THE STRENGTH OF WEAKNESS.

As Moscow has adopted an ever tougher line, Russian Foreign Minister Andrei Kozyrev has sought to exploit his own political weakness as a source of strength, Michael Dobbs said in the April 30 Washington Post. Kozyrev first tried this tactic at the Stockholm CSCE Ministerial meeting in December 1992 but now uses it so often that the Post said it is very difficult to tell” where his own beliefs end and the rhetoric begins. Having asserted the right to use military force to protect ethnic Russians in neighboring states, Kozyrev nonetheless maintained in an interview with the Post that “there is a clear line between us and the ultranationalists.” He suggested that terrible things could happen if the West did not support Moscow’s tough new line.

“Only the Most Naive.”