Jerusalem Post
May 15 2010
Grandmaster of dissidence, Garry Kasparov
By DAVID HOROVITZ
14/05/2010 19:06
"To stop Iran, you must bring down Putin."
Garry Kasparov is ` what else? ` playing chess when I arrive at his
Tel Aviv hotel suite. He drags himself away from the laptop and phone
in the bedroom just long enough to let me in, says a quick hello while
waving me vaguely toward a couch, and then disappears again.
I know he doesn’t have much time to talk ` he’ll shortly be leaving
for Tel Aviv University, where he is scheduled to play one of his
famed simultaneous exhibition matches, against 30 greater and lesser
local talents (all of whom he will defeat, of course). As the minutes
slowly pass, and I overhear him discussing sophisticated variations
for pawns and knights with whoever it is on the other end of the phone
line, I start to assume that the former world champion has quite
forgotten that I’m waiting.
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Brilliance in chess, after all, requires absolute focus. The tuning
out of all distraction. And Kasparov, who held the world’s top ranking
for 255 months in succession ` three times longer than any rival ` is
considerably more than brilliant. He is widely regarded as the
greatest ever exponent of this most cerebral of pursuits.
Recently turned 47, the black locks now graying, Kasparov formally
retired from chess five years ago. But plainly the obsession remains
overwhelming.
He has been coaching the 19-year-old player Magnus Carlsen, helping
the Norwegian prodigy establish himself as the youngest ever World No.
1. And even now, on what should be a short holiday break in sunny Tel
Aviv, with that 30-game contest ahead of him, the Russian maestro
evidently remains deep in the thrall of chess’s endless permutations.
As the burble of moves adopted and rejected continues from the
bedroom, I look out from his window to the Tel Aviv beachfront and
ruefully wonder whether, had I arrived here 10 or 15 minutes earlier,
I might have beaten the phone call and got the interview.
But Kasparov has developed a second obsession in recent years. Raised
in Azerbaijan, he was born Garry Weinstein to a Jewish father, who
died of leukemia when he was seven, and an Armenian mother whose
surname he later adopted. And he spent his formative years in the
paranoid world of competitive chess in the Soviet Union, where it was
often the players, no matter how gifted, who were the pawns, and where
success on the board of play was deemed vital to the nation’s global
prestige.
Having grown up with the weight of Communist expectations on his frail
shoulders, in the fevered climate of nationalism, manipulation and
defection that culminated in the collapse of the USSR, it is no great
surprise that, from competitive chess, the adult Kasparov turned his
focus to political activism. And that, here too, his commitment is
absolute.
And so it is, after I have waited perhaps a quarter of an hour, that
Kasparov the chess nonpareil reluctantly surrenders to Kasparov the
political activist. He emerges from the bedroom, warmly shakes my
hand, and sits down to discuss that other white-black strategic
adversary, his nemesis Vladimir Putin.
PUTIN, THE former president of Russia and now the prime ministerial
power behind his handpicked successor Dmitry Medvedev, is, in
Kasparov’s emphatic conception, a terrifying creature of ruthless
avarice – the personification of Russia’s woes and an acute danger to
much of the international community besides. Kasparov’s post-chess
cause, his post-chess obsession, is to bring Putin down and thus
`restore democracy’ to his country.
To that end, Kasparov has set up social movements for change,
organized a series of anti-Putin rallies and demonstrations, mounted a
short-lived presidential bid of his own, and found himself
intermittently threatened, arrested and even briefly jailed.
Inevitably, therefore, Putin quickly makes an entrance into our
conversation, when I ask Kasparov how, applying a grandmaster’s
strategic thought processes to some of our difficulties, he would
advise Israel to handle the looming threat of a nuclear Iran. And once
on stage, the baby-faced ex-KGB chief proves a lasting presence.
`Look,’ Kasparov begins with a world-weary sigh, `Israel is in some
kind of political trouble because there is no political will in the
West to do anything with the Iranian crisis. Europe is too busy with
their own agenda now. They are busy printing more money to save Greece
and other countries rather than thinking about anything a year ahead.
