracy is becoming. ?Politics is not based on knowledge, as it should be in my opinion, but on the myths imposed by the mass media? I am a French citizen, may be that?s why I found this sentence particularly interesting? Maybe also because Russia is also a severe observer of our own weaknesses.

How will the cohabitation work ? Will Medvedev eventually be his own man?

I like very much Russian politics because nobody can pretend to have the right explanation of the facts and therefore you can say almost whatever you want. Therefore I can dare to give here my own analysis of the raise of Mr Medvedev. I am nevertheless pleased to say that I could challenge this analysis with some Russian specialists and the views I present here are shared by few of them.

I do not think that what we saw in Russia since October 2, 2007 is Mr Putin?s own agenda. What came from the top Russian administration few month or few weeks before the Duma vote was a feeling of total indecision and unprepared ness.  You very well described the existence of the various clans and the willingness to maintain a certain balance. I say willingness and not necessity because one lesson of the Russian politics of the last 20 years is that the balance of power never lasts very long in Russia?

I personally think that Mr Putin was pressed by Mr Sechin to stay as a President since Mr Putin was or is (as you clearly say) the key for the stability in Russia. But since the Russian situation is a bit complex, it appeared that Mr Putin was here the best advocate and defender of the power of law that you so much advocate in Russia. I also personally think that Mr Putin wanted to organize a semi-democratic election in Russian leaving the Russian people in front of a real choice, Medvedev or Ivanov. It was certainly a mistake since the Russian power is traditionally the result of a balance, the result of battle of wills, more than the result of a choice excluding a determinant component of the politic scene. I think that he really hoped to be able to let in the Russian history the image of somebody having restored the Russian power and maintained a certain ?democracy? by offering, when leaving, a choice to Russian people between 2 parties and 2 candidates. The choice of October 2, 2007 is in total contradiction with all the former agenda and its long political construction. Therefore I think this is more a reaction than his own agenda. The lobbying (brutal demonstration of power!...) of the Siloviki was such that Putin had no other choice but to make this compromise and accept to go for the unique party. However the Siloviki made a big mistake by trying to gain further advantage. The war inside the Siloviki clan and the attack against the deputy-minister of finance convinced Putin that he could not let the Siloviki win the full game. Therefore Medevedev, and also maybe therefore the necessity to stay as a Prime Minister to maintain the balance and protect the counter power (Medvedev) he put in place.

I would also advise not to analyze the Russian political agenda on its own, Russia has no value, only interests. I repeat because this is key to understand : Russia has no value, only interests. Therefore there is no political agenda as such, the only aim is to defend either very private interests at he top of the state either to defend Russian global strategic interests. Putin?s choice for Medevedev, apart of the hope for loyalty and own protection, is the expression of the limits of the Siloviki policy. Russia rejected Yelsin policy as being the expression of a foreign liberal ideology and did not want to understand the economic or financial context of this experience and courageous attempt. Then Russian looked to the Chinese model and launched its Siloviki revolution. However Russia already understood that the Siloviki solution might not be the best to run a modern economy and that state policy should not mean necessarily plundering and dictatorship of new state oligarch clans. Russian chess players already understood that the Russian economy can not only rely on high commodities prices, that trade and budget surplus might soon disappear and that Russia interest is neither in an ideological liberalism neither in a new corrupted sovietism. Medvedev might be an attempt of reaction even if so far it is not a clear formalized solution, for all the reasons that you mentioned, and among which the total unclear evolution of balance of power.

Will there be a rapprochement with the west?

It is interesting that what you present here is mostly a regret of what the West did when Putin became President. As a Russian television viewer I fully agree with you, the race for love of the European political leaders was pathetic, but well let?s not fall into the other extreme, it would be a shame to miss the opportunity to see what we can build with this new young and open minded Russian president.  Also please consider that his era did not even start yet, I am even not sure that we can say he did orchestrate his own raise.

On this part, allow me to be a bit more critical, but maybe my critics show that we leave here the field of the foreign affair analysis to enter the uncertain field of foreign affairs policy. I find you recommendations and your conclusion a bit short. Yes, thousand times yes, the first thing is to finally build a common EU policy to supervise the EU-Russia relationship. But no, I do not think that the key of a EU-Russia policy lies in Iran, Kosovo and Energy transit countries. I found your conclusion a bit short where in such a think-tank you should on the contrary detail a policy to be advised to European decision makers. Please be ambitious! I read with the highest interest the Power Audit of EU-Russia Relations published by the ECFR, it is also an excellent analysis of the current situation but ? a bit short in concrete positive proposals. I am naturally a bit impolite and provocative but only in order to try to generate a reaction of brains which are clever and competent enough to really work on the detail of what should be a common European Russian policy. 

I did not take enough time to think precisely about it and to articulate something clever. Nevertheless my very first comments would be :
- first the condition to envisage the creation of a common policy is certainly the development of the consciousness of the weakness of the current situation where the multiplicity and contradiction of national approaches creates a weak position for Europe as perfectly described in the Power Audit of EU-Russia Relations. Great the analysis is made, written. Now it should be sold to the decision makers and to the opinion : what is your battle order in this respect? The answer to this question is damned important?
- second the ECFR should certainly work on a precise agenda for such a EU-Russian policy. It might be useful to define strategic goals before entering into the detail of the daily management of such a policy.

As any European Foreign policy to be built the Russian European policy should certainly found its ground in the respect of our European values (Peace and Reconciliation, Democracy and Human rights, social market economy, ecology). But this is clearly not enough, it should also precisely and without complex define and defend our strategical interests. Foreign Affair should not be driven only by ideology but also, and even mainly, by strategic interests.

As far as Russia is concerned the strategically goals should be certainly to contribute to :
  - a strong but peaceful Russia : strong enough not to be jeopardized by frustrations or dangerous emotions that always create weaknesses and dangerous mistakes, but certainly contained by a European security policy and a foreign policy which would ensure that Russia does not create instability on countries which also belong to the European neighborhood,
- the development of balanced and mutual fruitful economical relationship, Russia being the European BRIC where the part of European trade remains preponderant although declining in 2007,
- the definition of an Energy policy in the context of the current relative dependence of Europe from Russian energy but also in the context of the necessarily preparation of the after hydrocarbon world,
- the strict and strong common defense of our European value in the EU (in clear opposition to the current loneliness of the UK in the Litvienko affair for instance?).

This policy should be based on
- the comprehension that Russia is a sovereign country which will not buy the European democratic evangelization, on the contrary this evangelization is counterproductive because seen as very hypocritical (which it is very unfortunately really in many cases) if not aggressive and therefore it is much more useful to build a relationship on the understanding of both strategically interests, and defend clearly its own interests so long Russia is not mature for a more ?European? approach,
- the comprehension that Russia is a European power, the last one having played a world game and the last one having the illusion of a possible independence due to the natural resource and current commodities price. This might not last for ever.