It reads like a bad first draft of a John LeCarre potboiler, but the the Alexander Litvinenko poisoning in London is becoming more of a puzzle every day. The murder of a nosy journalist, the radioactive poisoning of an ex-KGB agent and a former Russian Prime Minister, radiation all over a bunch of commercial aircraft, an emigre Russian billionaire, Chechen rebel leaders and a couple of self-styled security consultants, all combine in a plot that demands you take notes just to keep up.
Here’s the short form: Vladimir Putin the President of Russia is an ex-KGB head. He likes the old school Soviet managed economy and society as a way to bring back some of the prestige and power, while trying to put a lid back on the Russian Mafia, who gutted the former Soviet Union when the wall came down and Gorbachev tossed the keys over the wall of the Kremlin. In order to work a new-style-old-school Soviet deal, human rights have to go. Journalists asking pointed questions, have to go. Cutting out western power players has to be done. It is being done.
Anna Politkovskaya was a Russian journalist who was crapping all over the government for human rights abuses in Chechnya. There are many: Russian troops use rape, torture and civilian attacks against the Chechyn rebels. The Chechyn rebels use kidnapping, torture and routinely target the civilian government, as well as the Russian troops. Chechnya is the Russian equivalent of Iraq, except the Russian troop are kicking out the jams when it comes to dealing with insurgents. The Chechyn government is just as bad. People disappear and are eventually found in mass graves.
Politkovskaya was going to work on October 7th when someone pumped four rounds into her: One round through the head made sure she wouldn’t get to the office. This is the equivalent of Karl Rove ordering the CIA to off Nick Robertson of CNN for breaking the Abu Ghraib story. There was much outrage in Russia.
Enter Alexander Litvinenko, ex KGB spook. He knew how the system worked and reportedly either had the goods or something close to the goods on the role of the Russian Security Bureau’s involvement in the killing of Anna Politkovskaya. Enter Mario Scaramella an Italian self-styled security consultant. Litvinenko and Scaramella had dinner at a London sushi joint November 1st, the night before Litvinenko came down ill.
By November 16th, Litvinenko is so sick, he’s in Emergency, going bald and disintegrating before the doctors’ eyes. On November 23rd, he dies, after doctors determine that he was poisoned with Polonium-210 and basically dies from the inside out at his body collapses. In a deathbed letter and through his media representatives, Litvinenko places the blame on Vladimir Putin and the Russian Security Service. Russia denies any involvement.
On November 27th, as in less than a week ago, traces of Polonium-210 are found on British Airways aircraft that Litvinenko and others had traveled on, specifically from Moscow to London. Inside the sushi joint and at two other locations, more of the radio isotope are found. Even the doctors doing the post-mortem on Litvinenko have to be careful, working under strict exposure guidelines. At the same time, Yegor Gaidar, former Russian Prime Minister and general pain-in-the-ass to Putin turned up with a low-level exposure to Polonium. Gaidar is ill, but is expected to recover.
On Thursday British Home Secretary John Reid announces that traces of radioactivity have been found in a dozen locations around London and four aircraft from British Airways are grounded for potential contamination. By Friday, tests had confirmed that Litvinenko’s wife and a hotel in Sussex had also tested positive for Polonium-210.
Note: Polonium is a naturally occurring element found in Uranium, first discovered by Marie Curie in 1898. Found isn’t quite the right word, as it doesn’t stick out. There are 100 micrograms of Polonium per metric ton of Uranium.
Polonium has 25 known isotopes, all radioactive and chemically poisonous. Polonium-210 was used as a heat source, as it generates heat via alpha particle emission. One recent use for Polonium-210 (or to be accurate in notation 210-Po) has been as a heat and power source for space satellites and was used in the Soviet Lunokhod rovers on the surface of the Moon.
Outside the body, Polonium-210 is dangerous, but the skin will repel much of the alpha wave radiation. If Polonium-210 is ingested or inhaled, it is deadly, killing bone marrow, destroying the liver and spleen and jacking up the white blood cell count. Essentially it collapses the immune system from the inside out.
You don’t pick this stuff up at the local Home Depot and if you find a two-pound box of Polonium-210 under the front steps, you have enough to kill everyone in North America a couple of times over. In simple terms, government nuclear science labs might have some, the quantity measured in micrograms. It isn’t commonly available, like rat poison or gasoline.
So who poisoned Alexander Litvinenko? The stinky finger points at the Russian Secret Service, now called the FSB, or more formally, the Federalnaya Sluzhba Bezopasnosti. The FSB is tasked with counterintelligence, anti-terrorism, protection of the government and fighting organized crime. Like the CIA under the Patriot Act, they can do whatever the hell they want to any citizen at any time any where on the planet, as long as they don’t get caught at it.
What’s the fallout, pun intended? None. Putin doesn’t care, as long as people stay in line. His definition of Human Rights, based on how things go down in Chechnya, are "You ain’t got none, if you piss me off"
The question then is implied, what does a resurgent Soviet-style secret police mean for the rest of us? Some indication might come from Hungary, which is wrestling with a resurgent Soviet-style government under the Magyar Szocialista Párt, the MSZP. The MSZP took over from the original Hungarian Socialist Workers’ Party (or MSZMP) that ran the joint from 1956 to 1989. (As soon as it is called the Socialist Workers Party, it’s the Communist Party, but it ain’t wearing a red dress this time.)
Ferenc Gyurcsány, the current PM has openly admitted he is a fan of Lenin and wants to centrally control just about every aspect of the economy and life of the citizens. Rumor has it that wiretapping is back in favour in Budapest. Is Ferenc Gyurcsány a low-rent Putin wanna-be? According to some, Ferenc Gyurcsány is just Putin without the honesty, charm, charisma and subtlety.
Hungary is part of the European Union and NATO, but despite that Western pipeline, the economy has fallen into the toilet to the point that they Ministry of Health is closing 37 entire hospitals: It can’t afford to keep the lights on. Some professions have seen their government wages cut in half, as in you work 90 minutes, but get paid for 60. Taxation has increased 25 percent in 2006 alone. Which explains why there are protests in the street every day and an increase in the activities of the state security forces.
Realistically, the death of Alexander Litvinenko means a return to old school Russian isolationism and fear led by Vladimir Putin. This is not a good thing.
RoadDave 