America is also busy printing money, but one would expect them to come
up with a plan. Yet it seems there is no plan. Making the same
statements that a nuclear Iran is `intolerable’?’ he snorts cynically.
`Fine. As we heard many times, a nuclear North Korea was also
`unacceptable.’
Swiftly now, in his fast, excellent English, Kasparov moves on to
Russia. `Without Russia’s technical assistance,’ he notes correctly,
`Iran wouldn’t be even close to a nuclear bomb.’
And that brings us immediately to the dark lord. Kasparov can be an
understated, almost self-effacing and certainly a friendly presence,
but when it comes to Putin, his body coils and his language turns
fierce. `I said it during the Bush administration, and I repeat it
now: Unless you make Putin listen, nothing is going to happen [to stop
the Iranian nuclear drive]. And he’s not going to listen to your
requests or your pleading, or [respond] to some kind of sweet deal. At
the end of the day, selling nuclear technology to Iran, selling
anti-missile defenses, brings cash. And if America or Israel, or both,
at a certain point attack Iran, the oil price goes up, so for Putin
it’s a win-win situation. Unless he sees real consequences for his
well-being, he will not do anything.’
But how, in Kasparov’s view, can Putin be made to fear `real
consequences for his well-being.’ Only, it seems, via his wallet. In
the next few minutes, Kasparov, leaning toward me from armchair to
couch, lists a succession of Russian oligarchs who he says serve as
the prime minister’s financial henchmen ` the `family,’ as he puts it,
making considered use of Mafia terminology. `The only way to make him
listen is to go after his money,’ he says.
Unless America is truly ready to take on some of these oligarchal
heavyweights, says Kasparov, brow furrowed now, speaking still faster
and with still more passion, `just don’t tell me you want to stop the
Iranian nuclear program. Iran will not stop unless Russia is ready to
join the sanctions, because apart from the nuclear technology and
anti-missile defense systems, Russia is a main energy supplier. It
seems the [Obama] administration is ready to attack Goldman Sachs,’ he
says witheringly, `but it is not ready to attack Putin’s financial
interests. Which means that Iran feels safe, and rightly so.’
How is one to `attack’ the Putin `family’? On what basis?
Kasparov looks at me a little pityingly. `I think there’s enough,’ he
says after a pause, and rapidly cites a sequence of tax-evasion and
money laundering allegations that he believes could be successfully
pursued, were there sufficient will. `I’m sure there are many options’
for international law enforcement. `If you believe that the Iranian
nuclear bomb is an imminent threat, not only to Israel but also to the
interests of the United States and the Western world, you act,’ he
says flatly. `If you don’t believe it, you can find thousands of
excuses [not to act] ` as the Western powers found 75 years ago when
not acting against the rise of Nazi Germany.’
Does he really want to make that comparison?
`Putin’s threat is probably not comparable to the one in the 1930s,’
he clarifies, `but to a certain degree it will have a very serious
impact on the Western system, because the No. 1 Russian export is not
oil. It’s corruption. And Putin has found great demand for this
product in the West. The damage he has done to the Western political
and business system has yet to be understood.’
Repeating phrases I’ve seen him utilize in past interviews, language
built to shock, he claims: `Where Hitler used tanks, Putin is using
banks. And I don’t know which will have the more lasting consequences.
He doesn’t use poison gas, but he uses natural gas. He’s very smart in
building his personal relationships and using enormous amounts of
cash. I’d guess he controls more cash than anyone else on this
planet.’
But isn’t even this horrifyingly depicted Putin concerned about
enabling a nuclear Iran on Russia’s doorstop? Kasparov’s response is
an emphatic no. `It’s a legitimate question to ask about Russia,’ he
allows. Russia doesn’t want a nuclear Iran. But Putin? Iran’s progress
toward nuclear weapons `doesn’t affect Putin’s power base in Russia,’
he says. Actually, `it might only help… A crisis around Iran will
boost his position. It will give him more bargaining chips at this
geopolitical casino.’
The Russian interest, as distinct from Putin’s interest, says
Kasparov, mirrors Israel’s. He argues that, whatever their ideological
backgrounds, Russians regard Putin’s policies on radical Islam as
`suicidal for our country.’ They don’t see Russia endangered by the
West, but rather facing `the geopolitical threat from China and a
growing threat from the south. A nuclear Iran is a terrible threat,’
he says.
