Russian secret document | How Russia wants to end “American domination”

Russia’s Foreign Ministry has drawn up plans to weaken its Western rivals, notably the United States, and use the war in Ukraine to forge a world order free from “American domination”, according to a secret Russian document .

In a classified text addendum to Russia’s official 2023 foreign policy statement, the Ministry calls for an “offensive information campaign” and other measures against a “coalition of unfriendly countries” led by the United States. United, in “the political-military, economic, commercial and psycho-informational spheres”.

“We must continue to adapt our approach to relations with unfriendly states,” we can read in the document sent to the Washington Post by a European intelligence service. “It is important to create a mechanism to identify vulnerabilities in their foreign and domestic policies, in order to develop practical measures aimed at weakening Russia’s adversaries. »

Hybrid Warfare

This document sets out an unprecedented official definition of what a large part of the Moscow elite perceives as a hybrid war against the West. Russia seeks to undermine Western support for Ukraine and disrupt the internal politics of the United States and European countries with propaganda supporting isolationism and extremism, according to Kremlin documents previously published by THE Washington Post. The Kremlin also wants to modify the geopolitical chessboard by moving closer to China, Iran and North Korea to modify the current balance of power.

In a much harsher and direct style than the public foreign policy statement, the secret addendum of April 11, 2023 designates the United States as the head of a coalition of “unfriendly countries” aimed at weakening Russia, Moscow being “a threat to Western global hegemony”.

According to its authors, the outcome of Russia’s war in Ukraine “will to a large extent determine the contours of the future world order”: for Moscow, its ability – and that of other authoritarian countries – to impose its will at the level world depends on the outcome of its war in Ukraine.

The official foreign policy statement of the Russian Federation, published on March 31, 2023 and approved by President Vladimir Putin, instead adopts a neutral diplomatic style to call for “democratization of international relations”, “sovereign equality” and the strengthening of Russia on the world stage. The document accuses the United States and “its satellites” of having used the Ukrainian conflict to intensify a long-standing “anti-Russian policy”, but instead asserts that “Russia does not consider itself an enemy of the West ( …) and has no bad intentions towards him.”

Russia hopes that the West “will realize that its policy of confrontation and its hegemonic ambitions have no future and will accept the complex realities of the multipolar world,” the public document said.

Creating difficulties for the United States everywhere

Russia’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement that it does not comment on “the existence or non-existence of internal Ministry documents” or the status of their development. “As we have stated several times at different levels, we confirm that the mindset is to decisively combat the aggressive measures taken collectively by the West in the hybrid war launched against Russia,” added the Ministry.

Ending 14 years of collaboration, Russia on April 11 vetoed the extension of UN monitoring of sanctions against North Korea over its nuclear weapons and ballistic missile program. It’s “a clear sign” that the work envisaged in the secret addendum is already underway, according to a prominent Russian academic close to Russia’s top diplomats, who requested anonymity to discuss delicate deliberations in Moscow.

“Russia can create difficulties for the United States in several regions of the world: the Middle East, Northeast Asia, Africa and even Latin America,” underlines the academic.

The foreign policy statement (like its classified addendum) follows the launch of a consultation with Russian academics.

Strengthening the American right

A suggestion submitted in February 2023 to the Foreign Ministry by the deputy director of the Institute of the Commonwealth of Independent States in Moscow, close to Russia’s security services, laid out Russia’s options even more directly.

Russian international relations expert Vladimir Jarikhin called on Russia to “continue to facilitate the coming to power of the American isolationist right,” to “promote the destabilization of Latin American countries and the rise to power of the extreme left and the extreme right in these countries”, as well as to encourage “the restoration of the sovereignty of European countries by supporting parties dissatisfied with American economic pressures”.

Mr. Jarikhine also suggests that Moscow inflame US-China tensions over Taiwan (to bring Russia and China closer together). He also advocates an “escalation of the situation in the Middle East around Israel, Iran and Syria in order to entangle the United States in the problems of this region”.

Mr. Jarikhine declined an interview request.

“The unipolar world is over”

Western officials warn that Russia has been stepping up its efforts and propaganda to undermine support for Ukraine for two years. It seeks to create a new global divide and its anti-West propaganda resonates in many countries in the Middle East, Africa, Latin America and Asia.

“The United States was convinced that the rest of the world – the North and the South – would support it in the conflict with Russia. However, that was not the case,” Mr. Jarikhine declared to Washington Post during a previous interview. “This shows that the unipolar world is over; the United States does not want to accept this. »

“For Putin, it is only natural to try to create as many problems as possible for the United States,” says disgraced oligarch Mikhail Khodorkovsky, a longtime Putin critic.

Mr. Khodorkovsky was Russia’s richest man until a conflict with the Kremlin landed him in prison for ten years.

According to him, the long impasse in the US Congress over the supply of additional weapons to Ukraine is helping Russia challenge Washington’s global power.

“The Americans imagine that since they are not directly involved in the war, a defeat (of Ukraine) would not be theirs. This is an absolute mistake. »

If Ukraine is defeated, “many will stop fearing challenging the United States” and the consequences will worsen for the Americans.

This article was originally published in the Washington Post.

Read the original article from Washington Post (in English, subscription required)