Moscow hits Bush on
‘anti-Russian hysteria’

March 27, 2001

The Bush administration is responsible for an “anti-Russian hysteria,” which is “supposed to spread to other countries,” according to official Russian sources.

The visit of FBI director Louis Freeh to the Balkan nation of Bulgaria last week was specifically attacked as an attempt to involve that nation in an “anti-Russian policy,” which “the new U.S. administration is revealing ever more clearly.” Freeh’s “mission,” according to the Russian sources, was to further an “anti-Russian campaign,” and have Bulgaria “follow the U.S. example of hunting Russian agents.”

The remarks were carried by the Voice of Russia World Service, the official broadcasting service of the Russian government.

Earlier this month, Bulgaria arrested two of its senior intelligence officers for passing classified information to Russian diplomats. Three members of the Russian delegation to Sophia were subsequently requested to leave. During his visit, Freeh congratulated Bulgarian intelligence services for their vigilance and capability.

Neither the White House nor the State Department was able to provide immediate comment regarding the Russian statements.

Moscow has noted “a certain link” with the detection and arrest of alleged Russian mole Robert Hanssen. Following Hanssen’s arrest, Moscow stated that “Washington had … been waiting for the right moment to bring out the case of Mr. Hanssen … which arrived exactly when the Bush administration took over.”

The Hanssen case, according to Moscow, provided those with a “Cold War mentality” the opportunity “to keep the Americans always scared of the imaginary Russian threat.”

Moscow has criticized the Bush administration’s pledge to increase defense spending, and is bitterly opposed to the Bush plan to establish a limited national missile defense shield aimed at protecting the country against hostile nations having only limited missile capability. Such a defense system, Moscow claims, would nevertheless violate the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty and initiate a new global arms race.

The threat from “rogue states” is, according to Moscow, a “far-fetched pretext,” disguising the U.S. “bid to secure its strategic predominance in the world.”

In an earlier broadcast, Russia also linked Bush defense spending to an attempt to reinvigorate the sagging U.S. economy.

In their March 16 broadcast, Moscow — recalling propaganda statements of the Cold War era — portrayed proposed U.S. defense spending increases as “a well-tried method of combating economic recession.”

Moscow’s broadcast acknowledged the present downturn in the U.S. economy, stating that current economic problems have ended the prosperity of the ’90s. The commentary also described the period of prosperity as lasting only nine years, “the first [period of prosperity] in many decades.”

No reference was made to the period of economic growth under former President Ronald Reagan.

The Moscow broadcast described Bush’s attempt to assist the economy as divided into two parts: the “well publicized” tax cut proposal, “which will benefit first of all the well-to-do,” and the increased defense spending — including the anti-missile system — “[which is] not openly advertised by the new administration.”

According to Moscow, the prosperity of the 1960s “had everything to do with the war in Vietnam and the sharp increase in the military budget.” No reference was made to the Kennedy-era tax cuts earlier in the decade.

“The strategists of the Republican Party have decided to resort to the same method again,” opined Moscow.