So let's eat!

The failure of negotiations with the IMF and the painful pause in the dialogue with the Paris club are caused in elites by very temperamental disputes, but not panic. Firstly, there were already a lot of these failures, they got used to it. Secondly, people close to Putin use the situation in the strict framework of bureaucratic games: for accounting. Finally, in addition to bureaucratic games, there are real beliefs. Who will win?

Kasyanov and Kudrin evaluate the situation as difficult and insist on the need to continue negotiations with the IMF and achieve agreements with the Paris club. The presidential adviser Illarion, on the contrary, believes that the debts should be paid and the debts, there will be less, the better. It is clear that the chairman of the government does not want to cross out his previous "negotiation" activity and its sad, in essence, results. It is clear that the presidential adviser speaks not only on his own behalf, but also on behalf of the highest authorities. Having evaluated this dispute with rumors about the ambulance of the prime minister and the diverse, which Putin began to regularly arrange for his government, we can assume that the president agrees with Illarionov.

We are talking about a certain ideology. About the set of concepts close to the Chinese model of building "capitalism under the leadership of the Communist Party." About the "support on their own strengths." The fact that Russia decided to really refuse new loans, which still have to be paid later, and probably in a more stringent economic situation. It’s cheaper to pay now, tomorrow, in the coming years.

Optimists, as well as Western financiers who deny us loans, have one good argument - enraged oil prices. (However, you can expect anything from those who have become furious.)

The situation slightly resembles the one that developed in March 99, in the era prehistoric, under the government of Primakov. Then, on the eve of the next “decisive” negotiations on the new IMF loans, it suddenly became clear that the West seriously intended to finish its billions until better times. The formal reason was this: discrepancies in the assessment of the budget balance. The reason is informal and, apparently, the main is the persistent political hostility of the IMF leadership to the then Russian government.

To a lesser extent, this concerned the head of the office. In the degree of the highest - Maslyukov, whose amazing charm and negotiator skill have already led to crushing successes. Gently lamenting about taxes, Mr. Campesser was more and more firmly understood that behind the numbers were people with whom he did not want to deal with.

Today, the West has a serious Maslyukov problem. It is too early to talk about Putin’s political distrust, but they obviously do not want to give money to him. Too many questions for this person. Most of them are associated with the course that our unsolved Vladimir Vladimirovich is going to conduct within the country.

They are in no hurry to lend to the "dictatorship of the law" and the Chechen war to the accompaniment of the Soviet anthem in the West. The West is pause, just like a year and a half ago. The government, as then, is nervous. But the president is calm. For oil prices are still high enough.

A year and a half ago, the problem of trenches and debts did not belong to the field of economic diplomacy. The intense decrease in gold and foreign exchange resources forced us to haste. For Russia, it was a problem of survival. At the same time, for the West, the problem of Russia's survival has ceased to be the main issue of modernity. Having tormented us after the default, the IMF and other creditors' sponsors tried to figure out their mistakes, so as not to repeat them anymore. Russia did not have time to study in mistakes - neither its own nor on strangers. The "pro -communist" government resigned. Loans were not received.

Now everything is different. Polemic with the same Illarionov, predicting the quick and deep fall of oil prices, we can say that these terms are not known to anyone. The Arab-Israeli war, strongly encouraging these prices, is not visible, and in the meantime, all new participants are included in the same game, which has long been included in the sphere of Russian foreign policy interests and influences: for example, Iraq. Tax collection becomes for Putin almost the main (of course, after the fight against Gusinsky and Berezovsky) political priority.

It turns out that you can live like this: remaining a "raw materials appendage", use oil (and gas) overpriduments for both the relative stabilization of the situation in the country and to pay external debts. The country remains poor, the economy is running and dependent, but not hopeless. Recently, the "collisions" of tax authorities to oil and metallurgical companies have intensified that the path has been chosen.

Illarionov warns that this is a path leading to the abyss: we’ll “eat” oil, but we won’t raise the economy. The prime minister is in solidarity with him. The conflict lies in the details: the adviser believes that "eating", through the fault of Kasyanov, has already begun. The government has a different opinion. So far, this dispute is purely theoretical: there are no direct indications that the oil needle will be empty. The discussion is in full swing.