Romanian-born US citizen Vladimir Socor is a Senior Fellow of the Washington-based Jamestown Foundation and its flagship publication, Eurasia Daily Monitor. He is also an internationally recognized expert on the former Soviet-ruled countries in Eastern Europe, the South Caucasus, and Central Asia, covering Russian and Western policies, focusing on energy, regional security issues, Russian foreign affairs, secessionist conflicts, and NATO policies and programs. Radio Free Europe’s Georgian Service sat down with him to discuss current issues, starting with Putin’s decision to cancel the visa regime for Georgia, and restore flights.
“It is one way for the Kremlin to drive a wedge between Georgia and the European Union, to pull Georgia into some kind of integration arrangement with Russia, and to offer the Georgian nation what amounts to a bribe: “We, Russians, are going to send you lots of tourists, and tourists are going to spend money in Georgia, so you don’t really need the European Union,” Socor claims. “I think this is basically a message. There will probably be a flood of Russian tourists coming to Georgia, increasing even more the number of citizens of Russia who are in one way or another present on the territory of Georgia. Their number is already very high for a small country like Georgia. Naturally, the FSB is going to put its agents among these “refugees.” Some will even look like refugees, while others will look like businessmen. With the influx of such Russians, there will always be corruption coming into Georgia, many of them, not all of them, but many of them, will engage in illegal business, in contraband. There will be more opportunities for government circles in Georgia to evade European sanctions against Russia. So none of this leads to good results.”
Where do we go from there? How realistic is it to expect the restoration of diplomatic relations?
Proper restoration of diplomatic relations would imply that the Georgian government has accepted the loss of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. When Russia occupied officially and openly Abkhazia and South Ossetia in 2008, that was the reason Georgia broke off diplomatic relations. To restore diplomatic relations means Georgia has reconciled to what happened in 2008. Forget about it. Let’s go to a new chapter. Let’s “be friendly with the Kremlin” again.
When the chairman of the ruling party calls the question as to whether Russia is an enemy “speculative”, what conclusions can be drawn?
I think he was simply trying to avoid answering the question. And I can see why: first, because he realizes that a great majority of the people of Georgia want to be part of the West. A Georgian politician, including the leaders of Georgian Dream, must take that into account. On the other hand, Georgian Dream wants to stay in power indefinitely. And it can only do so with the cooperation of Russia. So they cannot afford to upset Russia.
The Ukraine war has brought about a special challenge for Georgia – suddenly, everyone is forced to pick sides. Can Georgia juggle EU/NATO ambitions on one hand and be praised by Margarita Simonyan on the other?
It’s impossible, of course. We know this already, from the example of Ukraine until 2014, and from the example of Moldova until two years ago. Moldova is an especially instructive case, as, for almost 30 years, its governments took the position that they must be friendly with everybody; not take sides, not play geopolitical games, believing that they needed Russia and the Russian market; needed Russia to resolve the conflict in Transnistria. Of course, it all came to nothing. Russia delivered nothing. Russia will never resolve the Transnistrian conflict because Russia wants to be present in Transnistria permanently. But Moldova lived with these delusions for almost 30 years until the pro-European government and parliament were elected two years ago, and now Moldova has the candidate status for membership in the European Union.
Given the existential threat that Georgia is facing from Russia on a daily basis, is there a chance that, in the end, we’ll end up marveling at the wisdom of the Georgian statesmen who so pragmatically navigated these dangerous waters?
Georgia has a chance that it never has since the late 18th century- to be free of Russia. Not since the time of King Erekle II, for more than 200 years, has Georgia had such a chance. But Georgia is backsliding now, because the current government does not have a clear understanding of not only what Georgia’s national interests are, but what national interest is, in general. This government is guided by its own interest to stay in power, which is not the national interest. The present government is only interested in maintaining its own power and wants to do that with the acceptance of Russia. They want to play Russia’s game in order not to be bothered by Russia. That is why, for example, the current government is not lobbying NATO for a Membership Action Plan, or for a clearer process to join NATO. The NATO Summit is coming up, and the current government has made zero lobby for Georgia’s interest in NATO, and not for the first time. They don’t want to bother Russia. They want to demonstrate to Russia that Georgia is not knocking at NATO’s door.
During your speech, you declared that Russia’s “policy of conquest” towards its neighbors is historical, it hasn’t changed, and isn’t subject to change. What place does Georgia have in Putin’s “Eternal Russia” as you call it?
At present, Russia is not threatening Georgia with an invasion. It cannot do so, due to the war in Ukraine, but Russia does not need to invade Georgia again. Russia is perfectly satisfied with what the Georgian government is doing now. That is, not making efforts to join the European Union and NATO.
It’s happy to have Georgia in a gray zone. Russia does not want to reconstitute the Soviet Union, it does not want to incorporate Georgia as a territory into Greater Russia: Russia wants to keep Georgia in a gray zone between it and the West; a gray zone which is poor, corrupt, unsafe in terms of governance, vulnerable to Russian threats. Russia wants to become a stakeholder in Georgia’s government. That situation suits Russia perfectly. And Russia wants Georgia to be militarily defenseless, disarmed. Right now, Georgia has no capacity to defend itself. That’s why the government may say that if it doesn’t play along, satisfy Russia, Russia might resort to military threats. Well, as long as Georgia has no air defense, no artillery, no armor or combat helicopters, it will have a very limited capacity for Homeland Defense. So, practically, since 2008, Georgia has become a military vacuum. That, of course, invites pressures and threats. And the government is not unhappy with this; the government might even be happy with this, because it can always argue “we are too weak or too vulnerable, and we must never make Russia angry.” The government doesn’t really want Georgia to be capable of defending itself. It uses the country’s “vulnerability” in order to justify its own actions, among which is not seeking European integration.
Interview by Vazha Tavberidze for RFE/RL