The trouble is, he plunges on, that with Russia facing so many
domestic problems at present, the Iranian threat is not a priority.
`For people who live in the far east, yes, China is a priority; they
can see the gradual Chinese invasion. For people who live in or near
the North Caucasus, they can smell the rise of Islamic-based
terrorism. Although it is mixed in with all kinds of local fights, you
can still smell the rise of resistance based on Shari’a law and the
rejection of the secular state. But Moscow is so far away. Yeah, there
was an explosion in the Moscow subway’ ` 40 people killed by two
female suicide bombers on March 29 ` `and it clearly had a trace to
the North Caucasus, but still, you know, it’s very hard to break the
social apathy… And in this vacuum of the national agenda, Putin can
simply rule always with his own plans.’
So what are Putin’s plans, what is his agenda?
`I said once that his dream is to rule like Stalin and live like
[billionaire oil businessman and soccer club owner Roman] Abramovich,’
Kasparov shoots back. `With the emphasis on Abramovich… It’s all
about money and power. The advantages brought by money are at the top
of his agenda. But he knows that he cannot keep the money unless he
stays in power.’
Ominously, Kasparov then adds: `He probably lost his opportunity to
walk away peacefully… At a certain point, for people who rule
undemocratically, there is no way back. He has already crossed that
line.’
While he regards `puppet’ as the wrong term for Medvedev, he considers
the president – who this week infuriated Israel by meeting with Khaled
Mashaal in Damascus and urging the inclusion of Hamas in the
diplomatic process – to be too weak to lead what he says is a not
insignificant level of opposition to Putin. `It may be that at a
certain point, even Medvedev will realize that the balance of power
shifted in his favor. But Putin made a very good choice [of
presidential successor].’
A good joke that’s currently circulating, Kasparov says, is that
`there are two parties in Russia: Putin’s party and Medvedev’s party.
The problem is that Medvedev doesn’t know which party he belongs to.’
After that abortive bid in 2007, is Kasparov going to try to challenge
for the presidency again?
`In Russia, we’re not fighting to win elections, we’re trying to have
elections,’ he replies carefully. `Our fight is very different…
because we do not live in a democratic country. This is something that
people in the West and also in Israel don’t want to recognize. By the
way it is getting worse… They keep violating basic rights guaranteed
by the constitution, and they are limiting even what is left of the
political freedoms. In Russia today, you cannot stage any kind of
peaceful protest without being harassed, detained, maybe arrested, and
maybe even convicted.’
I ASK him, this intense individual, a genius in one pursuit who has
transferred his passion to a far more resonant field, whether he
considers that we are untenably naïve about the dismal Russian
dictatorship he has described.
`It’s about intellectual self-deception,’ he replies with a small
shrug. `You [in the West] don’t want to hear this. If you recognize
that Putin belongs to the group of [Belarus President Alexander]
Lukashenko, [Zimbabwe’s Robert] Mugabe and [Venezuela’s Hugo] Chavez,
you have to change your behavior. You’d rather not.’
In the case of China, there is less hypocrisy, he points out. America
and Europe are doing a lot of business with China, but no one is
claiming it’s a democracy. `We all understand that they rule
differently. We do business because it’s for mutual benefit. But at
the end of the day, you know that China is China.’
With Russia, however, the US and the world’s leading democracies
`pretend that Putin is a member of this elite club. So there’s nothing
wrong with [Italy’s Silvio] Berlusconi or others making friends with
him, and for others to be on his payroll. No one wants to touch it.
The only reason I make parallels with the 1930s is because it’s the
same rejection of the obvious.’
Doesn’t stating `the obvious’ in such open confrontation with so
powerful a figure as Putin place Kasparov’s life in danger?
Apparently so. There is no personal protection surrounding him here,
but `I have bodyguards in Moscow,’ Kasparov notes. Still, he adds, `in
Russia, if the state goes after you, nothing helps.’
He pauses, relaxes and allows himself a rare half-smile. `I try to
live a normal life.’
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