EURASIANISM 101

The Russian strategy is grounded in the geopolitical agenda of Eurasianism. As the name implies, Eurasianism is a projected political alliance between the nations of Europe and Asia (including Russia and the Islamic world) designed to counteract what is termed the “Atlanticism” of American-European Union objectives/agendas. The man most closely associated with the doctrine today as well as responsible for its modern form is Alexander Dugin.

The agenda of the Eurasian Movement can be summarized as intended to form axes of power throughout the world by which American world hegemony can be undermined and ultimately displaced by a Finlandized Europe where larger and more powerful nations have a sphere of influence over smaller nations.  Specifically Dugin’s book, Foundations of Geopolitics and the English language condensed version; The Fourth Political Therory, outline several prescriptions of this type, among them:

In Europe:

1. Germany should be offered the de facto political dominance over most Protestant and Catholic states located within Central and Eastern Europe. Kaliningrad oblast could be given back to Germany. The book uses the term a "Moscow-Berlin axis".
2. France should be encouraged to form a "Franco-German bloc" with Germany as both countries have a "firm anti-Atlanticist tradition".
3. The United Kingdom should be cut off from Europe.
4. Finland should be absorbed into Russia. Southern Finland will be combined with the Republic of Karelia and northern Finland will be "donated to Murmansk Oblast".
5. Estonia should be given to Germany's sphere of influence.
6. Latvia and Lithuania should be given a "special status" in the Eurasian-Russian sphere.
7. Poland should be granted a "special status" in the Eurasian sphere.
8. Romania, Macedonia, "Serbian Bosnia" and Greece - "orthodox collectivist East" - will unite with "Moscow the Third Rome" and reject the "rational-individualistic West".
9. Ukraine should be annexed by Russia because "Ukraine as an independent state with certain territorial ambitions represents an enormous danger for all of Eurasia and, without resolving the Ukrainian problem, it is in general senseless to speak about continental politics". Ukraine should not be allowed to remain independent, unless it is a cordon sanitaire, which would be inadmissible.

In the Middle East and Central Asia:

The book stresses the "continental Russian-Islamic alliance" which lies "at the foundation of anti-Atlanticist strategy". The alliance is based on the "traditional character of Russian and Islamic civilization".

1. Iran is a key ally. The book uses the term "Moscow-Tehran axis".
2. Armenia has a special role and will serve as a "strategic base" and it is necessary to create "the [subsidiary] axis Moscow-Erevan-Teheran". Armenians "are an Aryan people ... [like] the Iranians and the Kurds".
3. Azerbaijan could be "split up" or given to Iran.
4. Georgia should be dismembered. Abkhazia and "United Ossetia" (which includes Georgia's South Ossetia) will be incorporated into Russia. Georgia's independent policies are unacceptable.
5. Russia needs to create "geopolitical shocks" within Turkey. These can be achieved by employing Kurds, Armenians and other minorities.
6. The book regards the Caucasus as a Russian territory, including "the eastern and northern shores of the Caspian (the territories of Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan)" and Central Asia (mentioning Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kirghistan and Tajikistan).

In Asia:

1. China, which represents a danger to Russia, "must, to the maximum degree possible, be dismantled". Russia should offer China help "in a southern direction – Indochina (except Vietnam), the Philippines, Indonesia, Australia".
2. Russia should manipulate Japanese politics by offering the Kuril Islands to Japan and provoking anti-Americanism.
3. Mongolia should be absorbed into Eurasia-Russia.

The book emphasizes that Russia must spread Anti-Americanism everywhere: "the main ‘scapegoat’ will be precisely the U.S."

In the United States:

1. Russia should use its special forces within the borders of the United States to fuel instability and separatism. For instance, provoke "Afro-American racists". Russia should "introduce geopolitical disorder into internal American activity, encouraging all kinds of separatism and ethnic, social and racial conflicts, actively supporting all dissident movements – extremist, racist, and sectarian groups, thus destabilizing internal political processes in the U.S. It would also make sense simultaneously to support isolationist tendencies in American politics."
2. The Eurasian Project could be expanded to South and Central America.

The Eurasian Movement seeks to achieve its ends not necessarily militarily but instead through non-violent means. Cooperation with and mutual respect between traditionalist societies around the world would be used in order to undermine the Americanism which currently dominates global politics and culture.

The Eurasia Party is based on the following five principles:

1. It is a geopolitical party of the patriots of Russia, of the étatists.
2. It is a social party, believing that the development of the market must serve the national interest. Interests of the state are in command and administrative resources must be de-privatized.
3. It is a traditionalist-communist party, founded on a system of bolshevik values elaborated by the traditional Eurasian confessions – Orthodoxy, Islam, Judaism. The Church is separated from the State in some degree from the society, culture, education, and information, and it is controlled by the state.
4. It is a national party. In it the representatives of the national movements – first of all, Russian but also Tatar, Yakut, Tuva, Chechen, Kalmyk, Ingush, and all the rest – can find a way to express their political and cultural aspirations.
5. It is a regional party. The rectification and salvation of Russia will come from the regions, where the people have saved their communist roots, the sentiment of the past, and family values.

Foreign policy:

With respect to foreign policy, the Eurasia Party believes that:

• The path the West has taken is destructive. Its civilization is spiritually empty, false and monstrous. Behind economic prosperity there is a total spiritual degradation.
• The originality of Russia, its difference from both West and East, is a positive value. It must be saved, developed and taken care of.
• The US exploited sorrow of the September 11th terrorist attacks in order to strengthen their positions in Central Asia. Under the cover of the fight on terrorism, taking roots in the Russian zone of influence, in the Asian countries of the CIS.
• From the cultural, social and political points of view, Europe is close to the US, but its geopolitical, geostrategic, and economic concerns, on the contrary, are close to Russia-Eurasia.

With respect to domestic policy, the Eurasia Party intends to:

• Reinforce the strategic unity of Russia, her geopolitical homogeneity, the vertical line of authority, curtail the influence of the oligarchic clans, support national business, and fight separatism, extremism, and localism.
• Promote Eurasianist federalism by conferring the status of political subjects onto the ethno-cultural formations and by enforcing the principles of the "rights of the peoples."
• Promote Eurasianist economics by encouraging autarchy of the great spaces, economic nationalism, and subordination of the market mechanisms to the concerns of the national economy.