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Articles by Richard Lourie
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Kremlin May Get Last Laugh After the Vote
19 February 12
In two weeks, the presidential election will be over, and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin will most likely squeak out a majority in the first round.
2012 Predictions
05 February 12
In a column a year ago, I made a few predictions about Russia in 2011, promising to check on them a year later.
An Open Letter to Sergey Brin
22 January 12
Dear Sergey,
As you no doubt noticed, protesters took to the streets by the thousands in your native city of Moscow in December. I say "by the thousands" and that's just the problem. The police and other state officials always tend to lowball the number of demonstrators.
As you no doubt noticed, protesters took to the streets by the thousands in your native city of Moscow in December. I say "by the thousands" and that's just the problem. The police and other state officials always tend to lowball the number of demonstrators.
Putin's 3 Choices
09 January 12
For all the recent tumult in Russia, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin is still the most powerful man in the country. The choices he makes now and in the near future will have a significant, even decisive, influence on the fate of the country.
Booing Putin
19 December 11
There is a powerful scene in the movie "Doctor Zhivago" that goes a long way in explaining recent events in Russia. In the scene, a tsarist officer climbs onto a water barrel to address mutinous troops.
Dose of Oppression to Save Russian Culture
07 December 11
I am usually a little foggy in the morning, so I had to shake my head extra hard at a front-page story in the Nov. 15 Arts section of The New York Times titled, "Bolshoi Is Stung by Loss of 2 Stars."
The Logic of Putin's 3rd Term
21 November 11
The smart money says that Prime Minister Vladimir Putin will be president from 2012 to 2024. He will be 72 in 2024 and probably will not be up for "castling" with some amiable stooge until he is 78 and eligible to be president yet again.
Why Occupy Wall Street Hasn't Hit Russia
07 November 11
A few years ago, a Russian friend visited me in New York and expressed a desire to see Wall Street. But when I took her there, she exclaimed with almost angry disappointment, "That's Wall Street?!"
Zeroing In
24 October 11
It was 25 years ago this October in Reykjavik that Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev and U.S. President Ronald Reagan came as close to banning nuclear weapons as Nikita Khrushchev and John F. Kennedy had come to using them in October 1962.
Putin's Wabi Sabi
10 October 11
Neutrinos made headlines recently for having apparently traveled faster than the speed of light during an experiment at the European Organization for Nuclear Research in Switzerland. Possessing neither charge nor mass, neutrinos are "able to sail through walls and planets like wind through a screen door," as The New York Times poetically put it.
The Cold Rush
26 September 11
From Peter the Great until today, Russia's orientation has been westward. Only Western ideas, institutions and technologies could make Russia competitive. The two great attempts at conquering Russia also came from the West — Napoleon in 1812 and Hitler in 1941. But it was a Western idea, communism, that conquered it.
Resets and Reruns
06 June 11
U.S.-Russian relations took a complex turn in late May. On May 26, the U.S. State Department issued a statement declaring the Caucasus Emirate, a militant, separatist group led by Doku Umarov, as a terrorist organization. "We stand in solidarity with the Russian people," it said.
Zombie Russia
23 May 11
The New York Times recently included a "special advertising supplement … sponsored and written by Rossiiskaya Gazeta." Since Rossiiskaya Gazeta is the official paper of record of the Russian government, this supplement must be read as the image that the Kremlin wants to project at a time when attracting foreign investment and expertise is high on Russia's agenda.
Lessons for Medvedev in Bin Laden's Killing
10 May 11
I was standing on the sidewalk in front of a bar when a stranger came out on the fire escape and shouted down, “We got bin Laden!” I brought the news into the bar, which went wild. For people in that part of lower Manhattan, 9/11 was not only a national tragedy but an assault on the neighborhood as well.
The Face of War
11 April 11
On April 25, 1945, U.S. and Soviet armies linked up at the Elbe River, which meant, as a BBC broadcast of the time exulted, that Nazi Germany had been "split clean in half." The actual first encounter was a casual, accidental meeting between an American G.I. and a lone Kazakh horseman.
