Russian tanks crush hopes of Moscow liberal agenda

By Michael Stott - Analysis

MOSCOW (Reuters) - The Russian tanks which rolled into Georgia this month did not just crush a troublesome former Soviet neighbour. They also squashed hopes of a more liberal agenda back home in Moscow.

Kremlin leader Dmitry Medvedev, an Internet-savvy 42-year-old former corporate lawyer, took office in May pledging to fight corruption and lawlessness at home, promote democracy and set a softer tone overseas.

Medvedev's arrival aroused hopes among Western powers of a more liberal, investor-friendly Kremlin after what they saw as eight years of eroding democracy and hawkish foreign policy under his predecessor and mentor Vladimir Putin.

Those hopes lasted just three months.

Then Moscow unleashed its biggest show of military might since the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union to crush an attack by neighboring Georgia on the pro-Russian separatist province of South Ossetia.

Now, the Kremlin chief's complex, lawyerly phrases have given way to the clipped expletives of a military leader.

"Bastard" and "lunatic" have entered the Medvedev vocabulary, and the rule of law has given way to the rule of war.

Showing a tough streak that seemed unthinkable only a month earlier, Medvedev promised war veterans in televised comments that Russia would deliver a "crushing response" to any future aggressor.

One of his top generals threatened Poland with a possible future nuclear strike after it agreed to deploy a U.S. anti-missile system.

"There is no doubt the hardliners are totally in control," one senior Moscow diplomat said, speaking on condition of anonymity. "This intervention in Georgia has changed the game."

DIFFERENT SCRIPT

Medvedev's stated agenda of encouraging democracy and economic reform is now firmly on the back burner, along with hopes of a better relationship with the European Union, Russia's biggest trade and investment partner.

Liberal reformers such as First Deputy Prime Minister Igor Shuvalov, who enthused investors with a strong pro-market message at a business summit in June, have dropped from view on state television.

Hawks such as Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov dominate the airwaves, along with highly emotive pictures of victims and refugees from Georgia's initial attack on South Ossetia. Reports attack "biased" and "false" Western news coverage of the conflict.

This was not the script which Medvedev's advisers had written for his presidency, an administration which stressed policy continuity with Putin but added softer edges and a more modern tone.