Imperial Temptations
28 March 11
Since 2011 marks the 20th anniversary of the Soviet collapse, there will inevitably be a spate of articles viewing those two decades from every possible vantage. In fact, they've already started. March 17 was the 20th anniversary of the only free referendum ever held in the Soviet Union.
Tremors of Arab Youthquake Rumble East
14 March 11
Stability is the hot new commodity. If you can't deliver that, it doesn't matter much what else you can supply. This is especially true of energy. The current upheavals in the Arab world have suddenly cast Russia in a favorable light.
The Kremlin's Dance in Japan's Ring of Fire
14 February 11
It turns out that World War II isn't quite over. The dispute between Russia and Japan over the four southernmost Kuril Islands has kept them from signing a final peace accord.
World War IV
07 February 11
The horrendous bombing at Domodedovo Airport was quickly eclipsed by the Egyptian uprising, but both are incidents in the new world war. That war began on Sept. 11, 2001, with an act of violence as specific as the assassination of Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo in August 1914 that started World War I.
My Predictions for 2011
24 January 11
January is the month for resolutions and predictions. As a rule, little comes of either. Still, I thought I’d try my hand at making some predictions about Russia with an eye to revisiting them in December.
Rich Oligarch, Poor Oligarch
11 January 11
Every December, the richest men in the world sail their yachts to the French Caribbean island of St. Bart’s to throw lavish New Year’s Eve parties. What matters most is whose yacht is longest and whose party hottest. This year the honors went to Roman Abramovich.
The Mouse That Roared
20 December 10
Beijing’s reactions to the awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to human rights activist and writer Liu Xiaobo brought back memories of the bad old days. We heard the same old insults dished out by Chinese Communist Party hacks, and the sudden concoction of the alternative Confucius Prize.
Ivan the Terrible vs. Peter the Great
06 December 10
Billionaire Mikhail Prokhorov notes that when lecturing he always asks the audience to name the most effective manager of all Russian leaders in the last 500 years. Invariably, the answer is Ivan the Terrible or Peter the Great. They represent enduring currents in Russian history.
The START and Khodorkovsky Bellwether
22 November 10
U.S. President Barack Obama made a point of reassuring President Dmitry Medvedev that Senate ratification of New START would be his “top priority." There was talk that Republicans might ratify it to show they could be reasonable and bipartisan. But no such luck. The Republicans just couldn’t wait to start being unreasonable and partisan.
Some Assembly Required
08 November 10
In today’s America, only media personalities can draw crowds in the hundreds of thousands to demonstrate in Washington. Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert, two of the United States’ favorite comedians, both hosts of “fake news” programs, called a “Restore Sanity and/or Fear” rally for Oct. 30 in Washington, which I attended.
Bullish on the Bear
25 October 10
Russian policy is now driven by two factors: the imperative to modernize and the fear of China. Both dictate a move to the West, which is now well under way.
$800M Membership Dues
11 October 10
Sometimes what doesn’t happen counts most. In late September, President Dmitry Medvedev issued a decree banning the delivery of the S-300 air-defense system to Iran after Moscow signed a contract for the system in 2007 worth $800 million.
The $2 Million Spy
27 September 10
Russia was the big loser in the summer spy scandal when it lost its 10 “illegals.” In the subsequent spy swap, Moscow also lost four Russians convicted of spying for the United States and Britain. Russia also lost face, the use of illegals seeming laughably old-fashioned and unproductive.
The Khodorkovsky Card
05 July 10
Elie Wiesel, winner of the 1986 Nobel Peace Prize, has now lent his moral authority to the drive to free former Yukos CEO Mikhail Khodorkovsky from prison. This is an event that the Kremlin would be well-advised to interpret correctly.
In Need of 6-Year Plans
21 June 10
Future presidential candidates should run not on vague promises and rousing rhetoric but on a specific set of programs designed to avert the doom that President Dmitry Medvedev foresees and even recapture some measure of national greatness.
